Islands
Abstract Islands have a way of reconfiguring the center. Off on the edge, away from the mainland, they speak of difference, resilience, and self-reliance. Islands can symbolize the heart of human darkness, reminding us of what happens in insolated places when law and morality break down. Think of th...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Book Part |
| Language: | unknown |
| Published: |
Oxford University PressNew York
2019
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190842673.003.0012 https://academic.oup.com/book/chapter-pdf/56952721/oso-9780190842673-chapter-12.pdf |
| Summary: | Abstract Islands have a way of reconfiguring the center. Off on the edge, away from the mainland, they speak of difference, resilience, and self-reliance. Islands can symbolize the heart of human darkness, reminding us of what happens in insolated places when law and morality break down. Think of the schoolboys in The Lord of the Flies or the mutineers of the Bounty on Pitcairn Island. Yet islands are also symbols of paradise and the highest human aspirations as well. In Greek mythology, access to the Elysian Fields came by way of the Fortunate Isles lying in the mists off the West African coast. St. Augustine thought the Garden of Eden continued to exist on a remote, inaccessible island. Saint Brendan, the Celtic navigator, claimed to have discovered a thickly wooded island paradise shrouded in the fog off the western sea. The writings of Nikos Kazantzakis draw their power from the life he knew on the island of Crete. When the call for wildness, passion, and resistance is strong in your life—when you have to stop playing it safe—his novels strike a rich chord. The author reflects on the mystery of “islandness” and the teachings of Kazantzakis in connection with a trip he made to Monhegan Island off the coast of Maine. |
|---|