Coal

Drops

Feb 20, 12:10 ReligionTheology

What to post? What to post? I’m in one of those situations where I have so much I could write about that when it comes time to pour out the words the funnel gets clogged and you get nothing but a few gooey drops. Well, I guess we’ll just have to settle for drops then.

Thesis: While stressful, I’m actually having lots of fun. It’s nice to be able to invest some serious time in a single author (or in my case, two: theologian Anselm of Canterbury and analytic philosopher J. L. Austin). I’ve mentioned to a couple of people how much I enjoy reading Austin, which is strange given the technical nature of his writing. For instance:

We turn next to infringements of A. 2, the type of infelicity which we have called Misapplications. Examples here are legion. ‘I appoint you’, said when you have already been appointed, or when someone else has been appointed, or when I am not entitled to appoint, or when you are a horse: ‘I do’, said when you are in the prohibited degrees of relationship, or before a ship’s captain not at sea: ‘I give’, said when it is not mine to give or when it is a pound of my living and non-detached flesh. (How to Do Things with Words)

I like reading this aloud. It reminds me of when my father used to read The Hobbit to me as a child.

Assistantship: The next class I teach will focus on redemptive violence in popular culture. I’ll probably be looking at the writings of Chuck Palahniuk and Fight Club in particular, Quentin Tarantino’s films, Les Miserables (the film, not Victor Hugo’s gargantuan novel), and possibly LOTR. It should be fun to prepare, but I’m a bit nervous about how to present the material. Ah well, the day will come and go and the world will keep turning.

The Bonfire of the Vanities: I picked up Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities from Chapters this weekend using a gift certificate I received for Christmas. So far, no regrets. In the opening chapter a man named Sheldon escapes his home on the pretense that he is walking his dachshund in the rain. The dachshund is uncooperative, he has some difficulty making it around the corner, and by the time he does he is so flustered that when he tries to call his mistress, Maria, he accidentally calls his own home instead. Needless to say this is a bad move. The worst part is that after calling, after his wife recognizes his voice, he hangs up, calls Maria, and goes over to her place for the next three quarters of an hour. Stupid, stupid, stupid. But entertaining.

Barney’s Version: Over Christmas I read John Updike’s Roger’s Version and Mordecai Richler’s Barney’s Version. Since then I continually confuse the titles. The latter was definately a better read. In it, slightly crooked protagonist Barney Panofsky gives his apologia pro vita sua against a recently published biography by an old enemy of his. For those of you who have read The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, think of Barney as sort of a Duddy wannabe. Successful, but not really on top of the game. Everything he does he does basically because the people he worships do.

Anyway, the story is broken up into three parts – one for each of the three Mrs. Panofsky’s. The first one commits suicide and is immortalized by feminists for her macabre paintings depicting…well, this is a public place. The second Barney marries because he is trying to establish himself as a decent, average, middle-class businessman. On the night of his wedding to her, he meets Miriam – the girl who will become his third wife. “Miriam, Miriam, my heart’s desire” is his holy supplication to her, repeated throughout the book: the supplication of a broken man who had one thing he ever truly loved, and never truly deserved, but nevertheless cannot live without. On his wedding night, he asks her name, and when she leaves for Toronto, jumps on a train to follow her there. She tells him to go home (he’s slightly drunk), and a couple of stops later he gets off and returns to his new wife. Once his honeymoon is over, he is faithful to Miriam for the next seven months of his marriage.

This is a story worth reading. I could relate tidbit after tidbit from this masterpiece, but it’s Richler who’s the master storyteller, and you really ought to hear it from him. It would help if you’d read Duddy before reading this, but it isn’t absolutely necessary.

Punch-Drunk Love: Watched this film again over the weekend. Mike noted that it makes a great Valentine’s film. I agree completely. I don’t know whether or not girls like this one, but Adam Sandler’s character, though slightly overblown, is basically every guy in a nutshell. Or at least, the guys I know.