Friday Links
August 16, 2024
False Light: Moral Worldbuilding and the Virtues of Evil
Mike Mastromatteo reviews Contemporary Catholic Poetry: An Anthology
The Essence of Everything: A distiller muses on alchemy, monasticism, and the Philosopher’s Stone
Scoundrel or Saint? A Return to Robin Hood
False Light: Moral Worldbuilding and the Virtues of Evil
Brandon Taylor writes about how the modern novel’s worldbuilding is often anemic and lifeless:
This is never more evident to me than in matters pertaining to evil, but we must go beyond that. We must go beyond secular defaults, the received moral schemas that we put into our fiction without thinking. We must set these aside and begin to make real choices about the values that underpin the worlds of our creation. What our characters believe and value and feel. They need not be theists. They need not worship a god. Or a single God. But a moral universe with no evil is not a living world. It is dead. A ghost star that casts a false light.
Mike Mastromatteo reviews Contemporary Catholic Poetry: An Anthology
This new anthology from Paraclete Press was edited by Ryan Wilson and April Lindner and includes poems from 23 contemporary poets, including Dana Gioia, James Matthew Wilson, Franz Wright, and Molly McCully Brown.
This new anthology is an enjoyable read not only for scholarly readers, but also for those whose most recent taste of poetry occurred in the last year of high school English class. In their preface, the editors have added useful information of the importance of poetry, especially for those with Catholic sensibilities.
The Essence of Everything: A distiller muses on alchemy, monasticism, and the Philosopher’s Stone
Daniel Stewart’s essay in Plough on whiskey and other spirits is a fascinating—a good accompaniment for you Friday evening libation, I’d say:
My own experience as a distiller is of course quite different from that of Primo Levi. I jumped into the world of distillation by working on several gigantic copper pot stills, far from any chemist’s lab. On those stills, the hypotheses we tested were not for the sake of knowledge but for the pursuit of whiskey. Yet the basic process remains the same, and I often found myself thinking of Levi’s words, especially during the calm hours before the spirit began to flow. Distilling can still be beautiful and quiet. It can also allow for time to think despite requiring careful sensory attention. As the spirit flows it changes from moment to moment so the distiller must be attentive. We smell and taste constantly, trying to put words to the notes we catch.
Scoundrel or Saint? A Return to Robin Hood
David Deavel writes in The Imaginative Conservative on Robin Hood, children’s literature, and more.
And how is Robin depicted? Is he scoundrel or hero? I think the answer is obvious. Robert of Locksley Hall is a man who is unjustly taken from his lands. He sets up camp in the deep Sherwood Forest to evade capture by the disloyal villain King John’s forces, especially the Sheriff of Nottingham. Yet he moves around England periodically, staying with friends who are sympathetic or need his help. He gathers round him or goes to help those who are oppressed by the King and the Sheriff. To borrow from the intro to the 1980s television series The A-Team, “If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and you can find them…,” maybe you can get the Merry Men.
