"So how do we seize the past? As it recedes, does it come into focus?"(100). When Barnes poses this question in the chapter Cross Channel I can't help think how much we analyze our futures in order to "seize the past." If the past is a "distant, receding, coastline, and we are all in the same boat" (101) who is the captain? Don't we all look to the future in order to understand our past and vice versa. We are constantly revisiting what we have done in order to decide what we will do. This viscous cycle whirls us round and round, leading me to my ultimate question of Why question the past or future, why can't we live in the now? Barnes argues against critics and but in a sense he is creating his own hypocritical debacle. This entire book consumes the past of Flaubert. Who was he really and what did he mean by this piece of writing. In a sense Barnes is anylazing Flaubert on such a personal level that he makes assumptions based on what he has discovered: thus following the vicious cycle and looking to the past to anylaze the now.
At first all of these hypocricies were an annoyance. Now the book seems to flow on some inner debate or purpose that Barnes is trying to relay between his writing and the rest of the writing norm. For me Barnes writes in a way where I can accept these "ironies" and enjoy the sarcasm and comical aspects of his writing.
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