Death Defeated: The Nightingale

 "The Emperor and the Nightingale" is my nomination for the most-nearly-perfect short story ever written.

  

Jenny Lind-- wikimedia commons

 Hans Christian Andersen is one of my favorite authors, as I mention elsewhere. This tale is in part a tribute to the Swedish singer Jenny Lind and her unaffected performances in a musical world that valued a lot of frippery. 

This story is spiritually refreshing in many ways—the clever but gentle satire, the sheer beauty of the imagery, but most of all because in the end, Death is defeated.

  

A while ago I acquired the complete DVD set of Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre.  The Nightingale is one of the best episodes of this brilliant series, and but for some unnecessary but harmless embellishments is faithful to the original.  Mick Jagger as the world-weary Emperor hits just the right note, if you’ll pardon that pun….

The Logismoi blog features a post about the Elder Porphyrios and his encounter with a nightingale. The elder relates: 

After a while the silence was broken by a sweet, intoxicating voice singing and praising the Creator. I looked. I couldn’t discern anything. Eventually, on a branch opposite me I saw a tiny bird. It was a nightingale. I listened as the nightingale trilled unstintingly, its throat puffed out to bursting in sustained song. The microscopic little bird was stretching back its wings in order to find power to emit those sweetest of tones, and puffing out its throat to produce that exquisite voice. If only I had a cup of water to give it to drink and quench its thirst!

Tears came to my eyes—the same tears of grace that flowed so effortlessly and that I had acquired from Old Dimas [an old Russian Athonite hermit]. It was the second time I had experienced them.

. . . ‘Why did they [nightingales] puff out their throats to bursting?’ The purpose was worship, to sing to their Creator, to worship God. That’s how I explained it.[2]

Writes the poet John Keats:  "Thou was not born for death, immortal Bird!"

Indeed not. Beauty and worship are deathless.  

A Wrinkle in Time 50th Anniversary

 This is a 'me too' book-- one that my oldest and closest friend author Linda Finlayson and I both tagged as 'favorite' when we were in I think about grade seven. We've been sharing our favorite books, including our own, ever since.

Wrinkle clearly owes a little something to the Narnia books but it is a book for a newer generation with a twist all its own. The young heroes travel to a strange world, aided by powerful supernatural beings, where they must help overcome the rule of an evil being. In the end, it all comes down to love....

Let's not bother about the TV movie based on the book-- Madeleine L'Engle herself said "I expected it to be bad, and it is." I will however say that some years ago I saw a wonderful stage adaptation by Vancouver's own Pacific Theatre.  


This year is the 50th anniversary of the book, which is the first in a series.  There are live stage events in places I wish I could get to....but anyway, we can all access the net, where, for example, Tor.com blogger Mari Ness is celebrating with The Madeleine L'Engle Re-Read. Sounds like a good idea! 

I am so excited to hear that there is a graphic novel version of the book due out later in 2012. Here's a page from it. It is being done by Hope Larson.  I guess it is time to start my wish list for next Christmas already! 

A Book to Refresh One's Spirit

"The anti-hero is the prototype of despair. The hero flings aloft the banner of hope.....If we thought that there was nothing but misery, degradation and darkness and above all perpetual defeat, what would be the use of trying to feed or clothe ourselves, raise children, and put a penny by to purchase a book to refresh one's spirit* and fortify one's hopes?"-- Paul Gallico, "Aim for the Heart" 

*Emphasis added by me.

Paul Gallico is one of those writers I am going to read more of someday...but meanwhile, his Thomasina (aka in movie form as The Three Lives of Thomasina) is a family favorite. He is also the author of such diverse tales as The Poseidon Adventure, The Snow Goose, and Flowers for Mrs. Harris, among others.


Some find Gallico overly
sentimental. Now, anyone who knows me knows that I am personally the opposite of that. Opposites attracting as they do, of course, I picked an arch-sentimentalist for a husband. He goes 'awww'! when the characters in our favorite TV shows finally get together romantically, and wishes they would take his advice ("Dad! They AREN'T real!"  And if they were, well, too often people ask his advice and then don't take it after all. Ask any clergyman, it's a common phenomenon.)

Anyway, Gallico in the article quoted above talks about how he writes a story. In three short pages he does get to the heart of it, which is pretty simple-- think up human and likeable characters, and then "try them almost beyond endurance."

You can see that trial in this still from the movie Thomasina. Mary Ruadh and her friends are holding a funeral for her beloved cat Thomasina-- who has been 'put to sleep' by Mary Ruadh's own father, the vet, because he is too busy with another injured creature and thinks it is not worth trying to save her.

Gallico concludes his essay with the title, "Aim for the heart."  This may be sentiment, but it is not sentimentalism for its own sake. As he says, it is all about hope. If your spirit needs refreshing, let me recommend a reading of Thomasina or its very faithful film adaptation (with the bonus that it stars the wonderful Patrick McGoohan as the frozen-hearted vet who only thaws when he nearly loses his daughter.)

Refreshing Life Lessons from Jane Austen

Listening to people's stories is the nicest thing you can do for them. 

(from "Mansfield Park")

This pic is from the most wonderful slide show at The Huffington Post. Author Bill Deresiewicz has created a list of "Twelve Life Lessons You Can Learn from Jane Austen".  Naturally I picked the one about 'stories' to highlight here:

"A person's story is the most personal thing about them, and paying attention to it is just about the most important thing you can do. Our stories are what make us human, and listening to someone else's stories--entering into their feelings, validating their experiences--is the highest way of acknowledging their humanity."

Serendipitously, I just happened on a post that dovetails nicely with this, from the Children's Book Quotes Blog Check it out, one of my favorite blogs. 


And now excuse me, I am off to my public library's website to request Mr. Deresiewicz's book, A Jane Austen Education :

Sometimes, you can't make these things up....

It sounds like a sappy Christmas movie, but it's real and it's recent. This story is clipped from the website of the Orthodox Church in America's Diocese of New York and New Jersey: 

t was a sad day for the faithful of Saints Peter and Paul Church in Buffalo NY when an intruder forcibly entered their holy house and escaped with a parish treasure: a silver encased Holy Gospel book dating back to 1933. The parish had recently experienced the revitalizing efforts of OPERATION BUFFALO (a diocesan-wide project to revive the 114 year-old parish), the assignment of Father Vlad Zablotskyy as rector, and -- in an expression of gratitude for blessings received -- offered a $250 contribution to support OPERATION ONEONTA.  In the midst of such joy and thanksgiving, the theft was the cause of sadness and sorrow. That is, until something ... “a miracle on Ideal Street” ... changed everything.

During the week of Thanksgiving Day, faithful parishioner Steve Camp spotted an appealing sales coupon in the newspaper. It looked like a good deal, so he clipped the coupon. Although not in a particularly good mood, Steve decided to take a short walk to the corner store where the coupon could be “redeemed” (a word that would prove to have profound meaning). It was not a place he would have gone that day; in fact, it is located in the direction opposite of the way he would normally walk. Holding the coupon in his hand, Steve decided the “good deal” was worth a journey into that area “on the other side” of his world. On his journey he was approached by a young man. "Do you belong to that church on Ideal?"  Steve didn’t recognize the young man and was not expecting a conversation at that moment.“What?”  The young man repeated, “Do you belong to that church on Ideal?"  “Yes,” Steve replied,“I do.”  The two men stood face-to-face for a few moments, gazing into one another’s eyes.  The young man seemed very sad. It looked to Steve as if the young man’s eyes were about to cry.  Tears began to fall from those sorrowful eyes as he began to speak.  “I can’t live with what I did,” he said, “and I don’t want any reward.”  The young man spoke with great emotion.  He seemed desperate. “I only want to make things right and return the book I stole from the church.” Then a miraculous thing happened. Both men broke down in tears. They hugged each other. It was, according to Steve, an emotional couple of minutes. The young man begged for forgiveness. “All can be forgiven,” said Steve as he consoled him, “you are doing the right thing ... thank-you and God bless you.” Filled with joy and relief, Steve raced to the rectory to show the Holy Gospel book to Father Vlad. On the Sunday following Thanksgiving Day, the faithful of Saints Peter and Paul Church venerated their precious Holy Gospel book. In his moving sermon, Father Vlad spoke about giving thanks, repentance, forgiveness, and redemption.  There were tears of joy upon the faces of the faithful; and a special kind of blessing through their encounter with an unknown young man.

Into Great Silence

More than all things love silence: it brings you a fruit that tongue cannot describe. In the beginning we have to force ourselves to be silent.  But then there is born something that draws us to silence. May God give you an experience of this 'something' that is born of silence.  If you only practice this, untold light will dawn on you in consequence...after a while a certain sweetness is born in the heart of this exercise and the body is drawn almost by force to remain in silence.     - St. Isaac of Syria




Last Lent I posted a Facebook note beginning with this quote from St. Isaac of Syria. Just recently I got around to watching this wonderful film about the life of the monks of the Great Abbey of Chartreuse, Into Great Silence. 


George MacDonald, in "The Hands of the Father" in Unspoken Sermons describes Heaven as "...the regions where there is only life, and therefore all that is not music is silence..." 


When St. Isaac says  "in the beginning we have to force ourselves to be silent', he could have been talking about what it is like to view this film. More than ever in our constantly connect, cacophonous world, we seldom know anything like a real silence. And so it is no surprise that we ourselves have a hard time remaining silent. 

The Dragon is smaller than you think.....

Photo from 

Wikimedia Commons 

By Michail Jungierek 

[GFDL, CC-BY-SA-3.0 

or CC-BY-SA-2.5

As it's almost St. George's Day, I've been posting links to my medieval fantasy story, Light One Candle.  In that story I have an intervention by this very popular martial Saint of the middle ages. His own story has collected many embellishments over the centuries, and the best known details are the romanticized ones about the rescue of the princess. His historical roots are briefly summarized here. 

Whatever the factual origin of what later became the dragonslaying legend of St. George, in the Eastern Church we are often taught that the spiritual truth about dragon-slaying has to do with what we call 'the passions'--  by which we do not mean simply strong feelings, but rather the inflamed sinful impulses of us fallen folk that lead us astray and enslave us. George, who was in fact an early Christian martyr,  is a great exemplar of heroic conquest of these impulses. 

While writing my medieval fantasy, a particular aspect of the iconography of St. George really struck me: the dragon just wasn't that big. Look at the 15th C. bas-relief to the left, and the Russian icon below. These are just two examples of George-and-dragon art. Nearly all the images I could find had similar relative sizes of the figures. And I pondered on this as I had my fictional main character observe this fact about a stone statue of St. George in a mysterious woodland chapel. "Where's the great feat in slaying a dragon of that size?" he mocks.

The pious knight who has led him to the chapel says to him, "Do you think...that the dragon was so small at the beginning of the battle?"

That is what encourages and refreshes me about the legend and iconography of St. George. Sometimes whatever dragon we are facing looms impossibly large in our eyes. But if we fight the good fight, with the help of God and the saints, it gradually dwindles. A happy thought as we have now completed the battle of Lent and are approaching the darkest days of Holy Week.