Jan Karon - Writing and Wrestling with the Heart: Jan Karonfs Washington National Cathedral Lecture

Welcome

Jan will talk with us tonight about the personal journey of her writing life. She has faced the challenges so many writers dofrom writers block to publishers rejections to the interference of regular life. Yet, in her case, writing her novels has truly been a leap of faith, as she has opened herself more and more to Gods leadings. In this way she is a spiritual companion to us, her readers, and her vividly expressed characters lead us into an experience of spiritual community.

Know that Jans new book, Light from Heaven , the final novel in the Mitford series, will answer the questions youve been asking since the series begansuch questions as Will Father Tim find all of Dooleys siblings? How will he find the right moment to tell Dooley about his inheritance? and Will Edith Mallory recover, and what will she say if she does?

Jans books have won numerous awards, and from Out to Canaan and onward her novels have debuted on the New York Times bestseller list, often claiming the number-one spot. There are Mitford companion books including Jan Karons Mitford Cookbook & Kitchen Reader , and she has authored two childrens books and an all-ages inspiration title, The Trellis and the Seed . Jan has sold more then thirty million books since she began her writing life.

Having spent her writing years in Blowing Rock, North Carolina, Jan recently moved to a nationally registered eighteenth-century farmhouse in Virginia. How wonderful to have her so close by now. So many of you here tonight have been devoted fans of Jans writing for years, while I am relatively new to her work. But what has struck me most about it is the gentleness of spirit. In this time of conflict, and in a culture of ever more present and demanding electronic media, Jans voice and her stories remind us of the calm and steady loving presence of God at work in our lives. It is not only story line, but a visceral experience for this reader, and for many of you, I suspect. It is a joy to have her here with us tonight. Please join me now in welcoming Jan Karon.

Jan Karons Lecture

Thank you. Thank you so much. In the lovely words of Saint Paul to everyone gathered here tonight, Grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.

Its a powerfully felt honor to be here tonight. I know all of you in this audience tonight are blessed with imaginations. Youve had to use your imagination quite often when you read the Mitford books, as a matter of fact. Imagine, then, how I feel standing here in our National Cathedral. Not the Baptist Cathedral or the Presbyterian Cathedral or the Methodist Cathedral, but our National Cathedral. Im so deeply honored and so very moved. And I thank you for coming tonight, very much. It would be mighty empty in here if you all hadnt shown up. I want to say hats off to Scott and his wonderful musicians for giving me a multitude of goose bumps as I listened to them play Aaron Copelands Fanfare for the Common Man . Many thanks.

Writing and Wrestling with the Heart is the topic Ive been asked to address. Now sometimes Ive been given the title of a topic by a committee, and Ill just say, You know, I dont really want to talk about that. I mean, I just dont have anything to say about that at all. But when I got this title I thought, Yes, I want to talk about this wrestling business.

I remember very vividly a day when I was five years old and I was at my grandmothers house, and I was standing on the back porch. It was a summer day. The sky was very blue. Im from North Carolina, and you know what they say about Carolina blue. The mimosa tree was in bloom and the pink blossoms fragrant, and I was looking up at all that and I was just enraptured, when suddenly I began to preach. I mean I was preaching up a storm. It just came over me. Today I would call it the Holy Spirit. Now I dont remember what I said, but it raised quite a clamor, and my grandmother came to the door, and she said, Janice, whats going on out here? I said, Momma, Im going to be a preacher. She said, Well I dont think so, honey, because girls dont preach. Well that settled that. If Momma said it, that settled it.

Now a few years later, I had another childhood epiphany, if you will. I was standing at the front door looking out into the yard. Once again it was summer. I was ten years old and I remember turning and looking into my great-grandmothers mirrorit was hanging on the wall right by the door. And I looked into that mirror, and answering some stirring of my heart that had been going on for quite some time, I said, Im going to be an author. And so, more than fifty years later, I am an author writing about a preacher. Two birds, one stone .

Soon after this childhood epiphany I thought Id better get busy, I just better get right to it. So I sat down and wrote a novel. And in number two pencil. Im sure all of you remember the number two pencil. It had the softest lead, just the sweetest way of making its course across lined Blue Horse notebook paper. And I hid my writing very carefully because it had a word in it that I didnt want anyone in my family to see. I had recently seen Gone with the Wind , and I was very eager to use the word that was spoken so boldly toward the end. So holding my breath, I wrote it into the manuscript, shocking even myself. Publishers were paying five cents a word at that time, and I thought that was even more reason to add that. So my little sister found the manuscript, and one morning she came running into the kitchen and she said, Momma, Momma! Janice wrote a book and its got damn in it! (My sisters here tonight, in the front row.) My grandmother looked at me and she said, Janice, go out there and get me a little switch. And make it a little stinging switch. Now when I came up you had to go get your own switch. I dont know about the rest of you, but I had to go get mine. And then when you get it you gotta strip the leaves off. You gotta bring it ready to go. My grandmother nearly wore me out for using that word, which is just one reason that youll find no cussing in the Mitford books.