Heroine's Journey Blog

I have started a new blog called Sarabande's Journey to focus on the heroine's journey as I discover it while working on my sequel to The Sun Singer called Sarabande.

For years, pscyhotherapists, mythologists, authors and others have said that the hero's journey structure doesn't directly apply to the inner work done by women throughout their lives, much less to transformational literature about their paths to wholeness. As an author, I approach the subject as a generalist, researcher, reporter and--I hope--a sensitive interpretor.

I am relying, therefore, on two worlds of information as I write Sarabande. The story my muse and my imagination bring to me. And, the work done by such authors as Jules Cashford, Anne Baring and Laurens Van Der Post; Maureen Murdock; Sylvia Brinton Perera; Demetra George.

Writing a book is a journey in itself. It widens my horizons, it expands my consciousness, and it adds depth to my understanding of the world and of myself. This was very much the case insofar as the hero's journey was concerned as I wrote The Sun Singer and Garden of Heaven: an Odyssey. After the fact, as others began to ask where the themes and ideas originated from, I wished I'd kept a bibliography as the works progressed.

This time, I am. I make no claim to expert knowledge about the heroine's journey. I can sidestep that issue somewhat by saying I am, after all, writing fiction and not a definitive work on the journey itself. The books I discover are not the end of the journey for others who may be interested in this subject. They are a beginning.

I invite you to stop by Sarabande's Journey as the blog gets underway, evolves, twists and turns, gets stuck in labyrinths and, from time to time, finds ideas of interest to other seekers on the path.

--Malcolm