Terry Gross

Where on the scale were you?

Because it sounds like you've been pretty somewhere between thoughtful and obsessed with death for a good deal of your life.

My guest is Julian Barnes.

His new book is called Departures.

We'll be back after a short break.

I'm Terry Gross, and this is Fresh Air.

This is Fresh Air.

I'm Terry Gross.

Just a heads up here.

In the next part of our conversation, we briefly discuss suicide.

If you're having thoughts of harming yourself or having a mental health crisis, help is available by calling or texting 988.

That's the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.

Again, the number to call or text is 988.

You finished writing a book in 2012 about your wife's death.

She died 37 days after being diagnosed with a very aggressive brain tumor.

You describe her as stoic, even in how she handled illness and the approach of death.

Your illness has brought the thought of your own mortality to the forefront.

Are there ways that watching her die affected how you're handling your own sense of mortality?

Did your wife give you any directions or even clues about what you could do to help her, about what she needed from you?

You describe yourself as agnostic.