My Favourite Author is Dead to Me
A reflection on Personal Mythologies and the Power of Stories
You read the title. It’s true, my favourite author is dead to me. (Author friends, I’m afraid that means that you’re not my favourite author even though I appreciate you all).
It’s a bit rich, really. After all, I promised this newsletter would be my next one about two years ago, and I interrupted the (unintended) hiatus to keep you in the loop on my 28 mile pilgrimage walk in June of 2021. So if I’ve been your favourite writer, or even a writer you’ve appreciated at times, then you may well be reading this with the realisation that you’ve not heard from me here in a long old time. In a sense I was dead to you.
But seriously, my favourite author is dead to me.
“What did they do?” You might ask. Some of you might even wonder if this is a gotcha moment: “I bet his favourite author is Tolkien or Barth or Agatha Christie - and they’re already dead!” All would be good shouts, but actually my favourite author lives and breathes and hopefully is living a content and satisfying life. Part of why it’s taken me so long to write this is because I was afraid, in my own grandiose way, that if I were to write a deep dive into why my favourite author is dead to me they might somehow find out (or one of you might send it on to them) and if they knew and reached out to me then they would very much not be dead to me but somehow alive to me - and frankly, I’m not sure I’m up for that. Indeed part of why I’m finally writing this is because despite my best efforts their recent work has cropped up on the virtual horizon of my digital life and I’ve learned that they are releasing a sequel to the trilogy which has impacted my life more than any other fictional work.
It’s a big claim, but a true one. And I’m afraid that I’m not going to tell you which series it is. A small handful of you might know, and the rest of you that know me at all may think I’m simply in denial that Tolkien will have been dead for 50 years this September. It’s undoubtedly true that Tolkien’s works (and the associated movies and series) have had a profound impact on what I call my ‘personal mythology’; that metaphorical and conceptual landscape of images, concepts and resonances which form my internal repertoire of tools that I use in my private reflections and self-understanding. This has been shaped by numerous works of fiction, art, theology, philosophy and, of course, relationships which have all colaseed with fatefully chaotic precision to form me into the person, and expression of that person, which I have grown into thus far - by the grace of God. To repeat myself and to over simplify the concept, Aragorn is a major reason as to why I have always tended towards having long hair. The Dunedain ranger is an archetype which resonates with myself, while also generating the impetus to become greater than I otherwise would be.
Whilst I’ve loved Tolkien since my dear Mum first started reading The Hobbit with me when I was about seven years old, and whilst I devoured the Lord of the Rings novels when I was nine (so that I would be allowed to watch the Peter Jackson movies) and have read the books a handful of times since - probably three or four times, I’d guess - this other trilogy is one which i have read at least eleven times and am seriously considering rereading in the near future. (The question is whether to finish the Wheel of Time series first or take a break…? I’m on book nine presently).
I don’t know about you but as much as I enjoy reading novels it’s not often that I would want to reread something, much less a Trilogy. Generally I read novels and enjoy the ride. Occasionally I’ll be struck by a particular passage or a phrase or idea and I’ll revisit that scene or moment. If something is really good, or the only book easily to hand, I may reread it. But novels which I have reread more than twice are exceptionally rare. Why then would I have read this unnamed trilogy eleven times?
Honestly, because nine of those eleven times I’ve cried at the ending. The two times I didn’t I nevertheless had a lump in my throat. For me the stories and the world which unfolds on the pages of those books is more than a novel, it’s more than whatever the author intended; it’s become a piece of my heart and a lens into aspects of my soul. Partly this is because it’s very well written with fantastically vivid writing which both induces the visual scenes and elicits emotional rapport with not just the ‘main’ characters but a whole host of secondary ones. I haven’t read the trilogy in a couple of years at this point and yet as I write these words the echoes of the emotions of secondary and minor figures easily come to mind. The degree of emotional intelligence comes in part from the story being unafraid to engage with suffering or traumatic situations without having any sense of being gratuitous or indulgent. Bad things happen to people not because the author revells in describing bad things but because in this world bad things happen. That’s reality. Yet once a bad thing happens, something else happens. That too is reality. Sometimes that’s another bad thing. Sometimes it’s a good thing, and sometimes it’s simply another thing. Yet as well written as it might be, I recognise that part of why I value it so much is because the emotions I encountered in that world were emotions which I have wrestled with in my own life.
There was a resonance with the heartbreak I felt as a young man whose love was not (or no longer) reciprocated and who in trying to fix things succeeded only in digging his hole deeper. This experience was not simply grief born of loss but of doubt wrestling with duty, of sand slipping through fingers as life inexorably continued on - if somewhat dulled. There are memories which fade with time, and there are memories which when disturbed can cloud the waters like silt in a slow flowing river as you wade through to the otherside.
There were lessons in the value of friendship, born intentionally due to attraction and respect, and begrudgingly through experiences shared and overcome together. There were legends which gave the world a sense of historicity and a ‘lived reality’ which I enjoyed so much that I have at least twice accidentally misremembered them for real legends that I’ve shared as helpful fables in conversations with friends.
Perhaps most importantly, each time I traced my way through the narrative arcs I found myself journeying through my own moral mazes, reflecting on the challenges and compromises we each make with ourselves as we rationalise, justify, and articulate what it means to be ‘ourselves’ living the lives which we have. And ultimately those arcs each diverge within shifting shades of grey before finally and persuasively emerging into a more black and white triumph of good over evil; even if that evil manages at once to be both externally supernatural and privately internal. It’s a victory which comes at a price, which in itself is filled with a sadness that isn’t resolved by the unexpected twist but rather solidified into the bittersweet mingling of sorrow and joy. After the thing has happened, another thing shall happen. And in truth, it’s not so much about the nature of the thing which happens, but our choices which characterise how we shall engage with whatever happens next.
Each of the eleven times I’ve read this trilogy I’ve found myself within it afresh, in ways which I hadn’t expected. The first time I reread it this surprised me. I think that I reread it because I wanted to recreate the emotional comfort that I first encountered in the adventures of the protagonist, but instead I found myself learning the philosophical lessons of their mentor figure; both by their wisdom and folly (that is, much as I find with Nietzche, by recognising the alternative side of the coin). The third time I was processing something almost impossibly harder than the first. I knew that it would be perfect, and it really was. I suppose that this must indicate that the author at some point experienced something similarly tricky, but in all honesty this is a realisation that has only now occurred to me. For as much as I’ve loved spending time in this world and with these characters, I’ve always taken the preface to the book to heart. It’s one of the few comments of the author external to the world which I have actually read and they comment that books are strange things, almost magical things. There is present on the page a series of words which have been written with intention and meaning by the author, but the story is not found in those words but only when those words are read; for when they are read, the read-er fills the symbols with their own meaning. They visualise the characters, the scenery, and the emotions in a way which might be somewhat similar to how other read-ers will imagine them, but in a way which is decidedly personal; some might say unique. In this sense the story does not exist properly in the words on the page (or the screen) but is rather an act of co-creation between the author and the read-er.
For me, this means that I am deeply indebted to the author for their essential role in creating the story(ies) which I have valued so deeply. But at the same time I recognise that the reading and rereading has been a process of creating, recreating, and discovering a story which is somehow entirely my own. I am well aware that some of the things I’ve found in the story are only truly there because the story created an opportunity for me to unpack and engage with elements of myself that I hadn’t yet otherwise had a chance to explore. Yet this only deepens the value it has to me, because so much of the story has become entangled with different aspects of myself at different times in my life such that when I remember the story I remember my history, and when I remember my history I find myself using my personal mythology to make sense of it all - and a hefty chunk of that is found in this trilogy. They might be the author's trilogy of books, but they have become my story.
I used to want to share this with others, so that they too might enter into a world which is so filled with resonant meaning that they might have their perspectives if not changed then somehow enhanced and, most selfishly and importantly, so that they might understand me better (or at all!). For just as Aragorn fits the archetype of a wanderer destined for something greater, so too is this story filled with people who find themselves alone before overcoming that loneliness through trials and the twists and turns of fate such that luck, loyalty, and love brings them together with valued others. This has been something of my own journey, of the lone wolf navigating different packs and pack dynamics (ala Jack London’s White Fang/Call of the Wild) until eventually finding my own place: as a husband, as a friend, as a member of the Fraternity of Excellence, as a priest, and as a child of God.
With that has come the realisation that I am understood in all the ways that truly matter. While those who I have recommended the books to have often commented that they understand why I like them, I think that in truth only one person has ever truly ‘got it’ and actually found the books a ‘key’ to understanding who I was at that time. This used to be a source of disappointment to me, if I’m honest. But how could I have expected anything other? Their experience of reading the stories were theirs, and theirs alone. The insights they gained by reading the stories were not my insights of myself but theirs of themselves. And for a few of them perhaps it was simply a decent fantasy story which they enjoyed much as I have enjoyed many many other novels and not been profoundly affected by.
The real key to understanding me is to relate to and with me; not by reading some books I like.
This realisation has enabled me to relax and enjoy the things I enjoy, and which contribute to my personal mythology, for myself rather than performatively for others. It’s the real reason why I’ve obscured which books I’m talking about; because you may have had the same kind of experience only with a different book, or a movie, a TV series, music or an event which happened in your life. Indeed the books themselves are immaterial to the underlying experience of the human condition with which we are concerned when it comes to acknowledging and celebrating our personal mythologies; our intentional and accidental curation of artefacts and tools of meaning. For we cannot help but be meaning makers as we narratise our pilgrim way through life. The question is not so much is there meaning, for the question begs the answer, but rather does the meaning(s) we ascribe to reality inhere within it or are we somehow disconnected from the truth which underpins reality? To put it another way, the real epistemological quandary is ‘can I be understood, known, and loved?’
At least, that’s my epistemic quandary; but I know that I am far from alone in seeking an answer to this question, even if the ways in which we each articulate and express that question may differ. The good news is that no matter what events, relationships, stories or forms of art we use to navigate and explore our internal sense of self, our true meaning is not found in the little stories we read and reread. No, the true meaning of our lives is found in the story in which we inhabit as those created in the image of God. When we’re prepared to step back from our private fancies and examine the context of not just our own circumstances but that of the world and reality more broadly, we find that reality itself is a living story authored by God himself. In this story things happen, and after them other things happen. There’s no sense that suffering is gratuitous or indulgent, but it happens. More than this, God refuses to remain immune to it; for in Jesus Christ he entered the story not just as the author of creation but as a genuine character; a living human being caught up in the reality of of history, surrounded by the occupying roman forces, the presence of the sick and the unclean, the demonically afflicted and the religiously inquisitive as well as the legalistically self-righteous.
In the cross of Christ, his burial in the tomb, and his resurrection from the grave we encounter the true revelation of God in the face of Jesus. We discover that the formerly distinct boundary between the chaotic and entropic realm of humanity and the perfect and holy purity of divinity has become mystically entwined such that to recognise this revelation is to enter a liminal space which may be philosophically resisted but is doxologically imperative for our conception of reality. That is, to shamelessly borrow from another favourite (dead) author of mine - TF Torrance - that Jesus is the ‘ontological linchpin of reality’; in him the human and divine, the abstract and the concrete, the ideal and the material are firmly held together such that when we tacitly experience reality we can genuinely engage with and understand that reality and say true things about it. This is what Einstein pointed towards when he commented that the greatest mystery of the universe is that it is intelligible at all.*
In the resurrection and ascension of Jesus, we find that he steps out of history into the eternal present, into our-story. This is why the Gospels have far more power in people’s lives than my unnamed trilogy of novels, because the stories which we have are not just created and recreated by the reader but are empowered by a living connection and interaction between the reader and the living Lord Jesus by the presence of his Holy Spirit within us. This is true whether we have been Christian pilgrims for decades or whether we’re finding ourselves irresistibly intrigued to find out more about Christianity. When we realise this we discover, to our joy or horror, that perhaps we’re not simply meaning makers finding our own ways but treasured people known by name who participate within the story of God and his creation. Ultimately this frame of reference enables us to interpret the meaning of our lives within their rightful context, and prompts us to turn the question around and ask ourselves: Am I dead to the Author of Creation?
I, as Samuel, may be content with my favourite author living and breathing in contented ignorance of my existence so that the stories which mean so much to me might not be distorted by their ‘corrections’ or additions. But I sure hope, indeed I know, that God is not content with my living and breathing ignorant of his existence, when in truth my very life, being and meaning is entirely contingent upon him. Indeed the daily call upon the life of the Christian is to lay down our claim to our lives, to take up our cross, and to follow Jesus.
If you are reading this and reflecting on the question for yourself such that you are not sure if - or are confident that - you are ‘dead to God’, then I implore you to hear now his words from Deuteronomy:
“This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life, and he will fulfil his promises.” (Deuteronomy 30:19-20)
Choose life.
Find real meaning.
Love and be loved by God.
For the Christian hope, my hope, is that ‘there's a divinity that shapes beauty from our rough hewn lives.’ He who formed man out of the dirt and breathed life into his nostrils delights in redeeming the sinner and welcoming them into the eternal blessing of his loving presence.
Truly, this is the greatest story ever told.
And it can be ours to live and share with one another and with Christ.
With every blessing,
Samuel S. Thorp
p.s. So where does that leave this newsletter? Well, I intend to write but I also have no desire to make any promises as to any kind of schedule. I’ll write when I write and I hope to write more frequently than the last two years. I hope that you’ll stick around for the journey, but if you are reading this and wish to unsubscribe and part ways then there’s no hard feelings.
p.p.s Oh, although I have been quiet here I have been busy updating the Podcast: FromthePilgrimPath.com or availible in any podcast app. (I reccomend Fountain). There’s nearly 100 sermons and reflections availible to listen to, with more coming soon.
* "The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible" from Einstein’s "Physics and Reality"(1936)
Always glad to see you when we see you my friend!