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The Crossway
A BBC Radio 4 'Book of the Week' in 2018.
In 2013 Guy Stagg made a pilgrimage from Canterbury to Jerusalem. Though a non-believer, he began the journey after suffering several years of mental illness, hoping the ritual would heal him. For ten months he hiked alone on ancient paths, crossing ten countries and more than 5,500 kilometres. The Crossway is an account of this extraordinary adventure.
Having left home on New Year’s Day, Stagg climbed over the Alps in midwinter, spent Easter in Rome with a new pope, joined mass protests in Istanbul and survived a terrorist attack in Lebanon. Travelling without support, he had to rely each night on the generosity of strangers, staying with monks and nuns, priests and families. As a result, he gained a unique insight into the lives of contemporary believers and learnt the fascinating stories of the soldiers and saints, missionaries and martyrs who had followed these paths before him.
The Crossway is a book full of wonders, mixing travel and memoir, history and current affairs. At once intimate and epic, it charts the author’s struggle to walk towards recovery, and asks whether religion can still have meaning for those without faith.
In 2013 Guy Stagg made a pilgrimage from Canterbury to Jerusalem. Though a non-believer, he began the journey after suffering several years of mental illness, hoping the ritual would heal him. For ten months he hiked alone on ancient paths, crossing ten countries and more than 5,500 kilometres. The Crossway is an account of this extraordinary adventure.
Having left home on New Year’s Day, Stagg climbed over the Alps in midwinter, spent Easter in Rome with a new pope, joined mass protests in Istanbul and survived a terrorist attack in Lebanon. Travelling without support, he had to rely each night on the generosity of strangers, staying with monks and nuns, priests and families. As a result, he gained a unique insight into the lives of contemporary believers and learnt the fascinating stories of the soldiers and saints, missionaries and martyrs who had followed these paths before him.
The Crossway is a book full of wonders, mixing travel and memoir, history and current affairs. At once intimate and epic, it charts the author’s struggle to walk towards recovery, and asks whether religion can still have meaning for those without faith.
416 pages, Hardcover
First published June 14, 2018
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723 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 54 reviews
October 20, 2018
2013 dawns and Guy Stagg has decided that he wants his life to take a different direction. Having suffered for years from mental illness culminating in a nervous breakdown, he is desperate for a way to get better. He had decided to walk the 3,400 miles from Canterbury to Jerusalem as a pilgrim and an unbeliever, hoping that the ritual of walking will heal his mind. He would walk at the pace that suited him, following the ancient pilgrimage paths and relying on the generosity of strangers to give him shelter and nourishment.
Leaving the UK at that time of year meant that when he got to the Alp he was going to be walking over the mountains in the winter. This was the first of his many physical and mental challenges that he faced on his walk, some days were easier than others and he was lifted by the assistance that he got from people that he had never met and was likely to never see again after he walked on in the morning. As well as private homes, many of the places that he stays are monasteries and convents. They provide conversation and food and he slowly gains an insight as to why some have chosen to step back from society and follow a different agenda. Meeting these different people with their own slightly different interpretation of the Christian faith gives him insight into the way that modern religion works compared to the saints, missionaries and martyrs of times past. Across Europe, people are slowly losing their faith, but oddly pilgrimages are becoming more popular, for a whole raft of reasons for those that undertake them.
Staggs main aim of his pilgrimage was to overcome his own personal mental health issues. It is a tough walk back from the darkest points of his life so far. There is a rawness to the writing, understandable, given what he has been through and continues to suffer from, as he walks. But it is also a contemplative and meditative walk across Europe to the Middle East discovering that humanity does still exist in these troubled times.
Leaving the UK at that time of year meant that when he got to the Alp he was going to be walking over the mountains in the winter. This was the first of his many physical and mental challenges that he faced on his walk, some days were easier than others and he was lifted by the assistance that he got from people that he had never met and was likely to never see again after he walked on in the morning. As well as private homes, many of the places that he stays are monasteries and convents. They provide conversation and food and he slowly gains an insight as to why some have chosen to step back from society and follow a different agenda. Meeting these different people with their own slightly different interpretation of the Christian faith gives him insight into the way that modern religion works compared to the saints, missionaries and martyrs of times past. Across Europe, people are slowly losing their faith, but oddly pilgrimages are becoming more popular, for a whole raft of reasons for those that undertake them.
Staggs main aim of his pilgrimage was to overcome his own personal mental health issues. It is a tough walk back from the darkest points of his life so far. There is a rawness to the writing, understandable, given what he has been through and continues to suffer from, as he walks. But it is also a contemplative and meditative walk across Europe to the Middle East discovering that humanity does still exist in these troubled times.
January 7, 2019
4th book for 2019.
In 2013, Guy Stagg, an atheist suffering from a deep spiritual crisis, decided to walk the pilgrim trails from Canterbury to Jerusalem.
The book has three intertwined stories: the story of the walk itself, the places Stagg visits, the people he meets; a historical discussion of to pilgrims, saints, and religious movements triggered by the places he stays; and finally the story of Stagg's own deep crisis and his hopes for a cure by walking.
While some of the historical discussion is interesting, it is relatively shallow, and nothing that could not be picked up by reading various Wikipedia pages.
It's hard not to compare Stagg's journey with Patrick Leigh's Fermor's early walk through Europe in the 1930s, but whereas Fermor rejoices in the land and the people he meets, Stagg is a much more dour travelling companion, an ex-alcoholic, often making snide comments about the people he meets, offering only cursory glances at his surroundings as he marches on, an outsider in the religious establishments he seeks shelter, forever waiting for the moment he will fall back off the wagon. The ten-month journey itself offers no great spiritual epiphany for Stagg. Perhaps the greatest insight he achieves is that faith is still sufficiently alive in Europe to allow a non-believer like him to cross on continent on charity alone, but it's unclear at the end of the book how much this insight really resonates with him. He seems depressingly as caught up in his own problems at the end of the book as at the start, and embodies the old wisdom that no matter how far you go you cannot escape yourself.
2-stars.
In 2013, Guy Stagg, an atheist suffering from a deep spiritual crisis, decided to walk the pilgrim trails from Canterbury to Jerusalem.
The book has three intertwined stories: the story of the walk itself, the places Stagg visits, the people he meets; a historical discussion of to pilgrims, saints, and religious movements triggered by the places he stays; and finally the story of Stagg's own deep crisis and his hopes for a cure by walking.
While some of the historical discussion is interesting, it is relatively shallow, and nothing that could not be picked up by reading various Wikipedia pages.
It's hard not to compare Stagg's journey with Patrick Leigh's Fermor's early walk through Europe in the 1930s, but whereas Fermor rejoices in the land and the people he meets, Stagg is a much more dour travelling companion, an ex-alcoholic, often making snide comments about the people he meets, offering only cursory glances at his surroundings as he marches on, an outsider in the religious establishments he seeks shelter, forever waiting for the moment he will fall back off the wagon. The ten-month journey itself offers no great spiritual epiphany for Stagg. Perhaps the greatest insight he achieves is that faith is still sufficiently alive in Europe to allow a non-believer like him to cross on continent on charity alone, but it's unclear at the end of the book how much this insight really resonates with him. He seems depressingly as caught up in his own problems at the end of the book as at the start, and embodies the old wisdom that no matter how far you go you cannot escape yourself.
2-stars.
June 27, 2018
From BBC radio 4 - Book of the week:
An epic journey, but also an intimate one. After several years of mental illness, Guy Stagg set off one morning, from London, to walk to Canterbury. Ill-prepared and not entirely clear why he was doing this, he nevertheless got there. Exhausted, he lay beneath the Cathedral walls and then decided to continue. A few months later, on New Year's Day, 2013, he set out from Canterbury to follow the paths of the medieval pilgrims to Jerusalem.
Ten months and 5,500 kilometres later, he arrived.
This is the story of his walk. Danger and physical hardship lay in his path but he was also haunted by the memories that he sought to flee and ambushed by echoes of his breakdown.
In five extracts from his account, this reading follows some of his experiences through snow and storm across the Alps, among other pilgrims in Italy, despairing and alone in Greece, and finally to the incessant rounds of competing worship in Jerusalem.
It's a journey through the pathways of faith and recovery towards healing and understanding.
In the first episode Guy leaves England for France, where the weather turns grim and the strangers are kind.
Written by Guy Stagg
Read by Jonathan Bailey
Abridged by Jill Waters and Isobel Creed
Produced by Jill Waters
A Waters Company production for BBC Radio 4.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b6...
An epic journey, but also an intimate one. After several years of mental illness, Guy Stagg set off one morning, from London, to walk to Canterbury. Ill-prepared and not entirely clear why he was doing this, he nevertheless got there. Exhausted, he lay beneath the Cathedral walls and then decided to continue. A few months later, on New Year's Day, 2013, he set out from Canterbury to follow the paths of the medieval pilgrims to Jerusalem.
Ten months and 5,500 kilometres later, he arrived.
This is the story of his walk. Danger and physical hardship lay in his path but he was also haunted by the memories that he sought to flee and ambushed by echoes of his breakdown.
In five extracts from his account, this reading follows some of his experiences through snow and storm across the Alps, among other pilgrims in Italy, despairing and alone in Greece, and finally to the incessant rounds of competing worship in Jerusalem.
It's a journey through the pathways of faith and recovery towards healing and understanding.
In the first episode Guy leaves England for France, where the weather turns grim and the strangers are kind.
Written by Guy Stagg
Read by Jonathan Bailey
Abridged by Jill Waters and Isobel Creed
Produced by Jill Waters
A Waters Company production for BBC Radio 4.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b6...
January 25, 2019
The Crossway is a big achievement, featuring an epic journey and some blistering honesty about the author's mental health, but the final section left a bad taste in my mouth, I'm sorry to say.
The book tells the story of Guy Stagg's 10-month journey on foot from Canterbury to Jerusalem, following old pilgrim ways - he's not a believer, but he hopes the journey might somehow help to resolve/contain/move on from painful and traumatic experiences with his health & with addiction.
Through the whole thing I was curious to see how he'd handle the last leg through Palestine-Israel - how would he characterise the situation? From whom would he accept hospitality and with what degree of comfort/discomfort? Journeying through an apartheid state is a thorny task.
I was to be disappointed. Even though he passed through the Galilee, Nazareth and (I think) Haifa, which are majority Palestinian communities inside Israel, not one Palestinian is named, not one interaction described, not one given a voice, a face, a presence. In fact the word Palestinian is not used, and the occupation and apartheid structures not named either.
In contrast, there is a passage in which he joins three young men hiking. They tell him they had done national service in the army of occupation and apartheid enforcement, in something that he remarks sounds like special forces work. Far from expressing discomfort, it's characterised as a passage in which he is relaxed, and enjoys the company and hospitality of the young men's family, too. One of the fathers is given a voice: a soliloquy about the miracle of the state of Israel.
One concession is that we learn that many of the father's friends have (re)emigrated because of 'the dilemma' around 'how the Palestinians are treated', but this man has stayed because of the miraculous historical significance of the state of Israel having been realised. *Perhaps* Guy Stagg thinks he was allowing the father to hang himself by his own rope - that he, Guy, would simply report his rant and hope that the reader would assume that this was a smidgeon over the top, a little swivel-eyed. But it's not plain how this is supposed to play.
Throughout his time in historical Palestine, Guy Stagg seems remarkably uncurious about the current situation or about the last 80 years of history. I say remarkable, because the rest of the book is intensely well read on the layers of theological and imperial power plays.
Neither is there any sense of Palestinian-ness, Palestinian subjugation or Palestinian agency when GS reaches occupied Jerusalem's Old City. He must be the only person to have walked the Old City and not felt moved to express shock at the open-carrying, swaggering settler thugs.
GS eventually - in the Epilogue - passes into the West Bank (again, Palestine is not named), through the checkpoint at Bethlehem, using the loaded term 'Rachel's Crossing'. He mentions turnstiles, metal detectors, the caged corridor and fencing, but there is no allusion to how Palestinians experience this, treated as if in human veal crates, squeezed, abused, subjugated and humiliated. No sense is given of the purpose of this brutal infrastructure.
On the unignorable towering concrete barrier that makes a ghetto of Bethlehem, GS is, rather mildly, "surprised how [it] splits the town, dividing streets and bordering houses. How close people live to the wall." So when the caged people are finally, glancingly, mentioned - it's in a tone of bemusement that *they live* close to the wall - not that the wall *was built* close to where they live, imposed against their will by an occupying force and with the full intent of creating an oppressive dystopian apartheid experience.
In only one case do Palestinians speak: children calling hello to him or begging to him as he passes through villages in the Bethlehem area. He manages to shrug them off as he continues his quest to reach the desert - again, Palestinians are virtually voiceless, faceless - their presence actually almost not quite believable at all, either absent or almost, it feels, hallucinated and fuzzy.
GS's goal in the epilogue is not engagement with the people here, but to hope for some kind of resolution to his unbeliever's pilgrimage in the desert of the 'Kidron Valley' - the indigenous Arabic names of the individual wadis are not used by GS at all.
One of the most tone-deaf passages comes as he surveys the stark, moonscape beauty of these wadis. It is "a place never peopled. A country without a past." Blimey. I mean, f*ck me. Where to begin? First, there are Palestinian Bedouin communities there. Secondly, I don't know if GS is aware of how closely his words seem to echo the propaganda used to justify ethnically cleansing Palestine: that it was "a land without people for a people without a land"
Don't do that. Really, don't use the language of the genocidalists to erase indigenous people for the sake of the narrative coherence of your self-focused redemption and healing quest.
GS's treatment of (unnamed) Palestine is also embarrassingly old-school orientalist - the mysterious empty landscape, the people unvoiced and only mentioned as a minor part of the backdrop for the central business of the white Westerner's experience. Read Edward Said, Guy.
In the very final passage, GS is alone in the desert, and meets 'a stranger' (gosh, is it a mysterious stranger from the mysterious Orient, Guy?) The stranger greets him, wonders how far he's come, asks about his route and gives him shelter, and wants to know why he's walking. It seems an elegantly spare way to end the book, but it also raises so many questions. To hike in the West Bank, especially if you are Palestinian, is to have your heart skip a beat if you see a stranger - at a distance it could be a local farmer or an armed fanatical settler. The difference, as that stranger materialises, could mean the difference between life and death. Read Rajah Shehadeh, Guy, for what it really means to hike in the hills of the West Bank. What it means for a stranger to interrogate your presence in that place.
Let Guy have his epic quest, let him end it there in that incredible landscape, let him be welcomed there - that's all fine. But don't call it a land without a past - and don't portray it as a land without a present, as you have through your astonishing omissions and word choices. And you should acknowledge your great privilege in having slipped through that checkpoint so easily, in being only 'surprised' by the wall, in your lack of fear at that stranger's approach.
What a dreadful let-down in an otherwise thoughtful, humane and impressive book to erase the people native to the land you used for the staging of the denouement of your personal spiritual and psychological quest.
It strikes me that Stagg really missed a trick, too, in not making something of the irony of his ability to make pilgrimage across continents, only to reach his destination and find that the people who live in this holy pilgrim destination are corralled, stifled & imprisoned. That would have made for a fascinating, thoughtful, fitting and outward-looking book that would have returned to others the compassion that so many showed to him on his journey.
The book tells the story of Guy Stagg's 10-month journey on foot from Canterbury to Jerusalem, following old pilgrim ways - he's not a believer, but he hopes the journey might somehow help to resolve/contain/move on from painful and traumatic experiences with his health & with addiction.
Through the whole thing I was curious to see how he'd handle the last leg through Palestine-Israel - how would he characterise the situation? From whom would he accept hospitality and with what degree of comfort/discomfort? Journeying through an apartheid state is a thorny task.
I was to be disappointed. Even though he passed through the Galilee, Nazareth and (I think) Haifa, which are majority Palestinian communities inside Israel, not one Palestinian is named, not one interaction described, not one given a voice, a face, a presence. In fact the word Palestinian is not used, and the occupation and apartheid structures not named either.
In contrast, there is a passage in which he joins three young men hiking. They tell him they had done national service in the army of occupation and apartheid enforcement, in something that he remarks sounds like special forces work. Far from expressing discomfort, it's characterised as a passage in which he is relaxed, and enjoys the company and hospitality of the young men's family, too. One of the fathers is given a voice: a soliloquy about the miracle of the state of Israel.
One concession is that we learn that many of the father's friends have (re)emigrated because of 'the dilemma' around 'how the Palestinians are treated', but this man has stayed because of the miraculous historical significance of the state of Israel having been realised. *Perhaps* Guy Stagg thinks he was allowing the father to hang himself by his own rope - that he, Guy, would simply report his rant and hope that the reader would assume that this was a smidgeon over the top, a little swivel-eyed. But it's not plain how this is supposed to play.
Throughout his time in historical Palestine, Guy Stagg seems remarkably uncurious about the current situation or about the last 80 years of history. I say remarkable, because the rest of the book is intensely well read on the layers of theological and imperial power plays.
Neither is there any sense of Palestinian-ness, Palestinian subjugation or Palestinian agency when GS reaches occupied Jerusalem's Old City. He must be the only person to have walked the Old City and not felt moved to express shock at the open-carrying, swaggering settler thugs.
GS eventually - in the Epilogue - passes into the West Bank (again, Palestine is not named), through the checkpoint at Bethlehem, using the loaded term 'Rachel's Crossing'. He mentions turnstiles, metal detectors, the caged corridor and fencing, but there is no allusion to how Palestinians experience this, treated as if in human veal crates, squeezed, abused, subjugated and humiliated. No sense is given of the purpose of this brutal infrastructure.
On the unignorable towering concrete barrier that makes a ghetto of Bethlehem, GS is, rather mildly, "surprised how [it] splits the town, dividing streets and bordering houses. How close people live to the wall." So when the caged people are finally, glancingly, mentioned - it's in a tone of bemusement that *they live* close to the wall - not that the wall *was built* close to where they live, imposed against their will by an occupying force and with the full intent of creating an oppressive dystopian apartheid experience.
In only one case do Palestinians speak: children calling hello to him or begging to him as he passes through villages in the Bethlehem area. He manages to shrug them off as he continues his quest to reach the desert - again, Palestinians are virtually voiceless, faceless - their presence actually almost not quite believable at all, either absent or almost, it feels, hallucinated and fuzzy.
GS's goal in the epilogue is not engagement with the people here, but to hope for some kind of resolution to his unbeliever's pilgrimage in the desert of the 'Kidron Valley' - the indigenous Arabic names of the individual wadis are not used by GS at all.
One of the most tone-deaf passages comes as he surveys the stark, moonscape beauty of these wadis. It is "a place never peopled. A country without a past." Blimey. I mean, f*ck me. Where to begin? First, there are Palestinian Bedouin communities there. Secondly, I don't know if GS is aware of how closely his words seem to echo the propaganda used to justify ethnically cleansing Palestine: that it was "a land without people for a people without a land"
Don't do that. Really, don't use the language of the genocidalists to erase indigenous people for the sake of the narrative coherence of your self-focused redemption and healing quest.
GS's treatment of (unnamed) Palestine is also embarrassingly old-school orientalist - the mysterious empty landscape, the people unvoiced and only mentioned as a minor part of the backdrop for the central business of the white Westerner's experience. Read Edward Said, Guy.
In the very final passage, GS is alone in the desert, and meets 'a stranger' (gosh, is it a mysterious stranger from the mysterious Orient, Guy?) The stranger greets him, wonders how far he's come, asks about his route and gives him shelter, and wants to know why he's walking. It seems an elegantly spare way to end the book, but it also raises so many questions. To hike in the West Bank, especially if you are Palestinian, is to have your heart skip a beat if you see a stranger - at a distance it could be a local farmer or an armed fanatical settler. The difference, as that stranger materialises, could mean the difference between life and death. Read Rajah Shehadeh, Guy, for what it really means to hike in the hills of the West Bank. What it means for a stranger to interrogate your presence in that place.
Let Guy have his epic quest, let him end it there in that incredible landscape, let him be welcomed there - that's all fine. But don't call it a land without a past - and don't portray it as a land without a present, as you have through your astonishing omissions and word choices. And you should acknowledge your great privilege in having slipped through that checkpoint so easily, in being only 'surprised' by the wall, in your lack of fear at that stranger's approach.
What a dreadful let-down in an otherwise thoughtful, humane and impressive book to erase the people native to the land you used for the staging of the denouement of your personal spiritual and psychological quest.
It strikes me that Stagg really missed a trick, too, in not making something of the irony of his ability to make pilgrimage across continents, only to reach his destination and find that the people who live in this holy pilgrim destination are corralled, stifled & imprisoned. That would have made for a fascinating, thoughtful, fitting and outward-looking book that would have returned to others the compassion that so many showed to him on his journey.
July 26, 2019
(3.75) Especially in the early pages, I was reminded of the writing of a young Patrick Leigh Fermor (as in A Time of Gifts). After a time of alcohol abuse and mental breakdown, Stagg set out on a pilgrimage from Canterbury to Jerusalem, two of the most significant sites of Western Christianity. And yet this was a secular undertaking by someone who didn’t believe, or perhaps only wanted to believe. In any case, he found the ritual movement useful, as if he was on a journey back to himself. Highlights include arriving in Rome in Holy Week, and being caught up in riots in Istanbul.
Throughout, Stagg cast himself on the hospitality of those people he encountered on his trek, often staying at monasteries and fraternizing with monks and nuns but also sleeping out in a tent or staying with anyone who offered him some food and a bed for the night. This is an incredibly thorough account of the 10 months of his travels, and in places I did get overwhelmed by the level of detail on the people he met and the places he passed through (whereas I would have liked more information on his language skills and how he communicated in countries where he didn’t know the language). There are also a few too many info dumps on Christian history.
But the high caliber of Stagg’s prose and his deep emotional honesty make up for these minor issues. It’s easy to see why this was nominated for the Rathbones Folio Prize and won the Edward Stanford Travel Memoir of the Year. I’ll be excited to see what Stagg writes next.
Some favorite lines:
“Pilgrimage had shown me what was radical about the wandering life, as on the road all tokens of status were left behind. Food and shelter were riches enough, while possessions were excess weight. … How little we need to be happy. How little we need to survive.”
“I invented games to pass the time: scoring the monks’ beards out of ten, say, with added points for thickness, whiteness, and moustache length. Or guessing the pilgrims’ nationalities from their appearance”
“Too anxious to ask for help, I made a virtue of solitary endurance, mistaking my isolation for something heroic. But what I thought of as courage was in fact a kind of fear.”
Throughout, Stagg cast himself on the hospitality of those people he encountered on his trek, often staying at monasteries and fraternizing with monks and nuns but also sleeping out in a tent or staying with anyone who offered him some food and a bed for the night. This is an incredibly thorough account of the 10 months of his travels, and in places I did get overwhelmed by the level of detail on the people he met and the places he passed through (whereas I would have liked more information on his language skills and how he communicated in countries where he didn’t know the language). There are also a few too many info dumps on Christian history.
But the high caliber of Stagg’s prose and his deep emotional honesty make up for these minor issues. It’s easy to see why this was nominated for the Rathbones Folio Prize and won the Edward Stanford Travel Memoir of the Year. I’ll be excited to see what Stagg writes next.
Some favorite lines:
“Pilgrimage had shown me what was radical about the wandering life, as on the road all tokens of status were left behind. Food and shelter were riches enough, while possessions were excess weight. … How little we need to be happy. How little we need to survive.”
“I invented games to pass the time: scoring the monks’ beards out of ten, say, with added points for thickness, whiteness, and moustache length. Or guessing the pilgrims’ nationalities from their appearance”
“Too anxious to ask for help, I made a virtue of solitary endurance, mistaking my isolation for something heroic. But what I thought of as courage was in fact a kind of fear.”
September 22, 2019
****(*)
Na een zware depressie besluit de auteur van dit boek van Canterbury naar Jerusalem te stappen in de hoop zo genezing te vinden voor zijn voortdurende kwelling. De hele weg krijgt hij hulp, eten en onderdak van gewone mensen, in kloosters en abdijen, ...
Dit is een boek dat me zeer geraakt heeft. Niet alleen door de lange tocht die deze nog erg jonge man alleen onderneemt, maar ook door zijn eerlijkheid. Af en toe opent hij een venster naar zijn verleden en dat is hard en niet fraai, het vergt moed om die lelijkheid te tonen.
Ook is het boek, zeker in het eerste deel, ongemeen spannend. De man neemt zeer verregaande risico's, op het destructieve af, de link met zijn suïcidale gedachten van tijdens zijn depressie is snel gelegd.
Ook lees je in dit boek de geschiedenis van verschillende religieuze gemeenschappen - dit was soms een beetje taai.
Mooi boek.
Na een zware depressie besluit de auteur van dit boek van Canterbury naar Jerusalem te stappen in de hoop zo genezing te vinden voor zijn voortdurende kwelling. De hele weg krijgt hij hulp, eten en onderdak van gewone mensen, in kloosters en abdijen, ...
Dit is een boek dat me zeer geraakt heeft. Niet alleen door de lange tocht die deze nog erg jonge man alleen onderneemt, maar ook door zijn eerlijkheid. Af en toe opent hij een venster naar zijn verleden en dat is hard en niet fraai, het vergt moed om die lelijkheid te tonen.
Ook is het boek, zeker in het eerste deel, ongemeen spannend. De man neemt zeer verregaande risico's, op het destructieve af, de link met zijn suïcidale gedachten van tijdens zijn depressie is snel gelegd.
Ook lees je in dit boek de geschiedenis van verschillende religieuze gemeenschappen - dit was soms een beetje taai.
Mooi boek.
August 27, 2019
Quite a brave book!The author shares a good deal of himself with us and we accompany his soul to Jerusalem,via Rome and Mount Athos,in search of personal healing.His journey isn't over but I detect a glimmer of hope in his encounters with the lives of ordinary believers and the monks of Athos.I will admit my first spiritual ponderings were also from the Orthodox tradition-the writings of Metropolitan Anthony in his book about prayer,then popular with students.I became a Roman Catholic but,like Guy,I searched for a long time-life was a 'journey' in search of faith. I shall certainly read "The Way of the Pilgrim"which profoundly affected the author.Books like this go deeper than our limited thought patterns.I remember the challenging wisdom of Father Zosima in Dostoevsky's 'Karamazov',read as part of my College degree:
“Love all God’s creation, both the whole and every grain of sand. Love every leaf, every ray of light. Love the animals, love the plants, love each separate thing. If thou love each thing thou wilt perceive the mystery of God in all; and when once thou perceive this, thou wilt thenceforward grow every day to a fuller understanding of it: until thou come at last to love the whole world with a love that will then be all-embracing and universal.”Eventually, I saw that love in Mother Theresa of Calcutta,then in Jesus Christ,whom she had loved.
“Love all God’s creation, both the whole and every grain of sand. Love every leaf, every ray of light. Love the animals, love the plants, love each separate thing. If thou love each thing thou wilt perceive the mystery of God in all; and when once thou perceive this, thou wilt thenceforward grow every day to a fuller understanding of it: until thou come at last to love the whole world with a love that will then be all-embracing and universal.”Eventually, I saw that love in Mother Theresa of Calcutta,then in Jesus Christ,whom she had loved.
September 24, 2021
The idea of someone walking from England to Jerusalem over the course of the months should be interesting, yet this book managed to be birthstone belief. A few interesting stories are lost amongst all the moaning of the author. Periodically benefited from the journey to give some history of religion which I always found hard to read.
I don't know how was more relieved at the end - him to finish the pilgrimage or me to finishes absolute penance of a book.
I don't know how was more relieved at the end - him to finish the pilgrimage or me to finishes absolute penance of a book.
October 28, 2018
The book has charm as a journal of an admittedly impressive yet foolhardy journey. The author manages to convey the combination of actions and thoughts that describes his experiences in a direct, engaging manner. Unfortunately, the journey is also a search for some higher truths and when the book tries to reach them, it involves too many platitudes.
June 3, 2023
This is a long read, hefty too in hardback form, but then Guy’s journey was a long one. A mixture of detailed, it seems, context specific pilgrim / historical research, narratives of internal and external journeys and commentaries on relationships, encounters and simply trying to make sense of the world, human beings and himself. Fascinating and tough. The war torn and rioting cities, the religious divisions and politics are experienced though not always described in much depth. The Israeli / Palestinian divide is barely a footnote, the text weighted towards Israel.
I was left feeling sad and wanting more hopefulness for the good in human beings and kindness for himself.
I was left feeling sad and wanting more hopefulness for the good in human beings and kindness for himself.
August 24, 2019
Read for the Blackwell’s book group. This is a journey undertaken in search of healing. Although the author visits many holy places he sees them through the eyes of a non believer and his descriptions reflect this. The ending is quite unusual. I would have liked a post script that updated the reader on how the author arrived home and if he was able to move forward in life again.
February 4, 2024
In 2013, Guy Stagg had a nervous breakdown that led to a suicide attempt. The attempt failed, his
physical health improved but his mental health didn’t. He decided to walk the Via Francigena, a pilgrimage route dating to the Middle Ages, from Canterbury to Rome through France and Switzerland, and then onwards to ports of embarkation to Jerusalem. Following this route to the letter meant walking from one town to another, and seeking shelter in monasteries and churches along the way, as medieval pilgrims would have done. Stagg uses this as a jumping point to not just explore faith, the evolution of Christianity and its various schisms, and the people who are still choosing this way of life ( a Hungarian mother-daughter pair stay in the mind long after you’re done with the book) but the history of the places themselves-one of his places of refuge for the night, for instance, is Clairvaux Abbey, converted into a prison by Napoleon, where pilgrims are housed by a convent that also houses relatives of prisoners. One of Clairvaux Abbey’s famous prisoners was Peter Kropotkin and this forms the basis of an excellent chapter about him, and Bernard of Clairvaux. If the comparison seems forced, it really isn’t-it’s quite a profound exploration about how two men with very different ideas about faith approached the idea of a monastery/prison. Another chapter I loved was about the St.Bernard Pass and the abbey there, and about the breeding of the St.Bernard dog by the monks in the Abbey to help them with rescues-a task the Abbey has been performing since the 12th Century. Some of the people he meets are just as fascinating, and can be heartbreaking. Stagg writes of hoping for a breakthrough, through following a way that thousands had undertaken for centuries. Unlike the self-indulgence of Cheryl Strayed’s ‘Wild’ though, this book is a tough-minded interrogation of his journey, and of faith itself. It’s
also about the business of faith, in ways that you’re not aware of, apart from the obvious, and he links it to history and literature as well- for instance, there’s a very specific reason the Divine Comedy begins on Maundy Thursday, 1300, linked to Dante’s views about the corruption of the Catholic Church. This was the year when Pope Boniface announced that all pilgrims to Rome in the first year of a new century would be pardoned any sins, a tradition he claimed to be reviving but that he was actually creating. He read out a list of people who would not be pardoned, however, that was entirely politically driven, including supporters of the White Guelph faction, that Dante belonged to. Dante was there in the crowds when this speech was made. This announcement of Jubilee celebrations ( Jubileus, as Dante puts it) led to such a crush of people that the Pont St.Angelo broke, with more than three hundred dying, the bodies laid out in St.Peters Square for their families to identify, a celebration turning to catastrophe. In the Inferno, his descriptions of the circle of Hell for simoniacs are similar to what he must have witnessed, with the simoniacs forced to swim around in a lake, led by Pope Boniface. Though Stagg is also there during a Jubilee, his experiences are anything but exalted and he feels overwhelmed by the crowds, and feels more at peace in a park at Testaccio.
St.Nicholas’ grave is in an unexpected place, in a very well described chapter. A lot of the places he
travels through are going through traumatic conflicts, or are just recovering from traumatic conflicts, and while the book doesn’t aim to explain the origins of those conflicts, some of the opinions voiced are fairly illuminating. The most difficult parts to read were those set in Jerusalem and Stagg does not elide just how much of a police state it feels like.
I was skeptical when I started reading this book because I truly didn’t think going on a pilgrimage would help with mental health issues, and Stagg doesn’t believe that either. He goes on this journey to try it out, and nowhere does he succumb to woo-woo notions of higher powers guiding him or feeling in their presence ( the most obvious instances where one would feel moved to believe in a higher power are turned by Stagg into damp squibs). What Stagg wants to describe, though, is that you can experience grace from a fellow human, and kindness and empathy and peace absolutely anywhere, and that’s no less miraculous. Stagg does not give you a neat conclusion of healing and normalcy after his long journey because that’s not how the human mind really works. What we do get is this absolutely brilliant memoir-travelogue, and all the comparisons to Patrick Leigh Fermor are fully justified.
physical health improved but his mental health didn’t. He decided to walk the Via Francigena, a pilgrimage route dating to the Middle Ages, from Canterbury to Rome through France and Switzerland, and then onwards to ports of embarkation to Jerusalem. Following this route to the letter meant walking from one town to another, and seeking shelter in monasteries and churches along the way, as medieval pilgrims would have done. Stagg uses this as a jumping point to not just explore faith, the evolution of Christianity and its various schisms, and the people who are still choosing this way of life ( a Hungarian mother-daughter pair stay in the mind long after you’re done with the book) but the history of the places themselves-one of his places of refuge for the night, for instance, is Clairvaux Abbey, converted into a prison by Napoleon, where pilgrims are housed by a convent that also houses relatives of prisoners. One of Clairvaux Abbey’s famous prisoners was Peter Kropotkin and this forms the basis of an excellent chapter about him, and Bernard of Clairvaux. If the comparison seems forced, it really isn’t-it’s quite a profound exploration about how two men with very different ideas about faith approached the idea of a monastery/prison. Another chapter I loved was about the St.Bernard Pass and the abbey there, and about the breeding of the St.Bernard dog by the monks in the Abbey to help them with rescues-a task the Abbey has been performing since the 12th Century. Some of the people he meets are just as fascinating, and can be heartbreaking. Stagg writes of hoping for a breakthrough, through following a way that thousands had undertaken for centuries. Unlike the self-indulgence of Cheryl Strayed’s ‘Wild’ though, this book is a tough-minded interrogation of his journey, and of faith itself. It’s
also about the business of faith, in ways that you’re not aware of, apart from the obvious, and he links it to history and literature as well- for instance, there’s a very specific reason the Divine Comedy begins on Maundy Thursday, 1300, linked to Dante’s views about the corruption of the Catholic Church. This was the year when Pope Boniface announced that all pilgrims to Rome in the first year of a new century would be pardoned any sins, a tradition he claimed to be reviving but that he was actually creating. He read out a list of people who would not be pardoned, however, that was entirely politically driven, including supporters of the White Guelph faction, that Dante belonged to. Dante was there in the crowds when this speech was made. This announcement of Jubilee celebrations ( Jubileus, as Dante puts it) led to such a crush of people that the Pont St.Angelo broke, with more than three hundred dying, the bodies laid out in St.Peters Square for their families to identify, a celebration turning to catastrophe. In the Inferno, his descriptions of the circle of Hell for simoniacs are similar to what he must have witnessed, with the simoniacs forced to swim around in a lake, led by Pope Boniface. Though Stagg is also there during a Jubilee, his experiences are anything but exalted and he feels overwhelmed by the crowds, and feels more at peace in a park at Testaccio.
St.Nicholas’ grave is in an unexpected place, in a very well described chapter. A lot of the places he
travels through are going through traumatic conflicts, or are just recovering from traumatic conflicts, and while the book doesn’t aim to explain the origins of those conflicts, some of the opinions voiced are fairly illuminating. The most difficult parts to read were those set in Jerusalem and Stagg does not elide just how much of a police state it feels like.
I was skeptical when I started reading this book because I truly didn’t think going on a pilgrimage would help with mental health issues, and Stagg doesn’t believe that either. He goes on this journey to try it out, and nowhere does he succumb to woo-woo notions of higher powers guiding him or feeling in their presence ( the most obvious instances where one would feel moved to believe in a higher power are turned by Stagg into damp squibs). What Stagg wants to describe, though, is that you can experience grace from a fellow human, and kindness and empathy and peace absolutely anywhere, and that’s no less miraculous. Stagg does not give you a neat conclusion of healing and normalcy after his long journey because that’s not how the human mind really works. What we do get is this absolutely brilliant memoir-travelogue, and all the comparisons to Patrick Leigh Fermor are fully justified.
June 26, 2021
I'm deeply ambivalent about this memoir. I appreciate his writing style and hope that writing this book helped the author to heal in some way. As a believer I hope that at some point Mr. Stagg comes to believe in God who is love. I'm still mulling this one over and in the end, I'm glad I read it.
June 25, 2025
I've read this before so knew the basic plot, but this is a true story of a man's pilgrimage from Canterbury to Jerusalem. There's a really good mix of personal experience and history in this book which I found super interesting
May 27, 2019
Not great literature but an account of an extraordinary journey. Stagg occassionally over taxes similies but his candour throughout is engaging.
June 13, 2020
I wasn’t sure how to rate this one. I lost interest for large chunks, and it took me a while to get through it. But it’s a thoughtful and thought-provoking read, with wonderfully descriptive prose. This, for example: I passed boulders black with water. Pebbles glinting with salt. Shells like sharded porcelain and gravel gritting the sand. Sheets of sunlight tremored over the water, as the afternoon sun bleared. Or this: Something of this history seemed to linger in the stale air, the worn light, in the dust that brushed the back of my throat...the past felt close, as if I could dig my nails into the earth and scratch away centuries of suffering.
It’s a fitting way to tell of such an epic journey, ten months on foot, from Canterbury to Jerusalem. He’s trying to come to terms with the mental illness in his past, although I got the sense he was running (I suppose I should say ‘walking’) as far away from it as he could.
Stagg often struggles to explain to people why he’s doing the walk. In giving it context, he examines many of the sects and fringe beliefs which developed as offshoots to Christianity, and the history and nature of both pilgrimage and faith. It makes for a scattered narrative, in some respects, as its interwoven with the many folk he meets along the way. And yet it’s these characters who show Stagg the many facets of faith, and who edge him, slowly, towards a degree of understanding.
Many of these encounters are memorable. There’s the pathos of the woman who drags him all over her village trying to find someone to accompany him so he won’t be lonely, when in fact it’s a symptom of her own loneliness. There’s the volunteer in Rome, Gabriella, who sits him down and washes his feet, praying over them, kissing them when she’s done. In Turkey, he finds such kindness and concern in the remote villages that he was moved to remark, Their religion was not ritual or prayer, but the practise of sympathy performed day after day. And their faith was something felt as much as thought, a habit inscribed in the heart. In Jerusalem, a man with no money, sharing his breakfast with a stranger. Charity that gives before anything is asked and gives without hope of return.
The cumulative effect of these experiences is a healing of sorts for Stagg. He concludes: Looking back on the last ten months, it was not the solitude I remembered, but the charity of so many strangers. In our own travels, for one memorable day I once experienced what it was like to rely on the kindness of strangers for shelter and transport. So I can easily understand what a profound effect it must have had on the author, walking so far and for so long and relying wholly on others.
Amongst the varied experiences he recounts, there’s the Easter celebrations in Rome, a fascinating account of the Gezi riots in Istanbul, and one of the longest sentences I’ve ever read (if not the longest, at two and a half pages) describing the terror of a bomb attack in Tripoli.
And then, at the very end of the epilogue, a completely surprising conclusion. I really didn’t see it coming. Mark the change in tense, and read it how you will. Is it literal? Perhaps, perhaps not. It reads like something else altogether to me. Which, given the author’s internal journey, is a lovely note on which to end.
It’s a fitting way to tell of such an epic journey, ten months on foot, from Canterbury to Jerusalem. He’s trying to come to terms with the mental illness in his past, although I got the sense he was running (I suppose I should say ‘walking’) as far away from it as he could.
Stagg often struggles to explain to people why he’s doing the walk. In giving it context, he examines many of the sects and fringe beliefs which developed as offshoots to Christianity, and the history and nature of both pilgrimage and faith. It makes for a scattered narrative, in some respects, as its interwoven with the many folk he meets along the way. And yet it’s these characters who show Stagg the many facets of faith, and who edge him, slowly, towards a degree of understanding.
Many of these encounters are memorable. There’s the pathos of the woman who drags him all over her village trying to find someone to accompany him so he won’t be lonely, when in fact it’s a symptom of her own loneliness. There’s the volunteer in Rome, Gabriella, who sits him down and washes his feet, praying over them, kissing them when she’s done. In Turkey, he finds such kindness and concern in the remote villages that he was moved to remark, Their religion was not ritual or prayer, but the practise of sympathy performed day after day. And their faith was something felt as much as thought, a habit inscribed in the heart. In Jerusalem, a man with no money, sharing his breakfast with a stranger. Charity that gives before anything is asked and gives without hope of return.
The cumulative effect of these experiences is a healing of sorts for Stagg. He concludes: Looking back on the last ten months, it was not the solitude I remembered, but the charity of so many strangers. In our own travels, for one memorable day I once experienced what it was like to rely on the kindness of strangers for shelter and transport. So I can easily understand what a profound effect it must have had on the author, walking so far and for so long and relying wholly on others.
Amongst the varied experiences he recounts, there’s the Easter celebrations in Rome, a fascinating account of the Gezi riots in Istanbul, and one of the longest sentences I’ve ever read (if not the longest, at two and a half pages) describing the terror of a bomb attack in Tripoli.
And then, at the very end of the epilogue, a completely surprising conclusion. I really didn’t see it coming. Mark the change in tense, and read it how you will. Is it literal? Perhaps, perhaps not. It reads like something else altogether to me. Which, given the author’s internal journey, is a lovely note on which to end.
May 9, 2021
Really difficult to rate. It's a very well written book, but I expected more expansive travel writing than vague personal journal. I wanted to be plunged into what it's like to walk such a huge distance, but the surroundings themselves were barely mentioned and there was no insight at all into local culture and life. Perhaps most disappointing of all was that but we never really got to know how Guy Stagg *felt* about anything.
What we do get in reasonable depth is Christian history and, while of course this is to be expected in a book about pilgrimage, it not only dominated everything else but also felt obligatory at times (Stagg is a self confessed atheist, after all). I just didn't personally care about the endless nuns, abbeys and saints and that left me with nothing else to enjoy.
Sorry to say that I DNF. Not a bad book, but not for me.
What we do get in reasonable depth is Christian history and, while of course this is to be expected in a book about pilgrimage, it not only dominated everything else but also felt obligatory at times (Stagg is a self confessed atheist, after all). I just didn't personally care about the endless nuns, abbeys and saints and that left me with nothing else to enjoy.
Sorry to say that I DNF. Not a bad book, but not for me.
August 28, 2019
Abandoned before the end as I just didn't care any more. Book group's unanimous verdict on the author's so-called pilgrimage was "Why?"
July 5, 2023
Guy Stagg was born in 1988. The same year I was born. He worked for a newspaper in London before he started his pilgrimage. Though a non-believer he walked from Canterbury to Jerusalem like old pilgrims to find solutions for his struggles with mental health. This was the primary reason for his journey. But as you read the book it becomes clear his inner pilgrimage is similar to the disconnection that many of us around the globe feel and mask under the pretense of being busy and productive. His walk across ten countries and more than 5500 km is not the usual travelogue of geographical wonders and exotic cultural snapshots. It's an intimate kaleidoscope of the range of human qualities: the kindness of monks and priests and families, generosity of strangers who didn't speak his language, and tolerance of devout people.
The political highlights of this journey were the first Easter with Pope Francis in Rome and Taksim Square protests in Istanbul. The only time he took a flight was through Syria. But it was the more humane moments that grabbed my attention. Swipe to see my favorite parts of the book where Stagg attends a party hosted by the nuns at Nostra Signora del Buon Consiglio in Albania. It's a memory of happiness amongst strangers and sweet chocolates and wine and conversations that remind us empathy binds us first and foremost. Whatever our faith might be. Imagine our ancestors discussing fire gods and crop failures under the moonlight thousands of years ago. Our need for connection hasn't changed much. Did we forget that?
Parallel to his stories spanning churches and parishes he writes about the lesser-known histories of martyrs and various Christian sects throughout history. The Crusades. The Ottomans. The modern obsession with the Templars. All this is juxtaposed with Islamic history as he enters the Middle East. Does he get answers when he reaches Jerusalem? I don't think so. But there is an acceptance of ambiguity when he strolls the ancient city.
Along with the ambiguity of our existence, Stagg writes about how little we need to actually survive. The tiny details of living in dormitories overnight and a plate of pasta add mettle to his prose. He is a sincere diary keeper. The prose is golden spilling with descriptions I haven't read in a while. While reading I was hoping his rucksack doesn't get wet in the rain and his notebooks stay dry for such prose comes rare.
I am a non-believer. When I was nine I stopped believing that there was an actual deity that was interfering in my life. Before that I was a devout kid, waking up early, grabbing my bicycle, and picking flowers for my morning Puja. I think it was the ritual I loved most. I still do. I am interested in religions and theology. I am overwhelmed when I am inside a house of prayer. I grew up in a Hindu household and studied in a school where Vedic education was complimentary to a Western syllabus. But faith is a tricky puzzle for me. Is it science? I don't think so. Agnostic is the label I would use for myself. But like Stagg's book, I am clear-eyed about the ambiguity of this existence. This book helped me a lot. I hear Stagg is writing a book on Wittgenstein. Cannot wait for what he brings next.
The political highlights of this journey were the first Easter with Pope Francis in Rome and Taksim Square protests in Istanbul. The only time he took a flight was through Syria. But it was the more humane moments that grabbed my attention. Swipe to see my favorite parts of the book where Stagg attends a party hosted by the nuns at Nostra Signora del Buon Consiglio in Albania. It's a memory of happiness amongst strangers and sweet chocolates and wine and conversations that remind us empathy binds us first and foremost. Whatever our faith might be. Imagine our ancestors discussing fire gods and crop failures under the moonlight thousands of years ago. Our need for connection hasn't changed much. Did we forget that?
Parallel to his stories spanning churches and parishes he writes about the lesser-known histories of martyrs and various Christian sects throughout history. The Crusades. The Ottomans. The modern obsession with the Templars. All this is juxtaposed with Islamic history as he enters the Middle East. Does he get answers when he reaches Jerusalem? I don't think so. But there is an acceptance of ambiguity when he strolls the ancient city.
Along with the ambiguity of our existence, Stagg writes about how little we need to actually survive. The tiny details of living in dormitories overnight and a plate of pasta add mettle to his prose. He is a sincere diary keeper. The prose is golden spilling with descriptions I haven't read in a while. While reading I was hoping his rucksack doesn't get wet in the rain and his notebooks stay dry for such prose comes rare.
I am a non-believer. When I was nine I stopped believing that there was an actual deity that was interfering in my life. Before that I was a devout kid, waking up early, grabbing my bicycle, and picking flowers for my morning Puja. I think it was the ritual I loved most. I still do. I am interested in religions and theology. I am overwhelmed when I am inside a house of prayer. I grew up in a Hindu household and studied in a school where Vedic education was complimentary to a Western syllabus. But faith is a tricky puzzle for me. Is it science? I don't think so. Agnostic is the label I would use for myself. But like Stagg's book, I am clear-eyed about the ambiguity of this existence. This book helped me a lot. I hear Stagg is writing a book on Wittgenstein. Cannot wait for what he brings next.
April 7, 2019
When I first picked up this book and noticed the author’s surname, my first thought was Dickens’ Staggs Gardens in Dombey and Son – an area which was initially a physical wreck until an event (in Dickens’ case the advent of the railway) occurred which invigorated the area and gave it a sense of re-birth. Appropriately enough, this is the crux of The Crossway.
The accolades listed on the back cover of this book, together with the sticker on the front {which states that it has been read on Radio 4) initially gave me the impression that this travelogue-memoir was going to give me an insight into the author’s remarkable thousands-of-miles hike, humanity, and a search for the meaning of life. Indeed, this very readable book captures Stagg’s journey (as he walks from Kent to Jerusalem), the landscape through which he travels, the characters he meets as he goes from monastery to monastery (or convent to convent – he makes the decision to stay overnight at such locations), his health (physically and mentally, both of which reach very low points), and the events which occur during his pilgrimage. As an atheist, Stagg is not undertaking this journey for personal religious reasons, but rather to explore ‘the collapse of belief in Western Europe and the exodus of Christians from the Middle East’. More personally he undertook it to escape from himself, in particular his depression which had led to him attempting suicide. However, through his pilgrimage, Stagg learns that the monastic life led by his overnight hosts ‘was not an escape from the world, but a confrontation with the self. Alone there was no hiding from your failings’ (341), a concept which ultimately offers him a sense of mental healing: ‘for though I had hoped to heal myself by walking, any recovery came on the far side of collapse. In which case I should not try to forget what happened but remember it’ (395).
I really enjoyed this book. It is structured in five parts (excluding the prologue and epilogue), each part preceded by a map depicting the areas the author walks in each part of his pilgrimage. At times within the narrative, Stagg relates some religious history relevant to his locations, as well as some events that he witnesses (he sees the new Pope, Pope Francis in Rome, just after he was elected following the resignation of Pope Benedict). The writing is very immersive and incredibly detailed, as is the dialogue between individuals. For me, the stand-out section writing-wise was when Stagg describes the carnage following the aftermath of a bombing in Tripoli (pp 328 – 330), three pages written in the modernist ‘stream of thought’ mode, the absence of any punctuation effectively conveying the calamity and chaos of a city in turmoil. I thought this was an intelligent way to portray the unexpectedness of the disruption of life, and the immediate reaction to it. This is a travel memoir with the additional meaning of recovery and hope; Stagg’s seemingly endless journey to Jerusalem reflects the journey of life which is relatable to everyone, especially in the current climate where mental health occupies a major place in our society
The accolades listed on the back cover of this book, together with the sticker on the front {which states that it has been read on Radio 4) initially gave me the impression that this travelogue-memoir was going to give me an insight into the author’s remarkable thousands-of-miles hike, humanity, and a search for the meaning of life. Indeed, this very readable book captures Stagg’s journey (as he walks from Kent to Jerusalem), the landscape through which he travels, the characters he meets as he goes from monastery to monastery (or convent to convent – he makes the decision to stay overnight at such locations), his health (physically and mentally, both of which reach very low points), and the events which occur during his pilgrimage. As an atheist, Stagg is not undertaking this journey for personal religious reasons, but rather to explore ‘the collapse of belief in Western Europe and the exodus of Christians from the Middle East’. More personally he undertook it to escape from himself, in particular his depression which had led to him attempting suicide. However, through his pilgrimage, Stagg learns that the monastic life led by his overnight hosts ‘was not an escape from the world, but a confrontation with the self. Alone there was no hiding from your failings’ (341), a concept which ultimately offers him a sense of mental healing: ‘for though I had hoped to heal myself by walking, any recovery came on the far side of collapse. In which case I should not try to forget what happened but remember it’ (395).
I really enjoyed this book. It is structured in five parts (excluding the prologue and epilogue), each part preceded by a map depicting the areas the author walks in each part of his pilgrimage. At times within the narrative, Stagg relates some religious history relevant to his locations, as well as some events that he witnesses (he sees the new Pope, Pope Francis in Rome, just after he was elected following the resignation of Pope Benedict). The writing is very immersive and incredibly detailed, as is the dialogue between individuals. For me, the stand-out section writing-wise was when Stagg describes the carnage following the aftermath of a bombing in Tripoli (pp 328 – 330), three pages written in the modernist ‘stream of thought’ mode, the absence of any punctuation effectively conveying the calamity and chaos of a city in turmoil. I thought this was an intelligent way to portray the unexpectedness of the disruption of life, and the immediate reaction to it. This is a travel memoir with the additional meaning of recovery and hope; Stagg’s seemingly endless journey to Jerusalem reflects the journey of life which is relatable to everyone, especially in the current climate where mental health occupies a major place in our society
November 15, 2020
An extraordinary journey of one man's search for religion and recovery along the oldest pilgrimage paths from Canterbury to Jerusalem, The Crossway is a day-to-day travelogue of Tom Stagg's peregrinations that led him to the holiest places in the world; all with God's providence because without financial means, he needed to rely on the kindness and benevolence of strangers, most of whom would become friends.
Still haunted by his past, Stagg sought healing and the true meaning of religion and despite the obstacles that confronted him from his past and present, he persevered in his unswerving mission to reach Jerusalem.
As I read through his daily accounts, I traveled vicariously through some of the most extraordinary places on earth, some of the holiest places I long to visit someday; and learned firsthand of the people, the places, the history, the customs and some nerve-racking civil unrest in the Mideast. Stagg even managed to pepper humor throughout his encounters with his cast of characters he met along the way including my favorite, Max from St. Maurice monastery, and the tale of his nontraditional deep-fat fryer and chips. ;) Throughout the book, I found myself researching nearly every stopping place, following him on the map as he made his way from country to country and monastery to monastery.
In the end, I believe he found peace and has come to terms with his past. And although it's there to remind him of where he's been, I believe he has found a new direction to travel in this pilgrimage we call life. Ultreia, Tom!
I strongly recommend this to all pilgrims of the world.
Still haunted by his past, Stagg sought healing and the true meaning of religion and despite the obstacles that confronted him from his past and present, he persevered in his unswerving mission to reach Jerusalem.
As I read through his daily accounts, I traveled vicariously through some of the most extraordinary places on earth, some of the holiest places I long to visit someday; and learned firsthand of the people, the places, the history, the customs and some nerve-racking civil unrest in the Mideast. Stagg even managed to pepper humor throughout his encounters with his cast of characters he met along the way including my favorite, Max from St. Maurice monastery, and the tale of his nontraditional deep-fat fryer and chips. ;) Throughout the book, I found myself researching nearly every stopping place, following him on the map as he made his way from country to country and monastery to monastery.
In the end, I believe he found peace and has come to terms with his past. And although it's there to remind him of where he's been, I believe he has found a new direction to travel in this pilgrimage we call life. Ultreia, Tom!
I strongly recommend this to all pilgrims of the world.
December 20, 2022
It's kind of alright. I have not really learned much, but what did I want from an ordinary adventure book? Probably, I expected it to be more like a travel book where the author would know a lot about the places he's walking through. There are occasional "here the prince Kropotkin stayed, I imagine it was like..."
But then again, they feel strange in this book, albeit I liked them. So, it's a travel book and for that genre, it moves fast, even too fast. 40 pages and you are in south France. Really?
The annoying part is that the author keeps whining. First on his anxiety issues, then "Camino folks aren't real pilgrims", boasting "I'm so exceptional to go through the Alps in winter, everyone tells me not to do that". I mean, I get it: tourists vs pilgrims. Planning the journey and renting hostels vs relying on a stranger's charity. The lines read like some teenager's adventure: I don't need my pilgrim to feel that he is so exceptional that has no plan and risks his life while feeling contempt for every person with Instagram and of those that use trains. Oh well, would you grow up and do your journey the way you like without comparing it to other "non-true pilgrims"?
[..having finished the book]
And then all this belief/religiosity and the search of the author of what Christ-related religion he wants to believe. Like, the book starts with little religion about Saints that went on a pilgrimage, but finishes with "let's visit all Christ's stations and whine on how plastic-touristic they are these days and what is The True Belief". Ah, well the map was the hint as well as the book's place on a chart in my local bookshop in Ireland, I could have guessed it.
2.8/5 - fine, the cover looks better than the content and the top chart place is not really justified.
But then again, they feel strange in this book, albeit I liked them. So, it's a travel book and for that genre, it moves fast, even too fast. 40 pages and you are in south France. Really?
The annoying part is that the author keeps whining. First on his anxiety issues, then "Camino folks aren't real pilgrims", boasting "I'm so exceptional to go through the Alps in winter, everyone tells me not to do that". I mean, I get it: tourists vs pilgrims. Planning the journey and renting hostels vs relying on a stranger's charity. The lines read like some teenager's adventure: I don't need my pilgrim to feel that he is so exceptional that has no plan and risks his life while feeling contempt for every person with Instagram and of those that use trains. Oh well, would you grow up and do your journey the way you like without comparing it to other "non-true pilgrims"?
[..having finished the book]
And then all this belief/religiosity and the search of the author of what Christ-related religion he wants to believe. Like, the book starts with little religion about Saints that went on a pilgrimage, but finishes with "let's visit all Christ's stations and whine on how plastic-touristic they are these days and what is The True Belief". Ah, well the map was the hint as well as the book's place on a chart in my local bookshop in Ireland, I could have guessed it.
2.8/5 - fine, the cover looks better than the content and the top chart place is not really justified.
April 29, 2025
As a traveler, I always keep a travel journal. I feel that it gives purpose to the voyage, by listing encounters, places and other things (being big or small) that capture my attention on that day. Lately I have been adding a gratitude checklist at the end of each voyage. This means that I am thrilled to read such diaries of other people in a book format such as this one.
I love walking too, therefore I can understand the feeling of the author when he says that he feels good when he does walk. And walking he did, from Canterbury in the UK to the city of Jerusalem in the Holy Land! What is even more remarkable apart from such feat, is the fact that the author is not a Christian, nor a believer. He explains that he started this pilgrimage after a dark period in his life (you will read about that in the book). He wanted to find purpose and understand himself better.
He also gives a historical background of the places he had visited, with particular emphasis on the religious part. During his long pilgrimage that lasted over 10 months, he was carried forward by the charity and kindness of others who he encountered along the way.
A loved this book and wish to thank Guy Stagg for sharing it with us.
I love walking too, therefore I can understand the feeling of the author when he says that he feels good when he does walk. And walking he did, from Canterbury in the UK to the city of Jerusalem in the Holy Land! What is even more remarkable apart from such feat, is the fact that the author is not a Christian, nor a believer. He explains that he started this pilgrimage after a dark period in his life (you will read about that in the book). He wanted to find purpose and understand himself better.
He also gives a historical background of the places he had visited, with particular emphasis on the religious part. During his long pilgrimage that lasted over 10 months, he was carried forward by the charity and kindness of others who he encountered along the way.
A loved this book and wish to thank Guy Stagg for sharing it with us.
May 22, 2022
now this book was just lovely.
it is about a man called guy stagg.
he is from canterbury and he is supposed to walk from there to jerusalem.
he is mentally ill and takes medicines for that and he is not well.
he is a non believer.
he began his pilgrimage.
he passed through ten countries and walked over 5,500 kilometres.
he began his journey on new years eve.
he met many people during his journey and he relied on the support and comfort of people to make the journey.
he passed through various countries and was given shelter by people whom he met and they were very warm and welcoming and they wanted to know more about his journey and about why he was doing it.
some people even offered to take him to his destination but he refused and said that instead he wanted to walk.
he went through many countries including many countries in europe.
he was in greece and then turkey and also lebanon and other countries and he was walking through out the journey.
after such a long journey he finally reached his destination which is jerusalem where he met people and saw mosques , churches and synagogues.
it is about a man called guy stagg.
he is from canterbury and he is supposed to walk from there to jerusalem.
he is mentally ill and takes medicines for that and he is not well.
he is a non believer.
he began his pilgrimage.
he passed through ten countries and walked over 5,500 kilometres.
he began his journey on new years eve.
he met many people during his journey and he relied on the support and comfort of people to make the journey.
he passed through various countries and was given shelter by people whom he met and they were very warm and welcoming and they wanted to know more about his journey and about why he was doing it.
some people even offered to take him to his destination but he refused and said that instead he wanted to walk.
he went through many countries including many countries in europe.
he was in greece and then turkey and also lebanon and other countries and he was walking through out the journey.
after such a long journey he finally reached his destination which is jerusalem where he met people and saw mosques , churches and synagogues.
December 14, 2018
The Crossway by Guy Stagg chronicles his pilgrimage from Canterbury to Jerusalem in 2013. He went on pilgrimage to try to manage the demons in his life and to try to discover himself; he goes out to look within.
This is a book about humanity; we learn about ourselves as we see Stagg deal with the highs and lows of his journey and we see ourselves in the people he meets on the journey. Depending on the kindness of strangers, Stagg makes his way through the relatively safe countries of Western Europe before dealing with the ore challenging aspects of life in the east. Throughout the journey he draws in history to illuminate the experiences he has, and so the book is highly informative.
Stagg constantly reflects on his journey and the reasons for it, and often he finds no answer and even when he reaches Jerusalem there is no sense of triumph - simply more reflection and thought. Stagg reflects, " Perhaps that was the lesson of the pilgrimage, for though I had hoped to heal myself by walking, any recovery came on the far side of collapse."
This is a book about humanity; we learn about ourselves as we see Stagg deal with the highs and lows of his journey and we see ourselves in the people he meets on the journey. Depending on the kindness of strangers, Stagg makes his way through the relatively safe countries of Western Europe before dealing with the ore challenging aspects of life in the east. Throughout the journey he draws in history to illuminate the experiences he has, and so the book is highly informative.
Stagg constantly reflects on his journey and the reasons for it, and often he finds no answer and even when he reaches Jerusalem there is no sense of triumph - simply more reflection and thought. Stagg reflects, " Perhaps that was the lesson of the pilgrimage, for though I had hoped to heal myself by walking, any recovery came on the far side of collapse."
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 10, 2021
I really liked the idea behind this book. A pilgrimage to rediscover oneself across both familiar and unfamiliar territories. I think Guy really opens himself up to the reader and shows a lot of vulnerability which must be commended. I found the second half of the book (i.e. post-Italy) to be the most fascinating as it opened my eyes to the day-to-day lives of many of the people in small towns and villages along the route.
Two points frustrated me however. Firstly, it was incredibly heavy on the religious stories, specifically in Europe. Maybe that was my own expectations and I should have really bought into that (so perhaps that is slightly unfair). The second point is something many others have mentioned concerning how much both sides of the conflict in Palestine are discussed. I feel more could have been given to this factor.
Two points frustrated me however. Firstly, it was incredibly heavy on the religious stories, specifically in Europe. Maybe that was my own expectations and I should have really bought into that (so perhaps that is slightly unfair). The second point is something many others have mentioned concerning how much both sides of the conflict in Palestine are discussed. I feel more could have been given to this factor.
July 19, 2019
The Crossway is the story of a pilgrimage made on foot by the author in 2013. Prompted in part by a serious mental breakdown, Guy Stagg travelled from Canterbury to Jerusalem by way of traditional pilgrim routes, seeking shelter and sustenance from religious houses and individuals along the way. Setting off on New Year's Day, his journey took most of the year and took in the murky winter weather of Northern Europe, snowy Alpine passes, and the heat and dust of Turkey and the Holy Land. He doesn't find salvation, but is nevertheless greatly enriched by his journey, finding the sea of faith somewhat fuller than he anticipated. Stagg writes well about the vicissitudes of his life on the road, is honest about his mental and physical frailties, but is never self pitying.
July 16, 2020
After struggling with depression for years the author decides to undertake a pilgrimage in the hope that it will help him combat his illness. Over 10 months he walks 5,500 km from Canterbury to Jerusalem, often staying in convents and monasteries and dependant on the hospitality of strangers. Interestingly, Stagg is an atheist so this is not a Christian pilgrimage bounded in faith. In fact he abandons his hope that the journey will cure his mental illness which leaves him pondering his continued commitment to what was undoubtedly an often gruelling experience. In the end the gain seems to be in giving himself up to a project which enables him to see the world through different eyes, and find everywhere a kindness that asks for no reward.
October 23, 2024
Pfffft where to begin.
This for many would be an adventure of a life time - however I felt at times the observations were apathetic which made it hard to read, at times the narrator came across as almost spoiled? As someone who’s done a pilgrimage before I didn’t get the sense that he enjoyed it much which made me sad. Also - I think Palestine is mentioned once during his chapters about walking through Israel which I just felt was incredibly frustrating - no mention of the interactions he must have had with Palestinians either - just felt like he wanted to ignore that completely and seeing as the whole book is questioning religion this seemed absurd. Anyway - some really beautiful descriptions of the countryside at times but overall a difficult and long read.
This for many would be an adventure of a life time - however I felt at times the observations were apathetic which made it hard to read, at times the narrator came across as almost spoiled? As someone who’s done a pilgrimage before I didn’t get the sense that he enjoyed it much which made me sad. Also - I think Palestine is mentioned once during his chapters about walking through Israel which I just felt was incredibly frustrating - no mention of the interactions he must have had with Palestinians either - just felt like he wanted to ignore that completely and seeing as the whole book is questioning religion this seemed absurd. Anyway - some really beautiful descriptions of the countryside at times but overall a difficult and long read.
May 12, 2019
This book has been shortlisted for several literary awards, among them the Ondaatje prize awarded to a work most evocative of a “sense of place”.
Rathbones Folio Prize 2019 Shortlist https://www.rathbonesfolioprize.com/s...
Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje prize. https://rsliterature.org/award/rsl-on...
The author tells the true story of his walk from London to Jerusalem and his experiences along the way. Though well-researched concerning other religious travelers on foot through the years, it did not seem to portray the spirit and feelings of the journey or really come alive for me.
Rathbones Folio Prize 2019 Shortlist https://www.rathbonesfolioprize.com/s...
Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje prize. https://rsliterature.org/award/rsl-on...
The author tells the true story of his walk from London to Jerusalem and his experiences along the way. Though well-researched concerning other religious travelers on foot through the years, it did not seem to portray the spirit and feelings of the journey or really come alive for me.
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