The World Within

‘An intriguing exploration of withdrawal and solitude’ Daily Telegraph 

‘Stagg writes masterfully’ The Times

What do we gain and what do we lose when we step back from the world? 

Guy Stagg follows in the footsteps of three extraordinary twentieth-century figures who withdrew during moments of crisis: Ludwig Wittgenstein, David Jones and Simone Weil. 

Blending history, travel, biography and a moving personal story, The World Within examines how retreat can save a life or transform a creative practice. It asks why the idea of retreat still enchants people to this day and hints at how each one of us can find a sanctuary of our own.

‘Stagg writes well and brightly about all he encounters’ Observer

‘A readable book that looks at how three people tried to live at the extreme edge of the human spirit’ Literary Review

‘Remarkable . . . Stagg, too, is on a journey, which is what makes his books so attractive and accessible’ The Tablet

‘In an age riddled with noise and distraction, The World Within feels timely. It reminds us that silence and solitude are vital for self-discovery’ Press Association

About the Author :
Guy Stagg was born in 1988 and grew up in Paris, Heidelberg, Yorkshire and London. The Crossway is his first book and is an account of his ten-month walk to Jerusalem. The author sets off from Canterbury on New Year’s Day, telling his friends and family only that he’ll be home before the year’s end. It was shortlisted for the inaugural DRF Award in 2016 and since then has won the Edward Stanford Travel Memoir of the Year 2019, as well as being shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize 2019, the RSL Ondaatje Prize 2019 and the Somerset Maugham Award 2019. The Crossway was a BBC Radio 4 ‘Book of the Week’.

Review :
‘Stagg writes well and brightly about all he encounters: church architecture, monastic history, the people?, landscapes and weather?, and his own hesitancies. He is candid and flexible in his thinking. As to his three chosen figures, he is generous in his dealings with them, questing and explicating, never dismissive’ - Kathleen Jaime, Observer

‘This remarkable book is structured round three retreats by travel writer Guy Stagg . . . Stagg has chosen well with his three ­twentieth-century outsiders . . . [he] has interesting things to say about all of them . . . Stagg tells the story of [Simone Weil’s] life and death with great sensitivity. Almost everything about this beautiful outsider makes me cry . . . Stagg, too, is on a journey, which is what makes his books so attractive and accessible’ - AN Wilson, The Tablet

‘Treat[s] his complex subjects with insight and empathy . . . Though he remains ambivalent about faith, the author’s convictions about solitude and creativity change fundamentally throughout this elegant, thoughtful book’ - Mark Nayler, TLS ‘Stagg writes masterfully . . . in a way that that can hold the general reader. He can evoke a sense of place and give a sense of people . . . The merit of this book is that it demonstrates how damaging that search [for retreat] can be if undertaken for the wrong reasons’ ‘An intriguing exploration of withdrawal and solitude . . . An enjoyably written book on an important subject: whether it is good for an artist – or anyone else – to retreat from the world’ ‘Explores the lives of three 20th-century thinkers . . . Stagg visits the places where they found quiet solace in times of crisis and examines how their solitude influenced their work and genius . . . In an age riddled with noise and distraction, The World Within feels timely. It reminds us that silence and solitude are vital for self-discovery’  ‘In this intriguing book, Stagg identifies a number of reasons why these three figures pursued such radically different lives from most of us . . . In a relaxed and informative way, Stagg takes the reader to the places and religious houses associated with his three subjects, wondering at the back of his mind what withdrawal and retreat might mean for his own life. He is a close, attentive observer, and we get some excellent writing about places and people, with no false romanticism and some quite astringent realism . . . a readable book that looks at how three people tried to live at the extreme edge of the human spirit’ ‘Guy Stagg's The World Within is a compelling and contemplative investigation into the nature of retreat, asking why writers and artists seek periods, or lives, in solitude. Like a detective, Stagg traces the routes of three 20th century figures, arriving at their former sanctuaries with a self-conscious curiosity, speaking to monks, immersing himself in landscapes, listening to the prayers and chants that sustained them. In the shadow of each story is the fractious political history of 20th century Europe – war and persecution – which deepens the book’s study, as does Stagg’s voice – candid, self-revelatory, scholarly and empathetic’ ‘A luminous study. Guy Stagg penetrates as far as anyone can into the solitude of three geniuses in retreat and explores with elegance, erudition and honesty the strange territory of reclusion where emptiness and profundity meet’ ‘In this thrilling exploration of the complex nature of retreat and the ever-present allure of solitude, Guy Stagg carves out his own beautiful silences and transformations with prose as luminescent as his brilliantly inquisitive spirit’ ‘At once lucid and provocatively mysterious, Stagg’s meditation on the interludes in which three of the last century’s most imaginative minds chose to step back from the world offers fresh insights into their creative trajectories – and valuable clues as to how we might renew our own inner lives’ ‘The writing is beautiful and pure, the ideas sophisticated but simply said. More than anything, I love the emotional truth this book explores: the tension of wanting to participate in this world, but also retreat from it. In The World Within, Stagg is speaking to the paradox at the heart of the most meaningful journeys we might take’