From Canterbury to Contemporary: The role of Religious Ritual and Myth in shaping British Literary identity
From Canterbury to Contemporary: The role of Religious Ritual and Myth in shaping British Literary identity

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this paper is to depict how religious ritual and myth have been major contributors to British literary identity throughout the medieval period up to the contemporary era. By fusing traditional and modern aspects of religion, it contends that rather than only being a sign of an erosion of religious authority, British texts are evidence of a literary reconfiguration of the sacred made in response to cultural change. From the ritualized narrative structure of The Canterbury Tales to the mythic echoes in the works of T.S. Eliot and postmodern fiction, sacred motifs continue to be visible as symbolic strategies for the discussion of moral dislocation and historical disruption. Making use of literary theology and cultural hermeneutics approach, the book shows how the myth and ritual still act in literature as conveying agents of continuity, criticism, and reinvention. In this way, it picks up the theme of the conference and tracks how ageless truths are neither forsaken nor static, but progressively reinterpreted when facing modern puzzles. The study argues that British texts of the medieval period up to now do not simply show a lack of religious authority, but they also act as a re-exploration of the concept of sacred in their otherwise cultural world.

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