ABSTRACT
“His paintings don’t tell stories,” says, Griet, the central character in Tracy Chevalier’s The Girl with the Pearl Earring , apropos of Johannes Vermeer’s works (Chevalier, 2001, p. 91). As if to demonstrate the girl’s lack of imagination (or her lack of awareness of intertextuality), Chevalier contrived to write a highly compelling novel inspired by Vermeer’s painting by the same title. The novel’s central character is a girl whose family has fallen on hard times as a result of her father’s loss of sight. Once a skilled painter of Delft tiles, he was blinded in a kiln explosion. Griet has been her father’s eyes, reporting for him what she sees. The novel starts with Griet, chopping vegetables in the kitchen and arranging them on a board according to color. It is her sensitivity to color and her ability to organize through color that impresses the painter. He hires her, first as the family’s domestic servant, later as his assistant, his muse, and, eventually, his model for the famous portrait.
