Great post. As I wrote my novel, I had a cut glass doorknob nearby, its post sticking out like some fundamental lack of connection laid bare. My protagonist steals it from the family home that her sister claims as her own. The object reminded me of doors being closed and, towards the end of the book, other doors opening. I would sit and hold it when I felt stuck in my writing.
Thanks, Leslie. I can only imagine how thrilling it must have been to find those papers. Two differently textured items, for sure — your mother’s (it seems) is so laden with longing; your father’s (again, I imagine) might be more direct and explicit. Would love to know more.
Your post takes me back, to the first time I held the object that inspires my next novel: a necktie, 100% Seoul Silk, says the label, wide at the bottom and narrow at the neck in the style of 1970, deep blue embroidered with tiny blue diamonds surrounding red and silver icons. It was handed to me in 1972 by a the widow of the remarkable Vietnamese educator/politician who might one day have been president of a country that is no more. If he hadn't been assassinated by a bomb placed under his car. If America had kept its promise to protect his people. He's not the protagonist of the novel; he's the inspiration that changes the life of my protagonist, and will haunt the mind of my readers, Vietnamese and American. What if ... ?
Great post. As I wrote my novel, I had a cut glass doorknob nearby, its post sticking out like some fundamental lack of connection laid bare. My protagonist steals it from the family home that her sister claims as her own. The object reminded me of doors being closed and, towards the end of the book, other doors opening. I would sit and hold it when I felt stuck in my writing.
This is so beautiful! Agree, the best objects have the most exquisite meaning for our characters. And yes! That doorknob!
This post really resonated for me. I have written two substacks about finding something small in my research that inspired me to write my novel Fission, based loosely on my parents' Manhattan Project stories. The first was a pristine program my mother kept all her adult life from a concert she played with an orchestra at age 16: https://leslierschoverphd147820.substack.com/p/nuclear-fiction-newsletter-issue-b99?r=btzfh The second was finding a brief anecdote in a book of interviews with my father's group leader about the day the bombing of Hiroshima was announced and my father providing a forbidden radio at the lab: https://leslierschoverphd147820.substack.com/p/nuclear-fiction-newsletter-issue-793?r=btzfh
I made those connections in my two Substack posts, see links.
Thanks, Leslie. I can only imagine how thrilling it must have been to find those papers. Two differently textured items, for sure — your mother’s (it seems) is so laden with longing; your father’s (again, I imagine) might be more direct and explicit. Would love to know more.
Your post takes me back, to the first time I held the object that inspires my next novel: a necktie, 100% Seoul Silk, says the label, wide at the bottom and narrow at the neck in the style of 1970, deep blue embroidered with tiny blue diamonds surrounding red and silver icons. It was handed to me in 1972 by a the widow of the remarkable Vietnamese educator/politician who might one day have been president of a country that is no more. If he hadn't been assassinated by a bomb placed under his car. If America had kept its promise to protect his people. He's not the protagonist of the novel; he's the inspiration that changes the life of my protagonist, and will haunt the mind of my readers, Vietnamese and American. What if ... ?
So powerful, George. Thanks for sharing this.