The Time Traveler’s Wife Study Guide

Audrey Niffenegger was born in South Haven, Michigan in 1963.  When she was young, her family moved to Evanston, Illinois. Throughout primary school, Niffenegger loved art and storytelling, leading her to obtain her undergraduate degree at the Art Institute of Chicago. After working as a visual artist for over a decade, she completed her Master of Fine Arts in Art Theory and Practice at Northwestern University in 1991. After graduate school, Niffenegger continued her artistic work, publishing hand-bound visual books that she created in small batches. She began writing The Time Traveler’s Wife in 1997 and completed the manuscript in 2001. After an initial struggle to find an agent and publisher, the novel was finally published in 2003. It has since been adapted into a movie, limited television series, and stage musical. Since the publication of her first novel, Niffenegger has written two additional novels, comics, short stories, and visual art books. She currently teaches creative writing at Columbia College Chicago. She lives in Chicago with her husband, cartoonist Eddie Campbell. The Time Traveler’s Wife’s sequel, The Other Husband, is scheduled for publication in 2023.

The novel’s focus on the interplay of past and present mirrors the sentiments that many people felt leading up to the turn of the millennium, so it is fitting that Niffenegger chooses this era for her setting. The novel includes many key historical moments that occurred in the years leading up to and following the start of the 21st century. For example, Henry considers the unfounded fear around Y2K, which refers to the fears that many people had that the year 2000 could create computer errors that would collapse global infrastructures. (Many computer programs represented four-digit years using the years’ final two digits, which would make 2000 indistinguishable from 1900.) Clare and Henry also witness the news coverage of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York on September 11, 2001. These events reflect contemporary concerns around new technology, globalization, and increasingly volatile foreign policy in the Middle East. Clare and Henry’s passions and fears also convey tension between the past and present. The couple’s interests tend toward the historical, including postmodern art, punk music, papermaking, 17th-century English Metaphysical poetry, and antique books. Their disinterest in television and new media, however, stands contrasts with their need for 21st-century scientific and technological advancements like genome sequencing and medication to save Henry’s life.

There are several literary works referenced within the novel, including the poetry of John Donne, William Blake, Rainer Maria Rilke. The novel also features the writing of Metaphysical poet Andrew Marvell, most prominently his carpe diem poem, “To His Coy Mistress,” which encapsulates the novel’s themes of romance, time, and free will. Henry references this poem early in his relationship with Clare and again as they part upon his death. The Time Traveler’s Wife belongs to a diverse group of time-traveling stories, though it’s most often compared to works such as Jack Finney’s Time and Again, Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, and Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series. In addition to short stories, comics, and visual books, Niffenegger has written two novels since the publication of The Time Traveler’s Wife: Her Fearful Symmetry and Raven Girl. The Other Husband, the sequel to The Time Traveler’s Wife, is due to be published in 2023 and focuses on the life of Clare and Henry’s daughter, Alba.