Booker Prize winner Julian Barnes is one of the brightest and most original prose writers of modern Britain, the author of such international bestsellers as One Story, The Sound of Time, The Sense of the End, Arthur and George, A History of the World 10 1/2 chapters", "Flaubert's Parrot" and many others. Perhaps his main talent is the ability to easily and naturally play styles and directions. Subtle stylization and caustic irony, refined lyricism and sarcasm almost reaching the point of cynicism, aggressive toughness and cheerful mischief - Barnes is capable of all this and much more. What is stronger - love or jealousy? And how is it even possible to be jealous of the past, of all those men whom the former actress Anne knew “before she met me”? Graham, a teacher of political history, is obsessively tormented by such questions, and finds no place for himself, turning his own life into a cruel farce... The novel is published in a new translation.