Girl With a Pearl Earring

The Dutch painter Vermeer has remained one of the great enigmas of 17th-century Dutch art. While little is known of his personal life, his extraordinary paintings of natural and domestic life, with their subtle play of light and colour, have come to define the Dutch Golden Age. The mysterious portrait of the anonymous Girl with a Pearl Earring has fascinated art historians for centuries, and it is this magnetic painting that lies at the heart of Tracy Chevalier's second novel of the same title.

Girl with a Pearl Earring centres on Vermeer's prosperous household in Delft in the 1660s. The appointment of the quiet, perceptive heroine of the novel, the servant Griet, gradually throws the household into turmoil as Vermeer and Griet become increasingly intimate, an increasingly tense situation that culminates in her working for Vermeer as his assistant, and ultimately sitting for him as a model. Chevalier deliberately cultivates a limpid, painstakingly observed style in homage to Vermeer, and the complex domestic tensions of the Vermeer household are vividly evoked, from the jealous, vain, young wife to the wise, taciturn mother-in-law. At times the relationship between servant and master seems a little anachronistic, but Girl with a Pearl Earring does contain a final delicious twist in its tail. Chevalier acknowledges her debt to Simon Schama's classic study of the Dutch Golden Age, The Embarrassment of Riches, and the novel comes hard on the heels of Deborah Moggach's similar tale of domestic intrigue behind the easel of 17th-century Dutch painting, Tulip Fever.

Girl with a Pearl Earring is a fascinating piece of speculative historical fiction, but how much more can novelists extract from the Dutch Golden Age? --Jerry Brotton

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The artist and his muse - Rated
I adored this book finding it very evocative of a time when social standing was everything ... with servants naturally at the bottom, tradesmen in the middle with their own pecking order in the Guilds, and then the noblemen patrons.
Griet is forced down a level - when her father can no longer work as a tile artist her family becomes impoverished, and she is sent to work for the Vermeers. Soon the artist sees something in her and, initially unknown to the matriarch of the family, starts using Griet as his assistant. Their relationship has very few words and is unrequited although intense. Eventually Vermeer's wife finds out and Vermeer engineers to get Griet out of the house - she marries the butcher's son.
Although we know very little about Vermeer's life, we do know enough about the techniques of painting, including use of the camera obscura to help get proportions right, that the author can write convincingly about the creation of great works of art.
We see everything through Griet's eyes and we find she has an artist's vision herself for detail when she helps to improve a painting by altering the drape of a tablecloth in the setting.
Superb.

Disappointed - Rated
I was disappointed in this book. Having enjoyed looking at the painting, I was intrigued to learn that someone had written a story around it. However, I found it dreary and dismal. I was unable to engage with the characters.

It's a pearl, not a gem - Rated
Griet is the main character in this simple book. I'd seen the movie and wasn't exactly bowled over, and then decided to read the book and see how badly they'd mauled the film. Turns out, there's not a lot of action in either, but the book at least has beautiful writing and descriptive passages. Yes, it is the story of an earring and what happens to it, much like "The Red Violin" though that movie was incredible. This book didn't knock me out, but it was pleasant and I like the author's style.

Beautiful - Rated
I adore this book and have read it several times. It's so beautifully written! The plot is simple but the under current of what is going on and Griet being almost powerless to prevent it is artfully done. Being an artist myself, I can easily see through both Griets eyes and Vermeers, and understand the invisible bond between them. A really good read.

Delightful - Rated
The novel is set in 17th Century Delft and focuses on the life of a young maid called Griet. Coincidentally Griet ends up working for one of the most famous artists at the time - Vermeer - his difficult wife and ever growing number of children.

Very little actually happens (if I wrote any more, I'd probably give the entire plotline away) and if you are looking for an action packed read, then this is not the one for you. Despite the fact that the novel progresses very slowly, I really enjoyed it because there are so many delightful details that kept my attention from beginning to end. Plus the sexual tension between Vermeer and Griet is just gripping! I also feel that Chevalier has a lovely writing style; it's quite fresh, engaging and delicate.

I generally find that books are never really able to capture the essence of art, music or dance. However, Girl with a Pearl Earring was somehow able to bring every brush stroke and paint colour of Vermeer's artwork to life.

The novel didn't change my life, but it was a real page-tuner and hence I can recommend it to all who're looking for a good, well-written, light-hearted novel.