“The Only Thing I Know About the Dark…”
“The only thing I know about the dark is that you can’t see in it.”
Like many of you I’m sure, I was so sad to learn about the death of Robert Redford earlier this month. I had lot of admiration for him – as an environmentalist, an activist, an entrepreneur, a director, and a filmmaker… but most of all as an actor. I liked the films he was in, and I liked the characters he brought to life.
And among that list of characters, I’d have to say that my favorite was Roy Hobbs, the baseball player looking for his final shot at stardom in the 1984 film “The Natural.”
Inspired by the 1952 Bernard Malamud novel of the same name, “The Natural” begins with Roy as a young man who shows great promise as a ballplayer. He heads to Chicago by train for a tryout with the Chicago Cubs – but his plan is quickly derailed. On his journey, he crosses paths with a mysterious woman and grabs the chance to impress her with his talent. Sadly, his vanity has catastrophic results, as this deranged woman delivers a life-altering gunshot to his abdomen before killing herself.
Ultimately, after many years, Hobbs does make into the majors – but not as the naïve, optimistic young man he once was. The message here, I think, is that while we all make mistakes, they become a part of us. We can learn from the past but we can never defeat it.
It’s while Hobbs aiming to make his comeback that he utters this memorable line: “The only thing I know about the dark is that you can’t see in it.” It’s a far more complicated thought than it seems. Yes, it’s true that the dark makes it difficult to see things. But it’s also true that people often use the dark as an excuse to avoid seeing what’s right in front of them.
I was reminded of this line in some of the Redford obituaries I read last week, and I quickly realized how often light and dark play a role in novels – including mine. For example, in THE SECRET ORPHANAGE, my newly released World War 2 novel, my character Rachel keeps herself in the dark about why she can’t find a partner. She refuses to see that her expectations are unrealistic and clouding her judgment. Meanwhile, her grandfather, Henry, has pushed his memories of Nazi-occupied France to the darkened recesses of his mind – until dementia ultimately weakens his ability to do so. My heroine, the American Celina, clearly sees her calling when she brings a hidden pink bundle out of the dappled underbrush in a small French village– but her brother, Max, aims to confuse her, insisting that she’s delusional, and Nazi onslaught in France is not their problem to solve.
I loved exploring lightness and darkness in the book. And if this is something you also enjoy, I hope you’ll check out my novel. You can see the description and read some reviews by clicking here:
This week brings the fall equinox and the beginning of much shorter days and longer nights. Nevertheless, I wish you lots of warm, strong light in your life in the coming months!
