I am, I am fully aware, a Marilynne Robinson bore. So be it. Today, I am, once again, indebted to Frank Wilson for drawing my attention to this exquisite essay.
'To associate religion with unwavering faith in any creed or practice does no justice at all to its complexity as lived experience. Creeds themselves exist to stabilize the intense speculations that religion, which is always about the ultimate nature of things, will inspire.'
Read and be grateful.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
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A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.
Ain't no such thing as a Marilynne Robinson bore.
ReplyDeleteThank you.
ReplyDeleteI meant be grateful to Marilynne, not me, Vince, but okay I accept.
ReplyDeleteYou thank people who mention a very good work to you. And that essay was very good indeed. Which could be applied to many places on this side of the Atlantic or the west in general. Some very good Oz writers and painters spring to mind.
ReplyDeleteJust to be a slightly wondering voice in the wilderness...regarding Robinson being a Christian and then to point towards the parable of the talents and not leaving one's light hidden beneath bushels- she doesn't exactly seem to have killed herself in terms of literary output. I haven't read her yet but I'm sure I will do soon enough.
ReplyDeleteBryan, don't get it - what's the article about?
ReplyDeletethat was a lovely essay. i like her suggestion of similarity between religion & poetry; interesting that almost no one reads poetry now, and likewise what religion is evident tends to be highly dogmatic & literal.
ReplyDeletePerhaps we no longer have a taste for metaphor, and metaphor is more than a literary device, but rather something profound about how our minds work within our world. Even poetical prose like Michael Ondaatje's or Cormac McCarthy's often comes in for a lot of jeering, as if we no longer need poetry, we've seen through it and like our words as bland and inert as a slide under a microscope. It is in fact a denial of the imagination, the higher functions of the human mind, and an attempt to present us as little more than cameras, observing a static & responseless reality.
But this is an error; to be human is to live within metaphor.
A good point, well made, Elberry. Our language is pretty good at describing reality, if we make it work hard. Sadly, most of us don't, and we haven't the patience to listen to those who do. However, there are limits to what words can achieve. There is a great deal going on between the lines, so to speak. For me, music captures some of this additional, essential meaning very well. Poetry I can take or leave. Religion, well, that's a different kettle of fish.
ReplyDeleteReligion is a kettle of fish, Neil. You just have to work out what the metaphor means. Remember as the mystic will tell you, the All is in all.
ReplyDelete