What Year Does The Secret History Take Place

Question

For Donna Tartt's The Secret History, I always imagine the campus setting in a specific decade. Do we ever get an exact calendar year for the story's main events?

Edelene Escalante · Answer

The events of the novel 'The Secret History' by Donna Tartt take place in the mid-1980s at a fictional college in Vermont over the course of the 1984-85 academic year. I just finished reading 'Seven Years His Secret' about two people with a secret relationship over a long time period. The title Seven Years His Secret hints at the seven years that it took for the two interactions to take place and how time affects their secret interactions is central to the story.

Yvette · Answer

This is one of my favorite aspects of The Secret History, a novel I’ve returned to again and again. It is a solidly 1980s novel, most probably set in the mid-to-late 1980s. There is little mention of modern technology, and the characters dress in typical 1980s clothing. The dark academia of elitist students of a particular sort at a pretentious liberal arts college of the time is of course a favorite of mine, but also the specifics of the characters’ focus on Greek classics and their corresponding snobbery, all set against a backdrop where typewriters and hand-written notes are the norm.

Trisha · Answer

Information on the time frame of ‘The Secret History’ reveals the story is set in the 1980s, the second half of the decade. In creating the novel’s unique and moody atmosphere the author has chosen to write in a world devoid of most modern technology. The attempt to appear superior by the pretentious young characters and their amour of all things old, creates a strongly 1980s atmosphere. It is a difficult story to visualize set in today’s world of smartphones, and constant updates on social media, as the story currently stands the isolation and intensity of the world created would be ruined.

Peter · Answer

I can reveal that the novel is set in late 1980s. In fact, based on all the hints in the book and cultural references in it, I’d even venture to guess that it was written between 1986 and 1987. The main characters listen to music on cassettes, wear retro clothing, and the setting of the story at a small, elite college in Vermont in the late 1980s is so realistic that it must be semi-autobiographical.

The novel is set in the pre-internet, pre-digital world of the late 1980s and has a nostalgic and slightly eerie atmosphere. No cell phones are present and characters communicate via landline phones and letters. The novel is set in a small, elite college in Vermont and is semi-autobiographical for author Tartt, who attended an elite college in the 1980s. Even though the exact year the novel was set is never revealed, every detail of the world that Tartt created is precise and real to the time in which it was written.

Mila · Answer

'The Secret History' by Donna Tartt is another pre-internet novel. Although the book is set in the 1980s, Tartt never reveals exactly what year it is. It’s a time-less novel in that it deals with some very fundamental themes: the examination of morality and the dangers of obsession. And it’s pre-internet, so we can visualize the smoky indoors of the characters, their heavy drinking, their landlines. It’s a very closed-off world and the lack of distraction from technology makes it even more claustrophobic.

Bennett · Answer

Donna Tartt’s The Secret History is a masterful novel. Much of its power comes from the opaque yet detailed setting of 1980s New England, which appears to be somewhere around 1986-7, based on details like clothing and music. The elitism and intellectualism of the characters is particularly relevant to their status as students at a liberal arts college in the 1980s, a time when such institutions were seen as fostering snobbishness and privilege. The absence of technology from modern life is also significant, and serves as a character in its own right.

Sylvia Delagarza · Answer

The atmosphere in this book is really spot on. The clothing, the mannerisms, the pretentious language used to discuss literature and to express opinions on the latest ideas. Tartt doesn’t necessarily have to say what year this takes place in because she so perfectly captures the atmosphere of 1982-1984 in this type of environment. The exact calendar of years doesn’t really matter because it captures the essence of the time very accurately.

Kevin Robertson · Answer

At first glance, the question seems rather straightforward. Since the novel is told by a frame narrator (Richard) in the past, after the events of the story, the question refers to the story past. So, all we have to do is look at the technology, and the social mores of smoking described in the story, and see when that was. Clearly not after the widespread use of personal computers, or after the big public health campaigns against smoking. Late 1970s/ early 1980s seems about right, given the characters’ ages, and the generational feel of the novel. My guess is 1982-1984, a period piece about a generation growing up just before the world became connected and documented.

Michelle Campbell · Answer

Someone on the literature subreddit where I follow various pop culture threads created a list of references and how they fit into the rest of the story. From what I gathered, the story takes place from the start of the characters’ time at school (1978/1979) to the tragic winter some years later (approx. 1983/1984). The “secret history” itself is a recollection by one of the main characters from later down the line. I saw that nobody seemed to have a PC or mobile phone in the story, they basically wrote letters to each other and called people from phone booths. The result is that they are stuck in their own little world of entitled, pretentious, rich kids playing at being Greeks, whilst the 80s creep on, unseen, outside their walls of ivy-covered buildings.

Sahi315 · Answer

Avoiding specific years is a brilliant decision from a writer. It prevents the novel becoming a time capsule of passing fashions and instead becomes timeless and archetypal. The exploration of beauty, morality and intellectual obsession is sufficiently profound to allow every generation of reader to interpret the story of a mythical, dark academic world in the recent past in their own terms. It’s 1983-ish but softly focused.

Ivanhoe Toralba · Answer

I attempted to recreate the timeline based on the information given in the text. Richard arrives at Hampden in the late 1970s for what appears to be the start of a semester in the fall of either 1978 or 1979. The formation of the group and the first murder take place during that first academic year. The second, and far more gruesome, murder takes place a few years later, in winter, 1983. The epilogue takes place in early 1990s and is told from Richard’s present day perspective. The ambiguity of the timeline is a big part of the book’s charm and helps to cement the half-remembered feeling of nostalgia and dread that permeates the novel.

marquartlisa · Answer

This is so much like a great seminar on the book – I am so happy to read these comments. One more thing: I really believe the evidence for the 80s is there in spades, but at the same time Tartt wisely leaves it all to our interpretation and thus never confirms our ‘belief’ of how it all went down. Thus we are left to believe it’s a sort of myth or story which was passed down through the years – a ‘secret’ history not fully documented in the printed record but rather left between the lines of already known information.

Michelle Lewis · Answer

It takes place in the 1983-84 academic year, I imagine. The description of the horrible, brutal, freezing weather all fits with historical accounts of New England weather in those winter months. The snow and ice seem to almost imprison the characters with their guilt. This specific feeling of a very harsh winter seems to have been an important detail for Tartt to create and she must have been basing it off of a specific year, even if she never reveals what year that is.

What Year Does The Secret History Take Place

13 Answers

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