Book Review: MATRIX by Lauren Groff

Matrix by Lauren Groff
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

"The religion she was raised in had always seemed vaguely foolish to her, if rich with mystery and ceremony, for why should babies be born into sin... why should she, who felt her greatness hot in her blood, be considered lesser?"

This sentence should prepare any prospective reader for what lies ahead. Lauren Groff's book is sheer literary magic: a feminist re-telling of Marie de France's incredible life as an abbess in Medieval Angleterre (England) so well-told, I prophesy its inclusion in Literature curricula in the future!!

It must be said... this book is NOT for the close-minded! It ends with the heart-breaking burning of a book of visions, when described, might be considered "heretical."

(But then, so was the idea that the earth was round, at one time.)

It is the incredibly inspiring story of what educated women can do, when working for the good of their neighbors, despite the political maneuverings of power-mad male clerics who considered nuns inferior to priests in the flawed hierarchy of medieval organized religion.

"Of her own mind and hands she has shifted the world. She has made something new. This feeling is the thrill of creation."

Such a treasure of a book! More than a meditation on the blessings of celibacy ("She could give up the burn of singular love inside her and turn to a larger love.") and the religious life ("It is good, so very good, this quiet life of women and work."), it is for everyone who has ever felt discontent with the responsibilities they are born into... basically the human condition.

The protagonist, Marie, is unforgettable because she, too, starts out so unhappy. Thought ugly and unmarriageable, she rebels in her youth against the royal decree that binds her to the abbey. But through sheer force of will, she is able to remake her very soul, and creates a better world in her tiny patch of land, through a life-long struggle against "a new darkness" that "touches the island, led by incompetence and madness and greed."

This is my first Lauren Groff and it won't be my last! Look at the beauty of this paragraph:

"For when it comes to strength and goodness and brilliance and gentleness and grandeur of spirit so vast it takes one's breath away, beauty is nothing, beauty is a mote to a mountain, beauty is a mere straw alight beside a barn on fire."

There are books that are dangerous because of the ideas inside. This book is one of them. But I consider my being enriched for having read it.

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