I was recently re-watching, after several decades, the film "On the Waterfront" and at one point it brought to mind Virginia Woolf's novel "Mrs. Dalloway."
"On the Waterfront," directed by Elia Kazan, staring Marlon Brando and introducing Eva Marie Saint, was released in 1954. Considered a classic, it's about union violence and corruption on the New York waterfront.
Showing posts with label spirituality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label spirituality. Show all posts
Thursday, January 30, 2020
Sunday, December 1, 2019
Townshend Sees Rock and Roll as a System of Spirituality
The New York Times Dec. 1, 2019 Sunday Magazine has an interview with Pete Townshend, leader of "The Who," in which Townshend is pressed to explain what rock and roll was all about now that it is apparently widely considered to be dead.
After dodging and weaving for a while, Townshend finally comes out with the following:
"What we were hoping to do was to create a system by which we gathered in order to hear music that in some way served the spiritual needs of the audience."
When one reads, endlessly it seems, about Woodstock and why people went, that quote resonates.
But, Townshend continued: "It didn't work out that way. We abandoned our parents' church, and we haven't replaced it with anything solid and substantial."
Despite that, he himself hasn't given up hope.
"I do still believe in it," he said.
After dodging and weaving for a while, Townshend finally comes out with the following:
"What we were hoping to do was to create a system by which we gathered in order to hear music that in some way served the spiritual needs of the audience."
When one reads, endlessly it seems, about Woodstock and why people went, that quote resonates.
But, Townshend continued: "It didn't work out that way. We abandoned our parents' church, and we haven't replaced it with anything solid and substantial."
Despite that, he himself hasn't given up hope.
"I do still believe in it," he said.
Monday, January 7, 2019
Religion Seen as Most Difficult Topic for YA Fiction
I've written a number of posts on YA (Young Adult) Fiction because it has been showing good growth while sales of most other genres of fiction are described as stagnant or even declining.
Not surprisingly, given what anyone can easily find on the Internet, few topics are off limits for young adults (aged 12 to 18) except perhaps religion. That's the view of Donna Freitas, an author of such books and a person who has a doctorate in religious studies, as recently expressed in the New York Times weekly book review section.
"A writer can go as dark and violent as it gets. Sex is more than fine. ... Graphic, instructive, erotic, romantic, disappointing: bring it all on. Even better, current YA novels now have many L.G.B.T.Q. protagonists ... which was not the case 10 years ago."
In fact, "the sky is the limit," Freitas said, except for religion. "Religion is the last taboo."
Since most wars these days seem to be grounded in religious differences, that's a curiosity even beyond the reasons Freitas gives in her article.
"As a frequent speaker on college campuses, I can confirm that while young people may be more skeptical about traditional religion, their hunger for a more inclusive, nontraditional spirituality is constant," Freitas said. While teenage readers "search for themselves" in the books they read, few protagonists of YA fiction identify with a particular faith or claim spirituality as something of interest, she said.
Why don't authors address such interests?
"We worry someone may be trying to convert or indoctrinate teenagers; we resist preachiness about certain moral perspectives," Freitas said. But at the same time, she conceded that "religions and religious people have done and still do reprehensible things in our world, to women, to children, to some of the people I care most deeply about."
Not to mention what they do to other societies in general that don't happen to adhere to their faith. Remember what ISIS did to their neighbors and what they apparently would have loved to do with us, and what we in turn did to them? And all the "collateral damage" that occurred in the process?
But Freitas' point is nonetheless well taken. And I say that as an agnostic.
Not surprisingly, given what anyone can easily find on the Internet, few topics are off limits for young adults (aged 12 to 18) except perhaps religion. That's the view of Donna Freitas, an author of such books and a person who has a doctorate in religious studies, as recently expressed in the New York Times weekly book review section.
"A writer can go as dark and violent as it gets. Sex is more than fine. ... Graphic, instructive, erotic, romantic, disappointing: bring it all on. Even better, current YA novels now have many L.G.B.T.Q. protagonists ... which was not the case 10 years ago."
In fact, "the sky is the limit," Freitas said, except for religion. "Religion is the last taboo."
Since most wars these days seem to be grounded in religious differences, that's a curiosity even beyond the reasons Freitas gives in her article.
"As a frequent speaker on college campuses, I can confirm that while young people may be more skeptical about traditional religion, their hunger for a more inclusive, nontraditional spirituality is constant," Freitas said. While teenage readers "search for themselves" in the books they read, few protagonists of YA fiction identify with a particular faith or claim spirituality as something of interest, she said.
Why don't authors address such interests?
"We worry someone may be trying to convert or indoctrinate teenagers; we resist preachiness about certain moral perspectives," Freitas said. But at the same time, she conceded that "religions and religious people have done and still do reprehensible things in our world, to women, to children, to some of the people I care most deeply about."
Not to mention what they do to other societies in general that don't happen to adhere to their faith. Remember what ISIS did to their neighbors and what they apparently would have loved to do with us, and what we in turn did to them? And all the "collateral damage" that occurred in the process?
But Freitas' point is nonetheless well taken. And I say that as an agnostic.
Saturday, December 31, 2016
An Interesting Notion About Uncertainty
Uncertainty is the condition of being in doubt, or being in possession of imperfect information. Which fork in the road leads to one's destination?
I'm speaking metaphorically because in the age of smart phones, one can generally easily determine the correct geographic route.
Many of us experience from time to time, if not perpetually, an uncertainty about life -- if not its fundamental meaning at least how we should go about living, or what exactly we should do to accomplish something.
This can be very frustrating for some, but perhaps actually rewarding for others.
"I think people give a lot of spiritual credence to uncertainty, to not knowing," contemporary author Maggie Nelson said in an interview with The Creative Independent. "That's exactly how it should be, but it doesn't mean that not knowing is easy," she went on to say.
I'm speaking metaphorically because in the age of smart phones, one can generally easily determine the correct geographic route.
Many of us experience from time to time, if not perpetually, an uncertainty about life -- if not its fundamental meaning at least how we should go about living, or what exactly we should do to accomplish something.
This can be very frustrating for some, but perhaps actually rewarding for others.
"I think people give a lot of spiritual credence to uncertainty, to not knowing," contemporary author Maggie Nelson said in an interview with The Creative Independent. "That's exactly how it should be, but it doesn't mean that not knowing is easy," she went on to say.
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