“If humans could live as long as some of J. R. R. Tolkien’s famous fantasy characters, the author himself would have turned 120-years-old today (3rd January 2012).” Sam Parker has an article on made-up languages, starting with Elvish.
We’re tweeting some Tolkien facts today. #JRRTolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born on January 3, 1892 in Bloemfontein in Free State Province, South Africa, and the world has never been the same.
Localized Australian black-tip sharks have mated with the broad-range common black-tip sharks, and a scientific researcher says, “This is evolution in action.” Really? When the neighborhood dogs do the same thing, is that evolution in action too?
Far more compelling to evolution deniers like myself would be dolphins using tools, like sponges for example.
I am temporally at sea today, awash in the tides of chronology. My calendar tells me it’s Monday, January 2, but it doesn’t feel like Monday, January 2. That’s partly because although today is a holiday, it’s not January first (I suppose), and partly because of the energy drain caused by a weekend spent mostly with people. I spent much of this day certain I had a dentist appointment this afternoon, and it was only when my cell phone alarm failed to go off that I realized the appointment is actually for tomorrow. January two and twos-day; you can see how I got confused.
Time is the the great puzzler, God’s subtlest joke, in my opinion. And yet, it’s deadly serious. Take Jesus’ parable of the stewards and the talents (Matthew 25:14-30):
“Again, it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave five talents of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent, each according to his ability….”
“Talent” is a Greek term for a sum of money, and our own English use of talent as meaning a special, inborn ability comes from an interpretation of that passage.
But although I wouldn’t go so far as to call that interpretation entirely mistaken, I think there’s a simpler meaning. I suspect the Lord’s intention when He spoke of the talents was simply “time.” Each of us is given some—some of us more, some less. But whatever we’ve got, we’re responsible for. We may complain that we have no great gifts or abilities, but we always have some time, up until the day we die. And we can choose whether to use that time constructively or not, boldly or cautiously. The real targets of the parable are people who are lazy and cowardly.
In other words, it’s directed precisely at me. As for any application to you, you may judge for yourself.
A blessed new year to you.
Eric Metaxas asks, “Does anyone in the media read the Bible anymore?” He was shocked to read The New York Times attribute “Be not inhospitable to strangers, lest they be angels in disguise,” to the poet Yeats.
Katelynn set down her bowl of noodles with a sigh that next year would be different, more productive, a little creative, and maybe romantic somehow. She’d lose weight and eat healthier meals. Her tree with tiny picture frames and thinning garland lingered by her apartment’s balcony door. A stack of unaddressed “Best Wishes” cards sat on the couch beneath an empty bag of chips. She stretched out her feet to rest on a laundry basket and began searching for cookbooks and cooking videos online.
And her coke fizzed like it always did. And her clock ticked like it always did.
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I hope you have a good year, and in case you need a warm-up on tonight’s song, this is “Auld Lang Syne” as performed by Scottish folk group The Cast. And should you need a warm-up on your Christian theology, here’s an article by Tullian Tchividjian which has greatly blessed me this year. (link removed)
Stephen Spielberg’s new film War Horse is, as one would expect from a Spielberg production, visually gorgeous. The acting is excellent. The story itself, in my opinion, isn’t strong enough to bear the weight of a pony.
Based on a stage play based on a children’s book by Michael Morpurgo, the film opens in the lovely countryside of Devon, England, where young Albert Narracott (Jeremy Irvine), a farmer’s son, watches a thoroughbred colt being born, and attempts to make friends with it. Later his drunken father (pretty improbably) gets it into his head to buy the animal as a plow horse, and Albert trains it to work. Then setbacks force the father to sell the horse to the army (World War I has just begun), and we follow the horse’s experiences through the entire war, up to Armistice Day and beyond.
Although it was a delight to watch, I did not succeed in suspending my disbelief for one moment in the course of this (too long) movie. It’s a war movie from people who know nothing of war, and a horse movie from people who know nothing of horses (I happened to see it with a couple horse owners, and they got some good laughs out of it). I suppose I was supposed to learn a lesson about the horrors of war, but although there was plenty about that, it all seemed sterile and picture-bookish, and I never really identified with any of the characters. The lesson seemed to be, “Everything will work out for you, if you’re incredibly lucky, which chances are you aren’t.”
War Horse is a beautiful movie, suitable for older children (though there are disturbing scenes). But I brought nothing away from it except some pretty images.
Max Allan Collins is probably best known for having written the graphic novel on which the movie The Road To Perdition was based. I myself know him as the author of a very fine mystery novel, True Detective, set in Chicago in the 1930s. Turns out he’s written more books about his Jewish-Irish private eye, Nathan Heller, that I didn’t know about. These include Chicago Lightning, a collection of short stories covering a period of about twenty years.
Nathan Heller differs from the standard fictional private eye in that he’s ethical but not technically “clean.” He does occasional, cautious business with organized crime, and those associations are often useful to him in his investigations. His relations with the police are about as equivocal, as some of them bear him a grudge for helping to expose some crooked cops in the past. The assumption throughout is that both groups are about equally corrupt. Continue reading Chicago Lightning, by Max Allan Collins
Christianity Today has 12 book awards, mostly for Christian non-fiction. There are many interesting titles, and it’s curious that the runner-up fiction award goes to a translation of a Dostoevsky work.
Thanks to Professor Ray Van Neste, for listing The Year Of the Warrior as one of the 11 best books he read in 2011.
Do you know what I was? The Knight of the Unholy Grail.
In times like these when everyone is wonderful, what is needed is a quest for evil….
“Evil” is surely the clue to this age, the only quest appropriate to the age. For everything and everyone’s either wonderful or sick and nothing is evil.
Honesty comes first. I’m not at all sure I understand Walker Percy’s novel Lancelot. I think I understand some of it, but it’s one of those books that I come away from pretty sure I’ve encountered something written for people smarter than me.
But it was a fascinating read, and I’ll tell you what I thought. For whatever that’s worth.
The main character and narrator is Lancelot Lamar, formerly the scion of a fine old Louisiana family, owner of a handsome estate, successful lawyer with a record of civil rights advocacy, and loving husband to a beautiful wife.
Now, as he narrates the text of this book, he is a patient in a mental hospital, having been declared insane after blowing up his home, killing his wife and her movie industry friends. His confidante is his friend Percival, a priest (or a former priest; it’s never made clear) who never contributes a word to the narrative. Continue reading Lancelot, by Walker Percy