The Versions of Us
Page 37
‘Yes, Pen,’ Eva says. ‘I think I am.’
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
So many people have helped bring this book to life, or kept me sane while I was trying to do so.
Huge thanks to my eagle-eyed team of early readers, for their encouragement and advice: Jonathan Barnes; Fiona Mountford; Doreen Green; Simon Armson; Matthew Ross (I am still impressed by his familiarity with Ely Cathedral); and Sofia Buttarazzi (apologies for the late nights!). Thanks also to David Race, Ellie and Irene Bard, and Conrad Feather.
The research and archive team at the Guardian and the Observer, and Anne Thomson, archivist at Newnham College, Cambridge, both offered fascinating insights into the history of their respective institutions. Katharine Whitehorn kindly offered me some reflections on her time at Cambridge and on Fleet Street. Many thanks to all.
I am so grateful to Judith Murray for her invaluable wisdom, support and general fabulousness; and to Kate Rizzo, Eleanor Teasdale, Jamie Coleman and all at Greene & Heaton. Thanks also to Sally Wofford-Girand and everyone at Union Literary, and to the lovely Toby Moorcroft.
I am indebted to Kirsty Dunseath and Andrea Schulz for their belief, their consideration, and their astute, careful and sensitive editing. Thanks also to Rebecca Gray, Jessica Htay and the whole team at Weidenfeld & Nicolson and Orion; and to Lauren Wein and everyone at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Thanks to Jan Bild, Peter Bild and Ian Barnett for their incalculable support and faith over the years. And thanks, above all, to my husband, Andrew Glen, for putting up with me – and, as he pointed out, tolerating the fact that a fair few of his bon mots have unwittingly made their way into these pages …
Finally, this novel is infused with the memory of Peter’s mother, my late step-grandmother, Anita Bild. Miriam Edelstein’s story is in large part inspired by Anita’s own: like Miriam, she made the journey to London from Vienna in the thirties; and the Edelsteins’ house in Highgate is modelled on Anita’s, where we often sat talking about music and literature. I wish I had been able to show Anita this book; I like to imagine that she’d have turned to me afterwards, told me (I hope!) that she’d enjoyed it, and then, kindly but firmly, corrected my use of German.
LB
Laura Barnett is a writer, journalist and theatre critic. She has been on staff at the Guardian and the Daily Telegraph, and is now a freelance arts journalist and features writer, working for the Guardian, the Observer and Time Out, as well as several other national newspapers and magazines.
Laura was born in 1982 in south London, where she now lives with her husband. She studied Spanish and Italian at Cambridge University, and newspaper journalism at City University, London. Her first non-fiction book, Advice from the Players – a compendium of advice for actors – is published by Nick Hern Books. Laura has previously published short stories, for which she has won several awards. The Versions of Us is her first novel.
@laura_jbarnett
www.laura-barnett.co.uk
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Copyright
A Weidenfeld & Nicolson ebook
First published in Great Britain in 2015
by Weidenfeld & Nicolson
This ebook first published in 2015
by Weidenfeld & Nicolson
Copyright © Laura Barnett 2015
The right of Laura Barnett to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Grateful acknowledgement is made for permission to reprint an excerpt from Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot. Used herewith by permission of Faber and Faber Ltd.
Excerpt from The Amateur Marriage reprinted by the permission of HSG Agency as agents for the author. Copyright © 2004 by Anne Tyler Modaressi.
Excerpt from ‘This Is Us’ reprinted with the kind permission of Mark Knopfler.
‘Tangled Up In Blue’ Words and Music by Bob Dylan © 1975. Reproduced by permission of Ram’s Horn Music/ Sony/ATV Music Publishing Ltd, London W1F 9LD
‘Hearts and Bones’. Words and Music by Paul Simon.
Copyright © 1983 Paul Simon (BMI). All Rights Reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor to be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978 1 474 60018 7
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