Friday Links, July 30, 2021
+ More about the age-old question: What qualifies a work of fiction as literary art?
+ On the connection between the Benedictine vision and poetry.
+ Raft of Stars novel read chapter by chapter on Wisconsin Public Radio.
+ New Wiseblood Press essay by Michael D. O’Brien, on the history of mankind’s creative imagination.
+ “Dear Holy Father”: some respectful reactions to Pope Francis’ recent motu proprio.
In Which I Ask if Literary Art is Only to be Found in Literary Fiction
From Rhonda Ortiz, Dappled Things Webmaster and Chrism Press founder, “Of possible interest for Friday Links. Mark is a CP author and he’s also published fiction in DT.” [Mark Baker is the essay’s author, writing at “G. M. Baker’s Newsletter.”]
“The eternal question ‘Is it art?’ demands an answer to the eternal question, ‘What is art?’ But before I go there, I want to consider another question that is often implicit in the ‘Is it art?’ question, and that is, ‘Is it of value?’ In other words, is being art the only thing that makes ‘the arts’ valuable? . . . “A vampire novel, a romance, a western, a fantasy, a dancing violinist. They all could be art, if they change how we see. Literary fiction? Like anything else, it could be art. But most of literary fiction isn’t art either.”
“Man Reading a Book,” also called “The Book Snob,”is one of a collection of color portraits from the 1910s in the collection of the George Eastman Museum. It was created in the Autochrome Lumière method of color photography used in the first few decades of the 20th century.
Benedictine Poetry and the Restoration of Christian Culture
This article at the Catholic Herald by Christopher Fisher is adapted from the preface to A Benedictine Education (Cluny Media), which presents two essays by John Henry Newman on St. Benedict and Benedictine schools. Christopher Fisher is Executive Director of the Portsmouth Institute for Faith and Culture, and teaches in the Department of Humanities at Portsmouth Abbey School. It is available to subscribers and those who register for a free account with restricted monthly access
"In his essay on 'The Mission of St. Benedict,' St. John Henry Newman argues that the fruit of the cloister, the heart of the Benedictine life, is the cultivation of a certain spiritual disposition which he calls 'poetic.' It is this Benedictine poetic vision, he argues, which transformed civilization once—and has the power to do so again.”
Raft Of Stars 1 Of 20
Ann Thomas, DT Managing Editor: “From this years’ JM [Jacques Maritain] Prize second place winner, Andrew Graff! His fantastic essay [Burning My Education: Rediscovering the Basics of Story] traces the development of his latest novel, Raft of Stars, being featured on "A Chapter a Day" (that means exactly what it sounds like it means!) on Wisconsin Public Radio. Listen by following along here starting Monday July 26.”
“Norman Gilliland reads from Andrew J. Graff's 2021 novel about two boys who run away to Wisconsin's North Woods after one of them shoots the abusive father of the other.”
THE AWAKENING IMAGINATION: IMAGE, IDOL, OBJECT, ICON BY MICHAEL D. O'BRIEN
Katy Carl, DT editor in chief, writes: “Very much of interest to our readers!”
“Our latest Wiseblood Essay in Contemporary Culture is based on a lecture Michael D. O’Brien gave at the Centre for Faith and Culture, Oxford. His essay traces the long history of mankind’s creative imagination throughout millennia of expansion and growth—citing examples that range from cave painting to classical sculpture, the icon and manuscript illumination to film and contemporary literature.”
Dear Holy Father, dear Bishops: A plea from young traditional Catholics worldwide
And more about the traditional Latin Mass
Bernardo Aparico, DT Founder and Publisher, recommends this link. Katy Carl writes, “I’m in favor.”
Also, a video titled MASS OF THE AGES is currently online, and a longer documentary is in the works. When completed, MASS OF THE AGES will be a trilogy. If you want to watch the first installment of the completed Mass of the Ages video when it premiers live on August 15, go here and click the purple ‘GET NOTIFIED’ button.
NFL kicker Harrison Butker appears in the video to talk about his strong Catholic faith and love for reverent liturgy.
Literary Heroes Who Loved the Traditional Mass
Many of our literary heroes were great lovers of the traditional Mass. Following are some related quotes:
"Graham Greene was one of the signatories (along with many other writers and well-known intellectuals) on a petition that was sent to Pope Paul VI and resulted in the Agatha Christi Indult[1].”
"Greene confessed in his last extended interview before his death in 1991 that he still loved to attend the Mass in Latin, which his friend, the Spanish priest Father Leopoldo Duran, had his bishop’s permission to say.
"Though he welcomed the ecumenical spirit of the Council and its consequent stress on faith and justice, his Catholic identity was much tested by his personal distaste for the vernacular liturgy. Greene felt there was a diminishment of the supreme power, aura, and aesthetic beauty that the liturgy had traditionally played in the imagination of Catholics.”–Graham Greene’s Catholic Imagination, by Mark Bosco, S.J., Oxford University Press 2005.
Simon Tolkien, grandson of J. R. R. Tolkien, records this amusing story. "I vividly remember going to church with [my grandfather, J. R. R. Tolkien,] in Bournemouth. He was a devout Roman Catholic and it was soon after the Church had changed the liturgy from Latin to English. My Grandfather obviously didn't agree with this and made all the responses very loudly in Latin while the rest of the congregation answered in English. I found the whole experience quite excruciating, but My Grandfather was oblivious. He simply had to do what he believed to be right.""My Grandfather - JRR Tolkien," in: *The Mail On Sunday, 2003. Full article, here.
Evelyn Waugh's friend and fellow writer Graham Greene wrote this about Waugh's reaction to the changes to the liturgy. "I think the old expression 'a broken heart' comes near to the truth, when one thinks of his reaction to the changes in the liturgy of the Catholic Church."
[1] This article, “The Fascinating Story of the Agatha Christie Indult,” describes the changeover to the new Mass, the suppression of the traditional Mass, the various papal documents by Pope St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict that loosened restrictions on its celebration; reading it can be helpful in understanding the background of Pope Francis’s motu proprio Traditionis custodes.)
