This spiritual adriftness is reflected outwardly in his poor health he nearly dies of blood poisoning due to a tooth infection.
In his youth, as Merton tells it, he is aimless and sponge-like, absorbing everything without being able to fully comprehend it. His father, after taking him on many travels, died of a brain tumor while Merton was in college. His mother died of stomach cancer when he was a child. Although he was born in Prades, France, in 1915, he spent much of his childhood in New York and England. In Part 1, Merton discusses his family, their attitudes toward life, and the place where he grew up. The book follows Merton’s life chronologically, but with much retrospective commentary. The structure of Merton’s book also refers to the Divine Comedy, with its threefold division of Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. The journey is an allegory for the Christian life.
The book’s title is a reference to Dante’s Divine Comedy, which describes Mount Purgatory with seven tiers that correspond to sins that should be purged on the spiritual journey toward the top of the mountain, called the earthly paradise. Content Warning: The book referenced in this guide contains death, war, poverty, gambling, profanity, and racial discussion.
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