The Lit blitzes on...
Today's Piece: "Sugar Free" by Emily Debenham
One thing I've loved about the Mormon Lit Blitz is the way it's built relationships between Mormon writers. I've enjoyed the insights many of these people share outside their formal creative work.
A recent thought that struck me came from Sarah Dunster, winner of the 2013 Whitney Award for General Fiction. She said she's appreciated information she's learned through the popular genre of "10 things you should never say to [person in x situation]" posts, but wishes there were more posts that started with "10 things you SHOULD say" instead. As we learn about others' diverse burdens, after all, there's always a risk that we'll be too worried about the chance of helping wrong to help at all.
"Sugar Free" seems to do exactly the kind of positive modelling Sarah has asked for. But can reading a story like this really change behavior in the real world?
Have you ever used an insight gleaned from fiction to understand someone's needs in real life?
What should you never say to Hunter? What should you say to him?
What did you think of this story in general?
Thursday, June 26, 2014
Responses to Recent Events
On the AML blog yesterday, Theric Jepson asks if we "have art that responds to Recent Events." He is, not, I suspect, talking about the unfortunate elimination of Ecuador from the world cup--devastating though that may be to many. He is talking instead about the recent excommunication of Kate Kelly and the extended discussion swirling around it.
For many, the moment is uncomfortable, uncertain, and painful. As Eric Samuelsen and others have pointed out, that's true whether you were most uncomfortable with Kelly's rhetorical strategies or with the actions taken in response. This is the sort of discussion in which virtually all participants have been put on the defensive by someone. And unfortunately, the things most of us say while feeling defensive work to make someone else somewhere feel threatened as well.
Theric sees direct, emotional online discussion as a normal response to shared discomfort and pain, but also as sort of a psychic rut. He doesn't want people to just forget what they're feeling or walk away from problems, but he does hope we can rise above the cycle of mutual venting/defending/offending to engage the underlying questions about why it's so hard to be a human living among other humans.
And Theric thinks literature could be a part of that. Literature, which is almost never just about what it claims to be about, might help us escape our own defensiveness. It might give us a bridge from a moment's pain to a broader insight.
And maybe that's a pipe dream. Maybe it's just what Theric and I, as writers, get paid to say.
Or maybe literature really can get us thinking in broader ways. Maybe good works of Mormon Literature, selected more or less at random, can speak in some sideways and rut-evading way to the tensions many people are feeling right now.
In that spirit, I've made a list the Mormon Lit Blitz finalists published so far, indexed by sentiments I've seen people express. See which quote you identify with, and--in the spirit of experiment--see if the corresponding piece speaks to that feeling somehow.*
"I feel rejected and hurt."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/inremembrance/
"It shouldn't be this hard to go to Church."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/and-through-the-woods/
"We make a serious mistake when we think of service and power in the same terms."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/the-primary-temple-trip/
"Don't try to explain to me yet how this all makes sense if you look at the big picture. Right now I just need a safe place to cry."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/platinum-tears/
"I can't put my finger on it, but I feel like something important is slipping away."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/slippery/
"I see my faith and community in a different way now than I once did."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/2020/
"I don't know who to talk to about what I'm feeling. I don't expect everyone to understand, but it would be nice to find someone who can get where I am and who I can trust enough to get fresh perspective from."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/sugar-free/
"I can't afford for the feeling of sisterhood to fall victim to political differences."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/thick-and-thin/
"These kind of debates make me feel like a tiny little person being crushed between big forces I can't control. I want to get back to the basics."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/in-a-nutshell/
"I don't have strong feelings about this issue, but all the bad feelings around it bother me. I wish I could just hop on a curelom and get away from it all."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/curelom-riders/
*Disclaimers: No refunds of time or mental energy will be given to those who don't appreciate the story they choose. The index quotes have been generated without consultation with the authors and may not represent their personal reactions to said events in any way. Some stories may related to the index quotes in perverse or tongue-in-cheek ways. No animals were harmed in the writing of this post, but evidence suggests that animals may be harmed by excessive levels of online reading. Media outlets should not that these publications do not represent the Mormon Church, which doesn't like being called the Mormon Church, in any official capacity. Some stories contain violence, may remind the reader of specific swear words (though without actually saying them), and can involve immodestly dressed characters if the reader happens to use his/her imagination to mentally create them dressed immodestly. Some of these stories may take readers down the proverbial rabbit hole, and management is not responsible for any proverbial rabbit droppings reading may encounter along their way.
For many, the moment is uncomfortable, uncertain, and painful. As Eric Samuelsen and others have pointed out, that's true whether you were most uncomfortable with Kelly's rhetorical strategies or with the actions taken in response. This is the sort of discussion in which virtually all participants have been put on the defensive by someone. And unfortunately, the things most of us say while feeling defensive work to make someone else somewhere feel threatened as well.
Theric sees direct, emotional online discussion as a normal response to shared discomfort and pain, but also as sort of a psychic rut. He doesn't want people to just forget what they're feeling or walk away from problems, but he does hope we can rise above the cycle of mutual venting/defending/offending to engage the underlying questions about why it's so hard to be a human living among other humans.
And Theric thinks literature could be a part of that. Literature, which is almost never just about what it claims to be about, might help us escape our own defensiveness. It might give us a bridge from a moment's pain to a broader insight.
And maybe that's a pipe dream. Maybe it's just what Theric and I, as writers, get paid to say.
Or maybe literature really can get us thinking in broader ways. Maybe good works of Mormon Literature, selected more or less at random, can speak in some sideways and rut-evading way to the tensions many people are feeling right now.
In that spirit, I've made a list the Mormon Lit Blitz finalists published so far, indexed by sentiments I've seen people express. See which quote you identify with, and--in the spirit of experiment--see if the corresponding piece speaks to that feeling somehow.*
"I feel rejected and hurt."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/inremembrance/
"It shouldn't be this hard to go to Church."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/and-through-the-woods/
"We make a serious mistake when we think of service and power in the same terms."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/the-primary-temple-trip/
"Don't try to explain to me yet how this all makes sense if you look at the big picture. Right now I just need a safe place to cry."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/platinum-tears/
"I can't put my finger on it, but I feel like something important is slipping away."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/slippery/
"I see my faith and community in a different way now than I once did."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/2020/
"I don't know who to talk to about what I'm feeling. I don't expect everyone to understand, but it would be nice to find someone who can get where I am and who I can trust enough to get fresh perspective from."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/sugar-free/
"I can't afford for the feeling of sisterhood to fall victim to political differences."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/thick-and-thin/
"These kind of debates make me feel like a tiny little person being crushed between big forces I can't control. I want to get back to the basics."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/in-a-nutshell/
"I don't have strong feelings about this issue, but all the bad feelings around it bother me. I wish I could just hop on a curelom and get away from it all."
http://blog.mormonartist.net/2014/06/curelom-riders/
*Disclaimers: No refunds of time or mental energy will be given to those who don't appreciate the story they choose. The index quotes have been generated without consultation with the authors and may not represent their personal reactions to said events in any way. Some stories may related to the index quotes in perverse or tongue-in-cheek ways. No animals were harmed in the writing of this post, but evidence suggests that animals may be harmed by excessive levels of online reading. Media outlets should not that these publications do not represent the Mormon Church, which doesn't like being called the Mormon Church, in any official capacity. Some stories contain violence, may remind the reader of specific swear words (though without actually saying them), and can involve immodestly dressed characters if the reader happens to use his/her imagination to mentally create them dressed immodestly. Some of these stories may take readers down the proverbial rabbit hole, and management is not responsible for any proverbial rabbit droppings reading may encounter along their way.
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
"Platinum Tears" Discussion
Closing out the 2014 Mormon Lit Blitz's third quarter....
Today's Piece: "Platinum Tears" by Marianne Hales Harding
This poetic essay, or essayistic poem, jumps right in to a major recurring dilemma in Mormonism.
On the one hand, we believe that meaning comes through commitment. On the other, we know that in this world, serious commitment can cause serious pain.
What do you do with that?
What is the role of grief in the healing process? What are its limits?
Is Walmart acting in some way as a sacred space here? What is it doing and how is it like or unlike other places?
Today's Piece: "Platinum Tears" by Marianne Hales Harding
This poetic essay, or essayistic poem, jumps right in to a major recurring dilemma in Mormonism.
On the one hand, we believe that meaning comes through commitment. On the other, we know that in this world, serious commitment can cause serious pain.
What do you do with that?
What is the role of grief in the healing process? What are its limits?
Is Walmart acting in some way as a sacred space here? What is it doing and how is it like or unlike other places?
"Thick and Thin" Discussion
The Mormon Lit Blitz Continues....
Today's Piece: "Thick and Thin" by Vilo Westwood
In an era when people are extremely mobile, often moving vast distances multiple times in the course of their lives, Mormon wards--especially in major educational and economic centers--face certain challenges and make certain contributions as communities where many members have little long-term tie to the area. This piece looks at the way one character and one ward are managing these challenges.
What do you think of the piece?
What have you seen wards do to help new members connect to the ward? To the area?
What else could wards reasonably do to strengthen a sense of community in an era of migration?
Today's Piece: "Thick and Thin" by Vilo Westwood
In an era when people are extremely mobile, often moving vast distances multiple times in the course of their lives, Mormon wards--especially in major educational and economic centers--face certain challenges and make certain contributions as communities where many members have little long-term tie to the area. This piece looks at the way one character and one ward are managing these challenges.
What do you think of the piece?
What have you seen wards do to help new members connect to the ward? To the area?
What else could wards reasonably do to strengthen a sense of community in an era of migration?
Monday, June 23, 2014
"And Through the Woods" Discussion
Starting off at a hard run in the second week of the 2014 Mormon Lit Blitz...
Today's Piece: "And Through the Woods" by Jennifer Eichelberger
I would ordinarily call a piece like this post-apocalyptic fiction, though in Mormon Lit we probably need another term for social crashes that don't involve the Second Coming.
What do you think of the main character?
What are your thoughts on the setting?
What other stories do you know that involve a post-civilization-collapse attempt to build Zion? Which would you recommend to someone who liked this story?
If civilization is we know it collapsed tomorrow, what would you do?
What do you see as the most likely causes of the next collapse of civilization as we know it? How might Mormons respond?
Saturday, June 21, 2014
On Attention and Art -- 2 Nephi 2: 13
"O that ye would awake, awake from a deep sleep..." (2 Nephi 2: 13)
Reflections on the Mormon Lit Blitz, Week One
Viktor Shklovsky's 1917 essay "Art as Technique" begins with a simple observation: that as things become habitual, our minds tend to make them automatic and unconscious. Maybe you've noticed this while driving a car along a route you take all the time or while listening to a child bless the food during a bedtime prayer. There are certain tasks, we joke, that we could do in our sleep--and that we tend to perform with as much attention as if we were sleeping.
In many ways, this automation of the habitual is necessary and helpful. By not thinking about things we constantly repeat, our minds are able to apply more attention and energy to dealing with unfamiliar and new problems.
At times, though, our minds' insistence on automation comes at a steep cost. We can take familiar things for granted to the point that they disappear almost completely from our awareness. I can still remember my professor, Kim Abunuwara, reading out Shklovsky's counting of the costs: "And so life is reckoned as nothing. Habituation devours work, clothes, furniture, one's wife..."
On my mission in Germany, I once found myself translating a stake conference talk for an English-speaking visitor. By the middle of the talk, I found the ideas expressed to be so familiar I could finish translating a sentence before the speaker finishing saying it. By the end of the talk, the man I was translating for recognized the patterns of speech so well he'd only need a few words of each sentence to follow.
There have been moments in my life, I suppose, when I was glad my faith had reached the level of automatic, unconscious reaction. But I am frightened by the danger of habit devouring my faith instead. There have been times in my life when it eats up even the words of God, when I look up at the end of a page to realize I've glossed over everything. Do we reach a point when all the once-startling truths that should transform us become little more than vain repetitions? Can we come to take for granted even the idea that we are intended to become Gods?
We all fall, again and again, into the sleepwalk of habit. But perhaps, Viktor Shklovsky suggests, we can be awoken by art. Art that interrupts our habits, jars us out of our rote perceptions, and makes the familiar unfamiliar enough for us to see it once again.
I've felt blessed this week by art like that.
Art that invites me to look at exaltation as something that can happen when a shell breaks.
Art that takes an ancient warning and gives it fresh force.
Art that lets me see a familiar setting from the sky for the first time.
That gives pain new names.
That finds holiness through simple juxtapositions.
That straight-up offers me different eyes with which to see.
I've felt blessed this week by art that allows me to re-engage with parts of the rich heritage I've been given. And I've felt privileged to be able to share it.
Reflections on the Mormon Lit Blitz, Week One
Viktor Shklovsky's 1917 essay "Art as Technique" begins with a simple observation: that as things become habitual, our minds tend to make them automatic and unconscious. Maybe you've noticed this while driving a car along a route you take all the time or while listening to a child bless the food during a bedtime prayer. There are certain tasks, we joke, that we could do in our sleep--and that we tend to perform with as much attention as if we were sleeping.
In many ways, this automation of the habitual is necessary and helpful. By not thinking about things we constantly repeat, our minds are able to apply more attention and energy to dealing with unfamiliar and new problems.
At times, though, our minds' insistence on automation comes at a steep cost. We can take familiar things for granted to the point that they disappear almost completely from our awareness. I can still remember my professor, Kim Abunuwara, reading out Shklovsky's counting of the costs: "And so life is reckoned as nothing. Habituation devours work, clothes, furniture, one's wife..."
On my mission in Germany, I once found myself translating a stake conference talk for an English-speaking visitor. By the middle of the talk, I found the ideas expressed to be so familiar I could finish translating a sentence before the speaker finishing saying it. By the end of the talk, the man I was translating for recognized the patterns of speech so well he'd only need a few words of each sentence to follow.
There have been moments in my life, I suppose, when I was glad my faith had reached the level of automatic, unconscious reaction. But I am frightened by the danger of habit devouring my faith instead. There have been times in my life when it eats up even the words of God, when I look up at the end of a page to realize I've glossed over everything. Do we reach a point when all the once-startling truths that should transform us become little more than vain repetitions? Can we come to take for granted even the idea that we are intended to become Gods?
We all fall, again and again, into the sleepwalk of habit. But perhaps, Viktor Shklovsky suggests, we can be awoken by art. Art that interrupts our habits, jars us out of our rote perceptions, and makes the familiar unfamiliar enough for us to see it once again.
I've felt blessed this week by art like that.
Art that invites me to look at exaltation as something that can happen when a shell breaks.
Art that takes an ancient warning and gives it fresh force.
Art that lets me see a familiar setting from the sky for the first time.
That gives pain new names.
That finds holiness through simple juxtapositions.
That straight-up offers me different eyes with which to see.
I've felt blessed this week by art that allows me to re-engage with parts of the rich heritage I've been given. And I've felt privileged to be able to share it.
"In a Nutshell" Discussion
We close out the first week of the Mormon Lit Blitz with an explosion...
Today's Piece: "In a Nutshell" by Doug Staker
This is not the way we usually talk about exaltation.
Shortly after my mission, I was called to teach Sunday School for a large class of 14-16 year-olds. One week, the lesson was on the plan of salvation, and after going through the standard diagram with circles for pre-existence, earth life, the spirit world, and the kingdoms beyond, I handed out paper and a big bucket of crayons and colored pencils and asked them each to think of a different way to draw that same journey.
I would love to see Doug Staker's plan of salvation diagram.
What do you think of this poetic piece of it?
How might you describe the relationship between mortality and eternity?
What role can literature play in studying the gospel?
Today's Piece: "In a Nutshell" by Doug Staker
This is not the way we usually talk about exaltation.
Shortly after my mission, I was called to teach Sunday School for a large class of 14-16 year-olds. One week, the lesson was on the plan of salvation, and after going through the standard diagram with circles for pre-existence, earth life, the spirit world, and the kingdoms beyond, I handed out paper and a big bucket of crayons and colored pencils and asked them each to think of a different way to draw that same journey.
I would love to see Doug Staker's plan of salvation diagram.
What do you think of this poetic piece of it?
How might you describe the relationship between mortality and eternity?
What role can literature play in studying the gospel?
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