TheLionRampant.net

Because I like to self-analyse and because I like to procrastinate and because you like to participate, go here.

Because we are learning to love the city, please read this great testament to TK’s work in New York from The New York Times. How do we do this for Los Angeles? (HT: Sheena).

If you’re interested in some learning in your spare time and don’t want to or can’t attend classes, check these out: The Bible as Literature and on another site, there’s a whole bunch of lectures about the Bible, lay leadership and issues in the church here.

There is a strange idea abroad that in every subject the ancient books should be read only by the professionals, and that the amateur should content himself with the modern books. Thus I have found as a tutor in English Literature that if the average student wants to find out something about Platonism, the very last thing he thinks of doing is to take a translation of Plato off the library shelf and read the Symposium. He would rather read some dreary modern book ten times as long, all about “isms” and influences and only once in twelve pages telling him what Plato actually said. The error is rather an amiable one, for it springs from humility. The student is half afraid to meet one of the great philosophers face to face. He feels himself inadequate and thinks he will not understand him. But if he only knew, the great man, just because of his greatness, is much more intelligible than his modern commentator. The simplest student will be able to understand, if not all, yet a very great deal of what Plato said; but hardly anyone can understand some modern books on Platonism. It has always therefore been one of my main endeavours as a teacher to persuade the young that firsthand knowledge is not only more worth acquiring than secondhand knowledge, but is usually much easier and more delightful to acquire.

This mistaken preference for the modern books and this shyness of the old ones is nowhere more rampant than in theology. Wherever you find a little study circle of Christian laity you can be almost certain that they are studying not St. Luke or St. Paul or St. Augustine or Thomas Aquinas or Hooker or Butler, but M. Berdyaev or M. Maritain or M. Niebuhr or Miss Sayers or even myself.

Now this seems to me topsy-turvy. Naturally, since I myself am a writer, I do not wish the ordinary reader to read no modern books. But if he must read only the new or only the old, I would advise him to read the old. And I would give him this advice precisely because he is an amateur and therefore much less protected than the expert against the dangers of an exclusive contemporary diet. A new book is still on its trial and the amateur is not in a position to judge it. It has to be tested against the great body of Christian thought down the ages, and all its hidden implications (often unsuspected by the author himself) have to be brought to light. Often it cannot be fully understood without the knowledge of a good many other modern books. If you join at eleven o’clock a conversation which began at eight you will often not see the real bearing of what is said. Remarks which seem to you very ordinary will produce laughter or irritation and you will not see why - the reason, of course, being that the earlier stages of the conversation have given them a special point. In the same way sentences in a modern book which look quite ordinary may be directed at some other book; in this way you may be led to accept what you would have indignantly rejected if you knew its real significance. The only safety is to have a standard of plain, central Christianity (”mere Christianity” as Baxter called it) which puts the controversies of the moment in their proper perspective. Such a standard can be acquired only from the old books. It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. If that is too much for you, you should at least read one old one to every three new ones.

Every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books. All contemporary writers share to some extent the contemporary outlook - even those, like myself, who seem most opposed to it. Nothing strikes me more when I read the controversies of past ages than the fact that both sides were usually assuming without question a good deal which we should now absolutely deny. They thought that they were as completely opposed as two sides could be, but in fact they were all the time secretly united - united with each other and against earlier and later ages - by a great mass of common assumptions. We may be sure that the characteristic blindness of the twentieth century - the blindness about which posterity will ask, “But how could they have thought that?” - lies where we have never suspected it, and concerns something about which there is untroubled agreement between Hitler and President Roosevelt or between Mr. H. G. Wells and Karl Barth. None of us can fully escape this blindness, but we shall certainly increase it, and weaken our guard against it, if we read only modern books. Where they are true they will give us truths which we half knew already. Where they are false they will aggravate the error with which we are already dangerously ill. The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books. Not, of course, that there is any magic about the past. People were no cleverer then than they are now; they made as many mistakes as we. But not the same mistakes. They will not flatter us in the errors we are already committing; and their own errors, being now open and palpable, will not endanger us. Two heads are better than one, not because either is infallible, but because they are unlikely to go wrong in the same direction. To be sure, the books of the future would be just as good a corrective as the books of the past, but unfortunately we cannot get at them.

Done:
1. Read/skimmed 6 biographies.
2. Applied for a job.
3. Met with my supervisor about a revision of chapter 1. She liked it and suggested minor changes (this means I get to spend a heck of a lot of time reading FICTION! Folks, this is exciting. Who would’ve thought I’d be getting a PhD in English and spend so much time away from the stuff?)
4. Finished my work-in-progress paper for STAR on genre and transatlantic studies. It, amazingly, went pretty well. I think my supervisor was impressed I wrote it all in one weekend. (Now I don’t know if this is impressive because it was good or because it was utter crap).
5. Tutorial on Conrad’s Heart of Darkness successfully taught. We even got into a little conversation about if art was required to be moral. (Anyone care to take a gander on that one?)
6. Student essays marked and returned.
7. Plane tickets purchased.
8. Sarah’s surprise baby shower went off without a hitch (well, minus the small incident with the fondue catching on fire) and she was fantastically surprised!

Still to do:
1. Read/skim 6 more biographies by (new, later deadline!! the heavens rejoice!) 10 March.
2. Teach a tutorial on Ezra Pound on Tuesday.
3. Read some of George Steiner’s Real Presences for my Christian Literary Theory reading group.
4. Get together a list of ’suggested reading’ for my research project for my supervisors, by, uh, tomorrow.
5. Read fiction!!
6. Most pressing, I still need to finish the book and book review by the beginning of March.

So, all in all, less stress and more smiles are coming from this direction. This could be due to: developing a cleaning rota so I don’t go bonkers, watching 24 while skimming biographies, enjoying lots of tea and biscuits with my officemate, and wearing my red coat.

Hear ye! Hear ye!

The Lion Rampant shall be on a short blogging sabbatical between the 10th and 21st of March as its residents take yet another transatlantic flight from the land of cloud, rain and ancient castles to the land of sunshine, palm trees and suburban-latte-toting liberals.

It shall be a good, but quick, trip and Michaela shall marvelously hold down the (real) fort while we’re away. We’re off to check out some options for our near future and would appreciate your prayers for God’s guidance.

Oh, we’re also flying on British Airways; this makes me happy as 1) they’re British and 2) we’ll get really nice airplane food. We even might get some cool airplane socks. I love those socks, even though my whole family teases me for wearing those bright blue free socks.

In my preparation to preach on the 5th Commandment (Exodus 20:12) tomorrow, I came across this quote:

The nation’s moral climate is obviously not good. The majority of Americans may call themselves Christians, but a large number of them live by anything bu Christian tenets. It probably isn’t surprising, then, that many Christians see political action as a way to make things right. The religious left, carried away with the “social gospel,” has long been a vigorous advocate of income redistribution. But many conservative evangelicals and fundamentalists, while resisting economic collectivism, now advocate an expansive state in the social arena. Indeed, many of the strongest opponents of government economic intervention have pressed for social intervention through antipornography prosecutions, tougher drug enforcement, and prayer in public schools. And they have done so without addressing or even recognizing and contradiction between their positions.

What say ye?

Michael W. Smith is gonna be a movie star. I watched the trailer and still have no idea what the movie’s about. Kinda funny though.

Because we are both too busy to write too deeply on our blog at present — although I assure you we’ve had many a conversation lately about future goals, jobs, faith and our relationship — I thought I’d leave you all with some silly and perhaps interesting questions to answer.

1. If you could name yourself something else than your name, what would it be and why?
2. What is one thing that continually frustrates you and why?
3. What’s your favourite thing to eat for lunch?
4. How do you know when you’ve made the ‘right’ decision when you come to a decision-making crossroads, so to speak?
5. What’s the first thing you think of when your alarm clock goes off on a Monday?

Oh, I’m so excited; Sarah called and invited us downstairs to watch Olympic ice skating. Bryce may think this is a total dud, but I’m stoked on my evening entertainment. Enjoy the questions!

…I’ll just be in my hole* this month.

An open letter to my friends:
You may have to coax Bryce to post a bit more regularly, because I think I’ll be out of commission these next few weeks. I shall be gulping coffee like it’s water and striding my short little legs all around this city en route to the Uni and home.

I am giving a work in progress presentation a month earlier than I thought, on Monday rather than in March. This should be okay because I do have a chapter of my PhD that I’ve finished and so should be able to extract some from that. However I do need to have some very small bit of brilliance to go along with my brilliant friend who is also presenting on Monday. Cue: coffee.

I also foolishly signed up to read about 10 honkin’ biographies for a prize that the University gives out. I signed up as I get paid 150 quid. However, this 150 quid comes after reading (clear throat, skimming) and reviewing said biographies by the end of the month. Did I mention I just got the box of books today?

I also, glutton for punishment that I am, volunteered to do a book review for a journal. This is good as it counts as a minor publication. However, I’m only halfway through the book and the review is due at the end of the month. Again, brilliance needed…and by the end of the month, I’m sure it’ll be elusive.

I also have weekly tutorials to teach; I believe I shall let the students do presentations to lighten up my own prep work. Next week it’s House of Mirth, followed by Heart of Darkness and then Ezra Pound’s poetry.

Oh one more thing, a job application to fill out. Indeed, much brilliance and much coffee needed.

So dear friends,
I hope our friendship I can mend
If I in any way offend
As I run and run and run around
Marching from home to Uni, up the Mound.
Please leave comments to show you care
In the meantime I’ll sip my coffee and perfect the blank stare…
…and wait till March.

*’hole’ denotes my 4th floor garret office.

We remodelled!

I think this is version 4.0 of TheLionRampant.net. I’ll leave it up to you to decide if it’s grunge or vintage. I don’t really think it’s either, personally.

I’m pretty happy with this new design. I think it’s the sort of things folks will either like or not like, without much middle ground. I’m a bit concerned that it may have a faster burn-time than a plainer (more plain?) design. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

It should display properly in any modern browser, but let me know if you have any issues. Enjoy!

P.S. More substantial posting will resume as soon as we get our lives figured out. Or maybe a little sooner.

Bryce and I were discussing — regarding design technique — what is the difference between “grungey” and “vintage”. Bryce says: the technique is basically the same, just making something look worn. Whereas to me, “grungey” implies baggy trousers and chains, whereas “vintage” connotes old corduroy and lace. I may be totally off base. But what’s the difference (if any) in your view?