Book Review
By The Book Worm, New England Domestic News

Hello. As a Book Worm, I am an avid reader of all sorts of books but I will be focusing on books pertaining to nannies and household staff as well as their employers. Please send me your feedback or feel free to alert me to a book you have read and would like to share with our readers. Thank you.~ The Book Worm

Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier

First I’d like to tell you a little about Tracy Chevalier. She was born in Washington. D.C. in 1962 and moved to England in 1998 to study, where she wrote “Girl.” She finished it two weeks before her son was born. She had a picture of the “Girl” – often called the Dutch “Mona Lisa” because you cannot tell if she is smiling, sad or has something else on her mind – hanging in her apartment. The picture inspired her to imagine how this painting came to be and to research the author and the time in which it was painted, 17th century Netherlands.

The book sets out to tell the story of Griet, a young girl born in Delft. It depicts 17th century life in a middle-class family, where she worked. Griet was considered a maid, but, by today‘s standards, she would be a maid, a cook and a nanny for six children.

Griet was referred to the family of Johannes Vermeer – a typical middle-class European at the time who had household help – by her poor family. She was enlisted to work for the Vermeer‘s, where the father was a well-known painter. The book, which has won many awards, chronicles not only the life of the family but the growth of Griet’s understanding of her proper “place.”

The book itself is a wonderful painting of the times, where there was a strict social system that separated the rich and poor, often along Catholic and Protestant lines. As it unfolds, it gives you the idea of how household help was treated at that time and what the monetary rewards were, which was very little. Griet does everything for this family, including preparing the food. She takes pride in slicing up the vegetables daily for the family and she goes to the market , not far away from the family home, to pick up the daily meats.

Griet develops a crush on the painter and the story unfolds with love, angst, class distinctions, and the feelings that arose in an illiterate young woman as she learned about the finer things in life. The book interweaves scandals, art-as-a-profession, Catholic-verses-Protestant, and a strict social order where master and servant know their place.

I personally loved the book because, as all these relationships unfold, you can almost see the Hague as Chevalier relates the painting, Vermeer’s profession, and the picture that is the subject of the book into a well-crafted story. Besides being filled with eye-opening detail of the time, it is a must-read for those interested in how the roles of household help came to be. I really couldn’t put it down.

Tracey Chevalier has written several other books but this has become her most famous. There was a movie last fall, staring Kate Hudson, however I did not see it . Perhaps the movie is worth a watch but the book is worth the journey.

Please see information about Johannes Vermeer, a 17th century Dutch painter, on the Web.

The Book Worm, March/April 2003

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