تمام.... خب.
کتابی که به اندازه تار موهام تعریفش رو شنیده بودم رو بالاخره تموم کردم.
اول اینکه داستان چندان قوی نبود، منظورم این نیست که کشش لازم رو نداشت، نه، اتفاقا هرچقدر بیشتر میخوندم، بیشتر برای خوندن رغبت داشتم، اما، این حقیقت که داستان کاملا قابل پیش بینی بود روی همه لذت خوندنش سایه انداخت.
بنظرم بهترین قسمت کتاب، توصیف های اون بودن! چقدر ملموس!
اما چیز هایی که داستان رو جالب کرده بود، تفاوت افکار در پروتستان ها و کاتولیک ها بود که خب تو خیلی از کتاب ها ازش استفاده شده. دومین مورد عشقی بود که از اولین صفحه کتاب، چشمم رو درد آورد. راستش از این لحاظ باید بگم که خیلی کلیشه ای بود.
خب، درنهایت از خوندش لذت بردم، اما دوباره نمیخونمش.
حداقل نه تا وقتی که تصویر ستاره ۸ ضلعی و کلیسای نوین از ذهنم بیرون بره.

پ.ن: الان داشتم آهنگ این کتاب رو گوش میدادم و اون حس مرموز فراموشی زمان و مکان بهم دست داد، گفتم آهنگش رو بزارم که شما هم ازش لذت ببرید.
https://youtu.be/powCHN8DdXA

I am a little biased since the Vermeer painting of the same name captures my attention like few other paintings I have ever seen. My eyes just swim in it. Obviously, I am not alone.

But while I am captivated by the woman’s eyes, the author, Tracey Chevalier, must have been consumed by them. Not surprisingly, the author writes her historical novel like she was there in 1664 Holland, and I can’t give her a better compliment than that.

I am also partial to this novel because the author gives the painted woman life. We know Vermeer's painting and his brilliance, but we don't know anything about the subject he painted nor if he was a good or bad man himself. It’s an intriguing premise. In this novel, the woman is no longer merely an object of desire but a fleshed-out human being, flaws and all. It’s like watching an Instagram Influencer create a beautiful photograph of herself and share the moment on social media. What happens after she puts away the camera? Is she just as happy as she was in the photo? Does her smile fall flat? The same goes for this painting. Does the woman’s look of innocence change once the artist puts down his brush? Because of this novel, one of the most famous unnamed women in history now has a name, Griet, and better yet, a coming of age story.

It begins when 16-year-old Griet has to leave her home when her father gets blinded in an accident and cannot work. Indebted, he pays his debt through his daughter, and she must live in Vermeer’s household as a maid. Vermeer’s sensuous talent naturally attracts the young Griet to his studio. While there, she develops a talent for mixing colour for Vermeer’s paints and soon gains a deeper appreciation of his art. Meanwhile, Vermeer is stuck in an artistic rut, and his household suffers. Art means food on the table, and even though they are aristocratic, they live beyond their means. But Vermeer is only inspired to paint when a licentious patron fixates on Griet, and Vermeer strikes a bargain with the man to paint her as a means to protect her. This temporary fix results in a cost to all. The wife’s cost is having Griet around her husband when she senses her husband wants something more. The cost to Vermeer is to paint for a man he abhors. The cost to Griet, who has no stature in this house, is far worse. Forced to navigate a world of jealousy, pettiness, and regret, she must walk a fine line between suffering and loneliness, contentment and belonging. The choice she makes affects them all. While the pearl earrings she wears in the painting plays a part, it is not what you think. Her eyes tell you more.

Check it out.

I don't know if it has to do with my vacation days or the fact that I really, but really enjoyed reading this novel, but is was almost impossible to put it down, even though I'm not a big fan of historical fiction and I've watched the film 2 times already. Speaking of it, I'm sure there were many details left out, it's hard now to tell which, but it was definitely an advantage to put a face on the characters.

My interest in art over the years was quite inconsistent and I started by liking the modernists and surrealists, and by the time I met Vermeer I considered the Dutch masters (and many others for that matter) to be too old and classical for my taste. It was only in the last decade that I acknowledged them and still cannot put my finger on when I began to like Vermeer. Truth be told, Girl with a pearl earring is not a painting I particularly like, I tend to favour those that are sunlit, usually set in front of a window, like this, this or this, which later led me to love in the most absolute way the Danish trio, Ilsted, Holsoe and Hammershøi and their "Sunshine and silent rooms".

But back to the book. I don't remember if the Protestants VS Catholics issue was much focused on in the film version, but it was quite interesting to follow it throughout the book, and from what I've read, Chevalier's first novel went even deeper into it.
I terribly liked how Vermeer was always he, him or his for Griet and the Master and Servant relationship was very much to my taste! And I'm back to the film: having Colin's face and voice in mind really helped, sometimes my imagination needs help with faces but mostly voices. And now I must choose something as gripping as this or else I will end up struggling to finish Fry's memoir.

An extraordinarily well-written book - the fictionalized story behind the famous Vermeer painting. Luminously written. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but these thousand words paint a magnificent picture.

I went to a book-signing in January 2001 and Chevalier said she wanted the reader to fly through the book with breathless anticipation. That's certainly how I read it the first time. But then I read it again - slowly - to savor each perfect word. I prefer the slow read, and I told Chevalier that.

Our book club had a lot of discussion on whether the book should have / could have ended earlier ... when she is in the center of the square deciding in which direction to go.

There is a scene in the book where Vermeer is trying to get Griet to "see" the colors in the clouds. At the end of that scene Griet says "After that, I could not stop looking at things." I felt the same way on reading Girl With a Pearl Earring. Just typing this review makes me look around and really observe the world around me.
Quite simply a magnificent book.

“I heard voices outside our front door - a woman's, bright as polished brass, and a man's, low and dark like the wood of the table I was working on. They were the kind of voices we heard rarely in our house. I could hear rich carpets in their voices, books and pearls and fur.”

n  n
The Girl With the Pearl Earring

When the Vermeers came to visit Griet’s home she had no idea they were there for her. Her parents had decided, given their near destitution, to find Griet a position as a maid with a wealthy family. Her older brother had already been placed in a Delft tile factory. It was now her turn to earn the food that made it’s way into her belly. She was, after all, seventeen.

Johannes Vermeer was a master painter, recognized even in his own time as one of the best, but he was a slow painter. He would only paint when he was inspired to paint. An empty purse or a rumbling stomach were never enough inspiration to make him paint faster. He averaged only two to three paintings a year. As someone who has always admired his paintings I do wish he had been more prolific with his brush, but the fact that there are so few paintings by Vermeer make them all the more precious.

Griet is thrown into this chaotic household. The house is brimming with children, too many children even by the standards of the day. Catharina, Vermeer’s wife, liked being pregnant and though the added burden of a new mouth to feed each year places extra financial stress on her husband and her mother Maria Thins she is oblivious to the consequences. Their fortunes wane and fall based more on the property incomes of her mother than on the commissioned paintings of Vermeer. Each year the purse strings get pulled a bit tighter.

There is one patron, a man who has bought several Vermeer paintings, who they all have to curry favor with...Van Ruijven. His wealth infuses him with an air of entitlement. He is used to getting what he wants and when he sees the wide eyed beauty who has just joined Vermeer’s household he decides he wants her.

Vermeer has found from the very beginning that Griet is different. She sees the world as a painter sees the world. He finds reasons to have her help him by grinding paints and assisting with the objects that populate his paintings. It is only natural that a young girl would start to have feelings and dreams regarding a man such as Vermeer. He is not only talented, but he is also attractive with those gray eyes that see so much more than anyone else.

”I did not like to think of him in that way, with his wife and children. I preferred to think of him alone in his studio. Or not alone, but with only me.”

She becomes very adept at lying so she can spend more time in the studio.

n  n
The soldier in The Procuress reminds me of Van Ruijven. One of the most interesting things about this painting is the precariously perched pitcher. It makes me so nervous that I want to reach into the painting and move it to somewhere safer.

Van Ruijven, like odious men always seem to be, is adept at finding young women alone. He is not wanting to gossip with her or exchange thoughts about the weather or to woo her or to cajole her into parting with her charms. His hands with fingers like hooks push against her clothes weighing the curve and shape of her. She has to fend him off without offending him.

Griet has another man in her life, not one that she would choose, but one that is infatuated with her. Pieter, the butcher’s son, wants to make her his wife. Being the wife of a butcher is a dream for many women because she and her family will always be well fed. A butcher is miles away from dream landscape of being the wife of a master painter.

Tracy Chevalier has deftly conceived the possibility of The Girl with the Pearl Earring being a maid in the Vermeer household. With each new revelation the tensions between Griet and Catharina tighten like lute strings pressing into tender flesh. Maria Thins, a realist, runs interference between all parties as best she can, but Catharina beset by jealousy and churlishness has difficulty seeing the bigger picture. I’ve read where other reviewers were disappointed in this book. They felt that very little happened, but they must be the same people who think baseball is boring.

I was on the edge of my seat while reading this book as if I were watching a ten pitch at bat in the bottom of the ninth with two outs. The deception of the pitcher trying to outmatch the quick hands of the batter. The shifting of the outfield depending on the ball the pitcher intends to throw next. The subtle communications between the catcher and the pitcher. Add a base runner at first and now the situation feels like Griet trying to maneuver her way through a world of lust, deviousness, and deceit. Does she run or does she wait for something to happen?

There are lots of moments that need no dialogue as Griet experiences impossible longings…“I could not think of anything but his fingers on my neck, his thumb on my lips.” There are things we can’t say because they can not be unsaid.

n  n
Scarlett Johansson played Griet in the 2003 movie of The Girl With the Pearl Earring.

The painting that Vermeer paints of Griet is a compromise to Van Ruijven who wanted much, much more. With her direct gaze at her audience and the slight parting of her lips this is an acceptable form of pornography, slightly scandalous, fodder for gossips, but not anything that could bring unwanted attention from the authorities. It gives Griet a shiver to think of her captured innocence resting under the lecherous eyes of Van Ruijven, but better a painting than losing that which she wishes to give her future husband.

I bought a canvas copy of The Girl With the Pearl Earring last year. The print is gallery wrapped which gives the painting animation as if it can jump away from the wall and walk into this life. She is hung over the staircase with enough light from the window over the door to show off the skill of Vermeer to illuminate. When people walk in the door they are struck as millions over centuries have been struck. People who don’t know a Vermeer from a Dali have to take a moment to access and appreciate her lustrous beauty. From where I sit to read I can see her and occasionally she catches my eye, a flirtation that makes me feel years younger.

”I looked at the painting one last time, but by studying it so hard I felt something slip away. It was like looking at a star in the night sky--if I looked at one directly I could barely see it, but if I looked from the corner of my eye it became much brighter.”

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3.75/5 ⭐

Enjoyable, not a fancy review here. I'm no age player, power player etc so I deducted a few points off the final rating. Still, I think it's a good book with a good story.

Opravdala potpisan primerak knjige

اعتراف ميكنم كه تا ٢٠-٣٠ صفحه ى اول كتاب خيلى جذبش نشدم. دليل اين همه تعريف رو هم نميفهميدم. ولى وقتى بيشتر پيش رفتم فهميدم چقدر فوق العاده ست. از طرفى دلم ميخواست ادامه ى ماجرا رو بدونم از طرفى نميخواستم كتاب زود تموم شه.
خيلى خوب بود و متن فوق العاده روانى داشت. داستان و توصيفات به شدت جذاب.
خلاصه كه عالى بود :)

13th book of 2020.

1 star reviews always look violent to me, so I want to start by saying, I don't violently hate this book. Did I like it though? Not at all.

Several things I want to say. Firstly, the writing is bland, so horribly bland. It's like a chilli con carne without chilli - just mince and rice, because that's really all it is without the kick and this book had no kick whatsoever.

Secondly, the setting begins in Netherlands 1664, then jumps about a bit and ends in 1676. That sounds like an amazing, unique setting for a novel, does Chevalier make use of it? Nope. Most of this novel is set inside the house, whenever she goes somewhere, like the 'Meat Hall', there's hardly anything described between them or on the way. This book felt as if it had about three sets and they weren't connected at all, just floating in some weird ether. Why wouldn't you take advantage of trying to conjure up the Netherlands in the 17th century? How interesting would that be?

Finally, it took most of the book to get to the thing the book is 'about'. I felt as if I read 200 pages of being a maid, washing and drying and hanging things out. I didn't care for the main character, or any of them. She even made Vermeer boring.

In conclusion: chilli con carne sans chilli.

Are you suffering from insomnia?

Yes?

Well, try picking up this book. It should put you to sleep in 10minutes flat.

The story about the most boring people in the world, told by a girl who has the most boring thoughts and ideas in history. Even while getting groped in the alley, she thinks of the clouds! I mean really!!!

At times, I liked some of the description used, but at others it was so wrong I wanted to poke my eyes out and burn the book.

Characterisation does not seem to be something Tracy is familiar with, all of the characters (including Griet, the protagonist) were flat and boring and stock standard.

There is only one word I can use to describe this book: BORING!

This book is gorgeously written. I love that Chevalier makes up all these lives to give a back story to just this one painting. Well, that's not true. We actually see the painting of three or four of Vermeer's 35 through Griet's eyes. I know that I had to constantly pull up images of his paintings as I read to actually see what Griet was describing. I must also say that I have never been much of a Vermeer fan, but having read about Vermeer through Griet's eyes, I see his paintings as much more complex and studied than I had before. I hope Chevalier got the process right because it would be a pity if he actually painted some other way.

Vermeer hires Griet as a house girl for his wife and five children. The Vermeer/Thin family are Catholics and women of that standing do not nurse their own children so there are likely to be more and more children. Griet is sorely needed. Vermeer and his wife Catherina come to Griet's home to meet her and the initial meeting comes across more as his hiring her for his own mysterious "pleasure", but when Griet arrives in their home she truly is a house girl. Nothing else.

It takes much time for Vermeer to begin to use Griet to not only clean his painting studio but to eventually run painting errands, mix colors, help him "see" the painting in hiding, and eventually to model for him. Griet is the girl in the pearl earring. An earring, in a previously unpierced ear, belonging to Catherina. Talk about a scandal in the making.

There is more to the story. Griet's family falls on sad and hard times. Griet is wooed and eventually married by a nice young man, but none of that matters. The painting is the thing and Chevalier brings this (and other) paintings to life in a way I have never before experienced. I would compare this book to the Doctor Who episode "Vincent and the Doctor". We care about the art because we are made to care about the artist. Chevalier does a beautiful job of this.

I've seen many mixed reviews about this book over the years. Like many people, I admire Vermeer's (few) works and enjoy reading historical fiction, so it was just a question of time before I settled down with the novel. I'd seen the movie adaptation years ago and found it excellent. Some readers fault this novel for lacking depth. I didn't set high expectations, and looked forward to getting an insiders view into the masters household and studio.

Greet is a young protestant girl who must find work as a maid after her father is blinded and cannot continue to support the family as a guild member in the tile works. She has a fine eye for capturing detail, colour and light, something which Vermeer catches in her from the way she's arranged a plate of chopped vegetables in preparation for a stew. Going to work as a maid is unpleasant to Greet, but doing so in a Catholic family where there are paintings of crucifixions and religious subjects is all the more jarring to her. And of course there are the women of the house to contend with. While master sees potential in Greet as a studio assistant, eventually helping him mix colours and sort his things with a delicate touch, the painters wife isn't happy about having a pretty young maid in the household, and Greet must do her household duties and double as an assistant in secret, as Vermeer wishes to avoid explanations. According to this version of events, the circumstances in which the portrait is commissioned and comes to be created are the cause of much trouble in the household and in Greet's personal life. I appreciated the observation of detail as seen through an artist’s eye, in this case, Greet's, as she took in the world around her with her wide eyes, from dusty streets along the canal to meat market stalls, and of course, Vermeer's works and studio.