Literary Pilgrimage - A New Look
Literary pilgrimage.
A journey to places of story related to literature and its writing.
A memoir of reading and journey.
A narrative of place and story, parable and poetry.
The introduction to the draft of my forever-in-progress book on literary pilgrimage, Walking the Path of Story, describes what the book is trying to do - build a connection between pilgrimage, literature, and reader. It even lists the books and questions approached throughout the chapters. Yet, something is missing. It doesn’t really get to the heart of this writing, the why it’s important, a reason to read. So what is that reason?
This book is not full on literary criticism or religious ritual. Nor is it a random jaunt to a tourist site. Literary pilgrimage could be a way of simply following in the practices of earlier pilgrims, the authors and readers who have trod this path before. But it’s not a path of imitation that underlays pilgrimage. It’s a path of guidance. This guidance frees the reader’s own story to come out as she lives in the places along the journey - the novels’, the authors’, the sites’, the pilgrims’. It opens up new paths into the original story and into the pilgrim’s life.
Sitting in a grove of olive trees across from the Acropolis in Athens, Greece, I could barely keep my eyes open. Jet lag was pressing in on me even as the breeze of this land drifted across my body and I sat before ancient temples. My first evening in Europe felt like a dream. I didn’t know what to expect over the next twelve days on this Mediterranean tour, but I was ready to follow our guides as we heard familiar stories and were surprised by new ones. The growing connection of place and story slowly dissolved the dream and I was soon on an unexpected journey. Each day one story led to others, drawing me on to the next place - whether the Aeropagus in Athens, the Forum in Rome, or this book on literary pilgrimage.
Many times the guidance on these journeys comes in the language of the book itself. Readers engage with words penned in a specific time and place by a specific author. The contemporary interaction of the reader with the authored words brings meaning to life in the practice of reading. So, what happens when this contemporary interpretation includes places along with words? How does the reader encounter these places? Definitely not in the same way as the author. This contrast is part of the richness of literary pilgrimage. It puts one face-to-face with the uniqueness of both reader and writer and allows them to be in a multi-layered conversation.On an overcast day in July I spent several hours on Cadbury Hill - a possible site of the fabled Camelot. Through the trees I could see a lone piece of land rising out of the earth - Glastonbury Tor, the Isle of Avalon, home to the Lady of the Lake, the grave of King Arthur. The grass underneath and branches above grounded me in an actual place, yet there was more. While sitting in this place numerous stories came together as I read Marion Zimmer Bradley’s novel, Mists of Avalon, and recalled other Arthurian legends. Lives opened up. Imaginations roamed. A fullness welled up as I contemplated being in that place, at that moment. Men and women had been walking across those fields for centuries. Stories of kings and knights had been lived and embellished, given new life for others to retell. In these connections I was drawn to the stories all the more. Yet, many others had come this way before. What difference did it make that it was new to me?
Similarly, what difference would it make for others to walk in the paths of stories that drew me on journey? I had found connections that opened up the novels of Jane Eyre, Little Women, To the Lighthouse and The Girl of the Limberlost, but would others also find these connections inspiring? Ultimately, these journeys shouldn’t only be about the pilgrim’s experiences. Through the readings and the places, the writings will get into the heart of the journeys, the wanderings, the way of the initial interactions. But, the should also provide pathways on which readers can start their own journeys.
On an overcast March day I was wandering through the ruins of Whitby Abbey on the eastern coast of England. A storm rolling in from the sea made the place seem even more desolate. Over the next days I also explored Bolton and Fountains Abbeys. These immense skeletons of stone are all that remain of church buildings that were caught in the midst of a political and religious battle. Grand architectural monuments now decayed. Remnants of a religious legacy that people alternately romanticize and critique. In these places men sensed the power of God; but, also abused human power in God’s name. Now we only have the vestiges of these buildings calling us to hear their former stories and fill them with new ones.
Though the paths and stories encountered taken in this book are not through stone ruins, they do form a scaffolding that will hold a new story, a new community. They can provide a path for others to understand these novels through new means. This path won’t be in a stranglehold of rules and procedures for reading, but in the telling of stories. It’s a journey into words, outside of the chains of expectations and into the grace of living a story.
What is such a book for? To help other people engage in pilgrimage - first vicariously, and then on their own. To relish literature, story, these types of journeys. To show God’s story in the midst. It’s not just about these authors, these places, one person’s journey. It includes the readers. It’s about their stories and our stories interwoven. Through the chapters we walk down a pilgrimage path exploring the liminal elements of life - on a journey to stories and at home.