You don’t have to be an art enthusiast, or even know who Veermer is and his importance to painting in order to appreciate this novel. “Girl With A Pear Earring” transcends its focus on painting and the painter himself and reaches higher levels, when it is about love, duty and rendemption.
Sixteen year-old Griet has a simple Dutch life in the middle XVII Century until one day things change forever. She is assigned to work at the Veermer family’s house. At first she is not happy to leave her family to live with strangers and, to make things worse for her, catholics. She does only small things, like going to the market, washing clothes; but her importance increases when she becomes the maid who cleans the room where the painter works. She must clean everything without removing them from their original place. She develops a methode of measuring using hands, arms, and many others parts of her body. With time, she is one of the few people allowed to enter into that room. As we all suspect, she becomes friend of the painter, despite his sense of reservation. This leads them both to events that will change their lives, and many others’.
Tracy Chevalier has done a remakable job when writing this novel. It is undeniable that she made a huge ammount of research about not only the painter, but also Dutch life in the XVII Century. She reacreats the set so perfectly that it is impossible not believe that things were the exactly way she describes. The details are impressive: the market, the streets and houses, eveything is exaustive described but that doesn’t necessarily mean a boring description. Tracy’s writing is alive and colorful.
Another point well explored in this novel is Veermer’s paintings. While she describes his process of painting, readers can easily picture him setting the scene, preparing to paint, and, even, the painting process itself. Then again, her research about his methods, his material is impressive and very accurate. And Griet is not the only model that comes to life in this novel. Some other paintings done by him in the same period are `explained’, and the models become charaters in the novel.
The narrative is told by Griet, so she is the character that we know more. She describes her life, family, duty and even a love affair. In her 16 year-old mind, things are seen by a peculiar point of view. Her `text’ is easy as it is supposed to be, once she also barely knows how to write. The painter has a very important role in her life. He helps her in her coming of age — depiste that none of them is aware of it. The painter is a very mysterious character. His family — mainly wife and kids — is much more the characterzation than real life people, but I don’t think it is a problem, once it is a very young girl who is trying to describe them.
As I aforementioned, you don’t need to know Veermer, or have seen his paintings, the book is a work of fiction, and can be read as it is. It is a novel about love, courage, fear and rendenption.
All in all, reading this book is so enjoyable as seeing the paint. Chevalier’s work may not be as close to perfection as Veermer’s, but her novel is superb and it amazingly deliveries as a piece of fiction. Anyway, who knows what really happened when Veermer painted “The Girl With A Pearl Earring”?
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