Nevertheless, the phrase does have a kind of truth for a while–a day, a year, an age of men. I am “back” from Mythcon, the annual meeting of the Mythopoeic Society, in Dallas this year from July 9-12. But one never returns the same.

How to describe a Mythcon to those who have never been? Imagine a serious academic conference with world class papers and panels on C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, the other Inklings, and fantasy literature in general breaking out in the midst of a Renaissance Festival, with an Inklings meeting, a fan convention, a film festival, a Society for Creative Anachronism meeting, a theology/apologetics conference, a spiritual retreat, and an insane asylum all going on concurrently–and you will have just an inkling (ahem) of the weirdest and most satisfying convocation of Inklings devotees on the planet. Picture this astounding conglomeration as a seamless whole in which each part enriches all the others and you will have an even better idea. But you will have to attend to really understand. Warning: Mythcon is highly addictive. Like the infamous potato chip, you cannot do just one.

This year I did a paper on Lewis’s view of truth. It was part II of “A Tryst with the Transcendentals: C. S. Lewis on Beauty, Truth, and Goodness.” Part I, Beauty, was last year. Beauty came first because for Lewis it was beauty, received as sensucht, that led Lewis to truth. But it was to truth that he thought he had arrived. In an age of Post-Modernism and Post-Foundationalism, the very concept of truth finds itself subject to deconstruction. Lewis held to the old “correspondence theory” of truth, but did so in a way that withstands contemporary assaults better than many traditional formulations because he sought to integrate Reason and Imagination in ways not typical of earlier philosophy. Essays like “Bluspels and Flalansferes” provide a framework for understanding Lewis’s statements on the nature of truth. They make possible a view of truth that is neither relativist nor reductive, but rather profoundly humane. Or so I tried to argue.

I also participated in a panel discussion of the influence of a writer’s religion on his work. Some were so opposed to “preaching” in literature that they seemed to imply an author’s faith should have no influence at all; they had a problem with passages like the one in Narnia when Aslan tells the children that they had met Him there so that they could learn to know Him in their own world. I maintained that an author writes out of his total personality, which includes his faith (or lack of it), and that this should not be shocking. Some Christian “writers” have palmed off on their readers sermons disguised as stories, and this is a problem, not with their content but with their craft. But abusus non tollit usum. The question is not whether Aslan should be allowed to say such a thing but rather whether the Narnia books present him consistently as a Lion who would and could say that kind of thing with credibility. Christians should appreciate a novel like Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha because it lets them see the world through Buddhist eyes, and does it more effectively than any hundred treatises on comparative religion could ever hope to do. This understanding is a good thing, irrespective of whether it leads to conversion. Why shouldn’t non-Christians appreciate a work like Narnia in the same way? If they are afraid of being converted, let them be honest about that rather than blaming the work for daring to reflect its authors’ world view! For all works inevitably do.

My former student Brian Melton, a military historian, attended his first Mythcon and was absolutely enchanted. He also gave an excellent paper on War in Narnia, which was very well received. I was gratified to see him taking his place among the great Inklings scholars. Look for his name in the future!

And so I am back–but not the same. The other papers were almost all stimulating and enlightening. But what makes me feel that my own–not just understanding, but life–has been deepened is the level of integration between seriousness and fun, reason and imagination, intellect and heart, represented by the whole experience which is a Mythcon. The Inklings hold that kind or wholeness before us more effectively than any other group of writers, and their influence is not just celebrated but incarnated by the Mythies (as they call themselves) who gather around their works every year. I am blessed to be a part of it.

From Mr. Tumnus’ Library,

Don

Donald T. Williams, PhD
Prof. of English, Toccoa Falls College
Editor, The Lamp-Post
Web Site: http://doulomen.tripod.com/
Blog: www.journalofformalpoetry.com

Wordsworth wrote an endless poem in blank verse on” the growth of a poet’s mind.”  I shall attempt a more modest feat for a more distracted age: a blog, “Things which a Lifetime of Trying to Be a Poet has Taught Me.”

One of Luther’s most serious disciples was Johan Sebastian Bach, the greatest contrapuntist (some would say the greatest composer) who ever lived.  This is the first of a number of attempts to get something of the quality of Bach’s music down in words—a task not ever to be completely achieved!  How do you express the idea of, not just one note interacting with other notes to form the harmony, but whole melodies interacting with each other?  The acrostic, among other things, tries to capture something of the multilayered nature of Bach’s work.

Bach

Joining word to pitch and pitch to time,

Sounds line up to flow into the air.

Bach could make whole lines with lines to rhyme

And flow in streams of thought beyond compare.

Christ gave him this grace, to let us hear

His angels’ songs with (now!) the fleshly ear.

Donald T. Williams, PhD

Mark Eddy Smith.  Tolkien’s Ordinary Virtues: Exploring the Spiritual Themes of The Lord of the Rings.  Downers Grove:  InterVarsity Pr., 2002. 141 pages, $12.00, pbk.; Matthew Dickerson.  Following Gandalf: Epic Battles and Moral Victory in The Lord of the Rings.  Grand Rapids:  Brazos Pr., 2003. 234 pages, $15.00, pbk.

            Evangelical Christian publishers, always looking for ways to exploit current cultural phenomena, are currently falling over themselves to spew out books related to two recent movies:  Mel Gibson’s cinematic passion play and Peter Jackson’s version of Tolkien’s LOTR.  The two books on Tolkien reviewed here show that the people who write for them bear a striking resemblance to a certain little girl who had a little curl right in the middle of her forehead.  When they are good they are very, very good, and when they are bad . . . well, you know.  (Disclaimer:  I am one of these disreputable writers, with a book on the treatment of the human condition in various Inklings-related authors coming out from Broadman & Holman in February, 2006.  You will have to wait until then to determine which of the two modes of curly-headed urchin behavior I will exhibit.)

            I chose these two books to represent two poles you will find in Evangelical writers on Tolkien and Lewis:  the evangelistically pragmatic and the evangelically profound.  The one kind can cause even their Evangelical cohorts to roll their eyes, and the other can help even people who do not share their Christian faith to read Tolkien with better understanding and greater sympathy.

            Smith represents the first group.  At least his title is not inaccurate.  One gets the impression that he is not so much interested in LOTR as he is in the spiritual themes he can find there.  LOTR is basically a convenient excuse to do Sunday-School lessons.  Fortunately there are no serious misinterpretations of Tolkien generated in the process, but the exercise of making explicit the various moral platitudes that are embodied by his vision, while not illegitimate in itself, stays on the surface of the story and runs the risk of trivializing those very moral lessons.  Those who buy Tolkien’s Ordinary Virtues will be hiring a (very ordinary) personal coach to help them with exercises they could do more profitably on their own.

            Dickerson represents the second group.  Virtue was of course important to Tolkien; but Following Gandalf will in the long run teach you much more about virtue than its rival discussed above, because it wants to understand the story and the issues it raises.  Dickerson begins by wrestling with one of the common criticisms we hear from Tolkien’s detractors:  that LOTR glorifies war and violence.  So he carefully looks at the battles, at how they are described, at how the heroes respond to them and participate in them and feel about it afterward. 

In the process of his careful reading of these passages, Dickerson not only shatters the criticism but notices a significant pattern.  Gandalf, Frodo, Elrond, Aragorn, Faramir, and Galadriel all chose what looks like certain military defeat rather than submit to various moral defeats that appear to be the path to victory.  They do this even when the military defeat they are apparently accepting is total and devastating.  Saruman, Boromir, and Denethor enact the opposite choices.  The grand irony, indeed the eucatastrophe, is that this very preference of military defeat to moral defeat, no matter what the cost, turns out to be the key to ultimate victory.  Yet the people making these choices do not know in advance that it will be so; that is not the reason for their choice.  All they have at best is what Gandalf ruefully admits to be “a fool’s hope.”  Why do they make these choices?  How does one make such choices?  How are they rooted in Tolkien’s biblical world view?  Such are the questions to which this study is naturally led.

Wrestling with such questions as they are raised and answered by details of plot and texture of passage, Dickerson shows a profound understanding of what literature is and therefore of how it should be studied.  He is too accepting of the movie’s dilutions of Tolkien’s themes and bends over a little bit too far backward to avoid calling LOTR a “Christian myth” simpliciter, perhaps.  But this book’s virtues far outweigh its flaws.  Those who share Tolkien’s Christian commitment will have added reasons to appreciate this study, but any one who wants to understand Tolkien’s work better will read it profitably.  I hope somebody says that about my book when it comes out!

Note:  “my book” is Mere Humanity: G. K. Chesterton, C. S. Lewis, and J. R. R. Tolkien on the Human Condition (Nashville: Broadman, 2006).

 Reviewed by Donald T. Williams, Toccoa Falls College       

[This review was originally published as “Film: Strider’s Screening Room, Star Wars Episode III” (review), Mythprint 42:6 (June 2005): 4-5.]

“Star Wars Episode III” is indeed much better than I or II; and that is what makes it much worse.

            In explaining my paradoxical judgment, I forebear to nit pick.  I will not ask why Jedi can apparently use their light sabers to deflect an infinite number of blaster bolts coming at them from every conceivable direction until order 66 is given, whereupon it suddenly becomes relatively easy for clone warriors to pick them off.  I will not ask how, if Padme dies right after childbirth, Leia can remember her mother as “beautiful and sad.”  (The conversation when Luke asks her about her memories in its own context always seemed to me to be about her real mother, not her adoptive one, because Luke is trying to establish some connection with his own, whom he now knows to be the same person).  I will not ask why, since the first Death Star is already well under way by the end of Episode III, and an entire galaxy of slave labor is available, it is only just being finished twenty years later at the time of Episode IV.  All this I omit, being studious of brevity and disposed to charity.

            O.K., then, on to the good part.  The first two movies did an inadequate job of building up Anakin’s nobility so that his fall could be from a sufficient height.  He was a cute kid and a bratty teenager, but when was he really noble?  But the first half of Episode III significantly ameliorated that problem.  We see a more mature Anakin with a better relationship to Obi Wan, who insists on saving Obi Wan during the rescue of Palpatine, and who is feeling a real loyalty to the Jedi order for the first time just as that loyalty is coming into conflict with the lies he has been fed by Palpatine.  I think we do see the Jedi he could have become, just in time for that destiny to be sacrificed on the altar of his misguided but natural and understandable ”attachment” to Padme.  This irony heightens the sense of tragedy, as does the horrible irony that the death he turns aside from the path to prevent is caused by that very turning aside from the path to prevent it.  That is an irony worthy of Oedipus.  At that moment the film rises to the archetypal and made me want to forget all the inconsistencies and plot-holes and grant that it had achieved in spite of them a grandeur rivaling that of the original trilogy.

            But  . . .  it all came crashing down into an incoherent mess because of one horrible, intolerable, and inexcusable line.  When Obi Wan confronts the newly fallen Anakin, he is convinced that the fall is real when he hears Anakin declaring that if Obi Wan is not with him, he is his enemy.  Obi Wan’s response is, “Only a Sith deals in absolutes.”  Well, I guess we see where that places Lewis and Tolkien’s Christianity, or any other traditional view that takes certain verities as unchangeable and non-negotiable! 

But let those of us who are believers bracket for a moment our personal disappointment and offense as Christians, and think of the line only as it functions in the context of Lucas’s mythology.  I wearily ask if you do not smell something fishy, not about the content of Obi Wan’s statement (which is bad enough), but its form.  It is an absolute statement!  Only a Sith deals in absolutes.  Therefore, if Obi Wan’s statement is true, then he, having just dealt in an absolute, is a Sith Lord too.  And if that is the case–and logically it follows inexorably–then what is the fight about?  What is the difference between the Light and Dark sides of the Force? 

A moment in the original series foreshadows this fall into shallow relativism.  Luke thinks he has been deceived about his father, whom Obi Wan had claimed to be dead—“from a certain point of view.”  Luke finds this rationalization incredible.  “You’re going to have to realize,” Obi Wan responds, “that a lot of the truths we hold depend greatly upon our point of view.”  Oh, really?  Then how do we respond to Anakin saying, “From my point of view, you’re evil”? 

Our ability to perceive truth depends on our point of view, of course.  It may powerfully influence what truths we are able or willing to accept.  But truth itself does not and cannot depend on our point of view.  If it does, Anakin’s “point of view” is simply unassailable and no basis is left for distinguishing between the Light and Dark Sides of the Force or for claiming that the choice between them is anything more than an arbitrary personal preference.  If only the Sith deal in absolutes, the whole Star Wars ethos collapses into nonsense so nonsensical that Coleridge’s “willing suspension of disbelief that constitutes poetic faith” becomes simply impossible.  And the worst part is that it taints the whole mythos, three episodes of which I loved.  

Star Wars is more than just “escapist entertainment.”  It connects with some very basic and universal truths that our technological age tends to forget, and they, rather than great special effects, are why we care about it.  Many of them are consistent with the world view we get in Lewis and Tolkien, though in Lucas’s world they lack its biblical basis.  Self sacrifice in a good cause is noble and powerful (Obi Wan in Episode IV; cf. Gandalf at Moria, Frodo).  Choices have consequences, and you cannot use evil for good and get away with it (Yoda and the clones, Anakin wanting to use the Dark Side to save Padme; cf. Saruman, Denethor).  There is something inside us more powerful than technology (though Lucas’s new-age mysticism is vastly inferior to the Christian doctrine of the imago Dei as an explanation of what it is).  Little people, even flawed people, can make a big difference for good (Ewoks, an obscure, whiny orphan from the back side of a desert planet, a ne’er do well smuggler; cf. hobbits).  Evil is real and does great damage, but no one is beyond redemption (Vader in Episode VI; cf. Boromir, almost Gollum).  These truths are profound and important–and that is why I wish Lucas had worked a little harder to get his secondary creation right, rather than creating a mishmash of truth, error, and contradiction that is sometimes so flimsy that I can’t keep on believing in it even as fiction.  He should have paid less attention to Joseph Campbell and a little more to Tolkien’s “Essay on Fairie Stories.”  In other words, Star Wars could have been almost another Lord of the Rings, a work (the book supremely, the movies a little less so) that has all the same virtues (and more) without the same flaws.

            So then, you see why I say that “’Star Wars Episode III’ is indeed much better than I or II; and that is what makes it much worse.”  Because it does at times rise to the mythic power of the original trilogy, the message that “Only a Sith deals in absolutes,” that, in other words, anyone who believes in absolute truth is evil, will be disseminated far and wide, and disseminated effectively to an audience with whom it will powerfully resonate.  Logic has little power with a generation that has been taught to “trust its feelings.”  But my message to them is this paraphrase of one of Obi Wan’s better moments:  “Be mindful of your thoughts, Master Lucas; they betray you.”

 Reviewed by Donald T. WilliamsToccoa Falls College

The thing that made the original Pirates of the Caribbean work was the irony that, as Will put it, “Jack Sparrow is a pirate–but he’s a good man.” Sparrow exhibited plenty of amusing madcap rascality, but he began the movie by rescuing Elizabeth from drowning when nobody else would, putting himself at risk in the process, with basically nothing to gain. So the ironic premise had some credibility. It was that complexity in the character that made Pirates more than just a special effects version of a theme park ride–that made it in other words surprisingly interesting. But in “Pirates II,” we lost sight of that theme altogether. II was just an excuse to do two more hours of special effects. Sparrow did not perform a single act in II that wasn’t selfish, self serving, and callous to the point of cruelty. Everything that had made him interesting vanished, and he was just a rascally face running around as an excuse to do more effects. By the end, I had completely lost interest in his character and could not comprehend why his “friends” decide to rescue him from Davy Jones’ Locker at the end. (This is explained in “III”).

Then we come to “III.” I won’t even attempt to unravel all the plots and counterplots. Let’s just say that whoever kills Davy Jones by piercing his heart in the treasure chest has to become the new Davy Jones and skipper of the Flying Dutchman. He is granted immortality on the condition that he spend 10 years at sea ferrying the souls of the dead to the next life for every one day he gets on shore. (The current Davy Jones has become corrupted and gross-looking because he has been neglecting his job–if you don’t do like him, you still get to look and act human.) Sparrow decides that this is not a bad deal, because his first love is the sea anyway, and having been dead once, he is not anxious to do it again–and besides, he wants vengeance on Jones. Will also wants to kill Jones in order to free his father, who is a zombie in Jones’s crew. He is torn between keeping his vow to his father and his love for Elizabeth, whom he would only get to see one day in 10 years if he succeeds. In the big final battle he gets killed by Jones right before Sparrow is ready to stab the heart–so to save him, Jack puts the knife in Will’s hand as he does so, thus failing to fulfill his own quest for immortality. (Ah. Back to the original idea of Jack. That’s good.) So Will and Elizabeth get married. I guess one day every 10 years is better than nothing, which is what they would have with Will dead, and Jack sneaks off to look for the Fountain of Youth and thus pursue his quest by other means, while setting the stage for “Pirates IV.”

The moral of the story is that there needs to be a moral of the story in order for the story to be a good story. The presence of some moral dimension to the plot, an internal moral conflict to give complexity to the characters, made “Pirates I” interesting; its disappearance made “II” boring; and its return enabled “III” to salvage (ahem) the series (so far). The plot of “III” was way more complex than my summary shows, but without moral conflict that would just be so much confusion.  It was confusing enough even so, with more betrayals and counter betrayals than I could keep up with—but, hey, it was fun anyway.  If you have complexity in the characters, you don’t need that much complexity in the action to keep things interesting. Well, “III” has plenty of both.

Ahoy, matey! Hoist anchor! We’re off to the end of the world.

You will always remember this as the day you read a review that almost captured Captain Jack Sparrow.

“Nim’s Island” is a sweet little picture with much in it to enjoy, although one’s suspension of disbelief gets rather challenged by having not one but three Lassies: a sea lion, an albatross, and a lizard, any one of which would have beat the original Lassie back to Mom with the message that Timmy was in the Well. But I am getting ahead of myself. 

The premise is that an eleven year old girl, Nim, lives with her scientist father on a deserted island in the South Pacific. She is a big reader and a fan of the Alex Rover books (he being an Indiana Jones type adventurer). She has developed an email relationship with the author (Jody Foster), who, despite writing all these great adventure stories, is actually an agoraphobic who never leaves her apartment. Nim’s father gets lost at sea, and so she writes Alex Rover to come and save her; but she gets Alexandra Rover (the writer), who forces herself to travel to the Pacific to help the little girl, though by the time she gets there she is a basket case due to her agoraphobia. So now we have these two on the island trying to deal with each other as well as with the crisis.

The contrast between Rover’s public persona and the reality is absolutely hilarious, and the way she eventually overcomes her phobias, grows up, and has a real Alex Rover adventure due to coming to love Nim more than she dreads her fears, is genuinely heartwarming. Christians can understand this movie as a parable illustrating the biblical verse that says perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18).  I know of no reason to believe that this was the film’s conscious intent, but the truth is illustrated powerfully for those with biblical ears to hear, and without any morally objectionable sidetracks.  Meanwhile, “Nim’s Island” has the added bonus of giving a positive portrait of homeschooling and spinning intellectual life in general and reading in particular as “cool” for kids.

 Unfortunately, there is too much of the unbelievable critter-to-the-rescue motif, which is so incredibly corny (especially to anyone who remembers the TV “Lassie” series) that it gets in the way of enjoying the good stuff. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the film overall and thought that the good elements in its plot outweighed the bad.  Even that stricture would only apply to adults; undoubtedly it won’t be a problem for your children.  Take them to see “Nim” or rent it for them, and if you don’t mind rolling your eyes at a scene or two, you will enjoy it too.    Donald T. Williams, PhD, is Chair of the Department of Humanities and Sciences at Toccoa Falls College and the author of Mere Humanity: G. K. Chesterton, C. S. Lewis, and J. R. R. Tolkien on the Human Condition (Nashville: Broadman, 2006), Credo: Meditations on the Nicene Creed (St. Louis: Chalice Press, 2007), and The Devil’s Dictionary of the Christian Faith (St. Louis: Chalice, 2008).

http://www.breakpoint.org/images/content/breakpoint/audio/2009/080609_BP.mp3

http://www.breakpoint.org/commentaries/12125-worship-wars

 He summarizes my Touchstone article “Durable Hymns,” from the July/August issue.  If it interests you, see pp. 19-21 for the full essay. Donald T. Williams, PhD

Well, as a Southerner, maybe I’m a sucker for a Lost Cause.  We end this symphony of protest about the condition of the Poetic Arts with a serious statement of an Alternative.  (It is a Spenserian Sonnet, naturally.)  As one of Flannery O’Connor’s characters says in response to the objection that “People have quit doing that,” “They ain’t quit doing it as long as I’m doing it.”  Amen, say I.  And maybe the Journal of Formal Poetry is proof that I am not alone in trying to keep real Poetry alive in this decadent world.  Long live the Faithful Remnant, and may their tribe increase!

 ARS POETICA:  A Musical Suite in Four Movements

(Continued)

 IV  Hymn to the Logos  (For Solo Non-Conformist) 

My search for Freedom always led to Form,

And only there could I find liberty.

Inside myself, I found a raging storm

That had to be bound e’er I could be free.

I sought a channel for my energy

Though which my will could then direct its flow

That it not splash into eternity

And dissipate itself, but rather go

Toward some goal.  My soul was my own foe

And often tried to break out, marring all.

And yet, by God’s grace, I have come to know

Who my Redeemer is, and what my fall.

He it is who harnesses the storm

And gives, in life and verse, Freedom and Form.

Donald T. Williams, PhD

The third movement follows inexorably from the first two.  Once the Poets and the Critics have betrayed their trust, what else is there for the poor Readers to do?

 ARS POETICA:  A Musical Suite in Four Movements

(Continued)

III

 Nolo Tolerare:  (Plaintive Chant for the Reading Public) 

Poetry is a pastime for

The pedantic scholar and the bore.

My proof for this?  It’s plain to see

They’re not writing anything for me!

For all I care, their poems can rot.

I’m not a fool!  I’ll buy them not.

Oh, once I thought that Robert Frost

Had shown me something I else had lost

About a snowy woodland eve . . .

But I was wrong.  I was deceived.

The English Teacher (who should know

When such things are and are not so)

Said that he had really written

About a Death Wish that had smitten

The poor old man before his time,

And that was why he wrote the rhyme.

I thought he’d given me a sight

Into the mystery of the night—

How Nature’s presence, always near

Could suddenly become quite clear,

Life capsule in one snowy eve . . .

But I was wrong.  I was deceived.

And that’s not all:  this recent “verse”

Is, if it’s possible, even worse.

You can’t even think you’ve caught the scent

Of something the poet might have meant.

Well, I have now been burned enough.

I’m thought with all this wretched stuff.

For all I care, their poems can rot.

I’m not a fool!  I’ll buy them not.

Donald T. Williams, PhD

            It’s not just the poets who have landed us in this mess.  They had help.  They were aided and abetted by a large group of accessories to the murder of Poetry, people who ought to have known better—whose job in fact was to know better.  Good luck with that.

 ARS POETICA:  A Musical Suite in Four Movements

(Continued)

 II:  Allegro Stupido  (For Editors, Critics, and Teachers of English) 

The Modern Poets have just said

Why they want the Muses dead.

Shall we then resist this trend

And seek the Muses’ wounds to mend?

Never!  And just cause we’ll show

In the lines that come below.

All now confess Modernity

The essence is of quality

And Novelty is the greatest good

That can by man be understood.

Words of beauty, verse that rhymes,

Are not suited to the times.

Rhythm and alliteration

Are a vile abomination.

Like the plague, all now do flee

Metaphor and simile.

If the work makes any sense,

It only proves the poet’s dense

And is a vain and snobbish prig.

For meaning, then, give not a fig!

Only an archaizing fool

Would break this, our most basic rule.

If any such these words should hear,

Let him mark well, have no fear,

His fair, just punishment will be

Never his work in print to see.

No, let him not ask us to read

Aught with messages to heed.

Fractured prose, thoughts torn asunder,

Fill the readers’ hearts with wonder

And leave him them with no ground to tell

The road to Heaven from that to Hell;

And sets us free to fill the nation

With any old interpretation,

Immune from being proven wrong

Or right.  And thus the Muses’ song

Becomes (‘tis our firm resolution)

An instrument of prostitution

Designed to keep us (Aren’t we clever?)

In our tenured jobs forever!

Donald T. Williams, PhD