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.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

May15

Co-joined (Siamese) twins are separated at birth but sustain an unbreakable bond throughout the vicissitudes of life in Haile Selassie’s Ethiopia, and even after one of the twins, Marion, must flee to the United States for political reasons. A good picture of life in Ethiopia and lots of medical details (both boys become doctors) in addition to thematic elements concerning family loyalty and the meaning of commitment make this 560 page first novel by Verghese, a doctor himself, worth the read.

Other, more detailed reviews:
The Book Lady’s Blog: “Verghese’s writing is intense, detailed, and precise but in no way cold or detached. His characters are fully realized, and their relationships with each other ring of truth. There are moments of tension, surprise, delight, pain, betrayal, confusion, and loss, and every last one is beautifully done.”

Word Lily: “I loved much about this book. I loved the medicine, the twins, Ethiopia, the family. . . . The questions of faith held my attention best (not surprisingly).”

Amanda at Calder Reading Room: “In all, I can see why this book was recommended by NPR, the writing was really good, it was witty at parts, touching at others, but it had too much sex for me.”

Just one more program note from Semicolon: I think this one will appeal to fans of The Kite Runner (Semicolon review here) and A Thousand Splendid Suns (Semicolon review here) both by Khaled Hosseini (unless it was just the Afghanistan angle that drew you into those two books). Cutting for Stone has the same foreign-ness, the same cultural detail, the same vivid characterization, the same universal themes explored within a cross-cultural history.

Poetry Friday: More John Donne

May15

I so enjoyed thinking about death (enjoyed paradoxically speaking, like the metaphysical poets) this week with Wit and Mr. Richardson’s little book, and John Donne and of course, LOST, that I thought I’d share another poem by Mr. Donne written on his sick-bed:

HYMN TO GOD, MY GOD, IN MY SICKNESS.

SINCE I am coming to that Holy room,
Where, with Thy choir of saints for evermore,
I shall be made Thy music ; as I come
I tune the instrument here at the door,
And what I must do then, think here before ;

Whilst my physicians by their love are grown
Cosmographers, and I their map, who lie
Flat on this bed, that by them may be shown
That this is my south-west discovery,
Per fretum febris, by these straits to die ;

I joy, that in these straits I see my west ;
For, though those currents yield return to none,
What shall my west hurt me ? As west and east
In all flat maps—and I am one—are one,
So death doth touch the resurrection.

Is the Pacific sea my home ? Or are
The eastern riches ? Is Jerusalem ?
Anyan, and Magellan, and Gibraltar ?
All straits, and none but straits, are ways to them
Whether where Japhet dwelt, or Cham, or Shem.

We think that Paradise and Calvary,
Christ’s cross and Adam’s tree, stood in one place ;
Look, Lord, and find both Adams met in me ;
As the first Adam’s sweat surrounds my face,
May the last Adam’s blood my soul embrace.

So, in His purple wrapp’d, receive me, Lord ;
By these His thorns, give me His other crown ;
And as to others’ souls I preach’d Thy word,
Be this my text, my sermon to mine own,
“Therefore that He may raise, the Lord throws down.”

“As west and east are one, so death doth touch the resurrection.” I do like that simile. And then there are the other similes and comparisons: Paradise and Calvary, Christ’s Cross and Adam’s tree, the first Adam meets the Last Adam, a crown of thorns translated to a crown of glory.

I do like Mr. Donne’s poetry. It reminds me of the incongruities and the paradoxes of LOST, and of life in general.

Poetry Friday round-up is at the blog of Kelly Polark today.

Change of Heart by Jodi Piccoult

May14

This odd parody of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has two threads or themes:

Death penalty=bad, very bad.
Gnosticism=good, very good.

In the book Shay Bourne, a convicted murderer sentenced to death for his crimes, is actually Jesus or a Messiah or at the very least, a miracle-worker. And if you can accept the highly individualistic Religion of Shay Bourne, you, too, can come to your own Gnostic enlightenment. Or maybe it’s all a trick, and Shay is a charlatan. But probably not. But who cares anyway because we make our own truth. Or something.

BLECH.

By the way, Sam at Book Chase wrote a post just the other day about how Jodi Piccoult dissed Dan Brown. I’ve never read any Dan Brown, but if this book is a good example of the writing talents of Ms. Piccoult, the pot shouldn’t be calling the kettle black.

LOST Rehash: The Incident

May14

Scattered thoughts and observations which may or may not become more coherent during the eight months that we must wait for our next LOST fix:

The conversation at the beginning of the episode:
Antagonist: “They come, fight, they destroy, they corrupt. It always ends the same.”
Jacob: “It only ends once. Anything that happens before that is just progress.”
Is this summation the same as Sawyer’s statement something to the effect: “Whatever happened, happened.”?
Discuss. ‘Cause I’m clueless.

Jacob was reading from a book of short stories by Flannery O’Connor, Everything That Rises Must Converge, as John Locke fell from the umpteenth story of that building. I must read some Flannery O’Connor, even though I don’t like short stories.

Locke is/was the “loophole” that allowed the Smoke Monster/Partner of Jacob to do whatever it is he’s doing inside Locke’s (second?) body or with Locke’s appearance. Those two, Jacob and his antagonist, reminded me of the two brothers in the computer game Myst. In that game two brothers, Sirrus and Achenar (Cain and Abel?), are engaged in a struggle for power in which they both try to engage the person playing the game to help them.Of course, the problem for the game player is figuring out which brother is the “good guy” and which is not. The emphasis in LOST on books and puzzles and an unexplored island is also very Myst-like.

I loved the Star Wars moment when Sawyer shot the communication console in the sub. Sawyer is definitely the Han Solo type. And when Juliet gave Sawyer fits by changing sides with the simple declaration, “I changed my mind”?Classic woman’s prerogative. And Sawyer had the best lines last night:
“I don’t speak destiny.”
“This don’t look like LAX.”

However, I’m mad at Juliet. She gives up Sawyer, who obviously adores her, who tamed himself for her, who has her back, because she saw the way he looked at Kate? Stupid. Wrong-headed. Kate goes with Jack; they deserve each other. Sawyer goes with Juliet; they complement each other. Happily ever after.

So Jacob shows up at crisis points in each of the Losties lives and does what? Except for the conversation he had with Hurley, I can’t see that Jacob did much to influence the course of events or make them do anything in particular. Oh, I guess Jacob did cause Nadia’s death. Was he just mostly watching them, waiting to see what they would do, knowing that their destinies intersected? I don’t get it.

Ben was playing Aaron to Locke Impersonator’s Moses. Ben was going on and on about how Jacob never revealed himself to Ben in all the years he was on the island, and how he was passed over, and how, when Locke requests a meeting, Jacob immediately shows himself. But Ben didn’t know that Locke wasn’t really Locke.

Miles: “Has it occurred to any of you that your buddy is actually going to cause the thing he is trying to prevent. Perhaps the nuke is the incident.”
Good call, Miles.

I loved the Rose and Bernard retirement scene. They’re retired. “It’s always something with you people.” And now Rose and Bernard have opted out. I think they’re out of the show now, and although I will miss them, they made the right decision. Little Cabin in the Woods/Jungle.