'Girl with a Pearl Earring' by Tracy Chevalier

The novel Girl with the Pearl Earring was written by Tracy Chevalier in 1999. As she says, talking about the inspiration for this novel, the idea of writing such a story came easily:

“I was lying in bed one morning, worrying about what I was going to write next. (Writers are always worrying about that.) A poster of the Vermeer painting Girl With a Pearl Earring hung in my bedroom, as it had done since I was 19 and first discovered the painting. I lay there idly contemplating the girl’s face, and thought suddenly, “I wonder what Vermeer did to her to make her look like that. Now there’s a story worth writing.” Within three days I had the whole story worked out. It was effortless; I could see all the drama and conflict in the look on her face. Vermeer had done my work for me,” declared the author.

There is an interview in our books in which we can read very interesting things, such as how she conducted her research, why she chose Vermeer’s work to write about to which she confesses his work is beautiful and so mysterious. In her official web page, we can also read ” There is so much mystery in each painting, in the women he depicts, so many stories suggested but not told. I wanted to tell one of them.”

Have a look at the page!! You will find a little piece of writing about each painting that appears in the story. There so much to look at!!

http://www.tchevalier.com/index.html

 

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