Imagining Mary Cassatt: Behind the Curtain of The Cassatt Sisters
by Lisa Groen
When writing a novel about a historical figure like Mary Cassatt, a member of the larger Impressionist collective, it can be difficult to decide who to include as main characters of her story. All the Impressionists would be interesting to write about, not to mention her famous teachers in Paris.
To make this decision, I limited the scope of time in my novel—covering Mary’s years with the Impressionists—1877 through 1886. Then I studied her artwork and biography, placing paintings and events on a timeline.
The most significant event during those nine years, which predated Edgar Degas’ invitation to Mary Cassatt to join the collective, was the relocation of Mary’s parents and sister Lydia from Philadelphia to Paris. Mary was immediately bolstered by the presence of her family, whose support she leaned on—domestically, financially, and emotionally. She was no longer alone in Paris, and she relied especially on the companionship of her sister, Lydia Cassatt.
Everyone needs a sidekick, and Mary Cassatt’s showed up at just the right time. Lydia Cassatt, Mary’s older sister by seven years, is a recurring subject in Mary’s paintings, pastels, and prints. Mary featured her in a series of opera paintings at her first Impressionist exhibit on April 10, 1879. And she continued to paint Lydia in domestic scenes and gardens in the years that followed.
Lydia Cassatt and her parents, naturally, became main characters in my novel.
Soon after her first exhibit with the Impressionists, Mary began working with Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro, and Berthe Morisot on a magazine titled Le Jour et La Nuit (Day and Night), which featured black and white prints from each artist. The project was conceived to circulate Impressionist art more widely to art buyers in France and England. Though the magazine was never published, the artists worked closely for nearly a year in Degas’ studio.
The idea of these four people working in tight quarters intrigued me, so I cast these artist friends as main characters too. As I read and studied their paintings and biographies, their personalities began to emerge in my imagination. I could see them working shoulder-to-shoulder, talking, and laughing in Degas’ studio with ink-stained hands.
Though all the Impressionists make appearances in The Cassatt Sisters, Pissarro, Degas, and Morisot, along with Mary’s sister Lydia and her parents, are central to the novel.
I filled in many gaps with my imagination to create a larger story in the context of Mary’s life and work. After writing this book for years, I can’t help but feel as if I’d been there—learning and laughing alongside them.
An excerpt from The Cassatt Sisters: A Novel of Love and Art
In the seventh decade of the 1800s, Paris became the City of Light. A sense of progress accompanied the time like an ever-traveling current. Gas lamps gave way to incandescent bulbs that burned so brightly, lovers searched for darker shadows in which to embrace. The newly lit grand boulevards surrounding the Paris Opéra bustled with people and carriages. I strolled along the rue Laffitte one evening, a charming cobblestone street lined with stone-colored buildings—the center of Parisian art. One fine gallery after another vied for the attention of passersby, but my favorite belonged to Paul Durand-Ruel, a second-generation dealer known for collecting avant-garde paintings.
Les avant-gardes, the breakaway artists Durand-Ruel supported, openly defied the Salon, a juried exhibition that for centuries set standards and shaped careers. I, too, had set my sights on the Salon when I’d arrived by steamer from Philadelphia thirteen years prior. The jury had accepted one of my paintings when I was only twenty-four. I remember thinking, Surely my career will flourish.
The gallery’s large picture window sparkled in reflected streetlight, and I pressed my nose against the glass to peer at the paintings inside. Three pastel ballerinas glowed in a gilded frame on the far wall. Miniature dancers dressed in silk and tulle waited in the wings before a performance. As my rose-scented perfume gathered against the glass, I imagined the large bouquets they’d hold in their arms after the performance, taking their bows.
I don’t remember how long I stared at the painting. Only the thrill of color and light, and I felt a shift within—away from the Salon and its fickle approval of my paintings. And toward a new path lit by artists who longed for progress too. Not since I’d run my fingers over my first metal tubes of oil paint had I experienced this kind of certainty. I forgot about the years I’d watched students from Académie des Beaux-Arts, which barred women, advance beyond me. I didn’t think about my auditions to gain instruction from Académie professors during off-hours. Or how my ambitions had been dismissed by my father—even when the Salon exhibited my paintings.
The portrait of ballet dancers thrilled me. I hadn’t yet met the artist, but I whispered to myself while standing at that window. Je suis arrivée. In Edgar Degas’ work, I saw my future. I pledged to seek out as many of his paintings as I could.
I found Degas’ work in galleries and when I was very lucky, at a private residence. I came upon his self-portrait one afternoon, displayed next to a large oil portrait for sale, of a jockey and his horse. More movement, color, and surprising composition, but my eyes returned to the artist. I memorized and carried the angles of his face with me, secretly searching for him while going about my days in the city. If Degas were to cross my path, I’d recognize those dark, sad eyes and offer my hand. I came to know quite a few of his paintings during that time, but I did not meet him in the public places where artists mingle. The fates were trickier than that.
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“Replete with emotional interactions that bring the sisters and their world to life, The Cassatt Sisters is hard to put down, intensely revealing, and a work of art itself.” –Midwest Book Review
In 1877, the Paris art scene is very competitive for men but nearly impossible for thirty-three-year-old Mary Cassatt, an American woman. Bored by traditional methods of painting, she admires the work of avant-garde painters, especially Edgar Degas. So, when Edgar visits Mary’s studio to view her paintings, she is exhilarated by his invitation to join him, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and other Impressionists in the collective.
Meeting the standards of the Impressionists is nerve-racking. Mary is judged not only as a painter but as a woman. She takes comfort in her close bond with her sister, Lydia, who often poses for her. But Mary’s growing attraction to Edgar threatens to derail the plans Mary and Lydia have made for their future. When an opportunity arises to work side by side with Edgar, Mary begins a clandestine love affair that utterly upends her life and career.
In The Cassatt Sisters, author Lisa Groen paints a dazzling picture of Belle Époque Paris and the extraordinary life of artist Mary Cassatt during her time with the Impressionists. At the heart of this compelling historical novel is an age-old question: What must a woman sacrifice to live a life of freedom and accomplishment?
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Lisa Groen is the author of the forthcoming historical novel THE CASSATT SISTERS: A Novel of Love and Art (Oct 2025) and a collection of essays in THE MOTHER’S BOOK OF WELL-BEING. Her writing also appears in the textbook THE FOURTH GENRE: Contemporary Writers of Creative Nonfiction.
A graduate of the MFA program at The Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing, Lisa’s essays and short fiction have been published in Brevity, The New Southerner, and featured on Georgia Public Radio. Lisa publishes regularly on Substack, postcard essays from Belle Époque Paris with the artwork of Impressionist Mary Cassatt—the subject of her novel. She writes too about the invitations of midlife.
Lisa Groen resides in Salt Lake City, Utah with her husband, Aaron Irvin, and their dog, George Harrison. They have a blended family of five adult children and one grandchild.
Category: On Writing
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