Laziness?

Here's another good article on the importance of stories to life.  It sure is easy blogging when someone else keeps writing the articles!

Disturbed Sense and Sensibilities

I still think I was born in the wrong century, at least from a literary sense.  I immensely enjoy Jane Austen, and other such works, but I fear most modern readers really don't 'get' them.  They might enjoy the witty Pride and Prejudice and yet miss the heart of such literature.  Just look at all the 'sequels' that focus almost solely on various forms of carnal pleasure when such is obviously missing from the originals.  I just watched a version of Mansfield Park that really disturbed me.  They completely missed Fanny's upstanding moral character, downplayed the flaws in one of the main characters, implied a bit of girl on girl intimacy, and otherwise completely missed the point of the book.  Who puts a sex scene in Jane Austen?  The poor woman should be turning over in her grave so much she must be dizzy.  According to modern taste, apparently a lack of sex makes for a dull movie/read.  It would be better to have Austen unread than misread.  A pity she is not alive in our day and age, it would be interesting to read what she might have to say on the subject. 

The other problem with Jane et. al. for modern readers, besides for lack of sleaze, is a near complete lack of a traditional moral understanding.  A century ago, it was obvious what was right and wrong, but in this day and age, it depends who you ask.  The most recent Pride and Prejudice rendition featuring Keira Knightley made very little sense if you were not familiar with the story and the mores of the day.  Lydia's 'infamous elopement' seems like just another girl moving in with her boyfriend, what's the big deal?  Why is everyone freaking out about it?  Some were probably wondering why we didn't see them naked.

There are certainly affairs, misdeeds, and the like mentioned in the Austonian cannon, but it is mentioned, the deed itself is not covered in-depth, which sadly, many modern readers would expect.  Maybe there is a good reason why all my favorite authors have been dead for fifty years or more.  They knew the art of story and did not need insipid bedroom scenes to obfuscate their lack of skill.  Or maybe we as a culture have descended to a point where nothing else interests us or we think nothing else does.  But this means we have all the joy before us of learning to really appreciate the intricacies of a good story!  And then, perhaps if a love of good literature can be reignited in our musty, cramped souls, perhaps we will hunger after modern works equally good, thus starting a literary reawakening.  Or maybe we'll just turn on the TV and indulge our banal sensibilities.  In the age of Twitter, who has time for Jane Austen?   

Lost? Just ask the Lion!

It seems that the biggest lesson in life that God is trying to teach us is that we can trust Him, and if I am anything like the so-called average person, then humanity is in trouble in this particular class.  Of course we cannot trust Him to work things out as we want them, but rather in the manner which is best for us and all those affected by a particular circumstance, which usually means spiritual growth rather than striking it rich.  We can be rather peevish on this subject, thinking God does not answer prayers when He answers them in a way we had not anticipated, much like the hungry toddler who wants candy and mommy gives him something healthy.  Thus, we must learn to trust that His ideas are better than our own and that He intends a better outcome, even if we cannot at the moment fathom why things turned out as they did.

There have been many instances in my life where I thought I would do things a certain way, well aware that I should be doing it a different way, and after much vain straining and striving, finally I would give in and say, 'fine, have it your way,' and inevitably it works out beautifully.  Weird.  I have found it can be much less painful to do it His way first.  Just ask Jonah.  Or if you prefer, recall the scene in Prince Caspian where Lucy thinks she saw Aslan and knows she should take a certain path and no one believes her and they end up going on a long, pointless journey when they might have easily solved their navigational errors by believing Lucy in the first place. 

My life is either upside down or backwards at the moment, I suppose it depends on the angle, but I am okay with that.  There are moments when I feel a great sense of loss, actually grieve for what was, or wonder in trepidation at what will come next, but overall, I know, whatever happens, I do not need to panic or worry.  This sounds trite, I know, but after several lessons that may or may not have involved a sound, metaphorical thwack (is not that a lovely word?) to the head, I think I am finally starting to understand that whole 'be still and know' thing.  Definitely not perfect, but sort of (almost, hopefully) making progress, now about that whole patience thing... 

Out of Ur

My husband has been getting tired of me commenting that I feel much like Abraham, displaced from home and going forth into the great unknown that is the wide world, but knowing that there is a plan and purpose in it all, so I might as well blog about it.  Job, home, family, church, even my health insurance, are all up in the air at the moment.  I feel like a recent college graduate, looking on the broad horizon of the future that lies before me and not quite sure what to do with it.  Sometimes I wish God answered e-mail, it would make life much more straightforward, but I am finding that it is in the wandering that we often grow and learn and are fitted for whatever comes next.  I want a horizon to look towards, a goal to aim for, but sometimes all I am allowed is a glimpse of a curving road in the fog and with this I must be content, content in knowing that there is a 'plan and a purpose to everything under heaven.'   To 'be still and know that I am God.'  To know that 'even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil for You are with me.'  I don't know the future but neither did Joseph or David or Abraham or Mary, but they trusted God in all their strange and scary circumstances and He led them faithfully through paths they could not even imagine when first they set out.  I think then that I should be able to handle a minor interruption in my life as a career woman, but part of me is still anxious and uneasy, desperate to know the future as any child wondering what the packages beneath the tree actually hold in the weeks before Christmas.  What a great chance to exercise that wondrous virtue known as patience.  What is a little mortal discomfort when it is used to train up a soul for eternity!  Let me see, how does this 'being still' thing work...

Of Nightingales and Theology

I enjoyed the Importance of Being Earnest, but had not read much else by Oscar Wilde, save one of his fairy tales called 'The Happy Prince'.  It was a nice little tale, but slipped out of living memory until I read an article dealing with another tale in the collection called 'The Nightingale and the Rose'.  The hints of the tale in the article intrigued me, so of course I had to go read the whole story and now I will likely read the whole collection, happily supplied at Project Gutenberg.  As I know little of the author, save he has a great wit, I thought to review G. K. Chesterton's take on the man.

The lyrical quality of the story minds me much of the Song of Songs in its descriptions of Love and the underlying theme of ultimate and sacrificial love that surpasses even the power of death are certainly at the heart of Christianity.  From what little I know of Wilde, I had a hard time seeing him as a believer, but as Chesterton states, "he had, in his own strange way, a much deeper and more spiritual nature than they. Queerly enough, it was the very multitude of his falsities that prevented him from being entirely false. Like a many-coloured humming top, he was at once a bewilderment and a balance. He was so fond of being many-sided that among his sides he even admitted the right side. He loved so much to multiply his souls that he had among them one soul at least that was saved. He desired all beautiful things – even God."

It is a lovely little story, most of all in its portrayal of Love and how it is so often missed or misunderstood by we oft abstracted mortals.  One can pour out one's heart's blood for some beautiful cause and the whole world will overlook or laugh at your sacrifice.  It is an excellent reminder of He who did that very thing for each of us, and that He does not miss our own meager attempts to fulfill such Love, no matter what the world thinks of our efforts.

Though in keeping with Wilde's many sided philosophy, he does throw in this little bit at the last:
"What a silly thing Love is,” said the Student as he walked away.  “It is not half as useful as Logic, for it does not prove anything, and it is always telling one of things that are not going to happen, and making one believe things that are not true.  In fact, it is quite unpractical, and, as in this age to be practical is everything, I shall go back to Philosophy and study Metaphysics.”

I am not sure how one can study Metaphysics, at least the Christian variant, and misunderstand love, but oh, well...

Here is a little snippet to tempt you, it is not a long or difficult read, but certainly is not lacking in beauty: "The white Moon heard it, and she forgot the dawn, and lingered on in the sky.  The red rose heard it, and it trembled all over with ecstasy, and opened its petals to the cold morning air.  Echo bore it to her purple cavern in the hills, and woke the sleeping shepherds from their dreams.  It floated through the reeds of the river, and they carried its message to the sea." 'The Nightingale and the Rose,' Oscar Wilde.

Update: the rest of these stories seem to be well worth reading too!

The end of an epic

Well, I have finally finished Middlemarch and I am not sure what to think.  It was not so much a book as an epic, something you can't exactly sit down and write a brief review of.  It was an interesting enough story to make me slog through all eighty some chapters, but it will never be one of my favorite books.  It had some interesting insight into various human foibles, social institutions, and long forgotten English political upheavals but nothing you can really sum up in very few words; I am sure many have written a doctoral thesis on some minor content thereof.  So if you are an Anglo-bibliophile, I would recommend it, but to the vast majority of modern humanity, it shall sadly only act as a cure for insomnia.  This is probably a sad commentary on our modern attention span and waning interests in things considered classical. 

A bit more on stories and life

Here's a lovely little piece on stories and life!

http://inearnestmag.com/in-earnest/2013/10/15/to-live-creatively-not-fearfully