Q'S for THE BLUE FLOWER by PENELOPE FITZGERALD: Lesson 13 part 1
Q'S for THE BLUE FLOWER by PENELOPE FITZGERALD: Lesson 13 part 1
Ageless Creativity
The Blue Flower by Penelope Fitzgerald
This novel received the 1997 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction and The Booker Prize when Fitzgerald was eighty years old. She published her first novel when she was sixty. Although this novel is brief, it is not a quick read. So get it used (she’s passed), public library or new.
Worth the journey for lovers of literature.
The Blue Flower could be called historical fiction. It’s a novel about a real person, the poet Novalis, penname for Friedrich von Hardenberg, who lived from 1772-1801.
Penelope Fitzgerald tells the fictional story of this man before he became Novalis, the poet.
Consider these questions as you read:
Is the fact that this is a story about a real person the key to this story? In other words, is that the source of the novel’s power?
Did the test of fact become an issue for you as you read it?
Are the facts of Friedrich von Hardenberg’s life what make this a believable and engaging story? If so, why?
What does this writer do in telling this story that has little, if anything, to do with what she could possibly have learned from studying the sources she mentions in the author’s note?
We’ll discuss this novel in my lessons for Write it! How to get started.
And be sure to read Michael Mohr’s interview with Allison Landa, author of Bearded Lady and briefly me on (Re)Making Love.
The lovely Alicia Kenworthy who writes Catalectic will appear as guest.
Write me at marytabor@substack.com with questions.
To find out more about what I’m doing with “Only connect …”, go here: https://marytabor.substack.com/about
Do check out Young Men and Fire
I have free writes for you. Take a look. After the preview, that’ll cost you only $6 to subscribe for a month and participate
in our Starting Late conversation about prize winning authors who began when older: Ageless Creativity
It’s never too late to tell your story.
Click ➡️ Lesson 14: part two of Ageless Creativity Penelope Fitzgerald’s The Blue Flower
Love always,
I love the "starting late" theme (or encouragement!) and the way you guide us toward and in reads we may not have found on our own. Thanks, Mary!
80!! That’s incredible. Makes we strangely think of Bukowski, who didn’t publish his first novel until he was fifty. Sounds like an interesting read!