She died ~607 years ago, but she’s given me some very timely food for thought.
I can’t quite remember how we first met. It was a year ago. Maybe two. When I move somewhere new, I try to acclimatise by reading books written locally. Julian’s name is Search Engine Optimised.
Julian of Norwich
Get ready to hear a lot more about the first woman known to have authored a book in the English language. Not just from me.
She’s having a breakout moment.
As well as the anniversary, there’s the sheer herness of her, and how clearly she speaks to topics and concerns of our times.
Her writing is 🤯
At 30 years old, at the point of death, perhaps over the course of a few short hours, Julian experiences a series of shewings: vivid encounters with Jesus at the time and place of his grisly death.
Her writing is all about the nature and meaning of those experiences. As such, it’s too religious for a broad contemporary readership. My guess is her actual writing won’t get a lot of popular airtime except a few beautiful pull quotes that are compatible with secular wellness affirmations.
“all shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well."
In fact, TS Eliot uses (pinches?) those most famous lines for one of his more acclaimed poems.
It’s Julian’s who, when and how that are going to make her a star.
A woman who lived through a black plague that killed up to 50% of the people in her city. Including, most likely, all the people she loved. Husband, children, parents. All of them. A woman who emerges optimistic, charitable and full of vim. Most filmably, a woman who chooses to be walled up in a small room so she can free herself from distractions and focus on her writing.
In a (hazle)nut shell…
At 50 years old, she undergoes a living funeral. She enters a brick cell attached to the side of a church in Norwich. She will not leave that cell until her death 30 years later.
I predict: a great actress will win an Oscar for portraying her.
She doesn’t do it to run away from the world. She does it to experience the world more fully. To create a zone of concentration from which she can contemplate her shewings at length, in intricate detail. So she can fully understand them, describe them and convey their meaning to others.
Julian is a writer. Julian is an artist, and Julian is an inspiration to all artists who have ever been inspired. She shows us a whole new way to engage with that inspiration.
Her creative process is particularly inspiring for me because it’s so different to the way I work.
I’m a bumble bee.
I buzz from project to project. I flatter myself that I pollinate this one from that one and bring it all back to make thematically-coherent honey in some metaphorical hive. But is it really a methodology, or am I a slave to distraction? Do I go deep enough into the ideas that matter to me? Do I truly contemplate, excavate and craft them? Do I fully understand, describe and convey their meaning to others?
I’m going to say no.
I don’t go anywhere near as deep as I could, now that Julian shows me how deep one could go. I fear I get bored, or hit the limits of my known ability, and move on to the next shiny bright idea.
Can I go deeper?
Do I have it in me to really spend time with my ideas? My small ones that mean more to me than I can currently express to you? To wall myself up with them for years? To even devote a fraction of Julian’s attention?
I don’t know the answer to that - but I didn’t even know it was a question until I met Julian of Norwich.
Surely she is one of the greatest wrighters the world has ever known.
One of the greatest wrighters to have ever known the world.