Religion, Culture, and Sacred Space

"Smith has produced a fascinating study of narratives that center on sacred places. Through a deeply layered reading of texts, stories, and narratives he shows how places are associated with, are imbued, and transformed by the memories, histories, and constructed identities of religious groups. His study, besides being of value to scholars of literature and narrative, will appeal to those interested in how places come to be regarded as sacred places, and to those interested in debates about the nature of the sacred and how it may be produced; it will also appeal to scholars of pilgrimage, who will find in his excavation of the narratives associated with specific places, much to aid them in their understanding of how places not only attract visitors but, crucially, how the narratives of place shape and frame the ways in which such places are seen and experienced by pilgrims." - Ian Reader, University of Manchester