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.
