A Bucket of Thoughts: From Eliot to Strauss to Nietzsche to IWS
Random thoughts on a Monday morning …
I’m grateful to Thomas Howard for Dove Descending, his commentary on T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets.” But why must Eliot be so pointedly obtuse as to need line-by-line decoding? (Though I suspect some of my students would think I find in Eliot a kindred spirit.) Having forced my way through “Prufrock” and “Hollow Men” and “Wasteland” last week, I’m ready for some words of redemption. I’m just getting started on “Four Quartets” — I love the notion of there being “a way up that is at one and the same time a way down,” but this poetry is tough going. (I hope I can get some help from Charlie Kidd when he returns from abroad.)
Last week while grading exams (almost done), I listened several times (and am doing so even now) to Richard Strauss’s Alpine Symphony. The Alpine Symphony, a tribute to the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, makes Nietzsche’s atheism (or at least his quest for a “nobler god”) feel so, I dunno, so what? Brave?
Then again, if your best hope is to have your ashes parked on the top of the Himalayas in a Chock Full o’Nuts can (per The Bucket List, which movie Shari sat me down to watch this weekend, and which movie felt to me like an extended commentary on how to make Nietzsche work for you — even if the main characters do make non-Nietzschean moves toward relationships), you move past bravery into, well, again, what?
OK, I guess it makes a pretty big difference whether there’s a Redeemer or not. If not, The Bucket List is about as close to redemption as you’re going to get, I suppose. That said, I’m not sure a bucket list isn’t a bad idea even if (or since) there is a Redeemer.
What could be on mine? I’ve already killed a gator, hit a home run, played Bach & B.B. King, swung a samurai sword, driven (even briefly owned) a muscled up Mustang, kissed the most beautiful girl in the world, raised with her the three most vibrantly alive sons ever, written more than I have the right to expect anybody to read, spoken truth into the lives of half a generation of seminarians, seen tons of the majestic …
Before we leave Strauss, his Also Sprach Zarathustra (the whole tone poem) has inspired me to try to get the “Prelude” into my fingers on my Lucille and out through my Fender tube amps.
My head still hurts (that good hurt when your head feels like it’s taken in more than it’s able) from how rich the Institute for Worship Studies experience was this session. I’m grateful especially for bold prayers and wise counsel I received, and for the self-giving love I witnessed among strong-willed and talented worship leaders. It’s curious that my teaching partner and I are going through such parallel dysfunctions in church life. I love the church so — may all of us who love the Groom and his Bride help each other help Her not dress so ugly. I hold much promise of Her better adornment through my IWS friends.
Like I said, random thoughts … but, hey, it’s my blog.
Note to both devoted readers: I won’t forget about the other seven reasons for samurai sword training in Japan.
Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind
Cannot bear very much reality. • T. S. Eliot
Reggie,
Thanks for the reminder to visit your blog. I really need to do that more often. A couple of random thoughts:
Your reference to the “bravery” of Strauss/Nietzsche reminds me of the Resurrection Symphony of Mahler (#2), which I sang in college. I originally thought the text was written by Goethe, but apparently it’s actually Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock. Nonetheless, it always impressed me with its sense of bravura and bravado, perhaps even bravery, that pleads for its fulfillment in Christ.
Second, thanks for your reflections on IWS. A friend of mine, Henk Van Wyke, wrote a book titled, “The Dance of the Blind Bride,” an image for the church that he discovered while observing, for real, a blind bride dancing at her wedding. She seems at times to be both blind and poorly adorned.
Blessings to you!
Jim Hart
Comment by Jim Hart — June 23, 2008 @ 3:19 pm
lovely post, dear brother~
and with jim, i thank you for the reminder.
i’d really appreciate getting a notice whenever you post;
i sadly admit that everything going on the the world that is not in front of my face (read, in my e-mailbox) doesn’t seem to exist for me.
your writing always refreshes, delights, illuminates and challenges.
thou dost always “break the bread of life” in thy verbiage;
always manna for my hungry soul.
sometimes poetry is like glossolalia.
and from the tongue of eliot, unlike the sometimes jarring pot-luck ejaculation on a random pentecostal sunday morn, it can be like eavesdropping in the prayer-closet of a saint for whom the “prayer-language” has become a primary, rather than a secondary, tongue.
yes, it can be dense.
but that is part of its grace.
i often love to hear the scripture read or prayers prayed in tongues i do not understand.
someone said that god gave us music so we might pray without words.
sometimes unintelligible language is like that dimension in music for me.
i will pray and praise “with the spirit” as well as “with the understanding.”
“that art is best, which to the soul’s range gives no bound;
something beyond the form, something beyond the sound.”
(8th century chinese proverb)
the deep shalom of our crucified and risen elder-brother be with you, amigo~
dh
Comment by darrell a. harris — June 23, 2008 @ 7:20 pm
On Eliot: I couldn’t agree more, but, my, he’s worth the effort!
“Unreal City,
Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
I had not thought death had undone so many”
(The Waste Land, 1.61-63)
Comment by Chris — July 7, 2008 @ 2:17 pm
T.S. Elliot — isn’t he a NASCAR driver?
:0)
Can’t wait to help.
If I can…
Comment by Charlie Kidd — July 25, 2008 @ 3:08 pm
and isn’t it spelled with one “l”?
Comment by Charlie Kidd — July 25, 2008 @ 3:19 pm
Yeah, OK, my son, so how many “l”’s do you see?
Comment by Administrator — July 25, 2008 @ 5:58 pm
Couldn’t agree more about the Bucket List – a highly Nietzschean film. I felt like the whole bit about relationships was just some window dressing for the test audiences. The real substance was self-actualization through tightrope walking. Nietzsche would scoff at the sappy life lessons. Of course, Nietzsche is highly unpalatable so it was necessary for some measure of Box Office success.
Keep trucking at RTS and glad to see you, Richard, and the CSC continue to collaborate – great stuff.
Comment by Michael Graham — October 29, 2009 @ 4:37 pm