Burden Sh. Behold Thy Mother: A Picture Essay on Lourdes

Doubleday, 1965. — 104 p.First edition of this lyrical photo-essay on the Marian shrine of Lourdes, the result of a 1960 pilgrimage to the French village where Bernadette Soubirous encountered Our Lady in 1858. Behold Thy Mother, by the patrician fine art photographer, Shirley Burden, completed an early trilogy of sorts begun with God is My Life and continued with I Wonder Why. Lushly photographed, including many full-page plates, Burden's images reflect Mary's luminous presence at Lourdes in all her natural, human (and commercial), and spiritual incarnations. Burden had already converted to the Church when he was encouraged by Edward Steichen to photograph Thomas Merton and the Trappist monks at the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani, Kentucky. God is My Life, with an Introduction by Merton (published in 1960) was followed by I Wonder Why, a meditation on racism through the eyes of a young black girl (published in 1963).