Big Sur as a Symbol in The Celebrants: Commitment, Avoidance, and the Weight of the Pact

What Big Sur Represents in the Novel

Big Sur is a real stretch of coastline in California, but in The Celebrants it functions less as a tourist destination and more as a recurring emotional touchstone. It first appears in Chapter 3 when Jordy, sitting by the fire with his ailing husband Jordan, gently steers their conversation about future travel toward the California coast. Jordan immediately recognizes where the suggestion is heading and resists. Over the following chapters, Big Sur becomes the novel's shorthand for the pact—the agreement the five college friends made after Alec's death to hold living funerals for one another—and for everything Jordan is not yet ready to face.

A Destination That Keeps Resurfacing

The novel introduces Big Sur obliquely. In Chapter 3, Jordy and Jordan are fantasizing about Positano, Italy, when Jordy asks, “Anyplace else?” Jordan's expression sours: “Like Big Sur, you mean?” The exchange reveals that this is not a new topic. Jordy has been gently pushing the idea, and Jordan has been deflecting. The text notes that Jordy “had every right to invoke the pact for himself if he thought gathering their friends was what was best,” and that “as far as the pact was concerned, they were playing a game of chicken.” Big Sur, in other words, is not merely a vacation spot—it is the proposed site of a pact gathering, a living funeral where Jordan's friends would assemble to say what needs to be said before he dies.

By Chapter 4, the subject has become a running tension. Jordan is sorting through his belongings on a rainy afternoon, and Jordy reminds him of the trip. The narrative describes Big Sur as a subject that “had continued to surface, Jordan swatting at it each time like they were in an endless game of Whac-A-Mole.” Jordan's reasons for avoidance are explicit: he does not want to be seen in his current state, he does not want pity, and he does not want “the exercise of sitting through some fake funeral when the prospect of a real one loomed over both of their heads.” The passage also connects Big Sur to the pact's history by referencing Naomi's funeral in Mexico—Jordy reminds Jordan, “You were meant to have nine lives,” to which Jordan replies, “Eight, after that trip.” The Mexico trip, presumably a pact gathering for Naomi, cost Jordan one of his metaphorical nine lives, and Big Sur threatens to cost another.

Commitment and the Weight of the Pact

For Jordy, Big Sur represents commitment—to the pact, to their friends, and to the idea that Jordan should not die without the people who love him having a chance to speak. The text says that “to him Big Sur held the promise of more comfort.” It is a place where the friends can gather, where the pact can be fulfilled, and where Jordan can be surrounded by chosen family rather than facing his illness alone. Jordy's persistence is framed as love: he is “like a dog with a bone,” unwilling to let the subject drop because he believes the gathering matters.

But the pact is also heavy. Jordan's resistance suggests that the pact, for all its good intentions, carries a burden. To invoke it is to admit that death is imminent. To attend one's own living funeral is to sit through the very thing one is trying to avoid. Jordan's line about having “eight” lives after the Mexico trip suggests that the pact gatherings take something out of the person being honored—they are emotionally costly, even when they are loving. Big Sur, as the proposed site of Jordan's own gathering, becomes the physical embodiment of that cost.

Avoidance and the Pull of Home

Jordan's counter-proposal is Bogotá, Colombia, where his parents were born and where he lived until age eight. The contrast is telling. Bogotá represents origins, heritage, and the beginning of life; Big Sur represents the pact, friends, and the end of life. Jordan says, “I've been thinking a lot about Colombia,” and reflects on how the things his parents escaped are now in America, while the things they wanted for their children are now in Colombia. He wants “to see where it all began” as his life ends. Big Sur, by contrast, would force him to confront where it all ends—and to do so in front of an audience.

The tension between these two destinations is also a tension between two kinds of support. Bogotá connects Jordan to his biological family and cultural roots; Big Sur connects him to his chosen family, the friends who formed the pact after Alec's death. Jordan's preference for Bogotá is not a rejection of his friends—it is a desire for a different kind of comfort, one that looks backward rather than forward. Jordy, meanwhile, sees Big Sur as the more urgent priority, worried “they would debate this until it was too late to go.”

How the Meaning Shifts

Big Sur's meaning evolves over the course of the novel's early chapters. It begins as a simple travel suggestion, a place Jordy would like to visit. It quickly becomes a proxy for the pact itself—the gathering of friends that Jordan is avoiding. And it ultimately becomes a symbol of the choice Jordan faces: to accept the support of his chosen family and confront his mortality openly, or to retreat into the privacy of his illness and his heritage. The novel does not resolve this tension in the early chapters; instead, it lets Big Sur hang over the narrative as a question that Jordan must eventually answer.

The epigraph—“Life is what you celebrate. All of it. Even its end.”—frames the pact's philosophy. Big Sur, as the proposed site of Jordan's living funeral, is where that philosophy would be put into practice. Jordan's avoidance of Big Sur is, in a sense, an avoidance of the epigraph's claim: he is not yet ready to celebrate the end of his life, even with the people who love him most.

Character and Theme Connections

Big Sur is most directly tied to Jordan and Jordy, but it also implicates the other pact members—Naomi, Craig, Marielle, and the deceased Alec, whose death inspired the pact. The group text chain named “NANA'S HUNGRY LITTLE PIE EATERS” connects the friends across distance and time, and Big Sur is the place where they would physically reunite. The novel's themes of confronting mortality through planned farewells, autonomy and control in the dying process, and chosen family as a support system all converge on this single destination. Jordan's desire for control over his own death—sorting his belongings, choosing his own itinerary—clashes with the pact's communal structure, and Big Sur is where that clash plays out.

The theme of cultural heritage and the meaning of home is also relevant, as Jordan's preference for Bogotá over Big Sur reflects a pull toward his roots. And the theme of leaving nothing unsaid is the pact's entire purpose—Big Sur is where the unsaid would finally be spoken.

Study Questions

1. Why does Jordan resist the trip to Big Sur, and what does his resistance reveal about his relationship to the pact?

Jordan resists because he does not want to be seen in his weakened state, does not want pity, and does not want to sit through a “fake funeral” when a real one is approaching. His resistance reveals that the pact, despite being a loving invention, is also a burden. To invoke it is to admit that death is imminent, and Jordan is not ready to make that admission in front of his friends. His resistance also shows a desire for control—he wants to decide how and when the pact is triggered, rather than having Jordy push him toward it.

2. How does the contrast between Big Sur and Bogotá illuminate Jordan's priorities at the end of his life?

Big Sur represents the pact, chosen family, and confronting death openly. Bogotá represents heritage, biological family, and origins. Jordan's preference for Bogotá suggests that, as his life ends, he is drawn to where it began—to his parents, his culture, and the place he came from. The contrast also highlights a tension between two kinds of support: the communal, forward-looking support of the pact versus the backward-looking, ancestral pull of home.

3. What does Jordy's persistence about Big Sur reveal about his character and his understanding of the pact?

Jordy's persistence reveals that he believes the pact matters—that gathering the friends is not a formality but a necessary act of love. He is “like a dog with a bone,” unwilling to let the subject drop even when Jordan resists. His persistence also shows that he understands the pact as a mutual commitment: he notes that he has “yet to take his turn,” implying that the pact is not just for Jordan but for all of them. Jordy sees Big Sur as a way to give Jordan the support he needs, even if Jordan does not want to accept it.

4. How does the reference to Naomi's funeral in Mexico (“Eight, after that trip”) shape our understanding of what Big Sur would mean for Jordan?

The reference suggests that pact gatherings are emotionally costly. Jordan's joke about having “eight” lives after the Mexico trip implies that attending Naomi's funeral took something from him—that the experience of sitting through a living funeral is draining, even when it is loving. This reframes Big Sur not as a simple reunion but as an ordeal that Jordan is dreading. It also suggests that the pact, for all its good intentions, carries a weight that the friends carry together.