Mary Magdalene.
She is a character of fiction and history and historical fiction. In this era she seems more a media persona than beloved historical figure. How we know her is quite relative to how we meet up with her. France? Egypt? Traveling with the Templars? As writer of the Gnostic Gospel of Mary?
I just finished reading The Madonna Secret, a story by Sophie Strand just published in 2023. In the end I'll say this was a good book. But I found I had to wade too long in shallow chapters before reaching the deep end, the depth of a good book. Eventually we get there.
Sophie tells us from the get go in the Authors's note "I have attempted to tell a story that is deeply rooted in the flowers, the trees, the animals, the birdsong ...." " I have attempted to recreate a living breathing ecosystem that shapes my characters". And this is what she does, but at the expense of getting us inside her many characters.
The book is just shy of 600 pages. Its thick, and just a little too heavy with words. As in, the weight of repetive and unecessary imagery clothing her characters with too heavy a costume, too little of soul. Sophie also tells us in the Author's Note " ...it is based on serious study of the primary documents available from first century Palestine: canonical, gnostic, and apocryphal". And that is all we learn or see of research documentation. But, it is fiction, "... fiction that takes seriously Jesus's love of story telling", says Sophie.
Personally, I have an image of the Magdalene as a Cathar woman of the Languedoc region of France, among her kin in the esoteric landscapes.
We have to find her in our memories really, and in the end this is where Sophie Strand does take us. Into a potent memory of many stories blended into a single woman, mother, maiden, mage, Magdalena.
Many years ago I read The Secret Magdalene, Ki Longfellow’s book with over 5 pages of bibliography tracking her historical reseach. Fewer characters in this novel, with greater depth into each one. Ki Longfellow was an excellent writer.
I followed The Secret Magdalene with Flow Down Like Silver; Hypatia of Alexandria. Both of these Ki Longfellow books look through the yin window into the very yang histories, fables, lore and legends we are trying to re-member.
Sophie is telling stories of romance, and the opposite of romance, and of eras of religious upheaval. But in the end we are asked to remember, remember the keepers of the all the stories.
excerpt form the Madonna Secret
