EDITED BY JUANITA COULSON
REVEALING LOOK BEHIND THE VEIL
CLOISTERED: My Years as a NunbyCatherine Coldstream(Chatto & Windus, £20)
If ever you have wondered why an educated, sophisticated young woman born in the 20th century might want to enter an enclosed religious order, wear a bulky 16th-century habit, take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, and sleep on a straw mattress in an unheated cell, here is the answer in lush, poetic prose.
When her beloved father, the artist William Coldstream, died his daughter Catherine was overcome with grief and wanted to find another father figure, but a heavenly one this time. The ancient, largely silent Carmelite order seemed to speak to her deepest desires.
Radical austerity and simplicity appeared to be just what she was seeking, and the seclusion of a cell is at the heart of Carmelite belief. Time spent in there, says Coldstream, was bliss.
It soon became clear to her that God was her true father and the convent was her true home. Daily life there was harsh and materially uncomfortable, but the many privations only added to a sense of purpose.
Yet although there were moments of transcendence, as time went on this life also threw up what became insurmountable difficulties. There were tussles, occasionally leading to blows, with some of the other sisters, much jostling for position and seniority and also nervous breakdowns. It was not all serenity, love and peace by any means, and after twelve years Coldstream fled in despair to lead a secular married life.
But this runaway nun now says that, on one level, it is impossible to ever truly leave, impossible to forget the sound of silence – she still blesses ‘the inestimable gift of Carmel’.
As my oldest schoolfriend also became a Carmelite nun, I appreciate only too well what Coldstream went through, and know that a religious vocation can be quite as challenging as anything in the outside world.
Liz Hodgkinson
MEET THE AUTHOR MILLY JOHNSON
The romantic novelist can never have enough cats and dogsWhen are you at your happiest?
With my other half on a cruise ship. It’s the only place I ever relax, and we enjoy each other’s company. Heaven to me would be an eternal cruise on the Med.
What is your earliest memory?
Being at nursery and scrapping with a girl called Carol Thompson over the Cinderella costume in the playbox. Neither of us got it, and we were both sent to stand in the corridor. Carol and I are still friends today.
