Barbara Stuber has shown generations of schoolchildren and adults through the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. She’s worked as a docent there for 25 years. Stuber’s new novel, Girl In Reverse, highlights the museum’s collection - including its Asian art.
The book’s set in the early 1950s, the Korean War is underway, and teenager, Lily Firestone, who’s adopted and Chinese, faces discrimination. But, at the museum, she finds a link to her culture and her past.
"A museum holds the universe under one roof," says Stuber. "So if you're looking for an opportunity to experience diversity, which is exactly what this story at the heart is about, why not come in here?"
Interview Highlights
On writing novels as an extension of being a docent
"I didn't anticipate that that was going to be the case, but it is absolutely the case. Even down to the structure of a tour where you have a beginning, a middle and an end. Each stop on the tour, each artwork, can almost be construed as a chapter..."
On personal, historical, and artistic inspirations
"My first gut sense of it was talking to my own daughter-in-law, who's from the Philippines...and her own struggles ... struggles in high school and beyond — fitting in, feeling like she knew who she was ... that really hooked my heart.
"And then I picked a time period with this happening right at the height of the Korean War where the U.S. has been instructed to hate China. They're our mortal enemy, they are out to end the free world ... Then, here comes the Nelson and this sublime, gorgeous offering, this legendary offering of a whole different side of China. The compassion, the calm, the beauty, the genius of it all.
"So I wanted my character to interface with that, and do the magic that a museum can do, when you walk in, which is transport you through time and through culture."
On the process of self-discovery
"It's a combination of the art itself, the way she eventually grows to appreciate the art. And then, people who influence her and literally, almost help her create her backbone, her strength.
Barbara Stuber reads and signs copies of 'Girl in Reverse,' Friday, May 23, 6 pm - 7:30 pm. at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 4525 Oak Street, Kansas City, Mo., 816-751-1278. Docents will also be on hand to lead patrons on an art tour of the museum's collection highlighted in the novel.
