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3.54 AVERAGE
3.54 AVERAGE
Although not Christian myself, I’m not adverse to Christian texts at all – I quite enjoyed Bede’s Ecclesiastical History earlier this summer – but I couldn’t see the appeal of this text at all. It’s baffling to me that this was such a ubiquitous book in its day, even if people generally don’t read it now. I didn’t find it particularly entertaining or enlightening in theological terms: the story’s mostly comprised of episodes of various trials Christian (the eponymous pilgrim’s name) and some other characters encounter that teach them religious and moral lessons, but the things they learn seem like pretty entry-level stuff to me, so I can’t see how adult believers in the past would have got much insight into their religion from it either. It's so plain that its existence almost seems unnecessary.
The Librivox recording I listened to actually had a full cast, which certainly made it more entertaining to listen to as a performance, but that merit can’t be credited to the text itself. The singing and speaking in unison added some variety and made it more bearable, and some of the more malevolent characters (i.e. Apollyon) enlivened it a bit too, but neither plays a major part in the story overall. The antagonistic forces added some conflict for the characters to overcome, but never played a particularly major role in the book either, and the lessons in and of themselves are never particularly earth-shattering.
The dilemma here is that, a bit like [b:Robinson Crusoe|2932|Robinson Crusoe|Daniel Defoe|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1403180114s/2932.jpg|604666], there’s no getting around how important and influential this text has been in the past, and it’s certainly a stepping stone on one’s journey to reading the whole literary Canon, but it doesn’t hold much interest or appeal for the modern reader. I’m not sure if it’s worth people reading it just so that they’ve covered one more base, or if we should retire some of these texts now and only refer to them for academic purposes, rather than putting them on lists and the like for a general audience.
I will say that I like the hymn ‘To Be a Pilgrim’, so I’m grateful to this book for the song. I was tempted to give this 1.5 stars, but it earned an extra star since I discovered towards the end that this book is the original source for the hymn (I think it comes up around Part 2, Chapter 8). That song improves the work for me, as it’s a higher quality work than this book as a whole.
The Librivox recording I listened to actually had a full cast, which certainly made it more entertaining to listen to as a performance, but that merit can’t be credited to the text itself. The singing and speaking in unison added some variety and made it more bearable, and some of the more malevolent characters (i.e. Apollyon) enlivened it a bit too, but neither plays a major part in the story overall. The antagonistic forces added some conflict for the characters to overcome, but never played a particularly major role in the book either, and the lessons in and of themselves are never particularly earth-shattering.
The dilemma here is that, a bit like [b:Robinson Crusoe|2932|Robinson Crusoe|Daniel Defoe|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1403180114s/2932.jpg|604666], there’s no getting around how important and influential this text has been in the past, and it’s certainly a stepping stone on one’s journey to reading the whole literary Canon, but it doesn’t hold much interest or appeal for the modern reader. I’m not sure if it’s worth people reading it just so that they’ve covered one more base, or if we should retire some of these texts now and only refer to them for academic purposes, rather than putting them on lists and the like for a general audience.
I will say that I like the hymn ‘To Be a Pilgrim’, so I’m grateful to this book for the song. I was tempted to give this 1.5 stars, but it earned an extra star since I discovered towards the end that this book is the original source for the hymn (I think it comes up around Part 2, Chapter 8). That song improves the work for me, as it’s a higher quality work than this book as a whole.
Not to sound too pretentious, but this book was straight up dumb!
Was this why the pilgrims were kicked out of England?
The writing and storytelling was bad. If this was submitted in high school, there’d be a ton of red notes about how the plot sucks. It’s like a child telling a story they are making up on the spot with magical keys that appear when they need to move the plot along even though they never mentioned them before.
There’s no such thing as character development because each character is named for their unchangeable character trait for the allegory, and Christian (A Christian, creatively named) is only correct all along, so no need to learn anything or grow.
The morality is bunk too. It’s racist, sexist, and the main character is an asshole. He ditches his family to burn in hell while he goes to find the Celestial City. He’s an idiot repeatedly, and talks shit to people that did nothing to him. When his wife begins the journey in part two, she just gets talked at by all the men along the way and is not even the main character in her own story really. They try and scrub an Ethiopian’s skin white, but can’t because he’s a hypocrite. Why? No details other than he’s black, and I guess that means he’s going to hell.
If John Bunyan is in heaven, then I’m not interested, thanks.
Was this why the pilgrims were kicked out of England?
The writing and storytelling was bad. If this was submitted in high school, there’d be a ton of red notes about how the plot sucks. It’s like a child telling a story they are making up on the spot with magical keys that appear when they need to move the plot along even though they never mentioned them before.
There’s no such thing as character development because each character is named for their unchangeable character trait for the allegory, and Christian (A Christian, creatively named) is only correct all along, so no need to learn anything or grow.
The morality is bunk too. It’s racist, sexist, and the main character is an asshole. He ditches his family to burn in hell while he goes to find the Celestial City. He’s an idiot repeatedly, and talks shit to people that did nothing to him. When his wife begins the journey in part two, she just gets talked at by all the men along the way and is not even the main character in her own story really. They try and scrub an Ethiopian’s skin white, but can’t because he’s a hypocrite. Why? No details other than he’s black, and I guess that means he’s going to hell.
If John Bunyan is in heaven, then I’m not interested, thanks.
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
The novel follows Christian on his journey to the Celestial City. His journey, as well as the characters he meets along the way (Faithful, Piety, Sloth, Hopeful, etc.) is an allegory for the moral struggle of each person in the world.
My grandmother bought me a children's version of this book when I was 8 years old and I absolutely loved it. It was one of my favorite childhood books and it inspired a lifelong love of the fantasy genre. I love a good quest!
My grandmother bought me a children's version of this book when I was 8 years old and I absolutely loved it. It was one of my favorite childhood books and it inspired a lifelong love of the fantasy genre. I love a good quest!
I am shocked how much I enjoyed this book. It's not the best book ever, but it was much better than I thought it would be. The adventure hooked me and I wanted to know what happened. I took this for a course and of ~50 people only myself and one other person read it. It is difficult to put aside our opinions going into it, but I think that it is worth a try.
I can take or leave this one. It was an interesting allegory, but just seemed really irrelevant to anybody but a 17th century nonconformist Christian - and that's not really who I am.
challenging
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
Simply fantastic description of our journey with God replete with trials and tribulations. I cannot believe this gem has been on my bookshelf for so long untouched.
Loved the concept of the allegory as presented in the book but the second part was not necessary for me
challenging
reflective
slow-paced
I would not recommend this book to anyone unless you'd like to slog through many pages of dry allegory about characters that you probably won't care about.