Founded in the mountains above Grenoble in 1084 by Bruno of Cologne, the Grande Chartreuse expressed in stone the persistent monastic longing for the desert. Uncompromisingly separated from worldly entanglements, the first Carthusians developed a unique and eclectic syntheses of eremetic and cenobitic monastic lifestyles. As their fifth leader, or prior, in 1109 they chose a dynamic, well-connected young man, Guigo, former dean of Grenoble. Considered by contemporaries ‘immensely erudite in both secular and sacred studies, he had a keen mind, a sure memory, and a remarkable eloquence, and was very effective in encouraging others’. During his priorate, Guigo–later called ‘the first’ to distinguish him from the ninth prior–presided over the transformation of the Chartreuse from an isolated hermitage to the mother house of a new Order. His correspondence with Saint Bernard of Clairvaux and Peter the Venerable of Cluny testify to his familiarity with contemporary reform monasticism, and to the Carthusians' remarkable determination to avoid all unnecessary involvement with the world and be free from contemplation–not an easy task in a day when Church and world were virtually coterminous. His Meditations offer an insight into the spirituality which animated his life, his community, and his prayer.
