Month: March 2023
Christianity Made Me Talk Like an Idiot
Vladimir Nabokov on Writing, Reading, and the Three Qualities a Great Storyteller Must Have
Here’s the link to this article.
“Between the wolf in the tall grass and the wolf in the tall story there is a shimmering go-between. That go-between, that prism, is the art of literature.”
BY MARIA POPOVA
“Often the object of a desire, when desire is transformed into hope, becomes more real than reality itself,” Umberto Eco observed in his magnificent atlas of imaginary places. Indeed, our capacity for self-delusion is one of the most inescapable fundamentals of the human condition, and nowhere do we engage it more willingly and more voraciously than in the art and artifice of storytelling.
In the same 1948 lecture that gave us Vladimir Nabokov’s 10 criteria for a good reader, found in his altogether fantastic Lectures on Literature (public library), the celebrated author and sage of literature examines the heart of storytelling:
Literature was born not the day when a boy crying wolf, wolf came running out of the Neanderthal valley with a big gray wolf at his heels: literature was born on the day when a boy came crying wolf, wolf and there was no wolf behind him. That the poor little fellow because he lied too often was finally eaten up by a real beast is quite incidental. But here is what is important. Between the wolf in the tall grass and the wolf in the tall story there is a shimmering go-between. That go-between, that prism, is the art of literature.
He considers this essential role of deception in storytelling, adding to famous writers’ wisdom on truth vs. fiction and observing, as young Virginia Woolf did, that all art simply imitates nature:
Literature is invention. Fiction is fiction. To call a story a true story is an insult to both art and truth. Every great writer is a great deceiver, but so is that arch-cheat Nature. Nature always deceives. From the simple deception of propagation to the prodigiously sophisticated illusion of protective colors in butterflies or birds, there is in Nature a marvelous system of spells and wiles. The writer of fiction only follows Nature’s lead.
Going back for a moment to our wolf-crying woodland little woolly fellow, we may put it this way: the magic of art was in the shadow of the wolf that he deliberately invented, his dream of the wolf; then the story of his tricks made a good story. When he perished at last, the story told about him acquired a good lesson in the dark around the camp fire. But he was the little magician. He was the inventor.
What’s especially interesting is that Nabokov likens the writer to an inventor, since the trifecta of qualities he goes on to outline as necessary for the great writer — not that different from young Susan Sontag’s list of the four people a great writer must be — are just as necessary for any great entrepreneur:
There are three points of view from which a writer can be considered: he may be considered as a storyteller, as a teacher, and as an enchanter. A major writer combines these three — storyteller, teacher, enchanter — but it is the enchanter in him that predominates and makes him a major writer.
To the storyteller we turn for entertainment, for mental excitement of the simplest kind, for emotional participation, for the pleasure of traveling in some remote region in space or time. A slightly different though not necessarily higher mind looks for the teacher in the writer. Propagandist, moralist, prophet — this is the rising sequence. We may go to the teacher not only for moral education but also for direct knowledge, for simple facts… Finally, and above all, a great writer is always a great enchanter, and it is here that we come to the really exciting part when we try to grasp the individual magic of his genius and to study the style, the imagery, the pattern of his novels or poems.
The three facets of the great writer — magic, story, lesson — are prone to blend in one impression of unified and unique radiance, since the magic of art may be present in the very bones of the story, in the very marrow of thought. There are masterpieces of dry, limpid, organized thought which provoke in us an artistic quiver quite as strongly as a novel like Mansfield Park does or as any rich flow of Dickensian sensual imagery. It seems to me that a good formula to test the quality of a novel is, in the long run, a merging of the precision of poetry and the intuition of science. In order to bask in that magic a wise reader reads the book of genius not with his heart, not so much with his brain, but with his spine. It is there that occurs the telltale tingle even though we must keep a little aloof, a little detached when reading. Then with a pleasure which is both sensual and intellectual we shall watch the artist build his castle of cards and watch the castle of cards become a castle of beautiful steel and glass.
Indeed, as important to the success of literature as the great writer is the wise reader, whom Nabokov characterizes by a mindset that blends the receptivity of art with the critical thinking of science:
The best temperament for a reader to have, or to develop, is a combination of the artistic and the scientific one. The enthusiastic artist alone is apt to be too subjective in his attitude towards a book, and so a scientific coolness of judgment will temper the intuitive heat. If, however, a would-be reader is utterly devoid of passion and patience — of an artist’s passion and a scientist’s patience — he will hardly enjoy great literature.
Lectures on Literature is a wealth of wisdom in its entirety. Also see Nabokov on the six short stories everyone should read, then revisit famous writers’ collected insights on writing, including Elmore Leonard’s 10 rules of writing, Walter Benjamin’s thirteen doctrines, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s letter to his daughter, David Ogilvy’s 10 no-bullshit tips, Henry Miller’s 11 commandments, Jack Kerouac’s 30 beliefs and techniques, John Steinbeck’s 6 pointers, and Susan Sontag’s synthesized learnings.
Commentary on D. James Kennedy’s book Why I Believe–Chapter 8-13
Here’s the link to this article.
The remainder of this commentary will touch on a few issues in the remainder of the book. I had collected sufficient notes for a detailed review of each chapter, but these were lost when my computer died forever, before I finished with chapter 7 (though I have a few hand-scribbled notes left). This sounds like a lame excuse for being non-rigorous, doesn’t it? Well, for one thing, I feel I have given a sufficiently rigorous, detailed, and honest commentary on previous chapters to give you a good idea about the intellectual value of Why I Believe; more of the same would only belabor the point. Furthermore, as I approach the end of the book I find less and less material to argue about, for it relies more and more on Biblical interpretation (and more rhetorical fallacies) than rational argument. Lastly, I am tired. This project was a formidable effort for me, albeit enjoyable (learning new things is always enjoyable).
Chapter 8 – Christ.
Dr. Kennedy spends much of this chapter on the question of the existence of Jesus. For me, this is a non-issue. I do not deny that Jesus existed. I believe he did. Even if he didn’t, he might as well have, given the profound influence he has had on Western civilization!
This chapter contains some distortions of fact also. Dr. Kennedy claims that Christianity is the world’s largest religion. Perhaps in 1980 when the book was published, yes. Recently I heard from a Christian professor of religion that Islam has caught up, if not surpassed, Christianity in its number of followers. This is impressive given that Islam got started centuries after Christianity. Islam is one of the world’s fastest growing religions.
Dr. Kennedy also makes heavy use of the argumentum ad numerum fallacy in suggesting that the validity of a concept is related to the number of people who believe it (remember, millions of people once believed the Earth was flat), and he makes numerous appeals to authority by quoting the opinions of famous people, in effect saying “I believe this because so-and-so does.” Why does he think this means anything?
Why I Believe hardly touches on the Messianic prophecies concerning Jesus. The chapter 1 Appendix dealt with Messianic prophecy. The efforts in the New Testament to demonstrate that Jesus Christ was indeed the Messiah rely on a number of Old Testament quotes, quotes that are typically out of context. For example, Matthew’s quote of Isaiah 7:14-16 ignores the fact that Isaiah was referring to some would-be contemporary king. And Micah 5:2, which describes the origin of the Davidic dynasty in Bethlehem, is quoted out of context to sound like a messianic prophecy. In reference to Herod’s massacre of baby boys, Matthew quotes a lament in Jeremiah as a prophecy; the original had referred to the exile of Israelites by a conquering king. And Hosea 11:1 was used to demonstrate that Jesus Christ would be taken to Egypt and back, even though it was really a complaint about worshipping other gods rather than the one who aided the Jews in their exodus from Egypt.
Finally, I must mention something about the idea that Jesus is God, an idea considered blasphemous by Muslims, who also believe in Jesus. As explained in one of the arguments in the chapter 3 commentary, Jesus never actually claims this. Our records show that he was given God-status decades after his crucifixion and the deaths of his apostles. In fact, the records were actually altered! From 325 to 381 AD, the Council of Nicea was hard at work on the Bible, tampering and filtering, partly to give the rule of Constantine (Rome’s first Christian-convert emperor) the authority of divine will, but mostly to define the tenets of Christianity as we know it today. In particular, the Nicene Council defined the Trinity – the relation between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
However, the Council of Nicea probably didn’t go so far as to turn Jesus into God. That was finalized in 451 AD by the Council of Chalcedon. The most significant product of this council was the formulation of the two natures of Christ; the relationship between his humanity and deity. My Last Appendix is an interesting parable on this subject of Christ’s deity.
Chapter 9 – Resurrection.
This is a subject I really have no opinion about (although not counting chapter 4, it was oddly one for which I had collected the most notes – see “The Historicity of the Resurrection: The Debate Between Christians and Skeptics” by Jeff Lowder for a much more detailed treatment). However, I can, as before, make some comments about what Kennedy writes on the subject. In particular, he offers as evidence a stream of non sequiturs, such as the Easter holiday, Christian art, and hymnals, to show why he believes Christ was resurrected. Kennedy shows us a good example of argumentum ad antiquitatem; that is, arguing that something must be right because it is established by ancient tradition.
The evidence is based on myth. People want to believe some amazing things. For example, I recall an experiment where a magician performed in front of a classroom of college students. The performance was designed to give the magician the appearance of a person with occult abilities, who could talk to spirits and demons and read minds. Most of the class, when surveyed, fearfully believed his occult abilities were legitimate. Another class was shown the same performance, and then shown how each trick was done, and still most of the students reported in their questionnaires that they believed the performer had occult abilities, in spite of being shown that the performance was nothing more than simple tricks! Many people will believe what they want to believe, and their convictions will not be changed by facts. Similarly, I suspect that nothing could possibly sway Dr. Kennedy from his preconceptions.
Similar to C. S. Lewis’s “trifurcation” argument described in the chapter 3 commentary, Dr. Kennedy gives us another one concerning the resurrection. He says there are only three alternatives to choose from: the apostles lied, they were deceived, or Jesus did rise from the dead. I have already described a fourth likely possibility: that reports of the resurrection were after-the-fact changes to Scripture. Add to that the fact that all four gospels contain contradictions of the events of the resurrection (see the contradictions in the chapter 1 commentary), and one finds that Dr. Kennedy’s belief rests on quite a shaky foundation indeed.
Chapter 10 – Christianity.
This is the book’s second weakest chapter, next to the one on creationism. I say this because, while the chapter contains some truth, Dr. Kennedy has to lie to support his thesis. Specifically, he asserts that Christianity has had only positive influences throughout history, and is responsible for women’s rights, the end of slavery, and scientific progress! He also lies about the religions of Islam and Buddhism. Let’s examine these issues.
Kennedy dismisses the Inquisition by claiming that the perpetrators were “not true Christians.” I think he’s probably right, although this is known as the “no true Scotsmen” fallacy. Using it makes one’s argument totally unassailable (and uninteresting). For centuries, people claiming to be true Christians have been using their religion to justify all manner of atrocities. As mentioned in the chapter 3 commentary, Hitler had similar justifications to those employed by perpetrators of the Inquisition: “Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord.” (from Mein Kampf). And he certainly believed he was a Christian! Pulitzer Prize winner John Toland wrote in Adolf Hitler:
The Fuhrer made it known to those entrusted with the Final Solution that the killings should be done as humanely as possible. This was in line with his conviction that he was observing God’s injunction to cleanse the world of vermin. Still a member in good standing of the Church of Rome despite detestation of its hierarchy (“I am now as before a Catholic and will always remain so” [quoting Hitler]), he carried within him its teaching that the Jew was the killer of God. The extermination, therefore, could be done without a twinge of conscience since he was merely acting as the avenging hand of God – so long as it was done impersonally, without cruelty.
Even today, people who consider themselves true Christians continue to use their beliefs to rationalize any act, for God’s will must be moral and right! Examples today are given by religious fundamentalists wanting to pass laws proscribing private consensual behavior, or murder doctors who perform abortions. An outsider like myself looks at all this, and, seeing both the Good and the Evil affects of Christianity, observes that anything can be justified within the bounds of its ethical system, and I must conclude that Christianity cannot possibly be the wonderful entity that Dr. Kennedy claims it is.
Kennedy credits Christianity with the abolition of slavery. In the Bible, God found slavery acceptable, and indeed, the whole Bible takes slavery for granted as part of human civilization. Dr. Kennedy forgets that the same Civil-War-era Southern Christianity, in which Kennedy’s own denomination has its roots, was the glue that bound together the whole culture of the South, in which slavery was an integral part. It’s a good thing our country grew out of it, although the religion from that dark time still persists in the various forms of fundamentalism.
Incredibly, Kennedy also claims “Christianity has brought to the world liberty and freedom.” Does he know nothing of history? Let’s take a brief look at the freedom of men and women from the beginnings of Western civilization onward:
Maximum| m = men Freedom| w = women | | mm | mmm wm | mmmmm mm w w +mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm m m ww w |wwwwwwwwwwwwwww wwww m m w w | w w w mm mmmm m w | wwwwwwwww w m m m m w | ww m m wwww mm w Maximum| w mmmmmmmmmm w w w Oppression| wwwwwwwwwwww ww -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | | | | | | 1300 1000 500 0 500 1000 1500 2000 BC --d-- AD Periods: -------a------- ----b---- ---c--- -----e------ --f-- -g- -h- ijklmn
Description of each period:a. 1300 – 450 BCAncient Greece. Women are relatively free and exercise influence over men, but are subject to legal and sexual double standards.b. 450 – 27 BC:Enlightened Greece. Courtesans hold the highest positions of individual rights available to women. High-class prostitutes are held superior to wives, who are considered as housekeepers with few rights.c. 27 BC – 385 AD:Roman Empire. Increased economic freedom and a drive for individual freedom brings new rights and respect for women. Double standards are diminished with a drive for women’s liberation and equality.d. 200 – 385 AD:Christianity established. As Rome surrenders to this new religion, it plunges into altruism and asceticism, causing massive destruction and suffering. The high standard of living enjoyed by the Romans gets wiped out. Women lose almost all rights as Christianity rises in power, subjecting them to new, heavy oppression. Ominous parallels are developing today with rising fundamentalist, born-again, and anti-abortion movements.e. 385 – 1000 AD:Dark Ages (the unhappiest period in history). The rise of Christian power increases emphasis on self-torture and denial. Marriage comes under Church domination. Christians become more preoccupied with sex than ever as they struggle against lust (for example, by burning off fingers to resist temptation).386: St. Augustine converts to Christianity; promotes guilt through books like Confessions (criticizing his youth), and The City of God, his major work which states we are born between feces and urine, speculates how babies might be born from women “uncankered by lust and sex,” and generally displays passionate hatred for human life.By 585, Christians argue that women do not have souls and debate if women are even human beings. Sex is reduced to an unromantic and ugly act with penance granted easily to men whenever required. Women become pieces of disposable property.By the 9th century, Christianity dominates everyone’s lives. Women are considered the property of men. The Church sanctions wife-beating. Men are merely fined for killing women. Noblemen have a “natural right” to rape any peasant woman and deflower the brides of their vassals. Sex without values (rape, prostitution, sadistic sex) is not a serious offense, but sex with values (with love) is sinful: St. Jerome states that he who ardently loves his wife is an adulterer. However, the major Christian sin is not sex, but pleasure.f. 1000 – 1300:Pre-Renaissance. Courtly love challenges Christianity, elevating women to more equal partners with men, and generally reflecting happiness and countering religion’s malevolence. The Church fears and fights courtly love; for example, St. Thomas declares it a mortal sin to kiss and touch a woman with delight, without the thought of fornication. The primary struggle is between oppressive religion and Renaissance free-thinking.g. 1300 – 1500:Renaissance. Truth and Renaissance weaken Christianity. Growing enlightenment with spreading economic freedoms begin liberating human minds and reason from the dark, brutal mysticism of Christian theology. The Church develops an ominous interest in witchcraft and exorcism, and fights back the Renaissance with witch trials, killing, torturing, and burning women to death.By 1450, the Catholic church, losing its power, establishes the dogma that all physically desirable women are evil witches as a means to fight the rediscovery of human joyfulness brought on by the emerging Renaissance.In the 15th century, Renaissance nobleman equate beauty to good, the Renaissance enlightenment makes sex seem not so sinful, and the middle class begins to associate sex with love. The Church counters this trend by releasing heretofore unknown malefactors, the inquisitors, backed by papal pronouncements and bulls, leading to horrible tortures, primarily against innocent women.h. 1500 – 1700:The Puritans. This is a mixed period of Reformation, combining the enlightened Renaissance with the malevolent Christian position that continued to burn women as witches. On one hand, Martin Luther fights Rome, claiming that marriage is a civil matter, not a sacrament, that sexual impulses are natural and irrepressible. John Calvin, however, sets up a brutally strict theocracy in Geneva, even stringently regulating legitimate love.By the 16th century Puritans fuse the ideals of romantic love with the normality of sex in marriage. Women’s status improves, as do property rights and inheritance laws. Marriage becomes a civil contract.i. 1700 – 1800:Age of Reason. Rationalists of this new age reject Christianity’s gloom, abandoning the portrait of women as evil. Although men respect women for their minds, women are often considered as toys or ornaments, and the status of women declines slightly as sex becomes reduced to sensuality and pleasurable sport (probably as a backlash to past suppression). However, the rise of suppressive religious Victorianism results in increases of flagellation, pornography, and prostitution.j. 1800 – 1850:Victorianism. Freedom of women declines further as Victorianism gains strength. Men seek shy, virginal women. Women are glorified and idealized, but this is only a new pretext for their continued subjugation. Many doctors consider sexual desire in women to be pathological. Women begin revolting against their “pure” and “glorious” status.k. 1850 – 1900:Decline of Religion and Victorianism via the Rise of Capitalism and the Emancipation of Women. The rise of capitalism accelerates the dissolution of medieval religious ties along with their unjust social customs and racism, crippling the influence of the Church, and creating the atmosphere and pressure for female suffrage, individual rights, divorce reform, and equal legal and economic rights. Capitalism breaks the stifling, unjust religious/feudal class patterns. Women gain significant economic rights for the first time since the anti-Christian, pagan Roman Empire. Religious Victorians try to fight the inevitable changes brought on by the new industrial civilization, via religious coercion, government force, and police activities.l. 1900 – 1960:Rise of Romantic Love and women’s rights are still opposed by Christianity; for example, Catholic elements arrest and jail Margaret Sanger after she claims that a woman’s body belongs to her alone, publishes birth control information, and opens clinics. Women increasingly become equal to men in romantic relationships. A product of capitalism, the modern sexual revolution demolishes most of the Christian-Victorian patterns of anti-sexual, patriarchal oppressiveness.m. 1960 – 1980:The sexual revolution toward openness and honesty cause Christianity’s malevolent influence over sexuality to wane.n. 1980 – present:An ominous rise in fundamentalist religions, spread via electronic media, signal a turn back toward the malevolent views of life, love, sex, and individual rights.
Kennedy believes, correctly I think, that the Inquisition consisted of persecution of true Christians by others who followed a perverted form of Christianity. The efforts of Martin Luther, resulting in Protestantism, accomplished much in the way of assisting Western civilization’s escape from the clutches of an organized religion that had grown too powerful. However, as you can see from history, the Inquisition was but a small black mark in a much longer history of oppression.
How can a non-Christian know who is, or who is not, a true Christian? Dr. Kennedy obviously believes he is, but in his book Why I Believe, he is not only passes judgments on both honest Christians and non-Christians (see chapter 4), but he employs many dishonest tactics throughout the book to support his convictions. Is this the work of a true Christian? And if not, why should we trust anything he says about Christianity?
Kennedy writes, “Freedom is one of the gifts of Christianity.” History shows this to be mostly false. Even though the prevalence of Christianity has been highly correlated in history with human misery, Kennedy is correct in saying that Christianity has been greatly beneficial to many people and cultures. Indeed, many people need it. I recall a survey in a Christian discussion group on the internet, in which participants were asked how they would react if they lost their religion. By a 2 to 1 margin, respondents said they would abandon all pretense of morality. Christianity, and religion in general, does serve a useful function in instructing people how to get along with one another. Not all of us need a religion for this purpose, however.
Dr. Kennedy’s most outrageous lies concern other religions. He claims that science could not have originated in the Muslim culture because of its belief in fatalism. This is ridiculous on two counts. First, Islam is no more based in fatalism than Christianity; Muslims believe in free will. Second, much of our science has roots in Muslim culture, especially medicine and astronomy. We use an Arabic number system, and many terms (like algebra) have Arabic roots. Furthermore, in chapter 1, Dr. Kennedy lies about the Qu’ran not containing specific examples of fulfilled prophecy. Muslims will tell you that the Qu’ran is not a book of prophecy (they have other books for that), but nevertheless they can point out specific examples, just as Kennedy can with the Bible. I was appalled to read his lies about Islam. To cure his inexcusable ignorance, all he had to do was ask a Muslim! It’s so simple. He didn’t have to invent falsehoods.
He also lies about Buddhists and Hindus in stating that they believe that “the physical world is not real, that nothing exists but God and all this is merely imagination.” Buddhist teachings and philosophy contain no instructions to worship any gods – Buddhism is essentially an atheist religion! And the Hindu concept of God is obviously beyond Kennedy’s capacity to contemplate. To learn the truth, all he had to do was ask a follower of any of these religions. Dr. Kennedy, however, has no choice but to lie if he wants to make Christianity look like the sole source of scientific achievement.
Finally, he lies in saying that only through Christianity could education come to the world. This is true in some countries, but false in others, such as Asian countries like Japan, where Christianity has little, if any, influence, where the level of education is among the highest in the world. It is interesting that in the absence of Christianity, Japan also does not have many of the civil problems that plague Christian countries in Europe, North America, and South America.
Chapters 11 – 13: Second Birth, Holy Spirit, Return of Christ.
These chapters describe more “what” than “why,” so I will not comment at length.
I find myself in agreement with Kennedy’s exhortation to be born again, but not in the sense he means. I have met several born-again atheists, who became happier people by shedding the chains of religion from their lives. If becoming a born-again Christian brings a person happiness and fulfillment, I am all for it. Likewise for being born again into Buddhism, Islam, Shinto, Taoism, New Age thought, or anything else that brings fulfillment and growth. Anything that brings spiritual and intellectual stagnation, however, must be rejected. Unfortunately, it seems that many Christians succumb to this stagnation after being born again. Why I Believe, which does more to demonstrate Kennedy’s ignorance than to provide a rationale for a belief system, is evidence of that.
The chapter on the Holy Spirit was, to me, one of the most interesting, because it dealt with a concept difficult for Christians and non-Christians alike. This chapter is more of a theological discussion than an answer to challenges from nonbelievers.
The only thing I can say about the chapter on the return of Christ is “we shall see.” Ever since Revelations declared that the events described would happen “shortly,” Christians throughout history have been trying to fit the situations of their day to Biblical prophecy in an effort to convince others that the Apocalypse is at hand, and Dr. Kennedy is no exception.
Writing Journal—Friday writing prompt
Your character is a substitute teacher for a grade four class and slowly comes to realize something unusual is going on. As impossible as it seems, some of her students are reading her mind. Write the scene.
.
One Stop for Writers
Here’s five story elements to consider:
- Character
- Setting
- Plot
- Conflict
- Resolution
Never forget, writing is a process. The first draft is always a mess.
The first draft of anything is shit.
Ernest Hemingway
03/16/23 Biking & Listening
Biking is something else I both love and hate. It takes a lot of effort but does provide good exercise and most days over an hour to listen to a good book or podcast. I especially like having ridden.
Here’s my bike, a Rockhopper by Specialized. I purchased it November 2021 from Venture Out in Guntersville; Mike is top notch! So is the bike, and the ‘old’ man seat I salvaged from an old Walmart bike.
Here’s a link to today’s bike ride. This is my pistol ride.
Here’s a few photos taken along my route:
Here’s what I’m currently listening to: McNally’s Secret, by Lawrence Sanders
He was a tremendously talented writer.
Amazon abstract:
First in the series starring the sleuthing Palm Beach playboy from the #1 New York Times–bestselling and Edgar Award–winning author.
Inveterate playboy Archy McNally gets paid to make discreet inquiries for Palm Beach’s power elite. But keeping their dirty little secrets buried will take some fancy footwork in McNally’s latest case. A block of priceless 1918 US airmail stamps has gone missing from a high-society matron’s wall safe. Lady Cynthia Horowitz, now on her sixth husband, is a nasty piece of work who lives in a mansion that looks like Gone With the Wind’s Tara transplanted to southern Florida. McNally’s search takes him into a thickening maze of sex, lies, scandal, and blackmail. When passion erupts into murder and McNally must dig even deeper to uncover the truth, he unearths a shocking secret that could expose his own family’s skeletons.
Top reviews from the United States
5.0 out of 5 stars Cure Cultural Volcanics with Bubbling Champagne. Design Life To Suit Taste & Times.
Reviewed in the United States on May 21, 2006
This book didn’t merely capture my reading interest. It became a book of my heart…
In McNally’s SECRET, the pilot to this series, we’re informed that the pater McNally is not an “old-money” man. Okay. I get that and I like it. (That’s not the secret.)
Having reviewed 4 of the original 7 McNally books by Lawrence Sanders, I had accepted the face value (not realizing the facade) of the Palm Beach mansion and the genteel lifestyle of pater Prescott McNally, Yale graduate, leather-bound-Dickens-reading, attorney-at-law. Upon reading (in McNally’s Secret) the illuminating passages of Archy’s grandparent’s ways into money, I began to wonder what other Secrets this novel might expose.
Usually, if possible, I prefer to read a series in order, pilot first. I can’t explain why, but, in this case I’m glad I read 4 of the original 7 McNally’s prior to reading SECRET (though I believe this series can be satisfyingly read in any order).
The opening of this novel was classic, and felt to be the initiation of what Sanders was born and itching to write, beyond the sagas of his other fine works. The introductory remarks were exquisite in mapping the reasons for, “Can’t you ever be serious, Archy?” I’d love to quote that paragraph, but maybe I should allow you to read it with the book in hand. I will quote a few other passages, however, which might serve as appropriate appetizers to this banquet of a book.
Comparing himself to S. Holmes, Archy says:
“I can’t glance at a man and immediately know he’s left-handed, constipated, has a red-headed wife, and slices lox for a living. I do investigations a fact at a time. Eventually they add up – I hope. I’m very big on hope.”
Archy’s description of the start up of the Pelican Club were the best type of soul food. This is how and why such a club should be started (then survive through a near hit of Chapter 7). Of course you really should read the book to get the whole of that brief history, but here’s a prime paring:
“We were facing Chapter 7 when we had the great good fortune to hire the Pettibones, an African-American family who had been living in one of the gamier neighborhoods of West Palm Beach and wanted out.”
They “wanted out” and they deserved a chance where their skills could and would save not only themselves, but those who hired them. Isn’t that the type of win/win the world needs now?
I almost sobbed at the below passage, I felt such a deep surge of “right on” (definitely did a breath-catch hiccup and heart moan):
“… we formed a six-piece jazz combo (I played tenor kazoo), and we were delighted to perform, without fee, at public functions and nursing homes. A Palm Beach critic wrote of one of our recitals, `Words fail me.’ You couldn’t ask for a better review than that.”
Yep. This is a book of my heart. Words don’t often fail me in reviews; too much the contrary. But I’m getting better at refraining from using my critic hat with a steel-studded-bat accessory, which is what Archy was getting at.
Some might wonder why a person in my position, with my un-hidden agendas, would take so much time to write raves on a series by a deceased author. Mostly, I love Archy. But, possibly the live spirits of the dead are sometimes more able to be helpful than dead souls of the living? Keeping my tongue in cheek, I might add that freed spirits probably have better connections for helping an author into the right publishing contacts for a character series with ironic assonance with this one.
Moving quickly onward and upward, though not with wings attached yet…
In contrast to the other 4 I’ve read, I noticed that this Archy is less bubbly-buffoonish (though the buffoon is always endearing) and slightly more serious, sensitive, and quietly contemplative. I like both versions of Archy, though I prefer the slight edge of peaceful acquiescence in the pilot, and I can’t help but wonder, as I do with all series, how much reader feedback, and editor/agents’ interpretation of it, directed the progression of balance of certain appealing or potentially irritating qualities. I wonder how each series would have progressed if the feedback had been balanced and pure (as a species, we’re not there yet, but forward motion is perceptible), rather than inevitably polluted by the “life happens” part of the sometimes perverted, capricious tastes of us squeaky wheels, and the healthy ego needs of professionals in positions of swallow and sway.
I’m still trying to understand why honesty is the most appealing human quality to me, yet honest criticism does not speak to my heart, nor to my soul, not even to my head. Often, though, it does speak in perfect pitch to my funny bone. And, of course true Honesty (with the capital “H”) leaps beyond speaking the “truth” as one happens to “see” it on a good or bad day. Cultural honesty, of the type dramatized by Stephen King, Lawrence Sanders, Tamar Myers, Barbara Workinger, Joanne Pence, Sue Grafton, (and others) is what most often pushes me to stand up and cheer.
Somewhere.
One of the best spots I’ve found is on the edge of the clear cliff of ozone found in Amazon’s sacred forum of Customer Reviewers.
Of course the first lines in SECRET, the sipping of champagne from a belly button would snag the attention of even the most sexually skittish reader of the nose-raised, neck-cricked, personality persuasion. But, truly and honestly, what sunk me with every hook were the few lines exposing why Archy could never be serious. I know I said I wouldn’t, but I have to quote this passage, beginning on page 1 chapter 1. For me, it’s one of the main selling points of the series:
“I had lived through dire warnings of nuclear catastrophe, global warming, ozone depletion, universal extinction via cholesterol, and the invasion of killer bees. After a while my juices stopped their panicky surge and I realized I was bored with all these screeched predictions of Armageddon due next Tuesday. It hadn’t happened yet, had it? The old world tottered along, and I was content to totter along with it.”
I’d bet my fortune (which is based on a skill of “make do”; there are no bananas in it) that the above passage is what captured a collection of readers so absolutely in a “right on” agreement that this series spanned the grave of the author and is still spewing pages and stretching shelves. And, of course, this attitude of “if you can’t lick `em; flick `em” which Archy aimed toward “kvetch-ers” as he terms them, continues from the above, with relish accumulating, throughout the book.
Archy is a rare sane person swimming along nicely within the insanity of a last-gasp-culture (which is “drowning in The Be Careful Sea” as I described and termed that syndrome in one of my sci fi manuscripts titled MORNING COMES).
To Jennifer, of the champagne sea in her belly button, Archy answered why he wasn’t an attorney:
“Because I was expelled from Yale Law for not being serious enough. During a concert by the New York Philharmonic I streaked across the stage, naked except for a Richard M. Nixon mask.”
That answer brought to mind the bright side of Howard Roark (from Ayn Rand’s FOUNTAINHEAD, see my review posted 10/14/05) who was arrogantly unconcerned about his and the Dean’s reasons for Roark’s being expelled from architectural school. You’d be right to wonder where I got that comparison, since Roark could never be accused of being anything but serious. Syncopated irony? Assonance?
You be the judge. Get the SECRET of the McNally collection.
As I relished the final chapters and pages of SECRET, I had a thought about the beauty, warmth, lovely literary melancholy, and subtly complex richness radiating from those concluding textual treasures:
In retrospect, this novel doesn’t feel like a planned pilot to a mystery series. It feels to be a singular novel, like but not like, the ones Sanders had written prior to it. What it feels like to me is that Lawrence hit upon a “soul speak” story which couldn’t halt the cultural conversation it had initiated, however serendipitous that initiation may have been.
Yes, I do recall that in some of my other reviews (“reveries” according to my Amazon Friend, L.E. Cantrell) I speculated on something which could seem contradictory to the above mentioned “thought.” I had wondered if Parker’s Senser series might have been somehow a spark for this McNally series. I continued to see references to Boston in this book (as in other McNally’s I’ve reviewed), which, of course, is the city for which Spenser did the Walkabout. So possibly SECRET was somewhat an antithetical homage to Spenser, possibly even a hat “doff” with a friendly, competitive “one-better” attempt, meant only to be a single novel rather than a never-die series.
Based on Agatha Christie’s official web site, Miss Marple was not originally intended to be another Poirot, and look what happened there (see my Listmania of the Miss Marple series).
To me, Archy appears to be a gatekeeper for pure and primal, hidden wishes and dreams. Living home comfortably, guiltlessly at 37, on the top floor of his parent’s mansion in Palm Beach; eating drool-food from a house chef; having established a club like The Pelican as a side atmosphere to partake in daily; working at a cushy, just challenging enough, engaging career for discreet inquiries … If an author’s (or reader’s) going to retire that would be da place (or at least an entertaining option).
It’ll be interesting to see if/how I’m able to bridge the gap from Lawrence Sanders’s Archy to Vincent Lardo’s. I’d love to know how that bridge was built and continues to be maintained.
Though a perfectly acceptable, gorgeous reprint in a mass market paperback was (probably still is) available on Amazon’s Super Saver Special, I felt lucky to find a vender on Amazon (a-bookworm2) holding a used G. P. Putnam’s Sons hardcover of this novel, a first printing of the 1992 copyright. What an honor it will be to have this version of the pilot of such an auspicious series from such a life-perceptive author, Lawrence Sanders. The glossy-black jacket provides a luscious background for the name and title printed in thick, gleaming, copper ink, with the artwork of an antique magnifying glass and fancy-brass scissors weighing down the million-dollar-valued, 1918 US Stamp of the Inverted Jenny.
This pilot is a rare find in a rare series.
Linda G. Shelnutt
Georgia grand jurors say what’s coming Trump’s way, “Is gonna be MASSIVE!”
Richard Dawkins Religion vs. Reality
Fundamentalism and the Truth of the Bible
Here’s the link to this article by Bart Ehrman. It covers something I’d never really thought about. Interesting. Makes sense that it’s non-sense to believe that a Bible with errors precludes someone remaining/becoming a Christian.
May 15, 2017
I have recently received a number of inquiries about why realizing there may be mistakes in the Bible might lead someone to become an agnostic. Here is one that came a few days ago:
QUESTION:
I want to thank you for your extensive work in explaining … your journey from believing that the bible contained no errors to proving the bible is not inerrant and simply the work of human writers. What I would like to be explained is the necessary logic to go from believing that the bible is not inerrant or the “word of God” to believing there is no God.
RESPONSE
My view of the matter may seem odd to a lot of people, but it is nonetheless held by most critical scholars of the Bible and trained theologians. What is the “necessary logic to go from believing that the bible is not inerrant … to believing there is no God? There is no necessary logic at all.
I have never thought that …
To See The Rest of this Post you need to Belong to the Blog. If you’re not a member, JOIN! It won’t cost much, you’ll get a lot of bang for your buck, and every buck goes to fight poverty. So no one loses and everyone wins — including you. So JOIN!I have never thought that recognizing the historical and literary problems of the Bible would or should lead someone to believe there is no God. The only people who could think such a thing are either Christian fundamentalists or people who have been convinced by fundamentalists (without knowing it, in many instances) that fundamentalist Christianity is the only kind of religion that is valid, and that if the assumptions of fundamentalism is flawed, then there could be no God. What is the logic of that? So far as I can see, there is no logic at all.
Christian fundamentalism insists that every word in the Bible has been given directly by God, and that only these words can be trusted as authorities for the existence of God, for the saving doctrines of Christianity, for guidance about what to believe and how to live, and for, in short, everything having to do with religious truth and practice. For fundamentalists, in theory, if one could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that any word in the original manuscripts of the Bible was an error, than the entire edifice of their religious system collapses, and there is nothing left between that and raw atheism.
Virtually everyone who is trained in the critical study of the Bible or in serious theology thinks this is utter nonsense. And why is it that people at large – not just fundamentalists but even people who are not themselves believers – don’t realize it’s nonsense, that it literally is “non-sense”? Because fundamentalists have convinced so much of the world that their view is the only right view. It’s an amazing cultural reality. But it still makes no sense.
Look at it this way. Suppose you could show beyond any doubt that the story of Jesus walking on the water was a later legend. It didn’t really happen. Either the disciples thought they saw something that really occur, or later story tellers came up with the idea themselves as they were trying to show just how amazing Jesus was, or … or that there is some other explanation? What relevance would that have to the question of whether there was a divine power who created the universe? There is *no* necessary relevance. No necessary connection whatsoever. Who says that God could not have created the universe unless Jesus walked on water? It’s a complete non sequitur.
The vast majority of Christians throughout history – the massively vast majority of Christians – have not been fundamentalists. Most Christians in the world today are not fundamentalists. So why do we allow fundamentalists to determine what “real” Christianity is? Or what “true” Christianity is? Why do we say that if you are not a fundamentalist who maintains that every word in the Bible is literally true and historically accurate that you cannot really be a Christian?
Suppose Jesus did not walk on water. Does that lead to the conclusion that he must not have died for the sins of the world? Why would it lead to that? The only connection you can make between the two assertions – Jesus walked on water; Jesus died for the sins of the world – is extremely torturous. Sure, there are people on the blog right now who are probably concocting some kind of logical connection between these two statements. But think about it for a second. What is the necessary connection? There is none.
If Mark made a mistake when he said that Abiathar was the high priest when David and his men ate the showbread in the Temple, that has absolutely no bearing on the question of whether God exists as a Trinity. No connection.
You should not think: yes, but the only reason we believe that God is a Trinity (if “we” believe that) is because it’s what the Bible says, and if the Bible contains errors, then it must be erroneous in *that* as well. Here are several key points:
First, of all, there is no necessary reason why if the Bible makes mistake about one thing it is mistaken in everything. Even if there are mistakes in the Bible (there are) that doesn’t mean that everything in it is wrong (it is not).
Second, the doctrine of the Trinity is not actually taught in the Bible in the form that theologians came to develop it later and that is believed on by people today.
Third, in fact there are non-trinitarian ways to read the entire Bible, including *all* of the Old Testament and *most* of the New Testament. What we think of the doctrine of the Trinity was developed on the basis of logical, philosophical argumentation that used scattered verses of the Bible as proof texts for views that developed on other grounds. There were, and are, non-Trinitarians who base their views on proof texts as well. It is not a necessary teaching of Scripture.
Fourth, there were Christian believers for centuries before we even had a Bible (the 66 book canon we have today). Were they not believers because they did not believe in the Bible? They didn’t have a Bible. In fact there are millions of Christians in the world today who don’t have the Bible.
Fifth, more important, there are all sorts of Christian denominations, Christian theologians, and just regular ole Christians – in fact, the majority who are walking the earth – who do not think that fundamentalist Christianity is right, or anywhere near right.
So, is there a logical and necessary connection between the idea that there are mistakes in the Bible and the belief in God. No, no necessary connection at all.
So why did I become an agnostic once I came to think there are mistakes in the Bible. Short answer: I didn’t. Realizing that there are problems in the Bible had almost nothing to do with my becoming an agnostic. I’ll explain all that in later posts.
The Six Motives of Creativity: Mary Gaitskill on Why Writers Write
Here’s the link to this article.
The art of integrating the ego and the impulse for empathy in a dynamic call and response.
BY MARIA POPOVA
Why do writers — great writers — write? George Orwell attributed it to four universal motives. Joan Didion saw it as access to her own mind. For David Foster Wallace, it was about fun. Michael Lewis ascribes it to the necessary self-delusions of creativity. Joy Williams found in it a gateway from the darkness to the light. For Charles Bukowski, it sprang from the soul like a rocket. Italo Calvino found in writing the comfort of belonging to a collective enterprise. For Susan Orlean, it comes from immutable love.
But one of literary history’s most beautiful answers comes from Mary Gaitskill in her essay “The Wolf in the Tall Grass,” titled after Nabokov’s famous meditation on the art of storytelling and published in the 1998 anthology Why I Write: Thoughts on the Craft of Fiction (public library) — an altogether fantastic collection, featuring David Foster Wallace’s famous essay “The Nature of the Fun” and other notable reflections on writing from Ann Patchett, Elizabeth Gilbert, Rick Bass, Norman Mailer, Rick Moody, and more.
1. To satisfy a basic, fundamental need. I think all people have this need. It’s why children like to draw pictures of houses, animals, and Mom; it’s an affirmation of their presence in the corporeal world. You come into life, and life gives you everything your senses can bear: broad currents of animal feeling running alongside the particularity of thought. Sunlight, stars, colors, smells, sounds. Tender things, sweet, temperate things, harsh, freezing, hot, salty things. All the different expressions on people’s faces and in their voices. For years, everything just pours into you, and all you can do is gurgle or scream until finally one day you can sit up and hold your crayon and draw your picture and thus shout back, Yes! I hear! I see! I feel! This is what it’s like! It’s dynamic creation and pure, delighted receptivity happening on the same field, a great call and response.
Her second motive reflects Susan Sontag’s assertion that “a writer is someone who pays attention to the world — a writer is a professional observer.” Gaitskill continues:
2. To give form to the things we can sense but not see. You walk into the living room where your father is lying on the couch, listening to music. You are small, so he doesn’t hear or see you. His face is reacting to the music, and his expression is soft, abstract, intensely inward. It is also pained. It is an expression that you have never seen. Then he sees you and smiles, but the music still fills the room with that other expression…
Quoting Nabokov’s famous words — “Between the wolf in the tall grass and the wolf in the tall story there is a shimmering go-between. That go-between, that prism, is the art of literature.” — Gaitskill reflects on that ability to give shape to the ineffable as the essence of storytelling:
Stories mimic life like certain insects mimic leaves and twigs. Stories are about all the things that might’ve, could’ve, or would’ve happened, encrowded around and giving density and shape to undeniable physical events and phenomena. They are the rich, unseen underlayer of the most ordinary moments.
Gaitskill contrasts this intense outrospection and sensitivity to the world’s unseen layers with her third reason — which coincides with Orwell’s first motive — and writes:
3. To feel important, in the simplest egotistical sense. … Strong thoughts and feelings about what you see and feel require a distinct point of view and an ego. If you are frequently told that your point of view is worthless, invalid, or crazy, your ego will get really insulted. It will sulk like a teenager hunched in her room muttering, “No one ever listens. No one cares. One day they’ll see!” To make them all see — i.e., see how important I am — was once a big part of why I wrote stories. As a motivation, it’s embarrassing, it’s base, and it smells bad, but it’s also an angry little engine that could: it will fight like hell to keep your point of view from being snatched away, or demeaned, fighting even when there’s no apparent threat.
But just as one begins to raise a skeptical eyebrow and summon Alan Watts for a counterpoint, Gaitskill herself acknowledges the existential paradox therein:
The only problem is, the more your ego fights, the smaller your point of view gets. For a while, I needed to take great pains to make myself feel safe, to the point of extreme social isolation, so I wouldn’t feel like I had to fight. The angry engine quieted down a bit, and I began to learn about other points of view.
Indeed, this impulse for empathy and for giving voice to the marginalized realities of others brings us to Gaitskill’s fourth motive:
4. To reveal and restore things that I feel might be ignored or disregarded. I was once at a coffee shop eating breakfast alone when I noticed a woman standing and talking to a table of people. She was young but prematurely aged, with badly dyed hair and lined skin. She was smiling and joking, but her body had a collapsed, defeated posture that looked deeply habitual. Her spine was curled, her head was slightly receded, and her shoulders were pulled down in a static flinch. She expressed herself loudly and crudely, but also diffidently. She talked like she was a joke. But there was something else to her, something pushing up against the defeat, a sweet, tough, humorous vitality that I could almost see running up her center. I realized that if I hadn’t looked closely, I would not have really seen this woman, that I would not have seen what was most human and lively in her. I wondered how many people saw it, or even if she herself saw it…
That kind of small, new, unrecognized thing is very tender to me, and I hate it when it gets ignored or mistaken for something ugly. I want to acknowledge and nurture it, but I usually leave it very small in the stories. I do that because I think part of the human puzzle is in the delicacy of those moments or phenomena, contrasted with the ignorance and lack of feeling we are subject to.
Gaitskill moves on to her fifth reason, echoing Oscar Wilde’s famous emphasis on receptivity and reflecting on the osmosis of reading and writing:
5. To communicate. … To read well is an act of dynamic receptivity that creates a profound sense of exchange, and I like being on both ends of it.
Citing one of her favorite passages in literature, from Saul Bellow’s The Victim, she captures the highest potentiality of literature:
It opens life up down to the pit; when I read that, I can’t ignore how extraordinary it is to be alive.
In her sixth and final reason, Gaitskill returns to Nabokov:
6. To integrate; to love. One of Nabokov’s early novels, Laughter in the Dark, has an apparently simple, almost hackneyed plot: a foolish, wealthy middle-aged man (Albinus) falls in love with a vulgar, heartless sixteen-year-old girl (Margot). She and her lover, Rex, proceed to destroy Albinus and his family in a ruthless, ultimately grotesque fashion. On the face of it, it’s a soap opera, but what makes it extraordinary, aside from the beauty of the prose, is the author’s gift for inhabiting every energetic strain of his breathing animal creations. Rex and Margot are absolutely evil, but they are also full of fierce life, with, and supple, eel-like charm. Nabokov can step inside their cruelty and vitality almost as if it were an electrical current, then step out again and enter the much slower, cooler ambience of their poor stooge Albinus, or the person of Albinus’s bland, taffy-sweet wife, and emerge again, all in a flash. … The ability to do this requires a great understanding of and regard for life that is, I think, a kind of love.
Gaitskill concludes by reflecting on this “kind of integration [that] requires holding many disparate elements together in a fluid mosaic” in her own experience of writing, from the depths of which emerges the light of the creative impulse:
When I start writing a story, I don’t feel like I’m integrating anything; I feel like I’m marching through mud. But at least some of the time when there comes a moment when I feel I’m carrying all the elements I’ve just described and more in a big, clear bowl. It doesn’t feel like I’m containing them. It feels like I’m bringing them into being and letting them be, exactly as they are. My perplexity and upset may still be there, but they are no longer the main event. I feel sadness because much of what is in that bowl is sad. But because of that tender sadness, I also feel humility and joy and love. It’s strange because much of what I write about does not seem loving. But to write it makes me feel love.
Why I Write, while out of print, is still findable and very much worth the hunt. Complement it with its contemporary counterpart, one of 2013’s best books on writing, then revisit famous writers’ advice on writing.
Richard L. Fricks 