I wish I knew about this book by Eliot Stein sooner because I would have asked Santa for it! I thought it would resonate with you too. Enjoy!
Article below from 12/13/2024 by Jen Rose Smith can found here.
In his new book, the BBC journalist discovers our oldest living traditions.
On the Venetian artists’ island of Burano, nearly two decades ago, Eliot Stein met the woman who changed his life. Anna, then 90 years old and slight in appearance, wore her long hair looped into a silvery bun. She invited Stein, who was 22 at the time, into her home to see a collection of fine, handworked lace with delicate designs depicting fishermen, overwater bridges, and gondoliers helming slender boats.
Anna was among the last remaining adepts of an exquisite lace-making technique called punto in aria (“embroidering the air”), practiced in Venice for centuries. At the time, she explained that machines were taking over Burano lace production, and she worried the tradition would soon die out. While artisans still make lace by hand in Burano, that moment stirred in Stein a lasting awareness of human fragility and resilience. Now a BBC journalist, he’s spent the past seven years scouring the globe to find other near-extinct traditions and people like Anna who preserve them.
In his new book, Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions, and the Last People Keeping Them Alive, Stein profiles a woman who makes “threads of God” pasta in Sardinia, Peru's only traditional rope-bridge builder, and eight others – the last remaining caretakers sustaining these culturally significant traditions.
“These cultural custodians remind us how much there still is to discover and invite us to fall back in love with the world,” he writes. In a conversation with Virtuoso, Stein reflected on the impact of his awe-inspiring trips and the importance of staying curious.
What’s so powerful about encountering ancient traditions like the ones in your book?
Each of these cultural wonders reflects a community’s distinct, unique vision of the world. For those who travel to be stirred by the unfamiliar and enthralled by the depths of human expression, there’s something powerful and rather poignant about witnessing these gorgeous, gentle gestures that make the world so wonderfully diverse.
Is there a particular mindset you’d encourage travelers to adopt?
When you’re a traveler, you’re ultimately a guest in someone else’s home. Just as there’s a certain etiquette we should show when entering someone’s living room, there’s a certain level of respect we should each maintain when traveling to someone’s town, city, or country. Showing a genuine interest in and appreciation for the people, cultures, and environment around you not only reinforces the notion of travel for good, it also leads to much more meaningful travel experiences.
Many cultural traditions face enormous challenges in a changing world. What makes you hopeful?
Culture is an ever-evolving force, and it’s inevitable that certain rites may not survive modernization. Yet many custodians have begun reshaping these ancient, ancestral traditions in creative ways to try to ensure their survival. Raffaella Marongiu Selis, one of only three women alive who knows how to make the world’s rarest pasta (su filindeu), recently started teaching the technique outside her family for the very first time. As more people discover these wonders, my hope is their chances of surviving will only strengthen.
What would you like readers to take away from your book?
That the world can still be a wondrous place. In an age when everything has seemingly been explored and explained, and where cynicism so often overshadows curiosity and wonder, these custodians and the unlikely customs they carry on are a celebration of human ingenuity and imagination. They remind me that culture is born slowly, through a million tiny moments, and the world is always so much richer than our understanding of it.
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