Two Powerpoints

I find the contrast between the two powerpoints I'm making today quite humorous. They also illustrate the idiosyncrasy of my education--I pretty much only write about things I'm interested in. To hell if they don't match other people's conceptions of classic English major subjects.



And now to write my 20-page medieval exegesis of T.S. Eliot's "Four Quartets." Sigh.

Heidegger and Mormonism: A Possible Literary Aesthetic

Another cross post from Mormon Renaissance--please leave comments over there.

In my last post, I discussed the idea of Mormon literature as an aesthetic–an idea of how writing should be, rather than a specific genre. I briefly mentioned one possibility for a Mormon aesthetic, the idea of respect towards all human beings and the belief in the power of human choice. Many commenters rightly suggested that this idea is not unique to Mormonism–it is a general Christian, or even humanist, ideal.

So I’d like to present another possible “Mormon” mode of writing, this one derived from the philosophies of Heidegger. The major realization of Heidegger’s philosophy is that one can gain only so much from creating a system of knowledge. He believes that conceptual knowledge is reductive of reality, imposing limitations where none exist. The key to overcoming the barrier of human thought is not more human thought but human experience, for in situations that our intellect cannot make sense of, our experience has no trouble participating. As a result of this emphasis on experience, Heidegger thought that writing ought not to seek systematic views but out to be participated in as an experience–a poem should not represent a world view, but be experienced as a world of its own. This idea about writing seems to fit well with Mormon conceptions of what the written word can do and what it is.

I have often wondered over the fact that there is no explicit written Mormon theology. Sure, we have our scriptures and the Articles of Faith, which serve as at least a foundation, but when you think about it, they define only a very basic outline of our faith. It’s extremely easy to find points that can be and have been interpreted in multiple ways. And outside of scripture, any theological Mormon writings are a very delicate balance. Do we have room in our society for someone like CS Lewis, whose theological writings are mostly logic based rather than scripture or modern prophets? I don’t think so: I have yet to read any good logic-based theology from any LDS author. Yes, we have scholars like Hugh Nibley, but even those types are viewed warily from inside the establishment, and from outside of the establishment, it’s clear that they don’t derive LDS theology but use it as their assumption and continue from there. There seems to be a general perception that theological writings could get too scholarly and therefore detract from testimony and revelation.

From within Church correlated literature, the same is true: the ideas stay at a superficial level, never diving into the deep and controversial questions. I often feel a frustration over the fact that the Church doesn’t issue statements solving some of these basic controversial issues (particularly, of course, the ones on which I am right and other people are wrong, if they could only just understand properly). For this reason—not having a highly codified collection of doctrines like the Summa Theologica—Mormonism has often been called an orthopraxic religion, one that cares more about practice than an orthodoxic religion which emphasizes belief. This designation often feels like an accusation, and as a Mormon, I tend to be resistive to anyone who calls my religion a system of practices rather than a mode of belief. From this point of view, it would seem that writing in Mormonism is a futile exercise. The only texts that could be produced are essentially dogmatic propaganda or instructional books on practices.

But perhaps Mormonism is not really really all about practices but about their results. Like Heidegger, Joseph Smith believed there were some things that could not be understood only with words. When he commanded his followers to know the nature of God, he did not mean that we should be able to define Him in vague theological terms: to know the nature of God is not a command to study or think about him. In Mormonism, it is a command to reach out a meet him, face to face (a term that Levinas surely would have approved of). We believe that a knowledge of truth comes mostly through experience. The Book of Mormon is full of instances in which God told things to men which could not be written with language, not just that they were forbidden to write these things, but that they were unable to do so, perhaps because of the nature of language. Written things are seen as a limiting force in our religion.

Even our demand for correct practices, like daily scripture study, are really commands to find out truth through experience. In our reading of the scriptures, it’s not necessarily the words of the scriptures that we need. Rather, we seem believe that our presence in reading those books can open us up to receive other signs in our mind. It’s as though writing is not meant to convey knowledge, but to trip a switch, to create another experience all its own. We believe in revelation acting through the written word, not just through what it says, but through the very act of reading.

Perhaps this idea of literature as an experience could be a way around the much complained of didacticism of Mormon writing about spiritual matters. Instead of trying to explain our doctrines or show how those who make the right choices come to the right ends (one of the main faults of the Home Literature movement), our literature could focus on the reality of spiritual experience, trying to create literature that generates genuine spiritual experience. Of course, there are obvious problems with this: first, the highest Mormon spiritual experience, the temple, is mostly off limits in terms of writing. I have always seen this as a huge problem with taking Mormon literature seriously as a minority literature–we can’t immerse our outsider readers in the culture because it is forbidden to do so. Second, how does one go about creating a spiritual experience for the reader without presuming to be God and creating false revelations? And how do we keep this from becoming an aesthetic of manipulation? (Especially in film–cue the emotional music and fuzzy close-up.)

However, I think it still can be legitimately done. Actually, I think many Mormon artists are already out there trying to do just that–just think of the history of Church cinema. Some may think it a little manipulative, but at other times, it’s completely genuine in the world it immerses you in. The Mormon arts seem distinctively different than most post-modern literature in this way–we always genuinely have faith in the ability of arts to be an immersive experience, rather than a distant and cold examination of the world. Much of Mormon art has less regard for the nature of the medium and more focus on the subject matter.

What Mormon art has touched you in an experiential way? How can we develop this aesthetic into something legitimate rather than allowing it to devolve into a culture of propaganda and manipulation?

On a Unified Mormon Fiction

A cross-post from Mormon Renaissance

On Saturday at BYU's science fiction/fantasy symposium, Life, The Universe, and Everything, Orson Scott Card gave a lecture entitled "SF&F as a Legitimate Literary Genre." Now, I'm going to ignore the primary question of his speech, since science fiction is not what this blog is all about. However, I think some of the points he raised can be legitimately applied to Mormon literature. Because, in its own way, Mormon fiction is like SF&F: a class of writing read by a small, cult-like following, a genre which many (self-proclaimed literary) people look down on because of its "juvenile" conventions.

Card's point was this--the dismissal of an entire genre is usually illegitimate. When we do so (usually by using only one example, or only its worst examples), we're really just setting up strawmen to knock down to our own literary preferences. To read science fiction with an eye for literary fiction is an experiment doomed to fail. The genres have different definitions of success. For example, Card claimed that in literary fiction, the star is the author, who as he/she writes, encodes meaning into complex layers of symbols which the reader is then to decode. This is what people who read literary fiction want, and when it is done well, they are happy. However, these conventions would be found ridiculous to science fiction readers, who are completely concerned with plot. Science fiction is about the believable linkage of cause and effect, an exploration of how we effect the world. That exploration is best done through stories rather than symbols.

I see this applying to Mormon literature in two ways. First, as I said in our opening post, it's unfair to judge Mormon lit by all that is really crappy in it. In Jeff Savage's recent post on LDS Publisher, he pointed out that we ought to look first to find literature that suits our own tastes and then within that genre to find that best books that fit that need. Within Mormon literature, there is room for sappy romances, homey mysteries, epic historicals, as well as literary fiction, as long as we don't expect them to be what they are not. Any impulse to declare any one of these as the Mormon fiction, to the exclusion of the others, would be invalid. However, within each of these genres, there are good quality works and lesser quality works, and we can work on improving each genre to its own ideal to achieve its own ends.

Second, Card's discussion of the different aesthetic approaches of each genre reminded me of what the people in the Fit for the Kingdom films movement are trying to do. This film-making group has divorced itself from the idea that Mormon cinema ought to employ the popular Hollywood conventions, instead trying to define a style of honesty and celebration of the ordinary that is uniquely Mormon. I'd like to see a similar thing happen in Mormon literature. As I said, Mormon literature covers many genres. What makes people (like me) want to unite them is that they all deal with Mormon subject matter. But in style, in approach, they seem pretty disparates: Mormon literary fiction follows literary fiction conventions, Mormon romance novels follow romance novel conventions (obviously with some amendments). This is good--romance novels would not work if the character suddenly broke out into random bouts of symbolism as they tend to in literary fiction.

However, it seems to me that the unity of Mormon literature could benefit from the definition of some uniquely Mormon style, independent of the worldly genres. I'm not sure there's a genre that could be called the "Mormon" genre, but perhaps there could be a specific aesthetic or style of Mormon writing. My personal vision would be an aesthetic of individual consideration and empowerment--a Christian writing where there are no "bad" or "good" guys, but simply sympathetic people trying their misguided best to do what they think will bring them happiness. This belief in the power of humanity and its ultimate humanness is one of the most unique beliefs in Mormondom, and I think it could make for a great literature. From the buzz I'm hearing about Angela Hallstrom's Bound on Earth, this novel seems promising in that direction.

But that's my vision: What's your Mormon literary aesthetic? Am I wrong about Mormon literature not being about genres? Is there one genre that sticks out to you as Mormon?

A Mormon Renaissance

Hey everyone, sorry for being a slacker and not writing for so long. At least one reason I've been holding back is that I have been working on a sneaky bloggy project which is now live: presenting Mormon Renaissance, a blog about Mormon artistic efforts, their progress and criticism. I've written a nice long two-part blog post as the introduction, so if you've been craving my voice, there it is. Check it out and add it to your feed reader. I think it's high time educated Mormons, including me, stopped looking down on their own culture and started doing something about it.

It's not all about Card: Mormons and Science Fiction

All right, all right. After much harassment from Ben, I've been compelled to post something on my blog about what I've been up to. I just handed in a final paper with the title "Of Saints and Starships: The History of Mormons and Science Fiction." No, it is not all about Orson Scott Card. Seriously people. It's a twelve page long beast listing many of the intersections of Mormonism and science fiction. Here's some interesting excerpts, none of which include the ever delightful Card:

There are two strains of thought on the relationship between religion and science fiction. One view is that these two are inevitable partners because of their scale and themes, a view best represented by C. S. Lewis: “If you have a religion it must be cosmic; therefore it seems to me odd that this genre [religious science fiction] was so late in arriving” (Lewis 125).

. . .

The first [Mormon science fiction] is a short story/play by Parley P. Pratt in 1844 entitled “A Dialogue between Joseph Smith and the Devil,” which portrays a conversation between two regarding the success of the Restoration. . . . . As a work of science fiction, it must be admitted that the piece is fairly shallow. Most of the speculative fiction elements fall into the accusation that religious science fiction is primarily allegorical—the story exists primarily to convey a barely veiled ideas attempt to preach the Mormon message. However, this story undeniably represents an attempt by a Mormon to represent the tenets of his religion through speculative fiction framework.

. . .

Ironically, the short stories of inactive Mormon Zenna Henderson from the same period [1950s-1960s] show a more obvious LDS influence. In 1951, she published the first of her “People” stories. Her stories featured an alien race, dubbed “the People,” forced to emigrate to Earth because of the impending destruction of their home planet. Landing in the southwestern United States (Henderson spent most of her life in Arizona), the People established a society separate from humanity both to preserve their unique culture and to prevent harassment because of their unique psychic gifts. The analog to the establishment of Utah by the early Mormons is obvious, though it has apparently never been commented on by scholars . . . .

. . .

Additionally, three collections of specifically Mormon science fiction were published during the late 80s and early 90s entitled LDSF: Latter-Day Science Fiction (Thousand Oaks, CA: Millennial Productions 1982). These collections were inextricably tied to Mormon culture: the second volume contains an introductory essay by Hugh Nibley and stories that speculate on missionary work involving time travel and a future church where only women have the priesthood. (A copy with margin notes by Hugh Nibley can be found in the BYU library’s Ancient Studies room.) These collections are of mediocre quality and are generally little known . . . .

. . .

Six main themes of science fiction which coincide with the interests of Mormon theology:
1. The identity of the human race and possibilities for human progression
2. The identity of the individual; questions of destiny and free will
3. Explanations for the “homesickness” of the human soul
4. The identity of God; the conflict posed by discovering other belief systems
5. Responsibility for personal actions; the ability to atone for mistakes that affect others
6. The ideal structure of society; the treatment of fellow beings

. . .

Michael R. Collings studies several mainstream science fiction stories with prominent references to Mormonism, the most notable being the satiric “Fosterite Church of the New Revelation” in Robert Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land (New York: Berkley, 1961); the sexually repressed hypocrite Nephi Sarvant in Philip Jose Farmer’s Flesh (New York: Signet, 1986); and the attempt to theologically sanitize Mormonism in Piers Anthony’s Planet of Tarot trilogy (New York: Jove, 1979) (Collings). In other words, . . . many of the Mormon stereotypes of the 19th century had survived intact in genre fiction, and specifically science fiction.

If you're interested in this stuff you might check out the following websites:

• http://www.adherents.com/lit/sf_lds.html - A comprehensive list of all mentions of LDS characters in mainstream SF novels.
• http://mormonsf.org/ - A database maintained by Marny Parkin containing a comprehensive collection of all science fiction written by Mormon authors, as well as a list of non-fiction about Mormon SF authors.
• http://mormonsf.org/reading.html - Marny Parkin’s recommended survey reading list of Mormon science fiction.

When It Rains, It Snows!

Too many exciting things are happening at once. I feel my life is viable to explode.

Today I got my first assignment from John Welch for contributing to the Collected Works of Hugh Nibley (CWHN) project. They want to have all his papers processed in time for what would be his 100th birthday, March 27, 2010, so they need all the volunteers they can get. I'm working on retyping a transcription of a speech Nibley gave in the 1970's on translation (the language related kind, not the gospel type). It's very exciting, though I'm not sure how in the world I'll have time for this. Ah well. It makes me excited anyway.

I'm presenting my early Mormon rhetoric paper at the AML meeting at UVSC April 7th. I did all right when I read it at the Humanities Symposium at BYU, but hopefully this time I can slow down so people can actually understand what I'm saying. And maybe they'll have a podium tall enough that I can actually look at the audience without losing my place completely. Any tall people with me on that? (PS - You're all invited to come hear me! The conference is free.)

In exactly a month from today, I will be in Scotland hiking Ben Lomond!! And I've been wasting much valuable homework time mapping out the study abroad stops on Google Earth. Don't worry, I'll make the .kmz file available to y'all when I finish it, so you can all be properly jealous and stalk my journeyings efficiently. I've also been scoping out the various travel blogging sites to decide which one I want to use for my forays in England. Any suggestions from fellow travel bloggers?

I've been dating George for 48 days now. Not that I'm counting. Not that they've been some of the best days of my life.

And he's coming to my brother's baptism and the extended family after-priesthood-session dinner on Saturday.

What am I doing taking off to England for two months without him?

Speaking of, general conference is coming up, and I hear they're going to rededicate the tabernacle, which should be exciting. I'm trying to decide whether or not to do a blog-cast of conference like I did last year. Maybe I'll just settle for eating junk food and doing some general conference Snuggling. Mmm. (And now I can't remember if the Church style guide says I should capitalize general conference or not. Good thing I'm in the Writing Center and can look it up. Guess what? You don't, unless you use the full official title with the number. Does anyone else feel like they never seem to get out of the 170's? My brother and I have a long standing joke that every year it's the 176th or 179th and they never really change.)

The cover art for the final Harry Potter book is also out. Gah! I'm so excited! I just finished charting all the Harry Potter film locations I want to visit while I'm in London. :D

And to top it all off, there's snow on the ground this morning. My life is complete.

Thought Stew

So I have a whole bunch of things to blog about, but school is currently consuming my life. And I do mean consuming in its fully literal sense. Once we hit reading day, things should slow down considerably. (I never work during finals' week (should that be possessive?), so I have a ton of free time.) Until then, I doubt I'll have time to pull together anything decent for you to read. But since I feel guilty leaving you out in the cold, consider this post a preview of things to come. Here's what's been occupying my mind:

• I GOT INTO MY STUDY ABROAD!! I was so nervous, but it's really happening! I'm going to England in the spring to walk all over and write stuff. Joni is coming too, and it's going to be miraculous! I can't think of a better way to spend two months! Although, this does mean I have to get in shape for the hiking bit . . . drat.
  
• I finished reading Style: Toward Clarity and Grace, and holy crap! it is amazing. I want to write about it in more detail later, but here's a two page summary of the book that I whipped out as part of my ELang final project. Hurrah for classes that motivate you to do what you already want to do. Sorry about the yucky formatting. No time for making it look better. Read it, or better yet, read the book. It will improve your consciousness of good writing. I can already feel a difference in how I think about things.
  
• On Friday, I had an epiphanic moment in History of Rhetoric class: I found my philosopher! I've always found at least some truth in each philosopher I've read, but I also invariably find problems which make their philosophies unacceptable. On December 8, I discovered Kenneth Burke. His theory of dramatism explains exactly why I feel so uncomfortable with experimental fiction that tries to eliminate storytelling *coughVirginiaWoolfcough*. And he has a pyramid theory of rhetoric that almost exactly echoes my circle theory that I've been ranting about for so long! I almost gasped when the teacher introduced it to us. It was like someone read my thoughts and deemed them worthy. It made me want to sing for joy! (I know; I'm a nerd.) I'm now planning to read at least some of his works over the break. I'll write when I find out more.
• Speaking of History of Rhetoric, I'm writing my final paper on early Mormon rhetoric. It's making me think a lot about the previous debate on what makes a good talk.
  
• I'm planning out some Christmas personal essays. Hope you guys are up to some of my crummy attempts at dialog.
• I saw Happy Feet over Thanksgiving break, which has strangely inspired an essay on dealing with the institutional Church in Mormon literature. I promise I'll explain later, though reading Orson Scott Card's review of the movie might help you see where I'm going. (The review is towards the end, but this column also has some stuff about Scotch tape and Bill Bryson, one of my favorite nonfiction authors, so you should just read the whole thing.)
• Also, some thoughts on lit crit provoked by CS Lewis' essay "Fern Seed and Elephants" are in the works. For anyone keeping score in my creativity/criticism debate, creativity is beating the snot out of criticism, but we'll find some virtue in her yet.
• And I promise I have a follow-up for Ben's rebuttal to my Santa post. I will defend Saint Nick to the end. "I believe in Santa Claus like I believe in love . . . ." (Maybe that's not so apt after the last two posts.)

And people wonder why I'm so distracted.

Seeking Greatness

The other day, the idea of the "great Mormon writer" resurfaced in my mind via Ben's post on this quote:

The first great Mormon writer will be excommunicated from the Church for his writing.

Interesting. Like Ben and Richard Dutcher, I have to say I hope it isn't so. I have to trust that this community of faithful believers will not only have room for something great, but be an ideal starting point for such greatness. However, I can see where the quote is coming from, and I think there's some sad truth to this perspective. If you substitute "excommunicated from the Church" with "scorned by the Church community," you would be hitting much closer to the truth.

I guess I should start by defining what we mean by the great Mormon author (GMA) because there are many possible definitions. The obvious observations would be such a GMA must be a writer of renown who is Mormon. But beyond that, who is their audience, and for what purpose do they write? Here are the basic possibilities, as I see them:

1. Mormon audience, faith promoting--This GMA writes the ultimate novel about the typical Mormon family. They affirm the good things in our community, cause us to weep when the children of their character fall away from the church, and basically make us feel warm and fuzzy when we read them. Think Deseret-Book-style fiction: The Work and the Glory would be the prototypical work of this GMA.
2. Mormon audience, theological--This GMA gives us great analysis of our beliefs and the scriptures and may or may not also be a GA (General Authority). This is the category of writers like Hugh Nibley and CS Lewis (if he were Mormon).
   
3. Mormon audience, community analysis--This GMA analyzes the foilbles of the Mormon community from a faith-based perspective. They are able to write critically with issues like social snobbery and homosexuality in the church, all without losing their faithful perspective. They would deal with our doubts and fears as Church members and portray us in all of our imperfection with an eye to correcting these problems.
   
4. General audience, proselytizing--This GMA writes the great American novel about Mormonism. It is so great that it convinces even the most hardened skeptics to look into the Church further. It tells the tale of Mormon belief in such a way that the world can understand what it means to be a Mormon.
   
5. General audience, literary--A normal great writer who simply happens to also be Mormon. Their works are read throughout the country/world by believers and non-believers to great acclaim. A knowledge of Mormonism is neither necessary to read their works nor gained from doing so.
   

In all likelihood, the GMA must fulfill all of these functions in some way. They are all important aspects of what it means to be a writer from any community. The problem is that certain of these functions are more easily acceptable to the Church community than others. Obviously, numbers 1 and 4 can be done fairly easily without offending anyone within the Church, except that perhaps someone doesn't like your portrayal of Joseph Smith. Number 5 is problematic because many within the Church would see you as being ashamed of your faith if you shoot for a general audience without any intent to convert.

But numbers 2 and 3 are, I think, where the original quote is coming from. Theological writings, outside of officially authorized Church literature, are a very delicate balance in the LDS community. Do we really have room in our society for someone like CS Lewis, whose theological writings are mostly logic based rather than scripture or modern prophets? I have yet to read any good logic-based theology from any LDS author, mostly because our beliefs center so much on authority (ethos, if you will). Yes, we have people with scholarly authority like Hugh Nibley, but even those types are viewed warily from inside the establishment. Many people are worried these things, as Ben says, get too scholarly and therefore detract from testimony and revelation. The GMA would have to hit the right balance in order to not alienate the rest of the Church.

Number 3, social commentary, is an even more dangerous category. I think in Mormonism we are naturally disposed to dislike criticism of our society for two reasons. First, because of the extensive social programs of the church, it's difficult to separate societal issues from doctrinal issues. Second, just from our history of being persecuted, we've become slightly oversensitive to any criticism at all. It's difficult for us the see the line there. Anyway, this is almost certainly where the quote is coming from. Social critics from within Mormon culture almost always end up being pushed to the outside--Robert Kirby, even some of Orson Scott Card. It seems to be impossible to be a mainstream Mormon and also a social critic. The GMA would have to manage to do both, or fulfill this quote by being pushed out.

Of course, if the GMA moves too far out, they can lose their faith, or at least their identification with the community of faith. And the GMA can never be someone outside the community--they must never try to be a neutral observer. A GMA has a vested interest in the community; they are part of us.

(On a side note, as I wrote up these categories, I can see the case for Orson Scott Card as the GMA taking shape. He has major works in most of the categories:

1. Mormon audience, faith promoting: Saints, Women of Genesis
2. Mormon audience, theological: some essays--this is definitely a weak point; we have yet to see a Mere Mormonism from him.
   
3. Mormon audience, community analysis: "Hypocrites of Homosexuality," A Storyteller in Zion
4. General audience, proselytizing: perhaps the Alvin Maker series; also a weak point, according to some; personal beliefs incorporated into his works, but no great converting novel.
5. General audience, literary: Ender's Game, short stories
   

And he has been able to maintain his faith while also writing critically about it. Really, perhaps the only thing that holds him back from obtaining this title is that he lacks great literature about the doctrines of the Church (nos. 2 and 4). However, I personally see these as more minor functions of the GMA, so I would say OSC is, if not THE GMA, at least as close as we have gotten.)