DISCUSSION QUESTIONS Tinkers |
1. Start with the book's
title: what is the thematic significance of "tinkers" (plural, not
singular) to the story? Who are the tinkers...and what does it mean to
be a tinker, literally...and figuratively, within this story?
2. Consider, too, the evocative book cover with its vast white
snowscape and the single figure in the distance. How might the image be
related, symbolically, to the story? What connection is explored between
wilderness and humanity, life and dying?
3. At the beginning, as George lies dying, the ceiling collapses on
top of him. Think about the irony: in most deathbed scenes, souls float
upward to heaven; in this one, heaven comes crashing down. Did it
actually happen...or is it an hallucination? And why does the story
begin as it does?
4. How would you describe Howard—a man who makes his living selling
tangible goods but who stops, literally, to smell the flowers? What
about his disappearance? Was Howard right to simply disappear when
threatened with hospitalization? Was his wife justified in wanting him
institutionalized?
5. Talk about the way in which the author writes about Howard's
epilepsy, how seizures offer Howard a visionary sense of reality, of the
world. Do Harding's descriptions of the seizures seem plausible...overly
artistic...? Why, as an author, might Harding have given his character
this disorder?
6. Howard is the link between two generations of men in this novel.
Talk about those three men—especially Howard's relationship with his
father...and with his son George? What impact did Howard's father's
dementia have on him...and what impact did his own epilepsy have on
George?
7. This book is concerned with the joining of matter (people and
things) with the transcendent—unknowable space and time. Talk about
George's love of time-pieces—ticking clocks with their gears and
tumblers—and Howard's love of his tin pots, wrought iron, nails, and
nylon stockings. What do these dual fascinations suggest about the
ability, or desire, of humans to control time and space? Can time be
tamed?
8. Discuss the book's structure, the ways the points of view, time
frame, and even tenses change. Did you find the various ways of
telling—through journals, manuals, diaries, meditations—difficult to
follow? Does the book, to you, lack unity or seem disjointed? Why might
Harding have chosen this unusual narrative structure?
9. What role do Native Americans play in this story? Why do we
catch glimpses of them—chasing salmon beneath boats, as "silhouettes
traced by the sun," repairing birch bark—only to see them vanish quietly
back into the forest? What is their connection to the novel's themes?
10. Paul Harding says he is a transcendentalist (see "About the
Author," above). What is a transcendentalist (think Ralph Waldo Emerson
or Henry David Thoreau) and how are those beliefs and philosophy
expressed within this novel? In what way is this book a
transcendentalist work, perhaps akin to Thoreau's Walden?
(You might want to do a little research.)
11. Ultimately, what does this book have to say about the passage
from life to death, about how the past shapes the present, and about our
dreams? Can you put into words some of the life issues Paul Harding
explores in this work?
12. Talk about the books publishing history. According to the New
York Times (4/18/10), the book was rejected over and over
again by major publishing houses. Harding says all the rejection letters
suggested that "Nobody wants to read a slow, contemplative, meditative,
quiet book." "It was, 'Where are the car chases?'" Of course...now
Harding is vindicated: the book has won critical acclaim, including the
2010 Pulitzer. What do you feel about the remark that Tinkers is
too slow paced and contemplative? Did you feel that way reading it? Do
you think it will appeal to a wider audience—or to only serious readers?
If you were an editor, would you have taken a chance on this book...or
passed it over? * Some questions from LitLovers.
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