Chapter 91: What Edward Hopper Tells Us About Writing
I discovered Edward Hopper when I was in my 20s. I was living in Chicago and, as best I can recall, I must have encountered his work at the Art Institute where I first saw his masterpiece, Nighthawks. My memory on this point is hazy, but knowing what has drawn me to Hopper in the years since, I believe it was the decidedly urban feel of his work. That and the mysteries he captured.
I bought and framed a poster of Nighthawks and spent a lot of time staring at it during an overly long period of despair after a painful breakup. I somehow thought that my sadness would evaporate once I could resolve the existential question at the heart of the painting: Did I want to be the man who looks not terribly happy in the company of the woman at his side? Or did I want to be the man whose back is to us, and whose expression and state of mind is hidden? The sad sure thing or the gamble? I’d like to think I chose the latter, which feels so much more romantic.
The heartbreak ended. Life went on, very happily – thank you sir, whose face we never see – but I never stopped being drawn to Edward Hopper. So it was that for my birthday my younger child – whose very wise idea of a birthday present is an event, and time spent together – took me to see Edward Hopper’s New York at the Whitney Museum in Lower Manhattan, knowing full well I could think of no better way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
It is a terrific show, the paintings, of course, as well as sketches, etchings, and early illustrations. There is also a lovely short film of Hopper, by that point quite elderly, at work – we see him applying paint but not the painting itself - and taking a walk in the park with his wife, and muse, Jo.
We took our time, and J, who possesses both the keen eye of an artist and the sensibility of a fiction writer was quick to help me see what my overly literal eye could not – the shadows, the sources of light, the sky, the blankness of faces. Seeing a Hopper or two in the midst of other work cannot capture the fullness of the experience, but in an hour or so with just Hopper, I found what spoke to me now – as opposed to what I saw in his work decades ago – was a phenomenon that, I believe, too many journalists, myself included, miss: stillness.
Hopper at his best captures frozen moments in which little appears to be happening, aside from, well, everything. Often he lets us look through a window, to see what’s going on inside. Sometimes we’re in the room, looking out. The people who populate Hopper’s world do very little – there isn’t the sense of action you’d see in, say, a Bruegel village or Pissarro’s Paris. And yet, it is that seeming absence of motion that feels so hypnotic.
Journalists are drawn to motion, to people, alone or together, moving. We observe that motion, and work to capture what we see in words. Stillness, by contrast, can feel lacking in drama, in bigness. But spend some time with Edward Hopper and you begin to see what you’ve been missing.
One painting in particular stopped me cold, and has stayed with me ever since. It is called, simply, Room in New York. It is vintage Hopper: a young couple in a small room in what appears to be an apartment. He is reading the paper. She is sitting at the piano. They are connected only by proximity. They do not look at one another, nor is there any sense of a conversation interrupted or about to begin. They look stuck.
But look at her right hand. One finger sits on a piano key in a way that suggests she is not about to play. Maybe she will press one note. Maybe she will hit it hard or maybe she will strike it softly as to be almost soundless. Maybe she wants his attention. Maybe…
You can go on speculating forever, which is why this is such a remarkable painting. The literary analog, of course, is a work of fiction. But what if it were not? What if instead of a painting we were looking at a photograph? It is not only the best photographers who can see and capture such moments: even a snapshot can be as powerful as a short story.
Next week I start a new class, a return to a course I’ve taught for several years. It’s called The Memory Project. (I’ve mentioned it in previous chapters.) Each student chooses a photograph that speaks to them. (It cannot be a photo of themselves and if it’s a photo of relatives they need to make sure Uncle Fred or Cousin Shirley will not come back to them in a few weeks and say, on second thought…) They then have ten weeks to find the story in that frozen moment. Only then are they ready to write.
It is harder than you’d think. It begins, of course, with knowing who is in the photo, when and where and the circumstances in which it was taken. It’s often the case that the question that sets their reporting journey in motion changes as they learn more and begin to see the story in a new light.
In earlier chapters I’ve written about the need for writers to pivot as the story emerges in unexpected ways. I’ve also written about the process of weekly reporting memos – letters, really – in which students can see where their journeys began, and where knowledge begins taking them.
My first assignment, aside from finding a photograph, had nothing to do with reporting, per se. Rather, I asked - okay, required – each of them to make their way downtown to the Whitney, buy a student discount ticket, take the elevator to the fifth floor and spend some time with Edward Hopper.
Look at all that happens, I suggested, when nothing appears to happen. Look at the story you are sure you are seeing. See how this might apply to the work you are about to do.
My guess is that no two students will come back having seen exactly the same story in Room in New York.
In the weeks to come, I will be eager to see what stories they find in their photos.