Meg Boutwell

Meg Boutwell

Christina Black

ENG 1147 Mystery in the Story

12/15/13

Assignment 6

            Nostalgia is a powerful emotion. In fact, it is almost an unwritten rule of the modern mystery genre that the protagonist is haunted by an event in their past. Throughout novels such as The Reluctant Fundamentalist, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, and Our Man in Havana, the protagonists are influenced greatly by the past, letting it shape their decisions and oftentimes bring about their downfall. “Nostalgia” exemplifies this characteristic perfectly through its depiction of the destruction caused by not being able to let go of the past, as demonstrated by Erica in The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Leamas in The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, and Wormold in Our Man in Havana.

            I found inspiration for “Nostalgia” in the plight of Erica from The Reluctant Fundamentalist. A beautiful and rich Princeton graduate, Erica would seem to have everything, if not for the premature death of her first love, Chris. She “was struggling against a current that pulled her within herself, and her smile contained the fear that she might slip into her own depths, where she would be trapped, unable to breath” (Hamid 86). Erica is unable to move on from the death of Chris, and instead is trapped in the depths of her own memory. Much like the hand depicted in “Nostalgia,” she turns away from the present and instead desperately clutches the past, until her snow globe of their memories together is the only thing that holds color for her anymore. Erica is pulled deeper and deeper into her own mind, losing both her sanity and her life, succumbing to the inky darkness that her present and future have become.

            After coming up with the inspiration for the design, I began to draw the collapsed hand with art pens—a perfect choice to describe the darkness found outside of our memories—detailing the individual fingers with techniques such as stippling and cross-hatch. However, dissatisfied with both the proportion of the arm and the style that was slowly beginning to unfold, I decided to start over and change media ever so slightly. Rather than drawing with ink, I instead decided to paint with it, thus keeping the darkness of my original design while giving a new style to my work. I purchased Sumi Ink—often used in calligraphy—and began to paint the hand on a new page, mixing this incredibly dark substance with various amounts of water in order to get the numerous shades of grey required for the shadows of the fingers. Unfortunately, working with so much liquid had consequences that I did not foresee. Though the paper I was using was deemed “Mixed Media,” it did not hold up as well as I would have liked and instead was warped slightly in the process.

            After finishing inking in both the hand, the outside of the snow globe, and the surroundings, I encountered another difficulty. I had envisioned bright, colorful watercolors standing out against the inky black, their fluidness emphasizing the uncertainty of dreams. Though I’ve worked with watercolor multiple times before, I was mistaken in assuming that the pencils would behave in a similar manner. Through trial and error on scrap sheets of paper, I eventually came up with the design I wanted; however, the style is slightly different from that of true water colors. If you look closely, colors are not blended as well as they would be with real water color and the strokes of the pencil are evident. Despite this, I believe “Nostalgia” is an accurate depiction of both the theme of not being able to let go of the past and Erica’s predicament.

            “Nostalgia” doesn’t just depict Erica, however. Leamas from The Spy Who Came in from the Cold also struggles with letting go of the past. After narrowly avoiding hitting another car on the autobahn, Leamas “never drove again without some corner of his memory recalling the tousled children waving to him from the back of that car” (Le Carré 105). Though not as extreme as Erica’s case, Leamas holds on to that moment in time for the rest of his life, fearing and dreading the fact that he is “slowing down” (104). To him, that near accident represented the beginning of the end, the steady decline of his prowess as a spy and a man. And though Leamas’ snow globe is shoved to the back of the shelf, that moment never truly left him. In fact, the last thing Leamas saw before dying was that exact moment—his greatest fear, flashing before his eyes. “As he fell, Leamas saw a small car smashed between great lorries, and the children waving cheerfully through the window” (225).

            Finally, Wormold from Our Man in Havana also struggles with moving on from the past. Despite the fact that his wife left him for someone else, his daughter, “Unlike Wormold, who believed in nothing, Milly was a Catholic: he had been made to promise her mother that before they married” (Greene 10). Greene is still very attached to his wife and cannot get over the fact that she left him. Despite the fact that she moved on long ago, he cannot bear to go against her wishes, doing everything in his power to keep his daughter religious. He upholds this promise to her as a sort of tribute to their past relationship, even giving in to Milly’s ridiculous demands for gifts when she threatens to drop her religion. 

            Throughout the mystery genre, characters such as Erica, Leamas, and Wormold have struggled with moving on. Like the scene depicted in “Nostalgia,” these characters hold on to their memories with all their strength, letting go only in death. Whether due to lost love or a moment of weakness, the past never truly leaves these characters.

Works Cited

Le Carré, John. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. London: Penguin Books, 2012.

Greene, Graham. Our Man in Havana. New York: Penguin Books, 2007. Print.

Hamid, Moshin. The Reluctant Fundamentalist. New York: First Mariner Books, 2008.