In her book The Camino,
Shirley MacLaine wanders through puzzling visions and
boldly records her spiritual wanderings. In The Camino, she describes her thoughts
and adventures along the Camino trail, a 500-mile pilgrimage that begins in France
and cuts through northern Spain to the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. The
Camino presents a physical challenge, even for a lifelong dancer like MacLaine: It is
filthy, dangerous, and tiring. MacLaine walks it alone, beset by dogs, deceptive
tourists, and the violent taunting of the press. She wears blisters into her heels; she
carves ten pounds off her lean dancer's frame; she walks miserably through walls of
bees. The Camino, as an exercise, pushes MacLaine to her physical limits. In this
chronicle of discovery, MacLaine bravely and openly explores her own imagination,
memories, and heart. In doing so, she pushes her readers to think more freely about
their own spiritual journeys. MacLaine's progress encourages us to connect dreams
with physical life, to develop our bodies morally.
The odyssey began with
a pair of anonymous handwritten letters imploring Shirley to
make a difficult pilgrimage along the Santiago de Compostela Camino in Spain.
Throughout history, countless illustrious pilgrims from all over Europe have taken up
the trail. It is an ancient -- and allegedly enchanted -- pilgrimage. People from St.
Francis of Assisi and Charlemagne to Ferdinand and Isabella to Dante and Chaucer
have taken the journey, which comprises a nearly 500-mile trek across highways,
mountains and valleys, cities and towns, and fields.
For Shirley, the Camino
was both an intense spiritual and physical challenge. A
woman in her sixth decade completing such a grueling trip on foot in thirty days at
twenty miles per day was nothing short of remarkable. But even more astounding
was the route she took spiritually: back thousands of years, through past lives to the
very origin of the universe. Immensely gifted with intelligence, curiosity, warmth, and
a profound openness to people and places outside her own experience, Shirley
MacLaine is truly an American treasure. And once again, she brings her inimitable
qualities of mind and heart to her writing. Balancing and negotiating the revelations
inspired by the mysterious energy of the Camino, she endured her exhausting
journey to Compostela until it gradually gave way to a far more universal voyage: that
of the soul. Through a range of astonishing and liberating visions and revelations,
Shirley saw into the meaning of the cosmos, including the secrets of the ancient
civilizations of Atlantis and Lemuria, insights into human genesis, the essence of
gender and sexuality, and the true path to higher love.
For MacLaine, these
visions need not be material to be meaningful; they need only
encourage moral growth. She shrugs:
"The Camino seemed to be a walking meditation on what I had learned internally.
If the Garden
of Eden had indeed been lost, I would seek to find it again. If other terrestrial species had
sought to achieve that balance themselves, then I would give more attention to UFO sightings
and why they were here. And if we had once been androgynous, then I would cease to
stereotype any person's sexual orientation or preference. If the Camino's energy had amplified
all those memories for me, then I would trust it."
Most importantly, then,
MacLaine's imagined worlds (or memories) guide her to
explore her beliefs more deeply and to speak about them more honestly.
