The Pattern in the Carpet Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

Book Club Discussion Questions

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For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, Margaret Drabble and our BookBrowse Review of The Pattern in the Carpet.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

Introduction

The Pattern in the Carpet: A Personal History with Jigsaws is an original and brilliant work. Margaret Drabble weaves her own story into a history of games, in particular jigsaws, which have offered her and many others relief from melancholy and depression. Alongside curious facts and discoveries about jigsaw puzzles—did you know that the 1929 stock market crash was followed by a boom in puzzle sales?—Drabble introduces us to her beloved Auntie Phyl, and describes childhood visits to the house in Long Bennington on the Great North Road, their first trip to London together, the books they read, and the jigsaws they completed. She offers penetrating sketches of her parents, siblings, and children, and shares her thoughts on the importance of childhood play, on art and writing, and on aging and memory. And she does so with her customary intelligence, energy, and wit. This is a memoir like no other.


Discussion Questions

1. In the Introduction, Drabble begins the book by saying it is not a memoir, though it might look like one. What are the implications of this statement? What sorts of expectations do we bring to a memoir? How does this book defy or fulfill those expectations?
   
   
2. On page 260, Drabble confesses that her first conception of her book about jigsaws was as "the perfect stocking-filler. It would surely be as desirable as a Van Gogh calendar or a fake Sumerian necklace or a cardboard build-your-own dinosaur." In other words, she assumed that her book about jigsaw puzzles would be sold in a museum shop, like a jigsaw puzzle itself. In what ways is The Pattern in the Carpet indeed like a jigsaw puzzle? In what ways is it not?
   
   
3. Drabble writes that the book is not a history of jigsaw puzzles, "though that is what it was once meant to be." Throughout the text, Drabble makes occasional references to the writing of the book, breaking the narrative voice to speak directly to the reader and call attention to the book itself. Why does she do this? What did you think of these authorial asides and interruptions?
   
   

Unless otherwise stated, this discussion guide is reprinted with the permission of Mariner Books. Any page references refer to a USA edition of the book, usually the trade paperback version, and may vary in other editions.