Elizabeth Strout
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What inspired Elizabeth Strout to create the character Artie Dam?
Elizabeth, welcome back to Waterstones.
Thank you. It's lovely to be here and to talk with you again. Thank you.
We spoke, I think it was probably about six years ago now, on the publication of Olive Again. And what I remember from that chat was the way that you said that she just popped back into your consciousness again, and that's why you started writing. And with this new book... the things we never say, we have a completely new character. We have sort of moved in the Elizabeth Strout verse. And I've seen a little bit about where Artie Dam came from, a photograph that you were sent from an obituary. Which is incredible, but I want to know why that photograph? How did you know that this was a new character and what came next?
I didn't know that it was a new character at all. I just realized later that his face in this photograph was just so unbelievably ordinary. just the most ordinary looking face and I just stared at it because it was, and he looked pleasant and ordinary, had these big wire rimmed glasses and his last name was Dam, D-A-M-M. And I just remember that face and the name Dam And then at some point afterwards, a few months, maybe it was a year, I don't know. But I realized Artie Dam with one M. And then I explained in the book why it only has one M. Yeah. And that was Artie.
so you had you had the face and I wondered what because you often talk about how you have your characters and then you you drop them into a place and a time and then you see right what happens so what was it that you knew about Artie at the beginning of this book in terms of character or well um there's one other part that I don't talk about that much but I I happen to know a man in Maine he people in Maine by the way don't talk much okay and um
This fellow mentioned one day, just mentioned that he and his father had been in a boat one day and they had seen this man's head in the water and this man was just floating by and they picked him up and brought him to shore. And I just kept saying, but why was he there? And no answer. Guy was typical Maine. That was all there was to the story. But he did say, he did say, I think my father called him and took him for a drink a couple nights later. And then I realized, oh, that came back for Kenneth Moynihan to call him. And I thought, that was helpful. So I could not get rid of this image of a man floating in the water. And the fellow who told me just didn't seem interested at all. I mean, maybe he was, but he just was Maine and didn't show it.
And he had nothing else to tell me. He didn't know why the man was in the water. And so as the obituary person became more and more, I kept thinking about this man in the water. And I thought, okay, well, let's start with pretty much start with Artie in the water.
We're going to have to be really careful in our conversation because I'm so desperate not to spoil any plot points. We will find out a little bit more about, I suppose, why he might be in the water later. But as I was saying, you like to take your characters and you drop them in a very specific time and place. And the setting here is slightly different to your previous novels.
I went down the coast.
You went... I loved Maine. You've gone a few miles down the coast. So tell me a little bit about what's specific about this place and I suppose the actual time period you've set it in.
Well, I just realized, I thought, okay, I'd like to get out of Maine. I was, you know, I had just written, tell me everything. And I thought, okay, I'm done. Let's go down to Massachusetts. So my husband and I took a car ride, which we often do. We took a car trip down the coast of Massachusetts and we spent a couple nights and we found, you know, the dirt road that Artie probably lived on. It's a private road and we found Endicott Peabody standing at the end with his golf clubs and he waved at us and, you know, we waved. It was like, okay, he's going to be in the book. So, you know, we found, you know, the restaurant by the water, you know, we just found the different things.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What inspired Elizabeth Strout to create the character Artie Dam?
0:00–6:17
2
How does Artie's character reflect themes of loneliness and communication?
6:17–14:52
3
What setting does Elizabeth Strout choose for her new novel and why?
14:52–18:03
4
How does Artie's profession as a history teacher influence his character?
18:03–18:34