Archive | May 2009

The Well and the Mine by Gin Phillips

May30

The Well and the Mine is Alabama author Gin Phillips’s first novel, and I’m impressed. The plot is simple: Nine year old Tess witnesses a tragedy on her own back porch, and she and her older sister, Virgie, try to figure out why a Mystery Woman threw a baby in their well. It’s very much a bildungsroman, a coming of age story, reminiscent of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. (OK, I’m not saying it’s as good as To Kill a Mockingbird, but the setting and themes are similar. And it is good.)

The well part of the title is indicative of the plot; the mine points to the setting. The story of Tess and VIrgie and their family takes place in the fictional mining town of Carbon Hill, Alabama, somewhere not too far from Birmingham. Tess’s daddy is a coal miner; her mother is a homemaker who works from dawn to late at night to put food on the table and make a life for herself, her husband, and her three children. Tess and Virgie have a little brother, Jack. They’re all good folks.

Each member of the family takes turns telling the story in first person from his or her point of view, sometimes for a few paragraphs and sometimes for several pages. This rotating narration was annoying at first. I had to keep looking back to the beginning of the section to the name in italics to see who was talking, who “I” was this time. But you get used to it, and this style of story-telling has the advantage of giving the reader a fuller view of what’s going on in the family, of family dynamics, of how different people see things. Each of the five narrators became a real person for me. I felt I knew them, and I was glad that Ms. Phillips saw fit to tell us over the course of the story, which mainly focuses on one summer in 1931, what happened to each family member in later life.

I’m glad I got to read this novel about life during the Great Depression in a coal-mining town in northern Alabama. I didn’t even know they had coal mines in Alabama. I associate coal mining with Kentucky and West Virginia. At any rate, if you’re a fan of the Southern novel, the summer-of-growing-up family slice of life novel, or the gentle, rambling, character-driven story of an historical era, The Well and the Mine will fit the bill. Recommended.

Two by Laurie Halse Anderson

May29

Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson. Viking, 2007.

Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson. Viking, 2009.

Ms. Anderson is a skilled writer. Her contemporary YA novel Speak was “haunting and memorable.” (Semicolon review here.) Twisted, written from a male protagonist’s point of view is, well, rather twisted, but also thought-provoking even now, three weeks after I’ve read the book and returned it to the library. Wintergirls, Ms. Anderson’s newest novel, is twisted, haunting, and memorable and eventually crosses the line into downright disturbing.

Put it this way: I let my fourteen year old read Speak because I thought it dealt with a subject she should know about and be on guard against. I let her read Twisted because I thought she was naive about teenage boys and the fact that even “nice” boys think about sex . . . a lot, especially when confronted with immodestly and skimpily clad teenage girls. Ms. Anderson did an excellent job of getting inside the mind of a fairly typical teenage boy without making him into a saint or a hero or a total scumbag.

However, I don’t want Brown Bear Daughter to read Wintergirls. I’m not saying that the book is poorly written or pornographic, but do I really want my dancer daughter who already deals with body image issues (as do most teen girls) to read, to become immersed in, the seriously disturbed thoughts of a suicidal anorexic teenage girl? To read WIntergirls is to become immersed in an alternative universe in which thin is fat, eating is evil, and the self is to be annihilated. It’s scary and dark and very real. The book does hold out some hope, but not much.

So what I’m saying that it’s so well written that I don’t want impressionable teens to read it. Forget impressionable teens, impressionable anyage should beware. Enter at your own risk. Parental guidance suggested for both books, but there is some worthwhile stuff here.

Reading Wintergirls made me pray for those I know who have dealt with eating disorders or who are still living in the thrall of anorexia or bulimia. Reading Twisted reminded me of what a dangerous and twisted world we live in.

Other Hymn Surveys

May28

The BBC’s Sunday show Songs of Praise surveyed Brits in 2005:
1. How Great Thou Art
2. Dear Lord and Father of Mankind by John Greenleaf Whittier.
3. The Day Thou Gavest
4. Be Thou My Vision
5. Love Divine, All Loves Excelling
6. Be Still, For the Presence of the Lord
7. Make Me a Channel
8. Guide Me O Thou Great Redeemer
9. In Christ Alone by Stuart Townsend and Keith Getty
10. Shine, Jesus, Shine by Graham Kendrick.

Favorite Hymns of United Methodists by Dean McIntyre (2006).
1. “Amazing Grace”
2. “Here I Am, Lord”
3. “How Great Thou Art”
4. “O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing”
5. “Hymn of Promise”
6. “In the Garden”
7. “Great Is Thy Faithfulness”
8. “Holy, Holy, Holy”
9. “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee”
10. “Spirit Song”; “Blessed Assurance”

Christianity Today had about 500 respondents to its survey in 2001 of favorite hymns and praise songs:
1. Amazing Grace
2. How Great Thou Art
3. Because He Lives
4. Great Is Thy Faithfulness
5. The Old Rugged Cross
6. What a Friend We Have In Jesus
7. To God Be the Glory
8. Majesty
9. Shout to the Lord
10. Holy, Holy, Holy

PopularHymns.com administered a poll from December 2007 to February 2008, and these were their top ten:
1. Amazing Grace
2. How Great Thou Art
3. In the Garden
4. Be Thou My Vision
5. Great Is Thy Faithfulness
6. It is Well
7. What A Friend We Have in Jesus
8. Blessed Assurance
9. Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing
10. Holy, Holy, Holy

I deduce from these other hymn poll results that:
1. Amazing Grace will be in my top ten unless a bunch of Brits get in and clog up the works with the likes of American poet John Greenleaf Whittier.
2. How Great Thou Art is likely to make the top ten, too, even though Brown Bear Daughter can’t stand it. She’s fond of minor key mysterious sounding hymns, and How Great THou Art is much too rolling, majestic, and triumphant for her teen emo sensibilities.
3. Methodists sing a couple of hymns the rest of us haven’t heard. Hymn of Promise?
4. I don’t understand the popularity of a certain hymn which shall remain nameless, but which reminds me of the poem The Old Oaken Bucket, sentimental and slightly vapid.
5. I’m mostly in agreement with all of these polls. These are all fine hymns.
6. My poll may be redundant, but I’m enjoying it anyway. Please send your list of top ten hymns in today so that I can enjoy more.

Pseudogamy

May26

Anthony Esolen at Mere Comments is writing a series of essays that he calls “Pseudogamy,” reflecting the sham and pretense that we as a society have made of the sacred institution of marriage. It’s worth reading in its entirety, but here are some selected quotes to whet your appetite.

Marriage — marriage such as Jesus defined it — is the foundation of society not simply because it is the best environment for raising children, though it is. It is the foundation because in it man and woman commit themselves one to another, as if they were, so to speak, gods freely bestowing freedom upon what they create.

I return to the notion of cosmos: order. Man and woman unite in marriage to bring into being a new generation; and even when they cannot do so, because of age or some physical defect, they may well wish to do so, or they stand for others as exemplars of the act that naturally brings forth children. All of which is to say that marriage that is open to children is part of the order created by God. Then marriage that is not open to children violates that order, and introduces into our understanding of marriage a destructive chaos.

In these two posts, Mr. Esolen says eloquently and intelligently some of the things I tried to start talking about in this post on marriage: that we have already lost the meaning of marriage before the activists and anti-Christians came along to try to put into statute and law what was already broken. I’m not saying that it’s a losing battle but rather that we will have to re-examine the fundamental Biblical meaning of marriage itself before we will be able to speak truth to our culture and, perhaps, change the course we are travelling toward the destruction of both marriage and family.

Pseudogamy 101 by Anthony Esolen.

Pseudogamy 102 by Anthony Esolen.

Poetry Friday and Hymnic Research

May22

Yes, the word hymnic was in my dictionary. I rather like it.

The best place on the internet to get information about hymn writers, hymns, melodies, etc. is probably Cyber Hymnal. The site features over 10,000 hymns and lyricist/composer biographies. It also has pictures of all of the composers and hymn writers of whom they could find pictures. But the music is not nice. It comes on automatically when you click on a given hymn, repeats endlessly until you shut it off, and it’s some kind of electronic midi file that hurts my ears. Not appealing.
CyberHymnal also has a list of copyrighted hymns that have been requested but that the site is unable to post, along with the names of copyright holders, if known.

Oremus Hymnal Wiki “hopes to be the comprehensive source of information about the extensive tradition of English-language hymnody.” It looks as if it started out as a one-man project, and now others are invited to make it grow. Oremus also has articles about historical hymnals with an index to all the hymns published in that particular hymnal.

Scripture and Music has a limited number of hymn lyrics and midi or mp3 files to go with them. There’s also some information about the authors and composers of the hymns in their database.

Hymnal.net has better music, more traditional piano, and not that plinkety-plunkety electronic midi stuff. And from Hymnal.net one can embed the mp3 version of the music to most traditional hymns.

I like the following hymn very much, and I rather doubt it’s well known enough to make the Top 100 list, so I’m including it here for Poetry Friday.
James Mountain who wrote the music for this hymn also wrote the music to Like a River Glorious. The lyrics are by George Wade Robinson:

Loved with everlasting love,
Led by grace that love to know;
Spirit, breathing from above,
Thou hast taught me it is so.
Oh, this full and perfect peace!
Oh, this transport all divine!
In a love which cannot cease,
I am His, and He is mine.

Heaven above is softer blue,
Earth around is sweeter green;
Something lives in every hue
Christless eyes have never seen:
Birds with gladder songs o’erflow,
Flow’rs with deeper beauties shine,
Since I know, as now I know,
I am His, and He is mine.

Things that once were wild alarms
Cannot now disturb my rest;
Closed in everlasting arms,
Pillowed on the loving breast.
Oh, to lie forever here,
Doubt and care and self resign,
While He whispers in my ear,
I am His, and He is mine.

His forever, only His:
Who the Lord and me shall part?
Ah, with what a rest of bliss
Christ can fill the loving heart.
Heaven and earth may fade and flee,
Firstborn light in gloom decline;
But, while God and I shall be,
I am His, and He is mine.

The Star of Kazan by Eva Ibbotson

May20

I picked up The Star of Kazan at the library on spec. It looked interesting, and I’d heard of Ms. Ibbotson, but I’d never read any of her books. (If you want more about Eva Ibbotson, Austrian-born, British writer of both children’s and adult books, here’s a delightful Guardian interview with her. She starts out cranky and ends up reflective.)

A foundling, Austrian professors, Viennese cooking, a bookshop, the Lippizaner stallions, a castle, a mysterious trunk full of costumes and fake jewels. These are some of the elements that make up this adventure story set in early twentieth century Vienna and Germany. It’s not really a fantasy, but it feels a little fairy-tale-ish.

Annika, the foundling who is the story’s heroine, loves her life in Vienna as the adopted daughter of servants, Ellie and Sigrid, and the adopted “niece” of the three professors for whom Ellie and Sigrid work. However, as a found child, Annika does imagine what it would be like to have her birth mother sweep into the house and claim her as a beloved, long lost daughter.

Then, one day it happens! And Annika’s mother and her new-found family are both more and less exciting and wonderful than her imagination could have dreamed.

The story sort of reminded me of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Little Princess, one of my favorite tales when I was a girl. Annika, like Sara Crewe, is either a princess or a penniless orphan or something in-between. And Annika and Sara, as their fortunes rise and fall, are throughout both books rather Pollyanna-like, almost always humble and servant-like and joyful.

I think I would have had a great big noisy fit somewhere in there. Which shows that when it comes to living up to my fictional ideals, I don’t.

Top 100 Hymns Survey

May19

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE SEND YOUR TOP TEN LISTS TODAY! I really wanted to have at least one hundred responses, and so far I have heard from thirty SIXTY of you. Thanks to the Early Thirty! The rest of of you send in your lists! Deadline: May 31, 2009.

So, this past Sunday in church while listening attentively to the sermon, and even taking some notes in my Bible, I thought up a new project. I get some of my best thinking done during church. My excuse is that I can listen faster than my pastor can preach, so I have time left over to think. And I like projects. At least, I like thinking them up. Sometimes I’m a little bit lacking in the follow-through.

At any rate, inspired by Fuse #8’s Top 100 Picture Book Poll, which I enjoyed immensely and would recommend as a beginning reading list of picture books to accompany my Picture Book Preschool, I thought a Top 100 Hymns Poll would be a great summer project. I might learn something and be encouraged in my own worship. You might learn some new hymns or be reminded of some oldies. We all might enjoy visiting and re-visiting the hymns of the faith together.

Here’s how I think this poll/journey is going to work (I stole some of the rules from Fuse #8):

1. Make a list of your top ten hymns of all time.
Hymn (according to Webster): a song of praise to God
a metrical composition adapted for singing in a religious service.
For the purposes of this poll, I’m limiting the choices to Christian hymns, but the form of the song doesn’t matter. In other words, the songs on your list should be suitable for congregational singing and should be Christian. Handel’s Messiah is Christian but probably not suitable for congregational hymn singing. Anything you sing in worship service, even what are normally called choruses or gospel songs or spirituals or CCM, is fine. (Oh, English, please, or at least translated into English. Sorry, but it’s all I really speak.)

2. List these hymns in your order of preference. So your #1 hymn would be the one you feel is the best, and so on. I will be giving your first choice 10 points, your second choice 9 points, and so on.

3. Submit your list to me at sherryDOTearlyATgmailDOTcom. Write “Hymn Survey” in the subject line. I’d rather you didn’t leave your votes in my comments here because it’ll be easier to tabulate all the votes if they’re all in my email (plus I want everyone’s votes to be a surprise). Deadline for votes to be sent to me is May 31, 2009.

4. If you like, you can submit a justification for each hymn. Or you can send me a link to an audio or video version online. Include the name of the hymn’s author or lyricist and the composer of the melody you prefer if at all possible, especially if you think I might be unfamiliar with your particular hymn. At the beginning of June I will tally up the totals, and I will pull from the submitted pieces why one reader or another liked a particular hymn (naming the reader, of course). That way we’ll be able to hear from a whole bunch of people why they love one hymn or another. I will then count down from 100 to 1 over the course of the summer the top choices of what folks feel the best hymns of all time are.

I’m also going to talk to someone at my church to see if we can sing a lot of these favorites this summer in our worship services. As many of you know, churches get caught in ruts where they sing the same hymns over and over. I think singing some of the favorite hymns of the faith, even some that we may not have sung in many years, would do us good. By the way, I’m not any kind of expert on music or hymns, but I’ll bet I’ll be a lot more knowledgeable about both by the end of the summer.

Thanks in advance for your votes/nominations. I’m going to enjoy this little exercise, and I hope you will, too.

Oh, and if you don’t mind, I would appreciate your publicizing this poll on your blog. I’d like to get at least 100 nominations or lists for this survey; more would be even better. If you want to post your top ten list on your blog, that’s fine. Just be sure you send me a copy.

Seven Ten Fifteen Nineteen Twenty-five Thirty SIxty responses so far!

John Adams’ Advice to His Children

May19

When I read David McCullough’s biography of John Adams back in February and watched the PBS miniseries based on the book, I copied several passages into my commonplace book for future reference. These are some quotations from Adams’ letters or other writings that reflect his advice to his children.

John adn Abigail had four children who lived to adulthood: one, John Quincy, became president of the United States. The other three lived to experience varying degrees of tragedy in their lives. Abigail, the eldest, nicknamed Nabby, married Colonel William Smith who turned out to be a profligate husband who practically deserted her and their children for long periods of time throughout their marriage. Nabby died of breast cancer at age forty-nine.

Charles Adams was by all accounts a charming and talented young man, but he drank excessively and eventually died an alcoholic. He was married to Col. Smith’s sister, Sally, and the couple had two daughters. He also deserted his family and died at the age of thirty, alone, in New York City.

Thomas Adams, the youngest of the Adams children, became a lawyer, but not a very successful one. Thomas married and had seven children, but he, too, was prone to alcohol abuse. He and his family lived with his father John Adams in John’s old age, and Thomas outlived his father in spite of his alcoholism.

Perhaps John Adams’ children, in light of their sometimes poor decisions in adult life, should have taken his advice more to heart. At any rate, here is some of what Mr. Adams wrote to his children, in case you want to take advantage.

“Daughter! Get you an honest man for a husband, and keep him honest. No matter whether he is rich, provided he be independent. Regard the honor and moral character more than all other circumstances. Think of no other greatness but that of the soul, no other riches but those of the heart. An honest, sensible humane man, above all the littleness of vanity and extravagances of imagination, laboring to do good rather than be rich, to be useful rather than make a show, living in modest simplicity clearly within his means and free from debts and obligations, is really the most respectable man in society, makes himself and all about him most happy.” (John Adams, p. 289)

“Public business, my son, must always be done by somebody. It will be done by somebody or other. If wise men decline it, others will not; if honest men refuse it, others will not. A young man should weigh well his plans. Integrity should be preserved in all events, as essential to his happiness, through every stage of his existence. His first maxim then should be to place his honor out of reach of all men.” (John Adams, p. 415)

To Charles on exercise: “Move or die is the language of our Maker in the constitution of our bodies. When you cannot walk abroad, walk in your room . . . Rise up and then open your windows and walk about your room a few times, then sit down to your books or your pen.” (John Adams, p. 452)

“More depends on little things than is commonly imagined. An Erect figure, a steady countenance, a neat dress, a genteel air, an oratorical period, a resolute, determined spirit, often do more than deep erudition or indefatigable application.” (John Adams, p. 453)

To John Quincy: “Rejoice always in all events, be thankful always for all things is a hard precept for human nature, though in my philosophy and in my religion a perfect duty.”

Sunday Salon: Ramblings and a Hymn Project

May17

I haven’t had time to go through the Saturday Review this week and find all the books I’m interested in adding to my TBR list. My list is already so long that I may very well have to finish it in heaven because the Lord doesn’t give anyone that much time here on earth.

Anyway, I ‘m reading Bret Lott’s latest novel, published in 2008, Ancient Highway. I loved Jewel by this same author, and I liked A Song I Knew By Heart, also by Mr. Lott. But I’m over halfway through Ancient Highway, and so far it hasn’t captured me. I’m distracted and not sure where the book is going or why it’s going there.

So, this morning in church while listening attentively to the sermon, and even taking some notes in my Bible, I thought up a new project. I get some of my best thinking done during church. My excuse is that I can listen faster than my pastor can preach, so I have time left over to think. And I like projects. At least, I like thinking them up. Sometimes I’m a little bit lacking in the follow-through.

At any rate, inspired by Fuse #8’s Top 100 Picture Book Poll, which I enjoyed immensely and would recommend as a beginning reading list of picture books to accompany my Picture Book Preschool, I thought a Top 100 Hymns Poll would be a great summer project. I might learn something and be encouraged in my own worship. You might learn some new hymns or be reminded of some oldies. We all might enjoy visiting and re-visiting the hymns of the faith together.

Here’s how I think this poll/journey is going to work (I stole some of the rules from Fuse #8):

1. Make a list of your top ten hymns of all time.
Hymn (according to Webster): a song of praise to God
a metrical composition adapted for singing in a religious service.
For the purposes of this poll, I’m limiting the choices to Christian hymns, but the form of the song doesn’t matter. In other words, the songs on your list should be suitable for congregational singing and should be Christian. Handel’s Messiah is Christian but probably not suitable for congregational hymn singing. Anything you sing in worship service, even what are normally called choruses or gospel songs or spirituals or CCM, is fine. (Oh, English, please, or at least translated into English. Sorry, but it’s all I really speak.)

2. List these hymns in your order of preference. So your #1 hymn would be the one you feel is the best, and so on. I will be giving your first choice 10 points, your second choice 9 points, and so on.

3. Submit your list to me at sherryDOTearlyATgmailDOTcom. Write “Hymn Survey” in the subject line. I’d rather you didn’t leave your votes in my comments here because it’ll be easier to tabulate all the votes if they’re all in my email (plus I want everyone’s votes to be a surprise). Deadline for votes to be sent to me is May 31, 2009.

4. If you like, you can submit a justification for each hymn. Or you can send me a link to an audio or video version online. Include the name of the hymn’s author or lyricist and the composer of the melody you prefer if at all possible, especially if you think I might be unfamiliar with your particular hymn. At the beginning of June I will tally up the totals, and I will pull from the submitted pieces why one reader or another liked a particular hymn (naming the reader, of course). That way we’ll be able to hear from a whole bunch of people why they love one hymn or another. I will then count down from 100 to 1 over the course of the summer the top choices of what folks feel the best hymns of all time are.

I’m also going to talk to someone at my church to see if we can sing a lot of these favorites this summer in our worship services. As many of you know, churches get caught in ruts where they sing the same hymns over and over. I think singing some of the favorite hymns of the faith, even some that we may not have sung in many years, would do us good. By the way, I’m not any kind of expert on music or hymns, but I’ll bet I’ll be a lot more knowledgeable about both by the end of the summer.

Thanks in advance for your votes/nominations. I’m going to enjoy this little exercise, and I hope you will, too.

Oh, and if you don’t mind, I would appreciate your publicizing this poll on your blog. I’d like to get at least 100 nominations or lists for this survey; more would be even better. If you want to post your top ten list on your blog, that’s fine. Just be sure you send me a copy.

Princess of the Midnight Ball by Jessica Day George

May17

Novelizations or retellings of fairy tales have been all the rage for quite some time now. The first one I remember reading was Robin McKinley’s Beauty: A Retelling of the Story of Beauty and the Beast, first published in 1978. Of course, Disney’s been in the business of retelling fairy tales as movies for a long time, since I don’t know if Ms. McKinley’s success with Beautyinspired other authors to retell other fairy tales or or if Disney made authors want to do a better job of retelling these old tales if there was some other impetus to the trend (maybe the general Tolkien/Lewis inspired fascination with fantasy?), but each year brings more and more fairy tale engendered novels for children and young adults.

Princess of the Midnight Ball is a retelling of Grimm’s story The Twelve Dancing Princesses. It’s pretty much a straight retelling or the original except for one significant change in motivation: the princesses in Ms. George’s story are forced to dance away the night against their wills as a result of a bargain made by their mother with King Under Stone.

Looking on Wikipedia, I see that Ms. George is not the only author to have re-told this particular tale. There’s a movie version: Barbie in The Twelve Dancing Princesses.
Catholic author Regina Doman, whom I’ve heard of but never read, has a version called The Midnight Dancers, published last year, and it sounds interesting: “the twelve princesses are twelve girls in a blended family with a strict Christian fundamentalist father. The oldest girl, Rachel, discovers a secret door that leads them out of their Chesapeake Bay home, and the girls begin having rendezvous with guys from their church. Their secret is discovered by a young ex-soldier just back from the Middle East, Paul Fester, who concocts a plan to try to restore trust between the jaded girls and their frustrated father.”

“Suzanne Weyn’s novel The Night Dance retells the story, intertwining it with Arthurian legend.”

Juliet Marillier’s novel Wildwood Dancing gives a retelling set in Bulgaria, mixed with traditional Bulgarian folk tales.

Oddest of all, apparently, Jeanette WInterston’s Sexing the Cherry, which I’ve heard of but never had any desire to read, also incorporates the fairy tale of The Twelve Dancing Princesses into a a postmodern magical realism novel that features a grotesque mother, known as The Dog Woman and her protege Jordan journeying in a space-time flux in search of fruit?

That last one sounds even stranger than the story of twelve princesses who wear out their dancing shoes each night.

Some of our favorite fairy tale novelizations:

From Beauty and the Beast:
The afore-mentioned Beauty by Robin McKinley.
Rose Daughter by Robin McKinley. A different version of Beauty and the Beast.
Beast by Donna Jo Napoli.

The Sleeping Beauty
Spindle’s End by Robin McKinley.
Enchantment by Orson Scott Card. Semicolon review here.
Briar Rose by Jane Yolen.

Cinderella-ish
Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine.
Bella at Midnight by Diane Stanley. Brown Bear Daughter’s review.
Just Ella by Margaret Peterson Haddix.

Other Folk Tales Ride Again
A Curse Dark As Gold by Elizabeth Bunce. (Rumpelstiltskin) Semicolon review here.
The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale. Semicolon review here.
Zel by Donna Jo Napoli. (Rapunzel)

Oh, and by the way, if you find yourself inside a fairy tale, Neil Gaiman has some instructions for you. Neil Gaiman reads his poem: Instructions.