A Pilgrim's Progress Through Perception, Madness, and Another Dimension

This is the first post of a limited series wherein I will be discussing the inspiration and influences behind my first novel “Deep Purple Dream.”

For those who aren't familiar with “The Pilgrim's Progress,” the book is a Christian allegory written by John Bunyan in the late 1600s. It's a book that I read in my youth and a story that stayed with me in the strangest of ways. It was Bunyan's simplistic use of character and place names (albeit with masterful writing) that I found hard to shake. For those who are unfamiliar with the story, Christian is the protagonist of the allegory, which focuses on his journey from his hometown, the "City of Destruction.” A quick glance reveals an assortment of the character names it contains:

• Mr. Worldly Wiseman

• Mr. Legality

• Mrs. Light-Mind

• Obstinate

• Pliable

• Humble-Mind

• Giant Despair

• Hypocrisy

• Watchful

• Discretion

• Prudence

• Piety

• Charity

• Wanton

Of course some of these names are not all that unusual, especially for women – many of us may have met or heard of a Hope, Prudence, or even Charity. What of the Davids, the Roberts, the Lindas of the world? Search the etymology of a so-called common name and sooner or later you will find an attributed meaning, even though for most of us that meaning has been lost to the fog of history.

After reading The Pilgrims Progress, I contemplated names, word meanings, and how we interpret them – what we perceive and attribute from what we see and the names by which we refer to what we see. I was even influenced by the full title of the book: “The Pilgrim's Progress from This World to That Which Is to Come; Delivered under the Similitude of a Dream” and the simple and straightforward opening line:

“As I walked through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place where was a den; and I layed me down in the place to sleep: and as I slept, I dreamed a dream.”

So were found the initial threads I used to begin weaving the story of Deep Purple Dream, and its protagonist Cal, whose personal problems begins taking a toll on his mental health. Is he simply dreaming? Is he going mad? Everything he sees and all the people he has encountered – are they real? Is this all really happening? Or was it all the pills, a jolt to the brain's pineal gland?

But more on that inspiration later.