How bad can it be before it can no longer be called poetry? I know y’all are fierce poetry advocates, so here’s an article on a poem, once highly praised, now considered the worst ever written. If that’s not enough bathroom reading for you, here’s a promising book: Very Bad Poetry.
The Raging Debate
Apparently, Richard Dawkins and other atheists agree to be in a documentary without full knowledge of the intent of the film–or with incorrect knowledge because the film makers did not level with them. They say they were told it was a film on the debate between Darwinism and creationism, but it appears it was actually a film on the shut-out of professors who endorse Intelligent Design. (via Books, Inq.)
Hopefully, Dawkins is fully aware of what he’s debating tonight at the University of Alabama in Birmingham. He is scheduled to debate John Lennox on the question of God. Both men work at Oxford, so it will be an peer argument in a sense. The debate is hosted by Fixed Point Foundation.
Harry Potter and the Christian Critics
In First Things, Mark Shea writes:
The magic of Harry is, as John Granger points out, “incantational,” not “invocational,” exactly like the magic of Gandalf. Born with the talent for magic, Gandalf says the magic words and fire leaps forth from his staff, just as from Harry’s wand. No principalities or powers are invoked in HP. Indeed, if any words are “invocational” they are the prayer to Elbereth and Gilthoniel uttered in Middle Earth. Yet nobody accuses Tolkien of promoting the worship of false gods. That’s because we understand Tolkien’s fictional subcreation and its rootedness in Christian thought. I suggest Christian critics try to extend Rowling the same charity.
Spoiler warning. [via Mars Hills Audio]
Book Pictures
I’ve wanted to make this kind of art for a long time, but I’d tend toward playing with words as well as books, such as “Not Easily Moved” in Gallery 2 (the eighth selection).
Coming to a Theater Near You
Blue Like Jazz. At least, it will be a movie loosely based on the book.
Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing
First off, a link. The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood has a new website. I imagine we have both “egalitarians” and “complementarians” among our readership, but I’m a complementarian, so I like this organization and its site. Make of it what you will.
Today was a day rich in drama for your humble correspondent. It encompassed in a short span all those stages you’ve come to recognize in my response to crisis: First shock, then base despair, then self-flagellation, then the working out of things, then Never Mind.
First of all, the guy who’d said he’d cut down my tree came to my office and told me he didn’t think he could do it. Too tall; too close to the house. I thanked him, and contemplated the prospect of hiring a professional, and all that would cost me.
But he knew a guy, he said, and he’d ask him to take a look. “Please do,” I answered, large beads of sweat extruding from my furrowed brow.
I began to plan what I’d do when the Guy He Knew said he couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do the job. I’d have to find a professional. The professional would either a) say he had to do it this weekend, which would interfere with my plans to go out to Dallas, Wisconsin with the Viking Age Society. Or b) he’d say he couldn’t get to it till next week, which would mean I’d have to be here and wouldn’t be able to go to Minot. Which would mean I’d miss the Sissel concert and my life would be utterly, totally pointless.
Furthermore, the extra money it would cost probably indicated that I ought to give up on Minot anyway. Ragnar is expecting me there to do live combat shows with him, but these things happen.
If things worked out just right, I figured, I’d be able to disappoint pretty much everybody.
Then my guy came back and said his friend had looked at it, and could do it. Only he couldn’t cut the tree down for two weeks. However, my guy said he could clean up the branches on the ground this week.
In other words, it looks like it’ll work out perfectly.
Except that it’ll cost me a little more, but still it’s about half of what the professionals ask.
So how did I handle this test of my faith? About C-, I think. Maybe D+.
I’ve been thinking lately that maybe I worry too much about my emotional responses. The important thing, it occurs to me, is not how I feel, but how I force myself to say, “Praise God. Thy will be done.”
On the other hand, my feelings affect how I deal with other people, and my expressions of faith and peace could be much, much better.
Ah, well. At least I can put it online. “Praise God. Thy will be done.”
Grandfather’s Son: Why Now?
Ever since I read the rumor that Justice Clarence Thomas was going to write a book, which was shortly after starting this blog, I have looked forward to reading it. I knew it would be interesting. Same goes for anything Condoleezza Rice will write. Now, Judge Thomas’ memoir has been released. From what I’ve heard, My Grandfather’s Son describes Thomas’ entire life with more candor than most readers would expect.
Did you see the “60 Minutes” special on Thomas? I didn’t (segments available here), but I hear the same question asked in two different discussions of the book, and you know what they say about non-verbal communication carrying most of the weight in a conversation? Saturday on NPR, a couple women were talking about how angry and bitter the book felt despite its beautiful language. The anchor or host asked the reviewer why Thomas would write this book now? Why can’t we just put all this behind us? Why irritate old wounds? The tone was clearly negative.
Yesterday, Rush Limbaugh asked the same question of Thomas himself. Why did you write this book now? The tone was clearly positive, asking for a stated purpose of the book as opposed to a justification for something distasteful. If I remember correctly, the answer to both questions was about the same, though Thomas added a little which NPR may not have known. He wanted to describe his life and work at the Supreme Court–a high honor, in his view, not his destiny. Many had described his life already and with many lies or errors, so he wanted to give his perspective as an eye-witness.
Weekend wrap-up: Nothing to see here
I spent the weekend nursing a free-floating sensation of unfulfilled obligations. But it was rainy, so the painting I wanted to do on my basement windows couldn’t be done. I ended up running around a lot, without actually accomplishing much.
On the other hand, I spent almost no money. At this time in my life, that’s a big achievement.
In fact I made a little money. I worked past my fear of the unfamiliar, and offered my first item ever for sale on eBay: an autographed copy of The Year Of the Warrior.
I sold it too, though not entirely because of my skill in composing a listing. The subject of my books came up in comments on Gene Edward Veith’s Cranach blog (of course I didn’t bring it up. That would be bragging, and God would strike me dead). A woman was wondering where to get a copy, and I told her I had one up for auction, so she went over and “bought it now.”
I’ll do this again, but not right away. I’ll be going out of town to the Høstfest in Minot next week, so I’d have trouble servicing any orders I got on stuff I listed just now. But I’ve got cartons of The Year of the Warrior and Blood and Judgment in the basement, part of my divorce settlement from Baen Books. Might as well make something off them.
The guy came to look at my tree today, but I was at work at the time, so I don’t know yet what he thought. I suppose no news is good news. If he thought he couldn’t do it, I imagine he’d have told me right away.
Unless he wouldn’t have.
Read a collection of stories by Jeffrey Archer. Enjoyed them. I’m going to pick up one of his novels (at the library, of course).
Here’s a link to a review at The American Spectator Online (blessed be It). Christopher Orlet reports on Theodore Dalrymple’s new book on drug addiction. The shocking (for our times) premise is that addiction is not nearly as powerful a thing as we’ve been told, and that people who get addicted, in general, simply lack character.
I like Dalrymple.
I bet Rush Limbaugh won’t interview him.
Update: I know the Cranach blog link isn’t working. World Magazine has moved their whole site, and they haven’t condescended to give us a visible further link to Cranach. Meanwhile, Ed Veith is away, so I can’t e-mail him to ask about it.
New improved Update: I realize my timing isn’t very good in my Rush Limbaugh reference above. I don’t listen to Limbaugh myself (he’s not carried by the station I follow), but I like him generally. And I think the current smear campaign being waged against him is contemptible.
Spot the Loony
Q. What’s the common thread in this line-up? Michaelangelo, Charlie Peacock, Alexandre Dumas, George Washington Carver.
A. They were all loonies, suggest some psychologists.
Armagedon postponed, yet again
Things are better tonight. I suspect several of you prayed for me, and it worked, thank you very much.
I happened to speak to my former boss, down the hill at Headquarters, this morning, and I told him my tale of woe. He said, “Why don’t you talk to _________________?” He was speaking of a fellow who does a lot of landscaping and handyman work around the school.
So I ran the guy down, and he said, yeah, he imagined he could do it in about six hours for thirty bucks an hour.
Yes. I can live with that.
He’ll be out to look at the tree on Monday, and he’ll probably take it down on Tuesday.
Be still, my heart. Be low, my blood pressure.
(You’re getting a little tired of reading me predicting the end of my personal world, only to say, “Never mind,” a day or two later, aren’t you?
Never mind.)
When I came home tonight I went out to the curb to take in my garbage containers. I saw several young guys unloading a trailer at the recently sold house across the street.
One of them greeted me. I told him my name, asked him if he was moving in.
He said (I’m pretty sure), “I’m ___________, and (pointing at the other guy) that’s ____________, my fiancé. There’s another couple here too, helping us move in.”
I didn’t say anything, partly because that’s not my way, but mostly because I was trying to work out, as I walked away, whether I’d actually heard what I thought I’d heard.
Looking through the window, I saw four guys over there. No women. (I did see a woman later, but I think she came in a different car afterwards.)
I may have misjudged them, but it looks like those people are moving in.
And you know what happens when those people discover a neighborhood.
Houses get makeovers. Chic boutiques and coffee shops spring up. Property values soar. I probably won’t be able to pay my taxes anymore, and I’ll have to sell out at an obscene profit.
What a nuisance.