Though why should we expect age to mellow us? If it isn't life's business to reward merit, why should it be life's business to give us warm comfortable feelings towards its end? What possible evolutionary purpose could nostalgia serve?
Interpretation
The quote questions the notion that aging should bring about a sense of peace or contentment, while also pondering the purpose of nostalgia.
In this quote, Julian Barnes reflects on the nature of aging and the expectations society holds about it. He challenges the idea that growing older should naturally lead us to feel comfortable and rewarded for our experiences. Instead, he questions the evolutionary function of nostalgia, suggesting that clinging to past memories may not necessarily serve a beneficial purpose and that life does not inherently reward us for merit. This introspective view invites readers to reconsider their assumptions about aging and the emotions that accompany it.
In practice
A speaker reflecting on human experience in a philosophy class.
(on grief) And you do come out of it, that’s true. After a year, after five. But you don’t come out of it like a train coming out of a tunnel, bursting through the downs into sunshine and that swift, rattling descent to the Channel; you come out of it as a gull comes out of an oil-slick. You are tarred and feathered for life.
Is despair wrong? Isn’t it the natural condition of life after a certain age? … After a number of events, what is there left but repetition and diminishment? Who wants to go on living? The eccentric, the religious, the artistic (sometimes); those with a false sense of their own worth. Soft cheeses collapse; firm cheeses endurate. Both go mouldy.
It took me some years to clear my head of what Paris wanted me to admire about it, and to notice what I preferred instead. Not power-ridden monuments, but individual buildings which tell a quieter story: the artist's studio, or the Belle Epoque house built by a forgotten financier for a just-remembered courtesan.
But I’ve been turning over in my mind the question of nostalgia, and whether I suffer from it. I certainly don’t get soggy at the memory of some childhood knickknack; nor do I want to deceive myself sentimentally about something that wasn’t even true at the time—love of the old school, and so on. But if nostalgia means the powerful recollection of strong emotions—and a regret that such feelings are no longer present in our lives—then I plead guilty.
And that's a life, isn't it? Some achievements and some disappointments. It's been interesting to me, though I wouldn't complain or be amazed if others found it less so. Maybe, in a way, Adrian knew what he was doing. Not that I would have missed my own life for anything, you understand. [pp.60-61]
Every love story is a potential grief story.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
Has there ever been a society which has died of dissent? Several have died of conformity in our lifetime.
The future is uncertain but the end is always near.
Thus sharply did the terrified three learn the difference between an island of make-believe and the same island come true.
You do not explain the tree by telling of the water it has drunk, the minerals it has absorbed, and the sunlight that strengthened it.
For me Christ was not to be bought for thirty pieces of silver but with my heart's blood. We buy not cheap in this market.
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