The Crossway - Softcover

Stagg, Guy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1509844597 ISBN 13: 9781509844593

Publisher: Picador, 2019

Synopsis

Winner - Edward Stanford Travel Memoir of the Year 2019.
Shortlisted - Rathbones Folio Prize, Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, and Somerset Maugham Award 2019.

'An extraordinary travelogue, strange and brilliant' - i

In 2013 Guy Stagg walked from Canterbury to Jerusalem. Though a non-believer, he began the pilgrimage after suffering several years of mental illness, hoping the ritual would heal him. For ten months he hiked alone on ancient paths, crossing ten countries and more than 5,500 kilometres. Travelling without support, he had to rely each night on the charity of strangers.

The Crossway is an account of Stagg's extraordinary journey. It describes the dangers he faced on the road, captures the people he met and the landscapes he experienced, offers a unique insight into contemporary faith, and – most movingly – lays bare his struggle to escape the past and walk towards recovery.

It was a BBC Radio 4 'Book of the Week' on publication.

About this title

Review:

Golden prose illuminates this moving account of a pilgrimage taken for the good of the author’s mental health . . . compelling . . . moving and thought-provoking (Peter Stanford Observer)

Having finished this account, I felt dazed. Dazed at the thought of all that I’d learnt from its pages about 2,000 years of Christianity, dazed at how immediate its author had made so many centuries-old stories feel, and dazed at the strangeness and brilliance of this extraordinary travelogue. (Rebecca Armstrong i newspaper)

The extraordinary story of a pilgrimage to find out the meaning of pilgrimage. Completely absorbing, personal, often funny, and full of fascinating encounters - an enlightening book from an exciting new writer. (Sarah Bakewell, author of At The Existentialist Café)

The journey is remarkable – a hike of thousands of miles across Europe, undertaken with rare bravery and stamina. But what is really extraordinary about Guy Stagg’s The Crossway is the writing – acutely sensitive, hyper-alert and unflagging in its exploration of the strange depths and by-ways of human belief (Philip Marsden, author of Rising Ground)

Completely absorbing, personal, often funny, and full of fascinating encounters – an enlightening book from an exciting new writer. (Sarah Bakewell, author of At The Existentialist Café)

The journey as redemptive recovery is a well-worm trope, but there is no glib ending here. I really enjoyed this book (Sara Wheeler Spectator)

I loved it. Odd that a journey made to find salvation (a kind of 5,500 kilometre Stations of the Cross taking almost a year to walk) should turn out to be such a page turner. The reason is Stagg himself – an engaging, challenging, endlessly interesting companion who just happens to write formidably well. Travel writing has a bright new star. (Alexander Frater, author of Chasing the Monsoon)

Guy Stagg makes a pilgrimage across Europe, into history and, most powerfully, the (troubled) interior of his soul. He takes us on a journey full of wonder and woe, poetry and pain; writing in prose that’s as sure-footed as it is unsettling in its honesty. A brave and beautiful account of a man’s search for meaning (Rhidian Brook, author of The Aftermath)

A formidable achievement . . . This secular pilgrimage is a lively. (Country Life)

A sublime, intense, and intimate account of a journey . . . Beautifully written, filled with strange encounters and extraordinary language (Philip Hoare, author of Leviathan)

Book Description:

Simultaneously a breathtaking account of a physical journey and a memoir about recovering from mental illness.

About this edition

• Publisher: Picador
• Publication date: 2019
• ISBN 10: 1509844597
• ISBN 13: 9781509844593
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 352