Touching the void

I have always sought connection through story, myth and the imagination. One such medium that can contain and transmit these mysteries is film. Like the science of baking a good cake, if the ingredients are brought together and synthesised correctly you can make something special. This special something can then provide the observing ego an experience and temporal connection to something ‘other’.

Although not all films can do this and Most don’t, these failed attempts of immersion leave ones hopes dashed and I am often left feeling disappointed and unsatisfied.

However, sometimes, on the very rare occasions, there is a magnus opus just waiting to be fished out from the sea of flotsam.

One such opus is ‘touching the void’ originally a best-selling book written by Joe Simpson. The novel was adapted into a screenplay and directed by Kevin Macdonald. Its widely regarded as one of the most successful documentaries in British cinema history.

Throughout my lifetime, only a very few films have really, truly enveloped me in complete immersion. Touching the void was one such film. Upon previous reflection, I never really understood why, I certainly didn’t expect a mountaineering docudrama survival film to have me utterly enchanted, and although unknown to me at the time, the indelible imprint it left on my psyche would help steer the course of my life from thereafter.

I have often likened it to a seed being planted, but in truth, I think that seed was already there. I believe the film acted as a positive charge to a nucleus of potentialis, propelling me into mountaineering, climbing and subsequently a life working at height. But as I now know, many years later. You cannot have the height without the depth.

The unio opositorum – [unity of opposites] will eventually seek to be balanced.

Examined symbolically, Touching the void is a myth for modern man. Joe’s concretised experience of the ‘dark night of the soul’ on the mountain is masterfully recounted, symbiotically acting as guide, teacher, oppressor and redeemer.

An ancient pattern of the psyche that has played out through the ancient Egyptians, Greek mythology and various religious structures throughout the ages. The Greeks called it ‘Nekyia’ Joseph Campell called it ‘the hero’s journey’. Carl Jung called it ‘Individuation’.

Regardless of which lens you prefer to view it through the core principle remains the same. The individual is tasked with a journey to a very dark, deeply unpleasant place, a place no soul has been before because its unique to the individual. And in that place resides a piece of the Imago Dei.

Thank you, Joe Simpson, for sharing with us your hero’s journey and helping constellate the beginning for my own. You truly did touch the void.

#siriussimon #blackandwhite #mythformodernman