Thanks to Andrew Peterson for his great music.
Good Friday in Narnia
Photo credit: Nevit Dilmen
“Please, may we come with you—wherever you are going?” said Susan.
“Well—ʺ said Aslan and seemed to be thinking. Then he said, “I should be glad of your company to-night. Yes, you may come, if you will promise to stop when I tell you, and after that leave me to go on alone.”
“Oh, thank you, thank you. And we will,” said the two girls.
Forward they went again and one of the girls walked on each side of the Lion. But how slowly he walked! And his great, royal head drooped so that his nose nearly touched the grass. Presently he stumbled and gave a low moan.
“Aslan! Dear Aslan!” said Lucy, “what is wrong? Can’t you tell us?”
“Are you ill, dear Aslan?” asked Susan.
“No,” said Aslan. “I am sad and lonely. Lay your hands on my mane so that I can feel you are there and let us walk like that.”
And so the girls did what they would never have dared to do without his permission but what they had longed to do ever since they first saw him—buried their cold hands in the beautiful sea of fur and stroked it and, so doing, walked with him. And presently they saw that they were going with him up the slope of the hill on which the Stone table stood. They went up at the side where the trees came furthest up, and when they got to the last tree (it was one that had some bushes about it) Aslan stopped and said,
“Oh, children, children. Here you must stop. And whatever happens, do not let yourselves be seen. Farewell.”
–C. S. Lewis, Chapter XIV, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
A Roaring good time
The lecture last night, I’m happy to report, was excellent. Truly memorable.
The speaker, Roar Moe (ROW-ar MOW-eh), as I remember the story he told, was an ordinary Norwegian guy who worked in an ordinary job. But he was concerned about all the things that were being lost as his country, in the short period since the oil fields were discovered around 1970, has gone from being a poor, largely rural country to a rich, largely urban country. He traveled around the west coast and was horrified by the houses and boathouses left to nature, the boats dragged ashore and left to rot. So he and some friends set about creating a center where the old skills could be preserved and passed on to young people.
The acquired a little farm on a small island and rebuilt the house, the boathouse, and the barn. They first repaired old boats, and then built one of their own (they learned what they could from the old boat builders themselves, but he says it was hard. Those guys don’t like to explain about building boats, they just do it, and expect their helpers to learn by doing. “The eye” is the most important instrument). They run camps for kids, where the kids learn about the old ways and the old skills.
Then they got more ambitious, and built a “jekt,” (yes, the word is related to our English “yacht,” which comes from the Dutch language, I believe) a copy of a small 17th Century cargo vessel. This forced them to learn the art of square sailing, which is tricky.
And that’s what got him involved in the Dragon Harald Fairhair project, which I’ve written about here before. This ship, when completed this summer, will be the largest replica Viking ship ever built, at 140 ft. Roar will be involved in training the crews. Part of the reason he’s here in America is to try to recruit crew members.
Wish I could afford to do that.
In any case, it was one of the most fascinating lectures I’ve ever heard. I got a chance to speak to Mr. Moe a little afterwards, but only a couple words.
Czeslaw Milosz, “You Whose Name”
You whose name is aggressor and devourer.
Putrid and sultry, in fermentation.
You mash into pulp sages and prophets,
Criminals and heroes, indifferently.
My vocativus is useless.
You do not hear me, though I address you,
Yet I want to speak, for I am against you.
So what if you gulp me, I am not yours.
You overcome me with exhaustion and fever.
You blur my thought, which protests,
You roll over me, dull unconscious power.
The one who will overcome you is swift, armed:
Mind, spirit, maker, renewer.
He jousts with you in depths and on high,
Equestrian, winged, lofty, silver-scaled.
I have served him in the investiture of forms.
It’s not my concern what he will do with me.
A retinue advances in the sunlight by the lakes.
From white villages Easter bells resound.
“You Whose Name” by Czeslaw Milosz
Evolution: Stick to the Facts
Tennessee may pass a law that protects teachers if they allow or even encourage criticism of evolutionary theories. The governor says, “I think the one thing about that bill is this: Nothing about the curriculum of the state of Tennessee will change, and the scientific standards won’t change. So I think some of the discussion about its impact has probably been overblown.”
Words in passing
Just a quick wave as I sweep by tonight. I’m going to a lecture tonight (against my general principle of not going out on weeknights–or any night, come to think of it) to hear a lecture. A man from Norway will be speaking tonight at the University Club in St. Paul, and members of our Viking group were specifically invited. The speaker is an expert on Norwegian square-sailed boats, and is one of the trainers for the crew of the Dragon Harald Fairhair Viking ship project.
My Amazon sales of Troll Valley had a little spike yesterday, probably because of my column at The American Spectator Online. Yes, I watch the figures. And yes, I do esteem my personal worth on the basis of sales figures. Pray for me.
Say That Again?
Bookseller and poet Jen Campbell has made a name for herself by quoting odd and often hilarious things people say in bookshops. For example: “What books could I buy to make guests look at my bookshelf and think: ’Wow, that guy’s intelligent’?”
Now, that question makes complete sense to me. I remember a speaker, perhaps Ravi Zacharias, saying he overheard someone ask for so many feet of books. It didn’t matter what types of books really, just important looking ones to fill up a shelf behind a union leader’s desk to make him look educated when he spoke to business owners.
Writing related post
Yesterday was a big day for me, because I got my first royalty check from Amazon for the earnings on Troll Valley. Actually, it was the first time I’ve ever gotten a royalty check (I’ve had publisher advances, but no actual royalties). On careful consideration, I have decided that this is a good thing, and needs to be pushed along. So if you haven’t bought your copy yet, for Kindle or Nook, I can give you a tip that the crowds have thinned out and there’s no waiting.
As an added attraction, The American Spectator posted my cranky review of The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest today.
Finally, an outstanding post from Andrew Klavan Himself, on Palm Sunday and the Trayvon Martin case.
Because he puts the Truth before God, his fellow man, justice and morality, Everett is the last man standing in defense of all of them. That’s because Truth is the cornerstone on which every good structure stands. Without a commitment to Truth, our religions, brotherly love, justice and morality topple into meaningless ruins. Even when it’s carried by an imperfect vessel, the Truth and only the Truth can set us free for every other good thing.
You see why I boost Klavan so much? He gets it. Even before he was a Christian, he got this central point, which a lot of people just can’t seem to understand in this crooked generation.
The Writing On the Wall, by Gunnar Staalesen
I think it’s safe to assume that Norwegian author Gunnar Staalesen, author of The Writing On the Wall, has issues with evangelical Christians. Early in this book two characters, a cross-dressing judge who dies in bed with an underage prostitute, and a Bergen organized crime kingpin, are both identified as members of the “Christian People’s Party” (usually translated “The Christian Democratic Party”), the traditional party of conservative Christians in Norway. (Did you know that evangelical Christians control organized crime in Bergen? I didn’t either, but that’s the impression Staalesen leaves.)
I’ll have to admit he fooled me, though. With an opening like that, I took it for granted that the perpetrator of the murder at the center of this story, the death by asphyxiation of a teenaged girl, would be the evangelical crime boss. As it turned out he wasn’t guilty of that, though he was guilty of plenty of other things.
Staalesen’s hero, private detective Varg Veum (the last name’s pronounced VAY-oom), is apparently supposed to be a kind of Norwegian Philip Marlowe, tough and wry and world-weary. I didn’t get that at all, frankly, until a fight finally happened, and Veum turned out to be able to take care of himself, to my surprise. I’d imagined him kind of effete based on his earlier behavior, especially his interest in describing women’s clothing, and home furnishings, in loving detail.
But I may have missed some narrative hints that could be present in the original and lost in translation. The translation here is of that maddening variety that’s technically irreproachable, every phrase literally correct, but tone-deaf in terms of style and nuance, so that the characters speak as no English speaker ever would, mixing formal diction with British slang. All the characters talk the same way, and are equally unconvincing.
Hey, Norwegian publishers! Are you looking for an English translator? I can do better than this guy!
Anyway, it was all fairly unrewarding, especially for evangelical like me. I’m pretty sure Staalesen doesn’t want my business, and he won’t be getting any more of it.
Cautions for language and adult themes.
Is There a Literary Canon?
Is there a literary canon of books everyone who considers himself educated or maybe civilized should read? I mean, everyone reads Pookie and the Moonlight Vularoo, but what about the stuff teachers put on assigned reading lists?
D.G. Myers talks about personal Best Of lists here, saying the idea of books everyone should read is a quaint throwback to the 20th century. “If literature is no longer a part of every civilized American’s cultural inheritance, you can thank your English teachers, who gladly coughed up their authority over it,” he writes.
Myers also culls together a list of top authors according to how much has been written about them by scholars. Henry James and William Faulkner top the list.