went away again […] older than my father […] hurt my mother the most […] never wanted to see me again.”
What interested me, though, wasn’t so much the interview as the photo that went with it. Your wife, leaning against an ivy-covered wall. In jeans, wearing Adidas sneakers. It’s a white brick wall, the outside wall of a house, in the upper left-hand corner you can see a little bit of a drainpipe, painted green, and a small window—belonging to a bathroom or a shower?
It doesn’t say so in so many words, but it was immediately clear to me where that picture was taken. Probably at the same spot where your wife was interviewed. You yourself have made only sporadic mention of your “place in the country,” as you call it in some interviews. Your “second home,” or more frequently your “second work space,” because of course the work must go on: so that readers won’t think you’re goofing off at that second home, just lolling on the couch beside the fireplace.
In the nearby town of H., they’re oh-so proud to have a famous writer living close by. A real, still-living writer who shows up now and then at a sidewalk café along the market square; who orders fried fish or a dish of mussels at the local seafood restaurant. It doesn’t literally say that either in “Partner Of.” But if you read carefully, it’s in there. The name of the town—H.—is even mentioned outright, as an example of the kind of respectful deference one still finds in the provinces.
“At the supermarket, people let me cut ahead in line, because they know that I’m his wife […] rather embarrassing, really, but on the other hand I still enjoy it. That never happens in Amsterdam, anyway.”
The way she puts it, I think, is rather sweet. I see her face. How it glows with pride. But it’s also glowing a bit with embarrassment. That’s your wife, to a tee. Or perhaps I should say: that’s all the women whose portraits appear in “Partner Of.”
When I flipped over the postcard this morning and looked at the picture on the front, it took about three seconds for the penny to drop. It was a photograph of an old city gate. A gate in the wall of a fortified town.
Greetings from H.
was printed in red letters at the bottom.
Then I went upstairs to find that women’s magazine. After rereading the whole “Partner Of” interview, I turned my attention to the photo. How many little white houses could there be close to the town of H.? How many little white houses with ivy on the wall? With a drainpipe painted green?
I took an even better look at the photo. Your wife looked good. Rested. Healthy. Her hair pinned up, a few blond locks had come loose and hung down around her ears. Little earrings. Now I saw something else too. To the right of her face, a tile was affixed to the wall. A tile with a number on it. A house number.
The little tile with the number on it was partly hidden from view by her pinned-up hair. It could have been just that one number, or the final cipher of a larger one.
The number was a 1.
Once again, I hesitate. We now have two narratives running side by side. Or three, actually. The stories within the story. You yourself love that technique; as we’ve seen already, you make full use of it in both
Payback
and
Liberation Year.
So I’m hesitating. For a moment, I ask myself what you would do if you were in my shoes. Go ahead here with the next day—the day after the postcard arrived—with me driving down our street, after setting the navigation system for the route to H. (“A navigation system?” I hear you say. “What kind of gizmo is that?” I see you shaking your head after I explain. “What’s wrong with a road map?” you ask—and, once again, you’re not completely wrong about that.)
I could, of course, also toss you some new material. The way Laura Domènech, Mr. Landzaat, and I greet each other at the garden gate of the house in Terhofstede—up to the moment when the three of us go
What interested me, though, wasn’t so much the interview as the photo that went with it. Your wife, leaning against an ivy-covered wall. In jeans, wearing Adidas sneakers. It’s a white brick wall, the outside wall of a house, in the upper left-hand corner you can see a little bit of a drainpipe, painted green, and a small window—belonging to a bathroom or a shower?
It doesn’t say so in so many words, but it was immediately clear to me where that picture was taken. Probably at the same spot where your wife was interviewed. You yourself have made only sporadic mention of your “place in the country,” as you call it in some interviews. Your “second home,” or more frequently your “second work space,” because of course the work must go on: so that readers won’t think you’re goofing off at that second home, just lolling on the couch beside the fireplace.
In the nearby town of H., they’re oh-so proud to have a famous writer living close by. A real, still-living writer who shows up now and then at a sidewalk café along the market square; who orders fried fish or a dish of mussels at the local seafood restaurant. It doesn’t literally say that either in “Partner Of.” But if you read carefully, it’s in there. The name of the town—H.—is even mentioned outright, as an example of the kind of respectful deference one still finds in the provinces.
“At the supermarket, people let me cut ahead in line, because they know that I’m his wife […] rather embarrassing, really, but on the other hand I still enjoy it. That never happens in Amsterdam, anyway.”
The way she puts it, I think, is rather sweet. I see her face. How it glows with pride. But it’s also glowing a bit with embarrassment. That’s your wife, to a tee. Or perhaps I should say: that’s all the women whose portraits appear in “Partner Of.”
When I flipped over the postcard this morning and looked at the picture on the front, it took about three seconds for the penny to drop. It was a photograph of an old city gate. A gate in the wall of a fortified town.
Greetings from H.
was printed in red letters at the bottom.
Then I went upstairs to find that women’s magazine. After rereading the whole “Partner Of” interview, I turned my attention to the photo. How many little white houses could there be close to the town of H.? How many little white houses with ivy on the wall? With a drainpipe painted green?
I took an even better look at the photo. Your wife looked good. Rested. Healthy. Her hair pinned up, a few blond locks had come loose and hung down around her ears. Little earrings. Now I saw something else too. To the right of her face, a tile was affixed to the wall. A tile with a number on it. A house number.
The little tile with the number on it was partly hidden from view by her pinned-up hair. It could have been just that one number, or the final cipher of a larger one.
The number was a 1.
Once again, I hesitate. We now have two narratives running side by side. Or three, actually. The stories within the story. You yourself love that technique; as we’ve seen already, you make full use of it in both
Payback
and
Liberation Year.
So I’m hesitating. For a moment, I ask myself what you would do if you were in my shoes. Go ahead here with the next day—the day after the postcard arrived—with me driving down our street, after setting the navigation system for the route to H. (“A navigation system?” I hear you say. “What kind of gizmo is that?” I see you shaking your head after I explain. “What’s wrong with a road map?” you ask—and, once again, you’re not completely wrong about that.)
I could, of course, also toss you some new material. The way Laura Domènech, Mr. Landzaat, and I greet each other at the garden gate of the house in Terhofstede—up to the moment when the three of us go
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