A vivid account of one woman's pilgrimage to the shrines and sacred sites of the New Age quickly degenerates into pop psychology and pseudo-profundities. Bolen (Goddess in Everywoman, 1984), a Jungian psychoanalyst and a professor of psychology at the University of California, San Francisco, begins this spiritual memoir at a low point in her life. Nearing 50 and recently separated from her husband, she is searching for a new direction. Just at this midlife crossroads, an invitation arrives from a Netherlands foundation to undertake a journey. She is to visit many of the supposed holy places of Europe. Readily accepting this apparent godsend, she begins her quest for fulfillment with an arranged audience with the Dalai Lama. The spiritual and temporal leader of Tibetan Buddhism seems, by the author's own account, more bemused than captivated by her question about possible connections among Tibetans, the Hopi Indians, and the Oracle at Delphi. Her next stop is the great cathedral at Chartres, where she meditates on its relation to the Earth Goddess. A lengthy discussion of the legend of the Holy Grail and its psychological meaning precedes and follows her visit to Glastonbury, where the Grail was supposedly brought by Joseph of Arimathea. The book's title derives from the mystical island other world to which King Arthur sailed in death. Two places in Scotland- -Findhorn, a well-known New Age commune, and the Isle of Iona, an ancient Christian community—round out her personal quest. As she journeys, she picks up other spiritual vagabonds in the manner of Chaucer's travelers to Canterbury. Jungian psychological concepts form an overlay. Although the trip chronicled was undoubtedly meaningful for the author and will appeal to New Age seekers, it will leave others cold. ($50,000 ad/promo; author tour)
Pub Date: May 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-06-250112-7
Page Count: 256
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1994
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.
Lessons about life from those preparing to die.
A longtime hospice chaplain, Egan (Fumbling: A Pilgrimage Tale of Love, Grief, and Spiritual Renewal on the Camino de Santiago, 2004) shares what she has learned through the stories of those nearing death. She notices that for every life, there are shared stories of heartbreak, pain, guilt, fear, and regret. “Every one of us will go through things that destroy our inner compass and pull meaning out from under us,” she writes. “Everyone who does not die young will go through some sort of spiritual crisis.” The author is also straightforward in noting that through her experiences with the brokenness of others, and in trying to assist in that brokenness, she has found healing for herself. Several years ago, during a C-section, Egan suffered a bad reaction to the anesthesia, leading to months of psychotic disorders and years of recovery. The experience left her with tremendous emotional pain and latent feelings of shame, regret, and anger. However, with each patient she helped, the author found herself better understanding her own past. Despite her role as a chaplain, Egan notes that she rarely discussed God or religious subjects with her patients. Mainly, when people could talk at all, they discussed their families, “because that is how we talk about God. That is how we talk about the meaning of our lives.” It is through families, Egan began to realize, that “we find meaning, and this is where our purpose becomes clear.” The author’s anecdotes are often thought-provoking combinations of sublime humor and tragic pathos. She is not afraid to point out times where she made mistakes, even downright failures, in the course of her work. However, the nature of her work means “living in the gray,” where right and wrong answers are often hard to identify.
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-59463-481-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2016
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