Two books about 'myths'

One of the things I love about my book group is that I get to read stuff I would never have otherwise bothered to pick up. First, I should explain, my book group isn't like many other book groups. We don't have a set text that we all have to read and then discuss. Instead you read what you want to read, bring it along and tell the group about it.

It works well because you aren't stuck with some awful book (like 'Walk Among the Birds' in the movie Date Night), and you can borrow each other's books, expanding your library through the libraries of however many other people are in the group.

I borrowed two books off Elaine that are part of the Canongate 'Great Myths' series: Ragnarok by A.S. Byatt and The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ by Philip Pullman.

I loved Ragnarok, but then I have always loved the Norse myths. Byatt is a clever storyteller, interweaving some vivid childhood fears and the sense of dread and doom that I know I often felt as a child into a story that also captures the essence of the Norse myths and makes them accessible.

It is an excellent piece of writing, and she drew an interesting exegetical point from it - that the gods knew Ragnarok was coming, but they didn't have the imagination to avoid it. The parallel between our current culture's collision course with catastrophic climate change is thought-provoking.

Pullman meanwhile has tried to demythologise and then remythologise the story of Jesus. I've dissected this a bit on freelance theology already, but my main criticisms were over his unbalanced handling of supernaturalism. Plus, as I say on freelance theology, stealing a joke from Monty Python is naughty for an author like him.

I have no real issues with Philip Pullman saying what he wants to about God, Jesus, the historical basis for Christianity or the Church. I might disagree with him, but some of his points are interesting. But this book just isn't as good as the author seems to think it is when he writes about it in his essay afterwards. I can forgive him for being rude about religion. But I don't really like how smug he seems about his own work.

Still, perhaps worth a read. But read Ragnarok first.

Ends and means (-philosophy post)

At work today a friend and I were discussing a situation where someone we both knew had been treated quite badly by a religious organisation, which perhaps should have acted better. In fact, if they'd followed their own 'values statement', they wouldn't have done the things they did to end this guy's employment. But then, I always say, if you need to put your values in a statement, then they aren't obvious enough to people in the way you conduct yourself.

Anyway this drifted into a discussion of 'ends and means' and raised the ethical chestnut of 'do the ends ever justify the means?' After the discussion ended I remembered a quote from Michael Foot, onetime leader of the Labour party, on the subject. A couple of google searches later and I found what I was looking for, although Foot was actually quoting a writer called Ignazio Silone. Here's what he (Foot) wrote:

"Every means tends to become an end," Silone had one of his characters write, and the physical and mental torture of both Italian Fascism and Soviet Communism were known to him as he wrote: "To understand the tragedy of human history it is necessary to grasp that fact."

"Machines which ought to be men's instrument, enslave him, the state enslaves society, the bureaucracy enslaves the state, the church enslaves religion, parliament enslaves democracy, institutions enslave justice, academies enslave art, the army enslaves the nation, the party enslaves the cause, the dictatorship of the proletariat enslaves Socialism."

"The choice and the control of the instruments of political action are thus at least as important as the choice of the ends themselves, and as time goes on the instruments must be expected to become an end for those who use them. Hence the saying that the end justifies the means is not only immoral; it is stupid."

"An inhuman means remains inhuman even if it is employed for the purpose of assuring human felicity. A lie is always a lie, murder is always murder. A lie always ends by enslaving those who use it, just as violence always enslaves those who use it as well as their victims."

In some ways, this reminds me of Nigel Wright's description of 'institutional evil' - when the institution which was set up for the benefit of human beings takes control of those human beings. In terms of religion, it's not a long step to get to inquisitions, crusades and jihads, morality police or Pullman's Magisterium when that starts to happen.

Stardust (film review)

I've been keen to see this since seeing the trailer a few months back and then finding out it's based on a book by Neil Gaiman - a British sci-fi/fantasy/horror author with a confounding story-telling style. Years ago NG did a collaborative book with Terry Pratchett called Good Omens, which I maintain is still one of the best books about the 'end times' ever written. It's a hoot too.

So, to the film. Well, Stardust is billed as 'the fairy tale that won't behave', and that's a pretty good summary. Although after Shrek, Hoodwinked and the imminent release of Enchanted, Stardust is more like a classic fairy tale than a demythologising of the genre.

In fact, it's a beautifully filmed, acted and thought through grown up fairy tale. Michelle Pfeiffer is known in our house as 'Mmmmmm, Michelle Pfeiffer' - at least by me; the effect of her Catwoman role on an impressionable 15-year old. Here she does a sterling job as a rapidly aging villain. And as the heroine fallen star Yvaine, Clare Danes simply shines.

But most of the other characters are morally ambiguous - in other words, realistic. The only dip in acting form is one-trick pony David Brent, sorry, Ricky Gervais. But it's satisfying seeing him meet a grisly end (ooh, sorry, spoiler there).

It's a good time to be a fantasy movie fan. Before Stardust, we had a trailer for The Golden Compass, the adaptation of the first of Philip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy. New Line, of Lord of the Rings fame, are handling it and it looks absolutely awesome.

Beowulf - the father of all fantasy stories - is on the big screen again. Enchanted is coming out soon. And even Elizabeth I is getting a Hollywood makeover into a warrior princess in an epic retelling of the Spanish Armada, which can only be classed as 'historical' in the loosest sense of the word.

Jongudmund's verdict on Stardust: 8.5/10 "Get thee to a cinema."