ANITA BROOKNER AND JULIAN BARNES: PATHS CROSSING

In 1984, Anita Brookner and Julian Barnes appeared on the shortlist for the Booker Prize, respectively for Hotel du Lac and Flaubert's Parrot. Although these two novels and the two writers' fictional works as a whole greatly differ and therefore have not been the subject of comparative studies, Brookner's and Barnes's paths crossed on a number of occasions, partly because of their common interests in visual arts as well as in French literature and culture. A brief presentation of these points of convergence is followed by Julian Barnes's answers to three questions relating to Anita Brookner.