2
Sorrow
3
A Woman Young
4
Conjunction
5
Bound
6
Loss
7
The Dragon’s Tail
8
On My Way
9
Acquisition
10
Red
11
Safeguard Going Out
12
Beardless
13
Joy
I Saw Water explores in imagination the after death state of earth bound spirits. The characters continue, as in material existence, to be activated by fantasy and desire—whether mania or phobia—and to build round themselves the illusion of time and space. Most of them see themselves as still participating in physical life, so near is their consciousness to that of this planet; but the narrator becomes progressively more distant as the story unfolds.
Ménec is that Island of the Dead which is to be found in the mythologies under various names; it has many geographical locations. The characters who appear there are all discarnate, though a few of them may be so only temporarily, projected there in states of profound unconsciousness, however caused. As they arrive, they are received at the Ianua Vitae Convent where they remain until thirst for experience draws them away.
Only in the penultimate chapter, which explains the forgoing narrative, do living characters appear in an earth-life setting: while in the final chapter the narrator, having undergone the “second-death”* approaches impersonality and so achieves a measure of calm.
Ithell Colquhoun
It was my turn to herd our cows and goats, so I was eating a mid-day meal in the open air. But when I say it was my turn, that’s not strictly true because I wangled it by getting round our Novice-Mistress, Sister Mary Paracelsus.* Not that I was still a Novice, but I often helped her in the still-room,* so had opportunities for tactful suggestion.
In our Order stress is laid on outdoor life: we have a mystique of nature-appreciation, you might say. (This, perhaps, is to counter-balance the miraculous character of our central theme). But as idle dreams are not encouraged, nor even Wordsworthian wanderings lonely as a cloud,* the love of nature is usually given the form of land-work. Some of our city-bred Novices don’t care about it, and many a Postulant* has forfeited all chance of a Novitiate even, by not being able to take the bull by the horns. Yes, we do have bulls; our cattle are not the dispirited, de-horned, artificially-inseminated creatures that brood now, I’ve heard, in many an English field. And why not? Cows have a dull enough existence in any case, so it’s a shame to deprive them of their one diversion. Our bulls are seldom savage because we don’t keep them chained up but let them run with the herd.
It’s an act of charity for someone like myself, who enjoys it, to undertake a timid Novice’s turn with the cattle—when that can be discreetly managed.
It was the day of St. Januarius and so in some sense a doorway; perhaps, together with our festival of St. Mazhe* two days later, it is the Church’s way of marking the Equinox.* Mazhe is more than a Saint, standing as he does at the opening of one of the year’s quarters. The weather was fine with a haze that silvered the sunlight as I kept an eye on our beasts munching the grass-verges and strips of common-land on the outskirts of the town. I don’t know if we are within our rights in letting them so graze; but few people like to fight with nuns, so no one has yet queried the custom. And then we may be doing the neighbouring farmers a service by letting our herd crop the rank weeds before seeding.
I must admit that I find it a relief to have an occasional meal away from the refectory. Not that it isn’t very pleasant there: you don’t have to make conversation, because one of the Sisters always reads aloud to us while we eat. This Lection is another thing we take in turns: usually an incident from the life of one of the Saints is chosen, or one from Church-history. Whatever it is, you needn’t listen if you’d rather pursue your own thoughts, because no one questions on it. Still it’s a treat to have solitary contact with nature once in a while; luckily this is in the spirit of the Order, or I should have a thin time.
Thank God I’m not a Cistercian,* with no let-up from the common-life! Not even a cell of your own, and having to sleep in a dormitory as if you were still at a child’s boarding school. One writer has remarked that this unmitigated proximity to one’s fellows is the most severe mortification that can be imposed on a religious of our time. Sartre said much the same thing in other words, if I remember: ‘L’enfer, c’est les autres’.* (I haven’t read an author of this type for some while so I won’t be sure of the exact phrase. At the Ianua Vitae,* no ephemeral reading-matter is allowed; but if, as occasionally happens, a newspaper is smuggled into the precincts, it is left in one of the lavatories. An unwritten law forbids its use for wiping one’s bottom and decrees that one leaves it for subsequent visitors to read. A queue tends to form outside the cubicle containing this link with a former life, while other compartments are left vacant.)
It’s not so bad if les autres are quiet, and they have to be, in our Order. If you don’t move quietly by nature you soon have to learn: no doors must be slammed or implements roughly handled; there is no chattering, scuffling or stamping. No noisy machinery is allowed in labour-saving devices because labour saving isn’t one of our aims; and no radio because we are supposed to be able to do without mental and emotional drugs. Not that it’s a stuffy Order at all—it’s easier than most. Hidden in the tall herbage, I can often slip in a sun-bathe on my herding days, and sometimes even a bathe in the sea. But this latter we’re not supposed to do unless a party of us is going to one of the deserted strands—in case we get into deep water. I’m not complaining; in general I like the life. All decisions on trivial matters, which use up your energy while you are in the world, are taken from you; in return for obedience, you are relieved of a good many boring things—like buying a suspender-belt for instance. Few of us wear stockings, usually just strong sandals on bare feet. In cold weather (or all the year round for some of the elderly Sisters) we are allowed a sort of wool sock which needs no support; worn under a habit no one outside can tell the difference.
Well, as I was saying, there was I seated on a low wall that divides the lane from somebody’s field, eating my dinner from a tin plate. I’d taken off my head-dress, the black and white veil that I always find troublesome. In some of our convents it has been replaced by a kerchief like the Postulants’ which ties under the chin and which you can wear or not, as you choose. But Reverend Mother is a bit traditional in some ways and hasn’t got around to that one yet. I really must drop these colloquial phrases—it’s lucky my Superiors can’t hear me think or I’d be on the carpet. There I go again! They’re right, of course: nothing is dingier than outdated slang, and you can’t expect a nun to keep