Diary of an Old Soul, George MacDonald, with introduction and notes by Timothy Larsen. IVP Academic (ISBN: 9781514007686), 2024 (originally published in 1880).

Summary: A new edition of MacDonald’s extended devotional poem, with seven line stanzas for each day of the year.

In 1880, George MacDonald, the prolific fantasy writer, published a work he titled A Book of Strife in the Form of a Diary of an Old Soul. He intended the book as a gift to friends, assuming the cost of publication. As historian Timothy Larsen notes in the Introduction, devotional works were common during this time, supplementing daily Bible readings with spiritual reflections. What MacDonald did was write an extended poem broken into 365 seven line stanzas. Opposite the poems, he provided a blank page for the reader to write his or her own reflections, which would become part of the work.

The New Edition

IVP Academic has just published a new edition of this work. Unlike later versions, this edition preserves the interleaving of blank pages with the poem with one to three stanzas on a page with a blank page opposite. Wheaton historian Timothy Larsen, drawing upon the resources of the Marion E. Wade Center, provides an introduction to the life, context, and content of The Diary. He also lightly annotates the work, mainly defining unusual words and giving context for some allusions. I appreciated the unobtrusive character of the notes. They did not distract from the text. The IVP edition is 4.25 x 7 inches in size, with a cloth binding and bookmark ribbon, ideal for devotional use.

The Poem

The original first part of MacDonald’s title gives us a clue to the character of the poem. MacDonald portrays the strife of the soul against sin, spiritual inertia, and the vicissitudes of life, in order to love God as one would desire. This is not for lack of his intimacy with God but because of it. That intimacy is evident in these lines from January 5:

My soul breathes only in thy infinite soul;
I breathe, I think, I love, I live but thee.
Oh breathe, oh think--O Love, live into me;
Unworthy is my life till all divine,
Till thou see in me only what is thine.

The poem does not follow the liturgical year. MacDonald was from a Low Church background. He makes an exception only for Christmas, which he loved. Rather, his poems sometimes follow the circumstances of his own life: the memory of a lost child, the loss of a home due to straitened finances, or even a rainy, gloomy spring.

Given the extended poem nature of the work, consecutive stanzas are often thematically related. The stanzas for August 21-23, for example, focus on our forgetfulness of God. He observes how often our thoughts are upon other things than God. While he recognizes that this reflects his own finitude, he does not want to fall into sin. Rather, he longs to never stray far from God though not always conscious of God.

The verses remind us of God’s utter sufficiency and our utter dependence upon him in every moment, in our living, aging, and dying. This verse, from August 6 is a good example:

O Father, thou art my eternity.
Not on the clasp Of consciousness--on thee
My life depends; and I can well afford
All to forget, so thou remember, Lord.
In thee I rest; in sleep thou dost me fold,
In thee I labour; still in thee, grow old;
And dying, shall I not find in thee, my Life, be bold?

Using The Diary

Unlike my reading for this review, The Diary is best read one stanza a day. That said, be aware of the stanzas before and after. Timothy Larsen suggests his own practice of reading and re-reading each day’s reading. To this I would add turning your reading into prayers. And use the blank pages to crystallize your own thoughts and impressions. Just as in our reading of scripture, some passages will resonate more deeply at a given time. I suspect one may come back to this in another year and connect with a very different set of verses.

Even in my initial read-through, MacDonald caught my attention at numerous points. On December 23, for example, he speaks of the loneliness of God. That’s one I want to think about further! What makes The Diary so good is that MacDonald gives voice to all the seasons of our spiritual journey, not just the exalted times. In doing so, he often provides words for us in the times our own words fail us. What a gift this must have been to his friends!

[I will be interviewing Timothy Larsen, who introduced and annotated this work on July 9, 1 pm ET. If you are interested in listening to the live interview, sign up for the weblink here.]

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.