The Nib

flickr photo by Limbo Poet

Regenerating Symbols

Sometimes I think a favoured symbol of mine is worn out. It's either been used too often or has become anachronistic. How well does the modern reader relate to symbols like the steam engine, which once dominated the industrial literary landscape, or a rose by any other name, which has been a faded emblem since Shakespearean times.

But symbols that have lost their vigour can sometimes be revisited. A case in point is stained glass, which will be a significant symbol in my novel of the same working name. I have gone through several vicissitudes working with this particular element. At first I was excited. The symbolic import of light, passing through glass into a sacred space seemed so obviously potent that I couldn't help but be deeply pleased whenever the image came to mind.

But it dawned on me gradually that my excitement had as much to do with my own incomplete literary knowledge as with the vitality of the symbol itself. As a spiritual and religious image stained glass has probably been used in countless passages. As a modern symbol it will be irrelevant to a growing demographic of readers. So does the reference to stained glass warrant prominent treatment in my work, even a work of the same name?

Before abandoning the reference as anything more than a passing curiosity, I did a little research. And lo, a whole new set of meanings have emerged, which revitalize the symbol in ways I had not dreamed possible. Indeed, the beauty of this symbol is its transition from a classical religious icon into a feature of many religious institutions that has been deeply altered by modern science. Instead of being an overwhelmingly religious and spiritual reference, stained glass is now invested with an amazing set of scientific properties that become a metaphor for the impact of scientific inquiry on religion. It now symbolizes for me the altered nature of light that pours into our churches.

I haven't fully grasped even the fundamentals of the science around photons and light waves. But Einstein's Theory of Relativity and a cluster of other scientific discoveries have as much to do with the significance of a brilliant church window as do the biblical scenes that are depicted. A remarkable and provocative dissonance builds when I consider stained glass from these dual perspectives. It's a fragmenting view that makes me think hard to align my notions of spiritualism and science - both of which are central to my world view.

That makes stained glass a potent image, and the shattering of stained glass by the fictional  iconoclasts of Barkerville a dramatic statement pitting one world view against another. So my instinctive appreciations of stained glass as a symbol has been borne out by its precarious position in the modern intellectual and emotional context. I'm so happy it has a revivified meaning, because it would truly have been a shame to give it up.