Janey Bennett: The Pale Surface of Things
Reading Group Guides

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Janey, this book was a pleasure to read. I really felt like I was in Crete. Did you feel like you became a part of Cretan history and culture while you were researching and writing the story?

It certainly became a part of me. Crete's long history is both glorious and terrible, filled with human triumphs and strengths, howling outrages and brilliant moments, on a land that holds its secrets in its caves and underground rivers. There is a sense of the sacred in that island's landscape: the sense that its myths may actually have been history, that maybe Icarus did try to fly from King Minos’s control, that Ariadne really did help Theseus in the labyrinth (the maze which supposedly held the man-bull minotaur). A labyrinth actually exists in the ruins of the palace at Knossos! Is the story real? Is it myth? Maybe, maybe. Both possibilities exist.

All that history/mythology remains in present-day Crete. It's there, even if we don't look for it. The trail you are walking on may have been in continuous human use for 7,000 years! In comparison, our world (Douglas's world) is very young!

During the seven years I spent writing Pale Surface,I researched everything I could find about Crete. The nicest compliments I've received for The Pale Surface of Things are from readers born on Crete who are surprised to learn I didn't grow up there: I know things about life on Crete that their grandmothers have told them, no longer common knowledge.

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

I am having a hard time picking a favorite character from this book. Fr. Dimitrios was inwardly complicated. At one point it seems that even though he was raised in California and considered himself to be partly American, he harbored some animosity towards other Americans; one example being the Hansons while they prepared for a marriage and then a business venture. Do you believe that it is possible to assimilate with more than one culture and not view others from one of those backgrounds with animosity? Why was it difficult for Fr. Dimitrios to do so?

Animosity is too strong a word for Fr. Dimitrios's dealings with the Hansons. They are out of line in their demands of him. He is courteous but declines their inappropriate requests. His archbishop would never allow him to perform a wedding for non-Orthodox people. Nor would it be appropriate for him to do a photoshoot with Denise's models. The Hansons are not stopping to consider the rules of his culture and his church.

But the Hansons evolve, too in the course of the book:

In the beginning of Pale Surface, the Hansons are examples of a kind of tourist who is ready to consume the local customs without much sensitivity for the people whose customs these are. I've met tourists just like the Hansons-- from America, Germany, Japan, England, arrogant tourists who make others wince. They embarrass other visitors who try harder to melt into the environment and not step on the toes of the local residents.

I have a friend from Finland who said once that whenever he sees a drunk in an airport, he's sure it’s a Finn. Respectful travelers or expatriates often take on embarrassment for insensitive tourists from their original country. My Finnish friend was willing to assume that any drunk would be from Finland. There are drunks from other places.... So if Fr. Dimitrios is sensitive to the clumsy behaviors of the Hansons, it comes from that same feeling of responsibility for one's countrymen.

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

In the beginning, Douglas ran away from his problems. What do you do when you encounter difficult situations?

In my life I have come to understand that ethical behavior is the highest value there is, and it is the way to leading a rewarding life. I don't always live up to the standards I set for myself, but the awareness that there IS a standard is what sets me and Douglas apart. He is not aware of anything.

I was interested to see what I could do with a character like Douglas, who doesn't consider anyone else...or even his own goals (he has none), who moves from impulse to impulse, who isn't even sure what the truth is because he's always slipping around a corner. What lessons would he have to learn to move into a substantial life? On one level, The Pale Surface of Things is Douglas's "hero's journey": he runs from his known world with no resources (no wallet, no passport, leather shoes bad for running, and he doesn't speak Greek), and encounters a village life filled with strong traditions and loyalties and enmities. He has to learn fast how to survive in these new circumstances. By the end of the book, he has moved into a role in the community, engaging with the villagers, helping them and being helped by them. But it wasn't an easy journey for him. And at various times in the writing of the book, I wasn't sure he was going to get there!!

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

When Douglas is on the run the first time, he looks into a mirror at a gas station and sees, "not...himself but the surprising appearance of the face of the person who had just taken over his life. There was a resemblance to his former face, but something was changed. A young, astonished person looked back at him. This face looked scared and excited."

This is the beginning of Douglas coming to awareness of the magnitude of what he's just done. He's stood up for his life (first time), instead of going with the flow and taking what is offered to him. Compare him (before this moment) to Tonio, the handsome Albanian waiter whom Denise falls for later in the book. Do you see similarities?

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

In the conversation Fr. Dimitrios had with his Papou, we see how wise he was. Who is/was your Papou? Who is the person in your life that you would say is a gift to you as Fr. Dimitrios says of his Papou?

I had several truly great mentors and teachers, and I drew on those experiences to write Papou. He's an amalgam of all my mentors.

The really important thing about Fr. Dimitrios's relationship with his grandfather is that it moves from idolizing him to loving him with compassion and understanding: when he learns that his grandfather carried a dark secret (an act in time of war) he doesn't love him less because he isn't perfect. He loves him more, because he understands the magnitude of courage to perform the deed and to keep it secret to the grave.

There are three places in the book where characters discover uncomfortable truths about people they love deeply. Each person handles it differently. A book group I met with pointed these out. It's a good topic for discussion: Which characters learn bad things about someone they love, and how does each one deal with it? Can you find them? Go for it!! (Fr. Dimitrios is one...)

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

I have a question about Ellen. She came to see Fr. Dimitrios as if to settle unfinished business; to tie up loose ends. Why was this visit important to the story as a whole?

The change in Fr. Dimitrios's relationship to his former fiancée Ellen is a measure of how he has grown—how his commitment to serve the village has deepened—during the three years he's been village priest in Vraho.

She broke off their engagement just before he was ordained, and that committed him to a celebrate life. According to the rules of the Greek Orthodox Church, once he ordained, he could not marry. She broke up with him for what seemed like a frivolous reason at the time: because she didn't think she could give up the city life she'd grown up with to live in a simple village with him.

Since then, he has lived in that village alone and has grown and changed. She's been working in California, wondering what might have been. There aren't many young men as worthy and interesting as Fr. Dimitrios. Her regrets overwhelm her and she sends him a letter asking to see him. He waffles a bit before he says yes, because he also still has feelings for her and for what might have been.

To go back to her, he would have to give up the priesthood, which he believed was his calling. By agreeing to have her come to visit, he puts his choice to the fire: was he really really committed to his life in the village?

The visit clarifies that. They have grown in different directions. That secret wishing part of their spirits can relax. It's over. And that is why Ellen's visit is in the book.

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett

Where did the title come from?

The Pale Surface of Things carries a number of meanings. It refers to the whitewash that Papou, priest in the village during the Nazi invasion in World War II, painted over the old Byzantine icons on the walls, to hide the bullet holes from the Nazi massacre. At the end of his life he asks his grandson to remove the whitewash because "we must live with both the beauty and the horror of our past."

There is also whitewash over Douglas's spirit, hiding his true value from himself. That whitewash has to come off, too.

And the village is located on the side of Lefka Ori, the White Mountains, so named because they are wind-scoured limestone and look snow-covered even in summer. Another Pale Surface for this story!

Reading Group Guides: Interview with Janey Bennett