The Unquiet Path

Birth day of a book

I am currently inhabiting my own liminal space, lingering between the earthbound author’s life of bringing out a new book and the tricky navigation of finding unknown directions for the future. So a bit at sea and excited at the same time. My two years work on the Tro Breiz medieval pilgrimage around Brittany culminates this week in the publication of The Unquiet Path, an account of my experiences on the 1000km journey. The book will mark nearly a quarter century of writing about the region which is my adopted home.

The pilgrimage honours the seven founding saints who came from Great Britain to evangelise the territory, then called Armorica, during the Dark Ages. They were part of a gradual movement of hundreds of holy men (and a few women) often with entourages, arriving on Breton shores over a period of several hundred years. Some were solitaries seeking isolated worship, whilst others were focused on the foundation of monasteries which would grow into sizeable communities. Boat-shaped rocks gave rise to stories of magical travel, but welcome was not always to be found easily.

Because they were incomers, as I am, facing the eternal challenges of immigration, issues of secure arrival, acceptance, settlement and changing identity. All of us wriggle and shift as the new little by little becomes known, embellished by what we have to offer as we carve out and shape our niche. In my case this has taken place within a land steeped in tradition, rooted in ancestral mores. No lack of suspicion of outsiders for the saints or for modern arrivals, an impulse often motivated by anxiety over resources and fears of a powerful new energy being injected into old ways. Then and now. I could not help but think of many aspects of settlement on my path.

The Tro Breiz links the seven cathedrals of the seven founding saints. It is, unusually, a circular itinerary. Pilgrimage is only romantic from a distance, a comfortable seat somewhere warm. Out on the road there is always a point where difficulties – physical, mental or emotional – overwhelm. I have tried to capture the genuine balance between mundane, uplifting and dispiriting that characterises many of these long journeys on foot. Each one is, after all, a paradigm of life, set against a changing backdrop of historical context that lets us see ourselves in high relief. For good and ill.

It has been an unquiet path for me. I have lived and breathed the Tro Breiz for a long time now, fluctuating wildly between commitment and resentment, joy and despair in the achieving of such an enormous goal for someone with such physical limitations. Now I find it is unsettling to have finally finished all the many processes of the experience, and to be at the point of publication of my final word on the subject. And this one is very personal. As a historian writing about history and spirit of place, I have not dwelt too much on such things in other works, but here it seems appropriate.

For twenty-five years I have written a book about every eighteen months, covering all aspects of Brittany’s history and landscape. Now I feel that I am done, and have no thought of that form in my future, but adapting myself to shorter and more varied writing projects. I have no idea how this will turn out and feel a little shorn of support and structure in my life. Writing about ancient paths has involved much planning and travelling all over Brittany, whereas now I have the sense of being stuck in one place, without my usual movement or motivation. I am restless for setting out again, with or without purpose.

Author in her natural habitat

Liminal spaces are stirring, uncertain and changeable by their very nature. I will try to wait out this strange time without expectation, but the sensation of being adrift is an uneasy one. Fortunately I love December, my birth month, and look forward to solstice celebrations. Then I’ll be ready for whatever 2025 may bring.