Arthur & George

by Julian Barnes

Book Overview

NATIONAL BESTSELLER - BOOKER PRIZE FINALIST - From the bestselling author of The Sense of an Ending comes an "extraordinary ... first rate" novel (The New York Times Book Review) that follows the lives of two very different British men and explores the grand tapestry of late-Victorian Britain.

As boys, George, the son of a Midlands vicar, and Arthur, living in shabby genteel Edinburgh, find themselves in a vast and complex...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1400097037
• ISBN13: 9781400097036
• Release Date: January 2007
• Publisher: Vintage
• Length: 464 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.2" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

A Real Live Adventure

In ARTHUR AND GEORGE, author Julian Barnes presents the intersection of two lives - one successful and celebrated the other obscure -- until a strange conjunction of events propels each of them into the glaring spotlight of the British judicial system. The famous person is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; the unknown and ill-served man is George Edalji, the son of a Parsee Anglican Clergyman and his Scottish wife. Edalji is accused and convicted of a series of barbaric attacks on farm animals, incarcerated, and after several years in prison, released but not exonerated. Enter the recently-widowed creator of Sherlock Holmes, who decides to use the same skills of his fictional detective in a quest to absolve Edalji and solve the crime. Utilizing both facts and deduction, as well as modicum of subterfuge and a healthy dose of influence, Conan Doyle sets to work on cracking the case. Author Barnes has done a superb job of researching this true crime story--which at the time rivaled the Dryfuss case in France. Long-since forgotten by the cavalcade of history, the circumstances are revived and reviewed by Barnes in a thoroughgoing manner. He allows the reader to garner the impressions and facts that have guided his research into the crime, and is scrupulously accurate in his account of these two men and their contemporaries. It makes for an often riveting narrative--and is "so adventurous a tale it may rank with most romances" as W. S. Gilbert might have put it. The reader follows the surprising twists and illuminating turns, and is deeply sympathetic to both Arthur and George, men whose lives are anything but ordinary, as well as to all the main characters in the novel. It is clear that Barnes has become warmhearted toward them and he succeeds in helping the reader to become fond of them as well. Some passages in the book are quite tender and lyrical. There is poignancy to the moment he describes when Sir Arthur encounters the winner of a strong-man competition. Barnes' description of the various facets of Conan Doyle's personality is also outstanding. The surprises continue till the last pages and the closest comparison one might make would be to E. L. Doctorow's RAGTIME, which similarly recounts an historic event in a way that the narrative flows like fiction. Indeed, as has been said, "Fiction is real life with the boring bits taken out." Barnes has done this, splendidly. If you find this review helpful you might want to read some of my other reviews, including those on subjects ranging from biography to architecture, as well as religion and fiction.

A really great read

I ordered this book from the library, and when it arrived I had forgotten what it was about. Therefore, I was well into the book before realizing that Arthur was Conan Doyle, and that the book was based on historical fact. It is so well written as a novel, that it would be unnecessary to know anything about the real figures in the book, but knowing a little makes the book even more rich and complex. I stayed up late reading about George's persecution and woke up the next day worried about him. My son got to watch a lot of TV today while I rushed to finish this book (I hope he doesn't read my reviews someday and realize he can get away with anything if I have a good enough book...)

Exploring what defines a man.

Arthur & George is the story of two boys who came of age in late Victorian England. One became a celebrity author; the other, a humble solicitor whose claim to fame should have been a treatise on railway law. We follow their lives from early childhood to the end, experiencing life with them in a time and place far removed from the western world in the twenty-first century. Julian Barnes weaves for us a story, one scene at a time that helps us to realize who Arthur and George are. One man was famous; the other became infamous. One man was widely considered what is best in Englishmen; the other was "not the right sort." One was a man of faith in the unseen; the other a man of faith in himself. One helped to clear the name of a fellow countryman; the other could not clear his own name unaided. In Arthur & George, we are granted a glimpse into the psyche of men, the struggle to balance our desires with what we want to be and the hope that personal integrity will ultimately prove stronger than whatever adversity we face. Barnes explores a thought quite dear to my heart: justice can be denied but character will endure. Men of good character--of strong character, who have not surrendered to the prejudices of others--will not be defined by their circumstances; men of substance will always (if belatedly) be known for who they are. Or, as Horace Greeley said, Fame is a vapor, popularity is an accident, money takes wings, those who cheer you today may curse you tomorrow. The only thing that endures is character. Barnes is a wonderful storyteller and reading his prose is a pleasure. To read Arthur & George is to visit another place and time and to discover that for however things change in the world around us, things remain very much unchanged in matters of defining who we are.

Lives Imagined

Julian Barnes, with his usual elegant prose style, imagines the intertwined lives of two real nineteenth century figures, the solicitor George Edalji and the author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, most famous as the creator of Sherlock Holmes. And as befitting a story associated with Holmes, even if at once removed, at the center of this tale lays a mystery. But Barnes, an experienced mystery writer under a nom de plume, has bigger game afoot. The book moves from an intimate biography of the two men to the gradual revelation of the criminal case that stands at its center. The case echoes in its bare outline Peter Schaffer's play "Equus". But the playing out of the case, and the novel itself, echoes an even more illustrious progenitor, EM Forster's "A Passage to India", exposing the false promise of the protections of the British law when left in the hands of individuals prey to racism and class conciousness. These larger themes are woven into a narrative of supense, emotional urgency and full-bodied characters, making this one of Barnes's most successful works to date. Like the Edwardian fiction it calls to mind, this is old-fashioned reading at its best.

Predictably Unpredictable

Having completed the works of many an author chronologically, I have always admired successive maturity amidst those promissory. Julian Barnes is an exception. Each of his novels is an experimentation with the limits to which the definitions of 'fiction' and 'novel' can be stretched. From the uncanny literary critic that he was in 'Flaubert's Parrot', to the ambitious scale of 'A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters' - time and again, his works have defied classification and 'Arthur and George' is no exception. A thoroughly researched, intensely moving and earnestly brilliant novel, Barnes takes us through the distinct early lives of one of the most famous novelist who ever lived and an aspiring young lawyer, whose father is a Parisee; then slowly and eerily brings forth the inexcusable racial prejudices highly prevalent in England those days; intertwines the lives of these two men, and richly illustrates how their lives are permanently altered thereafter. Barnes is very subtle as he assiduously changes his narrative in each of the four parts of the novels, and is undoubtedly clever in hijacking the reader into the minds of the character. You cannot but sympathise with Edalji (Ay-dl-jee); you will be proud of Sir Arthur, you'll feel sorry for Touie, and understand the position of the lovely Jean. He'll even leave you feel intelligent some times, when the novel takes on the form of one of Holmes' adventure - for example, Sharp initially tells George, 'you're not the right sort', a phrase which is often repeated in the abusive letters (which are authentic, by the way) he receives. It takes an extraordinary writer to turn a historical account into a novel, where the characters are sculptured with delicate care, that at the end of the intense ride, one finds his novel complete. Except Barnes chose to include the fourth and rather unnecessary part of the novel, which neither informs much about the characters whom we come to love by the end of the third part nor adds much to the strength of the narrative. The reader is bewildered at the irrationality of the distinction that is supposed to exist between the rational and the spiritual - Barnes concludes on neither side, as usual, he is predictably unpredictable in leaving an open question. Being the extremely readable, lucid historical fiction that it is and having been exquisitely packaged, it certainly demands a wide readership, and certainly deserved its Booker nomination.