Authors, Blogs, Socials, Fiction

On the Notion Club Papers

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This is a remarkable way of writing. Most writers know roughly what they mean in their first draft, and in the process of revising and re-drafting they try to get closer to that known meaning. But Tolkien did the reverse: he generated the first draft, then looked at it as if that draft had been written by someone else, and he was trying to understand what it meant – and in this case eventually deciding that it meant something pretty close to the opposite of the original meaning.

I am a Tolkien fan, but not a Tolkien acolyte. Aside from the standard texts, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, I’ve read The Silmarillion and a few other writings, but I never made it through The Book of Lost Tales, and I’ve never even tried The History of Middle Earth.

Prof. Bruce Charlton is hard core. I was directed to his blog, Tolkien’s The Notion Club Papers, by our friend Dale Nelson, who has been in correspondence with him. Dale sent me a file of Prof. Charlton’s long blog post, A Companion to JRR Tolkien’s The Notion Club Papers, which I read with some interest. You can find it at the blog right here and judge for yourself. Continue reading On the Notion Club Papers →

Uncategorized

Link sausage, 8-8-12

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A couple links via Neatorama:

A Japanese company has adopted a radical strategy for success in a world where Japan is rapidly disappearing, as an economic force and as a culture. They do business exclusively in English:

The country has both a dread of English and an understandable attachment to its own ornate business customs. Those idiosyncrasies made Japan a bewildering but envied powerhouse during its economic boom. They now make Japan a poor match, experts say, for global business.

Mikitani took a step few other companies here have dared because, he said, he thought it would help his company expand and thrive. He also wanted to prove a point — that the Japanese, counter to the stereotype, could embrace the risks and embarrassment that come with learning a foreign language.

In another part of the world, a group of masked bandits in armor robbed a French/German Renaissance Faire:

A bunch of people dressed as knights and armed with a sword and an axe forgot to look up the definition of knight. They robbed the organizers of a medieval festival and stole $25,000. Yeah, they’ve apparently been learning knighthood from the likes of Jaime Lannister.

They needed this Englishman (not from Neatorama)–a man who has lived out the not-so-secret fantasy of every historical reenactor:

A Civil War re-enactment enthusiast used the battle skills he learned playing a Cavalier to disarm a knife-wielding robber.

Alf Thompson, 60, sprang into action when the thug threatened to slash a shop assistant’s throat.

Mr Thompson, a member of the Sealed Knot, grabbed the robber’s hand and dragged him over the shop counter.

The grandfather wrenched the knife from the man’s hand and then pinned him to the counter while the shopkeeper dialled 999.

During the brawl, the masked robber drew a second knife – but Mr Thompson disarmed him again before pinning him to the floor and waiting for police.

Someday you’ll read about me doing something similar.

The story will be accompanied by my death notice, of course.

It will be worth it.

Authors

Critiquing David Barton’s History

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David Barton of WallBuilders is a big name among public speakers and authors who teach on our nation’s founding fathers and the soul of America. His latest book, The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You’ve Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson, is being harshly criticized by historians who usually agree with his conclusions. World Magazine reports:

Getting Jefferson Right: Fact Checking Claims about Our Third President (Salem Grove Press), argues that Barton “is guilty of taking statements and actions out of context and simplifying historical circumstances.” For example, they charge that Barton, in explaining why Jefferson did not free his slaves, “seriously misrepresents or misunderstands (or both) the legal environment related to slavery.”

In response, Barton says he cites his sources extensively so that critics can take up their arguments in their original context.

Authors

Electwic Twain

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Somebody shared this on Facebook, and I thought it was just the thing for a book blog. The only known footage of author Mark Twain, taken by Thomas Edison in 1909.

Somebody noted in the comments that both Twain and his daughter Jean would be dead within a year.

What do we learn from this fragment? Well, Mark Twain walked a little funny. Also, Thomas Edison was a better inventor than cinematographer. Didn’t it occur to him that the middle daughter’s face, in the second scene, is mostly hidden behind that samovar, or whatever the thing is? Then she puts on a big hat, and we can’t even see her hair. Frame the shot, Tom!

Blogs, Socials, Fiction, Reviews

And now, a little Culture

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Mike Hall, over at The American Culture (where I am also known to post now and then) offers a flattering review of my novel, Troll Valley.

In all of his novels, Lars Walker has managed to combine realism with wild fantasy, producing a fascinating hybrid genre that makes for compelling reading. As an artist, he has arrived, and he just keeps getting better and better.

Fiction, Reviews

Odd Apocalypse, by Dean Koontz

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Guys who wear porkpie hats are always, in my experience, up to no good—and pleased about it. Whether that style of headwear turns previously benign men into sociopaths or whether men who are already sociopaths are drawn to that style is one of those mysteries that will never be solved, though the Department of Justice has probably funded a score of scientific studies of the issue.

Another Odd Thomas novel from Dean Koontz, another home run. I won’t say Odd Apocalypse is my favorite in the series—I won’t even say I’m sure I liked it better than the previous novella, Odd Interlude, which I reviewed recently. But all these books are so far superior to anything else being done in the genre (assuming I know what the genre is) that you know going in that you’re in for a delight. And you are not disappointed.

Odd Thomas is the simplest of men, with the simplest of desires. All he wants is a quiet life, and to love a girl who is gone. But he’s been entrusted with gifts—the ability to see the “undeparted dead,” and a sort of psychic GPS that helps him find people he’s looking for. Because he’s faithful to God, he employs these gifts for the good of others, which leads him into great danger time and time again. Continue reading Odd Apocalypse, by Dean Koontz →

Fiction, Reviews

Raven’s Ladder, by Jeffrey Overstreet

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What to say about the third book in Jeffrey Overstreet’s The Auralia Thread fantasy series, Raven’s Ladder? It’s difficult to decide, really, because these books are in a class by themselves, unlike anything you’ve ever read. Most fantasies are derivative to one degree or another. The Auralia Thread is a thing unto itself. It reminds me a little of Mervyn Peake’s Titus Groan books, but the resemblances are remote, and very few of you will have read them anyway.

Although the story isn’t locked into one location, the bulk of Raven’s Ladder takes place in the city-state of Bel Amica, which we’ve known only by reputation in the previous books. Since most of the Bel Amicans we’ve met already were favorable characters, one is inclined to think well of the place. But the rottenness in sophisticated, luxurious Bel Amica is as serious as was the rottenness in the ruined kingdom of Abascar. It’s just a decay of a different kind. Continue reading Raven’s Ladder, by Jeffrey Overstreet →

Blogs, Socials

In which I am once again vindicated, to my sorrow

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I have another article up at The American Spectator Online today. It’s about the problem of how young people are to understand the thinking of their ancestors, especially on issues like slavery.

And then, this morning, James Lileks pointed me to an article from io9 that perfectly illustrates the problem. This writer talks about the “mysterious” culture of the Incas, which “had no markets.”

The secret of the Inca’s great wealth may have been their unusual tax system. Instead of paying taxes in money, every Incan was required to provide labor to the state. In exchange for this labor, they were given the necessities of life.

Of course, not everybody had to pay labor tax. Nobles and their courts were exempt, as were other prominent members of Incan society….

Only someone who has completely failed to understand history, in the sense about which I write for the Spectator, could fail to recognize the actual nature of Incan civilization. The common people were all slaves.

Authors, Publishing

More Odd, Less Gore

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Last night as I was getting ready to turn in, I turned on Dennis Miller’s talk show, which is delay-broadcast here. A married couple was sitting in for him (I forget their names), and they announced that their next guest would be their friend Dean Koontz, to talk about his new novel, Odd Apocalypse.

I listened to the interview and took the book’s release date, my birthday, as a sign from heaven that I was meant to buy it now, and not wait for a lower price when the paperback comes out.

I’ll review it soon.

In other literary news, Gore Vidal has died.

They say you should speak no ill of the dead.

I have nothing more to say.

Religion

Mary, Mary

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Today, by coincidence, is my birthday. Oddly enough, it fell on the exact same date last year. I wonder if that qualifies me for a Guinness World Record.

A dear friend bought me a steak dinner after work. Unfortunately, that dear friend was myself, but we didn’t let that spoil the festivities.

I came up with a question in my Bible reading the other day, and wondered if any of our erudite readers know the answer to it.

I was reading the account of the Resurrection in Luke 24:10, where it talks about the women who went to the tomb on Sunday morning, found it empty, and reported it to the disciples. “It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles.”

There’s a parallel passage in Mark 16:1: “When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body.”

There’s also an earlier reference to this woman in Mark 15:40: “Some women were watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses, and Salome.”

So here’s what I’m wondering. Scholars have pondered this previously unmentioned Mary, one among so many Marys who keep popping up in the gospels. Has it ever occurred to anybody to argue that this Mary might actually be Mary the mother of the Lord?

We know that the Lord had a brother named James, who became the head of the Jerusalem church. And an otherwise unmentioned brother named Joses (perhaps named after his father Joseph) isn’t unthinkable. If you’re Catholic you’d insist that the Virgin Mary wasn’t the mother of James, but the stepmother. But she could still be called his mother informally.

Why doesn’t it say, “Mary, the mother of the Lord?” I don’t know. Modesty? Fear of the authorities?

Another objection would be that James, the Lord’s brother, has traditionally been called James the Elder (I think) rather than James the Younger. My theory would require that tradition to be wrong.

Catholics probably wouldn’t take to this idea, though I might point out that it would give a biblical foundation to all those “Pieta” statues.

But my main question is, has anyone suggested this before? Or is it too dumb for anyone to have suggested before?