Scripta 9_2_link_final.pdf - Uniandrade

other Frans at his new job (CHEVALIER, 1999, p. 68). The change in
her personality leads her to lying. Eventually she acknowledges how she
“began to get used to lying” (CHEVALIER, 1999, p. 107) in order to
avoid enemies and avoid talking about the closeness between her and her
master. Griet stands up for herself whenever necessary, e.g., when she makes
it clear to Maria Thins that she does “not wish to sit with van Ruijven”
(CHEVALIER, 1999, p. 157). Finally, when she leaves the house after
Catharina sees the finished portrait, she is very aware of all the choices she
had made so far and all the possibilities that lay ahead of her.
In short, the female writer gives voice to the silent women in
Vermeer’s work. Chevalier brings a fictional female character, Griet, from
the margins to the center of the narrative making her the voice that tells the
story, blending fiction and historical facts in a different type of Künstlerroman,
since the main character is the fictional muse instead of the real-life artist.
Notes
1 The Music Lesson by Katharine Weber, 2000; The Dance of Geometry by Brian Howell,
2002; Chasing Vermeer by Blue Balliett and The Irish Game: A True Story of Crime and
Art by Matthew Hart, 2004; the poems in the books In Quiet Light: Poems on
Vermeer’s Women by Marilyn Chandler McEntyre, 2000; La pared amarilla by Carlos
Pujol, 2002; the book Music on the Time of Vermeer by Constantijn Huygens, 2000;
and the movie Brush with Faith, 2002, starring Glenn Close, based on the novel Girl in
Hyacinth Blue by Susan Vreeland, 2000; can be cited.
2 My translation from Portuguese: “a obra de arte, ou a figura de um artista – pintor,
escultor, músico, não importa – aparece como elemento estruturador” (OLIVEIRA, 1993, p.
40).
3 Bildungsroman meaning the novel of formation.
4 My translation from Portuguese: “qualquer narrativa onde uma figura de artista ou uma
obra de arte (real ou fictícia) desempenhe função estruturadora essencial, e, por extensão, obras
literárias onde se procure um equivalente estilístico calcado em outras artes” (OLIVEIRA,
1993, p. 05).
5 My translation from French:“L’effet-tableaux: effet de suggestion si fort que la peinture
semble hanter le texte” (“Nuances du pictural” 177).
6 My translation from French: Vue pittoresque (LOUVEL, 2001, p. 178).
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