Weaving art, history, romance

In her 1999 novel “Girl With a Pearl Earring,” Tracy Chevalier imagined the story behind Vermeer’s captivating painting, describing an erotically charged relationship between the 17th century Dutch artist and his servant girl-muse. In her fourth and latest novel, “The Lady and the Unicorn,” she again makes use of a work of art about which little is known to tell a tale of forbidden love. This time, she brings to life a set of medieval tapestries that now hang in the Musee National du Moyen Age in Paris. To this day, no one knows who made them, or why.

In an author’s note, Chevalier writes that although her story is fiction, it is based on “sensible suppositions” about the “Lady and the Unicorn” tapestries. She provides extensive detail about 15th century weaving techniques and a compelling story of how the tapestries might have come into being. To Chevalier’s credit, her novel is likely to inspire people to read factual accounts of the tapestries, perhaps even to journey to Paris to see them.

While her tale changes perspective among its various characters, it focuses on the path of Nicolas des Innocents, a charming, arrogant, lecherous and undeniably gifted French painter. It is he whom Chevalier imagines as the creator of the magnificent tapestries, in collaboration with Belgian master weaver Georges de la Chapelle.

In 1490, Nicolas is unexpectedly hired by Jean Le Viste, a vain Parisian aristocratto, to design the tapestries. The snobbish Nicolas, renowned for his miniaturist works, is in no position to decline a commission that means “food on the table for weeks. Only the King says no to Jean Le Viste, and I am certainly no king.” Le Viste (the name of the family that really did commission the tapestries) is more caricature than character, but he is certainly entertaining -- a kind of medieval Donald Trump.

Like the brash mogul, Le Viste has a huge ego. He wants tapestries -- big ones -- to cover the walls of a grand room in his home and his family’s coat of arms prominently displayed. He tells Nicolas that he expects to see plenty of horses, swords, armor and blood. Furthermore, he wants the tapestries done unreasonably, impossibly soon: two months for the entire scene to be drawn and painted and two years to complete the entire project.

In the end, the tapestries have nothing to do with battle. Instead, they allegorically depict the five senses, prominently feature a unicorn and seem to have a spiritual theme. This is due partly to the coaxing of Le Viste’s wife, Genevieve de Nanterre, who prefers a gentler subject: “I don’t want my daughters to look at bloody carnage while entertaining at a feast.” And she insists on the inclusion of a lady and a unicorn, an apt image because Nicolas’ standard seduction speech just happens to involve a unicorn and seems to work every time. (He already has impregnated one of the Le Vistes’ servants.) His inspiration for the tapestries is Claude, the Le Vistes’ oldest daughter, with whom he is smitten. Unlike the love story in “Girl With a Pearl Earring,” it is the artist who is the servant, the muse his master.

Although 14-year-old Claude falls hard for Nicolas, his lower status and her aristocratic background guarantees this love story cannot end happily.

“He is not worthy of you,” her officious maidservant Beatrice reminds her. “He’s just an artist, and not trustworthy at that. You should be thinking of lords instead.”

Claude is immortalized in the only tapestry that does not appear to depict one of the senses: “A Mon Seul Desir,” (To My One Desire). And despite proving herself a fierce barrier between Nicolas and Claude, Genevieve is also represented in the tapestries, along with Alienor, the master-weaver’s blind daughter, and his wife, Christine du Sablon. Each woman has a profound effect on Nicolas, though none more than Claude.

“The Lady and the Unicorn” tells a fascinating story, but its diffuse perspectives make the narrative less forceful at times. Some of the moments between Nicolas and Claude seem more suited to a romance novel: “She ran around me to stand on the stairs above me. She didn’t go higher. Yes, I thought. I’ve set out my wares and she’s coming for a look. Come closer, my dear, and see my plums.” There’s more awkwardness when the tapestries are described by her characters, making the dialogue occasionally stilted.

That aside, Chevalier has impressively blended a good deal of historical fact with a richly imagined story. For the most part, she pulls it off. Who would have thought that a late 15th century work of art -- neglected for about 300 years -- could yield such a passionate, intricate novel?