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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
ABC Listen. Podcasts, radio, news, music and more. At a rural picnic spot in the dark, a young man suddenly disappears. You could nearly say an alien took him away because he's just vanished. When more clues from that night surface, something doesn't sit right. It's nonsensical where the stuff is. It's been scattered. I'm Rob Bergen.
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Hello, it's Claire Nicholls here, and I must confess, if there is a book by Anne Patchett, chances are very high that I am going to love it. This is the book show where, yes, the American author Anne Patchett is here. Anne is best known for her novels Commonwealth, Tom Lake and Belcanto. That one won the Women's Prize in 2002. And Anne writes about families and relationships.
There is a goodness to her characters, even the most difficult ones, which I find really appealing as a reader. Now, when Anne's new book arrived at the ABC a few weeks ago, this one's called Whistler, I must admit I was a little worried. There is a horse on the cover and I wasn't sure if this was going to be one for me. But as Anne will tell you, Whistler is not a book about a horse.
Anne Patchett, welcome back to the book show.
Thank you so much. Yes, in fact, you have to read a long way to understand discover why there's a horse on the cover. But I like to think it keeps the reader engaged. What's with the horse, they keep saying to themselves.
It's a beautiful painting as well.
It is a beautiful painting, and it was done by my friend Noah Satterstrom here in Nashville, who did the cover for The Dutch House.
which was also a beautiful cover.
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Chapter 2: What themes does Ann Patchett explore in her novel Whistler?
I need a horse.
Yeah.
I'm having another look now to figure out how he did that. Yeah, he's got the eyes right on the edge there so we can just see them. Exactly. But Whistler is about a New York woman. Her name's Daphne and her one-time stepdad, Eddie. And it opens in the Metropolitan Museum of Art where Daphne seems to be getting followed through the rooms of the gallery.
What exactly is happening in this opening scene?
So Daphne is with her husband, Jonathan, and Jonathan says, oh, you know, some guy is looking at you. It's an old guy looking at you. And she's like, I don't care. I could care less. It doesn't make any difference to me. And Jonathan, being super friendly and curious, finally goes over to talk to him and discovers Daphne.
that it is Eddie Triplett, who had been Daphne's stepfather when she was nine. Now she's 53. She didn't recognize him. He only recognizes her because she looks a little bit like her mother, who was his ex-wife.
So Daphne's mom had married three times while Daphne was a kid. And as you say, Eddie was only Daphne's stepdad for about a year. So what was their relationship like in that very, very small amount of time?
It was a little more than a year because her mom dated Eddie for a while before they got married. So he was in Daphne's life probably for more like two years, like seven to nine. And Daphne just adored him. He was everything to her. she wanted to be. He was smart. He was bookish. He was a books editor.
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Chapter 3: How does Ann Patchett's childhood influence her writing?
He wanted to be a writer. She wanted to be a writer. He took her seriously. She just loved him. And any time they got to spend any time together was a really happy time. And then when Abigail's mother divorced Eddie, she didn't just divorce him, she banished him from their lives. And He wasn't allowed to have any contact with Daphne or her sister, Lita.
And since this was a pre-internet age, pre-cell phones, you know, when you're nine years old and your mother says, he's gone, you're never going to see him again. That's true. You just, he's gone. And after a while you stop looking.
Yeah, it's incredible to think that they had this relationship, which was so important, and then just ended, like absolutely cut off. And as an adult, Daphne's never thought to look up Eddie Triplett, this man that meant so much to her for this short time.
Right. And I think that what's so important is the divorce was such a trauma for her. It was so sad. It was so terrible. And she couldn't find him. There was nothing she could do. And I just don't think... she would grow up and think, well, now I have a computer. Let me see if I could find him. She's still thinking with her child's brain, this is the way it is.
So anyway, I'm sorry, she's thrilled. She's thrilled to see Eddie. And Eddie is thrilled to see her. And right from the start, they decide, They are going to be great friends.
Yeah, and it's so wonderful. I was reminded just as you were talking about the step parent that, of course, the Dutch house has this very strong step parent narrative. And Patchett, are you interested in rewriting some of the stories that exist around step parents and the relationship that can exist with them?
I am interested in family. And I had a great, big, sprawling, messy family when I was growing up. And in ways it was awful. And in ways it was fantastic. Lots and lots of different people coming in and out. So I think it's not that the idea of what constitutes a family necessarily needs to be expanded because I think it's pretty huge at this point. But yes, a stepmother isn't always bad.
A stepfather isn't always bad. I've had several people who've read this book say, oh, I got really worried when the stepfather shows up, you know, worried that something creepy was going to happen. And I was like, no, no, no, it's a really good stepfather. So that's fun.
I love that you were so determined with that because I had that thought for a moment too and I love that on every page, Anne, you're like, no, this is a good man. We love Eddie. Yeah, yeah, it's true.
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Chapter 4: What is the significance of the reunion between Daphne and Eddie in Whistler?
You have one sister. You've got to be there for each other. You are not allowed to hate each other. And we were like, but we do. We do hate each other. And then we got through it. But it took half of our life to get through it.
Well, congratulations. I think that's more than a lot of families achieve. I sometimes feel that siblings get locked in whatever they were when they were 13. You go to your parents' house for dinner and you suddenly revert to being 13 again.
It's really true. And it was my sister's responsibility to be angry about the circumstances of our life. And I look back and think, oh, wow, there was a lot to be angry about. But because she was angry, I didn't have to be angry. And because she was angry and I never was angry, everybody liked me best. And it wasn't fair.
If she hadn't been in a rage about what had happened, I would have had to have been in a rage and then they wouldn't have liked me.
Wow. So the secret to Ann Patchett, the lovely author famous for being so nice, has just been unlocked. It was all your sister's doing. No, it's true.
My sister really carried the heavy load. I mean, well, here you go. Here's a great example. When we were children, my sister and I were in a terrible car accident. And my sister was in the front seat and I was in the back seat and we were hit by a drunk driver. And my sister was terribly, terribly hurt. And I was moderately hurt. I was cosmetically hurt.
And that seemed to be the symbol for everything that happened. She was in the front seat. She took the hit and I got off.
And listeners won't know because they haven't read Whistler yet, but A Car Accident is a very pivotal part of this novel.
And when my sister read the novel, when I gave her the manuscript, she started it and she said, oh, I don't want to read this. She was like, A Car Accident, I don't want to read this. And then she said she kept reading it. She put it down for a while and she went back to it. And then she called me and she was like, oh, my gosh, that's not our car accident. That's a different car accident.
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