Tinkers - A Debut Novel by Paul Harding

To pass the time waiting at yet another airport gate and without my knitting due to security regulations I took the book TINKERS by Paul Harding with me. His debut novel, it was published in January 2009 and has 192 pages. A small book but a forceful, spellbinding and impressive one, a book leading to contemplation, reflection and soul-searching. The story tells about a tinker, Howard, a man mending broken pots and pans, a man standing for a vanished lifestyle, when time appeared to run at a slower pace and yet the days were full.
And it is the story about another man, the late tinker's son George, who is slowly dying, in the house he built and amidst his family and all his lovingly repaired antique clocks, his entire life achievements if you will. The book deals with the relationship between a father and a son, and although Harding writes in great prose about the subject of the last days of life and impending death, in effect weaving through three generations, it is truly a comforting book, somehow giving the reader solace through knowing what a rich, life-affirming and fulfilled life the main characters enjoyed. A spiritual story told in a strong narrative voice.
As it were, Tinkers won this year's Pulitzer Prize for Fiction today, 13 April 2010.

As we get older - here a lovely poem of which most people know only the first line:

Warning

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple

With a red hat which doesn't go, and doesn't suit me.

And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves

And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter.

I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired

And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells

And run my stick along the public railings

And make up for the sobriety of my youth.

I shall go out in my slippers in the rain

And pick flowers in other people's gardens

And learn to spit.

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat

And eat three pounds of sausages at a go

Or only bread and pickle for a week

And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry

And pay our rent and not swear in the street

And set a good example for the children.

We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.

But maybe I ought to practice a little now?

So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised

When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

Jenny Joseph