Eowyn Ivey

"Several years ago I was working an evening shift at our local bookshop, Fireside Books, when I came across a children’s story. It would have been easy to miss – just a little paperback with a few sentences on each page. But I had never seen it before, so I opened it and read it standing among the bookshelves. It told the story of an old man and woman who are unable to have children, but one night they build a little girl out of snow and she comes to life. As soon as I read the words, I knew – this was the story I wanted to tell. The fairy tale is known as Snegurochka in Russia, and as I began my research, I discovered that it has a long, rich history there. It has inspired music and dance, beautiful oil landscape paintings, and small, incredibly detailed lacquer paintings. It captured my imagination because it was the first fairy tale I had ever come across that could be set in my own back yard. The spruce forests and snowy winters, the foxes and wolves and bears. I was at home in this landscape. There was also something about the couple’s deep longing, the mix of joy and sorrow, the sense that life is hard but at times offers up rare, magical gifts. It all spoke to me. So I set my own telling of Snegurochka in my lifelong home -- Alaska. It is 1920 and Jack and Mabel have moved here with hopes of starting a new life, but their homestead is backbreaking and they are struggle beneath the weight of their own grief. But one snowy night, they build a little girl out of snow …

 

When Eric Wetherell contacted me about adapting my novel into an opera, I was overjoyed. What a wonderful opportunity for Snegurochka’s path to continue! A children’s book, an old fairy tale, Russian paintings – they had inspired me as I wrote, and the idea that my novel would now provide the inspiration for yet another art form was a tremendous gift to me.I hope you enjoy it.

 

Cheers!

Eowyn"