Tom Berry had the best vegetables on the estate. He kept a quiet garden, buried under a shady tree that hid it from the neighbours’ view. Raised bed with solid Oregon timber beams: turnips, sweet potato, prize-winning-sized carrots and pumpkin in the winter [?] months. Folks on the impoverished housing estate called him Old Tom. No-one really knew him as Tom Berry, Retired & disgraced Dr. Tom Berry. But there he was, Dr. Tom Berry, retired Head of the Research Dept at the University of Anatomy in the Deep South. Old little bent scarecrow of a man in his grey Anorak and Black Rubber Boots, looking like a Nazi War Criminal. He would sit perched in his window seat and scan the street below, writing descriptions of the local thugs as they sold their wares and loitered in the trash-filled gutter. He was given a wide berth by the mostly-black residents who dividedly thought he was either a child-molester, or someone on the witness-protection- programme. So he kept to himself and pretty soon became part of the grey concrete surroundings. As far as anyone knew nobody had a garden or had attempted to grow one on the estate, apart from a few trees and shrubs at the rear of people’s properties that existed without human help, everything was concrete. But Tom had silently broken up the concrete patch of yard at the rear of his house, under the cover of a ragged hedge-of-a plant that grew in the alley that ran parallel to Tom’s high fence. He drove to the outskirts of town in a hired small covered-truck. He returned in the middle of the night and parked under the smashed streetlight outside the entrance to his apartment on the ground floor. If anyone had seen him they would have been surprised at the old man’s strength, as he lugged the retaining beams for the vege-garden down the side of the two-storey unit, stacking them neatly under a black tarpaulin. He later used the black tarpaulin to cover the garden from the elements and neighbours prying eyes. After a while, word got out amongst his neighbours that he had a pretty successful vege-patch right under their noses. Dr. Berry saw this coming and appeared within a matter of minutes on each doorstep within the visible vicinity and presented them with a shopping bag full of fresh vegetables. His plan seemed to have backfired as pretty soon every mother’s son was queuing up for Old Tom’s fresh ‘organic’ vegetables.
The varied critical debate about Katherine Mansfield’s sexuality seems more of a biographically inclined criticism about her lifestyle, rather than her literature. Such criticism also tends to construct a reflection of the various political agendas of the critics, who carry out these treatments. Therefore, I will try to refrain from making any judgements about Mansfield’s sexual preference/s, and look at some select examples of the type of criticism that focuses more on Mansfield the ‘lesbian’, or ‘bisexual’, than on Mansfield the ‘writer’. I will treat these issues alongside relevant aspects of Mansfield’s life and literature.
The focus is primarily on the arguments of two feminist critics: Sydney Janet Kaplan and Alison Laurie. Both attempt to decode Mansfield's sexuality by analysing her influences and experiences, in the context of a repressive patriarchal society. A common thread that will guide my discussion, and that of the critics, will be the relationship of the influence of the ‘decadents’, in particular Oscar Wilde, on Mansfield’s life, sexuality, and art. I will also attempt to show the influence and biases present in her critics’ reactions, to issues of sexuality in Mansfield’s personal life, and in her writing.
From a male perspective of Mansfield's art, Vincent O’Sullivan’s essay, The Magnetic Chain: Notes and Approaches to K.M., analyses her work by interpreting the symbolism; her (‘decadent’) influences, and the probability of her lesbianism under the title of ‘bisexuality’. He claims that “as a young woman (and to some extent all her life) Mansfield was bisexual. Its early appearance comes often in that ornate language she took from Wilde.” In this quote, we see O’Sullivan’s recognition that Mansfield's artistic ideals developed from Wilde’s ideas, manifesting themselves in her life and sexuality. In this respect, Kaplan’s view of Mansfield’s “bisexual nature” is empathetic toward O’Sullivan’s argument. I agree with O’Sullivan, concerning Wilde’s effect on Mansfield’s art and life, but I do not want to attempt my own definition of her sexuality. I will however, use O’Sullivan’s ideas (as well as my own), as a counter-claim to argue the limitations and strengths of the two radically different feminist viewpoints.
The influence of Oscar Wilde and ‘decadence’, on Katherine Mansfield, was profoundly significant in the development of her aesthetic ideals and literary practice. Both Kaplan and Laurie accept this (whilst not necessarily endorsing it). Her ideals, garnished with Wilde’s own concepts, were useful, yet problematic in the development of her identity and sexuality. While there was a profoundly positive influence on her growth and strengths as an artist, there was also a negative aspect to the effects of that ascendancy in her personal life. As she herself wrote in a candid letter of confession to a ‘friend’:
In New Zealand Wilde acted so strongly and terribly upon me that I was constantly subject to exactly the same fits of madness as those which caused his ruin and mental decay. When I am miserable now – these recur. Sometimes I forget all about it – then with awful recurrence it bursts upon me again and I am quite powerless to prevent it – This is my secret from the world and from you – Another shares it with me, . . . For she, too is afflicted with the same terror – We used to talk of it knowing that it w[oul]d eventually kill us, render us insane or paralytic – all to no purpose – It’s funny that you and I have never shared this – and I know you will understand why. Nobody can help –it has been going on now since I was 18 and it was the reason for Rudolf’s death. I read it in his face today. I think my mind is morally unhinged and that is the reason – I know it is a degradation so unspeakable that – one perceives the dignity in pistols.
Sydney Janet Kaplan suggests in her essay, The Problem of Oscar Wilde, that this letter of Mansfield’s “gives clear and painful evidence of the ways that society’s ingrained homophobia finally overcame her.” Other critics like Alison Laurie suggest emphatically that “the context within which Mansfield saw her lesbianism . . . was that of Oscar Wilde and other [?] male homosexuals; she saw her feelings as an abnormal and shameful perversion which would lead to insanity.” The title of Laurie’s essay, Katherine Mansfield – A Lesbian Writer, leaves no doubt as to her beliefs about Mansfield’s sexuality.
Although Mansfield continually wrote in her Journals and Letters of romantic liaisons with men as well as women, which would indicate bisexuality, Laurie denies any critic outside the realm of her critique, the luxury of such logical claims. She states that “lesbian writers, lesbian writing and lesbian readings can be addressed only within the context of lesbian – feminist theory.” She sees ‘bisexuality’ as an invalid notion, a “simplistic and inaccurate” socially acceptable label, used to trivialise lesbian relationships. Laurie also uses the letter (quoted above) to show “the context within which Mansfield saw her lesbianism. It was that of Oscar Wilde and other homosexuals [like “Rudolf”]; she saw her feelings as an abnormal and shameful perversion which would lead to insanity”. Toward the end of this essay, I will address the strengths and limits of Laurie’s critical judgements in relation to this issue.
Kaplan and Laurie, both tend to focus on the relationship between homosexuality (particularly Wilde’s) and influence. This has the effect that Mansfield's sexual experience is seen as the primary centre around which her life revolves. Consequently, the criticism focuses on sexuality as crucial to understanding her work. Sexuality is not considered as ‘just a part of life’ in this respect, it is seen as the biggest part of Mansfield’s identity. I feel that the treatment of such issues does not give us a greater enjoyment in the reading of the fictional short stories.
Whilst it may provide reasons why Mansfield conveyed ambivalent sexuality and gender sensibilities, in the majority of her compelling characters, it does not add to our appreciation of the fiction itself. The mystery of Mansfield’s characters, both male and female, is what compels the questions no doubt. However, the question must be asked if the same compulsion to determine the author’s own character would have occurred, if her Journals and Letters were not as well written (and available), and provocative, as her prose. In order to place the criticism in context we must look at the reasons (which are largely biographical in detail), why the critics I discuss, believe what they believe about Mansfield’s sexuality.
2. The Immoral Influence
“The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.”
WILLIAM BLAKE
“While there were many times when I rejoiced in the idea that my sufferings were to be endless, I could not bear them to be without meaning. Now I find hidden somewhere away in my nature something that tells me that nothing in the whole world is meaningless and suffering least of all. That something hidden away in my nature, like a treasure in a field, is Humility.” OSCAR WILDE from De Profundis
‘Humility’ was a characteristic of Katherine Mansfield’s life and art. Whilst never losing her strong sense of aestheticism, her work reflects an image of one who was too aware of her own mortality, to ever consider herself above the ordinary characters that she wrote about. While she had empathy with her character’s and other writers, Mansfield’s work and life was renowned for the sense of loneliness it conveyed.
Whether this isolation and loneliness was intended or not, driven by her sexuality and/or art, it flavours Mansfield’s work with a profundity of depth that is characteristic of modernist literature. The sense of loneliness and suffering, conveyed through the characters of her stories, gives an impression of the trials she endured through her short life, along the route of her commitment to art. Her identification with the decadent Oscar Wilde, seemed to cause Mansfield a great deal of mental anguish as she tried to fulfil the aesthetic prophecies of her idol, through her own conscious experiments with decadent sexual behaviour and aestheticism.
Whilst Wilde’s example carried with it a risqué ‘anxiety of influence’ for Mansfield, it also served as a liberating model for her own self expression and sexuality. The freedom she sought in Wilde’s ‘immoral’ influence could only take her down the same path of martyrdom and struggle. Resulting, from similar excesses, in a symbolic incarceration of disease and misfortune, that was far from the desired form of liberty she sought. Kaplan, from a feminist perspective, suggests the dangers of Wilde’s influence on Mansfield’s being, particularly upon her ‘womanhood’:
Although Wilde provided her with the impetus to seek experience, to express sexuality and not deny the body, following such advice proved dangerous, as her later pregnancies, abortion, and related illnesses gave sad evidence. Moreover, the call to burn oneself out for experience, to destroy the body in service to art, and all those other exaggerated aesthetic poses were intended rather to suggest a certain kind of masculine initiation into art.
Whilst Kaplan’s feminist reading attributes an immoral influence to Wilde, that is ‘masculine’ in nature, she points out that we should not “assume that Mansfield’s innovations are attributable primarily to literary influence[s].” This may well be true of Mansfield’s literary innovations and style, but yet Kaplan also deals largely with the fact that Mansfield’s character and ideas were influenced, more so than by any other, by Oscar Wilde. Kaplan relays Mansfield’s early sexual experience and identification as a woman, as being negative because a male model of sexuality (the homosexuality of Wilde) encouraged it. This is one of the few weak points that I found in Kaplan’s argument.
Kaplan’s strong feminist view of stereotypical notions of gender, is contradictory in this instance; because of her own political notions expressed as to what a feminist should be and how a woman should act. Here Kaplan herself conforms, and subsequently supports, stereotypical assertions about gender related notions concerning experience and emotion i.e., that aggressive, self-sacrificial behaviour, and artistic idealism are ‘masculine’ in nature, and therefore not suitable as ‘feminine’ artistic and sexual prerogatives.
Combining select ideals with her own philosophy and the urge to create, Mansfield refused to exist within archetypal models of belief and practice. This useful ambivalence is as much a part of her character and style, as is her humility. Using impressionism, symbolism, imagism, realism, and other aesthetic concepts of practice, she developed an aesthetic style that was a fusion of imagination, influence, experience, and eclecticism. Her rebellion within conventional models of society and literary tradition, which were predominantly male dominated, suggests a strong feminist sense of self that had to be aggressive to ‘make it new’ and to develop her own identity and personal freedom.
Mansfield’s rebellious nature led to trial and tribulation that was on a par with Wilde’s own suffering. His maxim that “life imitates art far more than art imitates life” (from The Decay of Living), fuelled the fire of Mansfield’s imagination and her complete involvement in the creation of experience and disposition as an ‘artist’. This conscious and motivating desire led her life to become as aesthetic and stylised as her work. The symbiotic relationship between the artist’s life and the her work, may not have been as profoundly relevant, to her stories and to criticism, if it were not for the extent of personal literature that is available about Mansfield. Her fiction enveloped fact, and vice versa, as Mansfield’s body of works (her fiction) coupled with the body of her being (personal life).
Distance, between reader and writer, diminishes because of the carefully constructed realism of her fiction and the relation of her fiction to her personal experience (as described in her published Letters and Journals). It is interesting that both Kaplan and Laurie do not address the validity of Katherine’s personal writing. They never dispute the factuality of her highly romantic personal style. Just because Mansfield’s journals and letters are available, does not mean that they are untainted by the fictional fingers of their author.
The importance of art to Mansfield seems to be diminished and underwritten by the critics I discuss in this essay. They tend to focus their criticism on determining her sexuality, through the filter of Wilde’s homosexual escapades, in a sort of symbolic trial that parallels his own. Except in the case of Katherine Mansfield, there seems to be no conviction forthcoming. One thing that stands out for me in my reading of Wilde, Mansfield, and her critics, is that ‘art’ was the supreme and most constant influence on her life. As Wilde is so much a part of the criticism I will use him to sum up the power of the influence of art on the imagination: “I treated art as the supreme reality and life as a mere mode of fiction. I awoke the imagination of my century so that it created myth and legend around me . . . I became the spendthrift of my genius and to waste an eternal youth gave me a curious joy.”
3. The Mask of Ambivalence
The façade, for Mansfield, was an important means of both identity and protection. This applied not only to her persona, but also to her sense of style and aestheticism. The importance of character development and personal identity, within her stories and her own life, caused Mansfield to try on many different ‘masks’ of character and experience. Alison Laurie believes that the most transparent mask Mansfield wore throughout her life, was that of the heterosexual. She used this ‘mask’ to disguise her identity as a lesbian, and she did this because of the “patriarchal ideologies of gender” that forced her into a ‘theatrical’ state of pretence.
Laurie discusses Mansfield’s position as a “lesbian writer”, in relation to negative social views of homosexuality (both male and female) within the context of early twentieth century history. She also looks at the reasons for and behind Mansfield’s renowned multiplicity of character, citing select examples to support her claim that Mansfield’s lesbianism was the cause of assumed identities and deliberate heterosexual relations. Laurie implies that nearly every man, whom Mansfield had more than fleeting relationships with in her life, was homosexual. In fact, she states that the main evidence for this claim lies between the pages of Mansfield's Letters, which Laurie sees as “theatrical” disguises that try to mask her true but “secret and marginal self”:
Mansfield constructed the fiction of a heterosexual self, engaged in romantic relationships with men such as Garnet Trowell and John Middleton Murry. She then attempted unsuccessfully to translate her own romantic construction into heterosexual reality . . . Many other women of her time also concealed their lesbianism . . . most lesbians learn to live double lives, and to deceive at least some of the people around them, because they fear the consequences of exposure. I see Mansfield’s romantic letters to men as theatrical presentations of various identities, which are acceptably heterosexual, despite their flamboyant and made-up quality (pp. 213 – 214).
Laurie dismisses all other accounts of Mansfield’s heterosexual abandon as negative (if she even mentions them at all). I feel that Laurie’s argument is weakened by the narrow focus of her political agenda, which is in proving that Mansfield was a lesbian. Another flaw is her uncompromising view that same-sex relationships are ‘normal’ and heterosexuality is somehow an archetypal social construct characterised by homophobia. She also relies heavily on Mansfield’s life long relationship with Ida Baker (or LM) as more evidence of her Lesbianism. Although she admits the lack of factual proof of such a relationship, she implies that the love Mansfield expressed for her closest friend was lesbian in nature. While there is a lack of definitive proof about LM and KM’s sexual relationship, Laurie insists that “the absence of such information does not provide evidence that a lesbian relationship did not exist”(p. 220).
While there seems to be much contradiction and conjecture in Laurie’s essay, I feel that she makes some insightful comments about Mansfield’s difficulty with relationships and the effect of her terminal illness on her friendship with Ida Baker. She also points out Mansfield’s early identification of death and tragedy with homosexuality. The death by suicide of her young homosexual friend, Rudolf, obviously had a profound effect on Mansfield. In relation to her secrets of sexuality and decadence and the connection between Wilde’s suffering and Rudolf’s, she is obviously greatly troubled by her own connections. She exclaims that “Wilde acted so strongly and terribly upon me that I was constantly subject to exactly the same fits of madness as those which caused his ruin and his mental suffering . . . and it was the reason for Rudolf’s death” (p. 219).
Like Kaplan, Laurie suggests that this letter is evidence of Mansfield’s context in which she sees her ‘lesbianism’. It is the best case Laurie puts forward to support her argument. The letter is highly emotional and personally subjective; it links figures of homosexuality with her own anxiety, and it expresses a moral dilemma that seems to point toward despair because of a “degradation so unspeakable”, that Mansfield felt she had to keep it secret. The letter is interesting, as it seems so obvious, because of the links between sexual identities, that the secret of Mansfield’s is that she too is homosexual. Yet, the letter remains highly ambivalent because of its suggestive nature; she is not explicit and for a letter that is meant to be opened after her death, it is not exactly a Pandora’s box of definitive personal revelation.
Laurie believes that the letter was intended for Mansfield’s ex-husband, George Bowden, to explain her lesbianism, “because she believed that he was, like her, a homosexual” (p. 219). Laurie also disputes C. K. Stead’s claim that Mansfield had previously given Bowden cause to believe she was a lesbian. She dismisses Stead’s suggestion as a “typical trivialising heterosexist device”. She bases her conclusion on her political agenda and in doing so she neglects the fact that Bowden had indeed acknowledged Mansfield’s sexual ambivalence, in a letter to Mansfield’s father: “The lady I married, though of excellent and well-to-do people, and herself of some literary reputation, was sexually unbalanced and at times was irresponsible, although at others perfectly normal”(p. 219). Why would Mansfield need to write a letter (as encoded as it was) explaining her sexuality, to someone whom was already aware and obviously forgiving of her sexual identity? Like the letter, the question is as ambivalent and elusive, as is a definition of Mansfield’s sexual identity.
Laurie’s analysis, along with Kaplan’s, of Mansfield’s sexual identity, in her writing and in her personal life, contain references to Oscar Wilde and the ‘decadent’ nature of her own sexuality. Like Mansfield’s life and art, his influence is present in the criticism also. Wilde’s notorious ‘homosexuality’ and ‘decadent’ philosophies affect the critic’s treatment of Mansfield’s sexuality, by making ‘it’ the connecting experiential factor, between her and her mentor. Rather than her profound sense of aestheticism and artistic ideals, which I feel Wilde influenced more than her sexual preferences, sexuality has become the compelling life force that these critics try to wring out of Mansfield's cadaver. It is almost as if, because Wilde influenced her literary art, and was present in her personal writing (which so many critics treat as non-fictional doctrine), then therefore the crossover between fictional and factual worlds must become the bridge to deciphering Mansfield the person, rather than Mansfield the writer. That ‘bridge’ being Wilde’s most infamous claim to fame, his homosexuality. In other words, the critic becomes a juror, in the trial of the defendant’s character, in relation to a case of crime by association.
Photos Source: Wikimedia Commons
NOTES:
Ibid, pp. 41 – 59, in particular, see p. 52 in relation to O’Sullivan’s perception of Mansfield’s sexual disposition.
See Sydney Janet Kaplan’s, Katherine Mansfield and the Origins of Modernist Fiction (Ithaca & London: Cornell University Press, 1991), pp. 25 – 26, 36 – 37, 88, and 169 – 70.
The mystery and ambivalence that surrounds Mansfield's life, sexuality, and art, is the perfect foil for contemporary feminist critics of socio-political cultural theory. In the process of such politicised critique, we unfortunately tend to lose sight of the literary object itself. However close we are to finding out about the writer (and the critic) through biographical interpretation, ultimately, as literary criticism, the critique must focus on the writing or else it becomes mere biography. A fault I find with this criticism is that the search for such prudent meaning narrows the response to the text, and thereby its accessibility. This has the tendency to negate the work in question and the critic’s response to it, i.e. we are looking for something that may not be there. This ultimately renders the literary work near impossible to enjoy, for the mere quality of its art. As an activity, or mode of interpretation, it then becomes about as devoid of objectivity as is criticism of a particular subjective bias.
See Sydney Janet Kaplan’s, Katherine Mansfield and the Origins of Modernist Fiction (Ithaca & London: Cornell University Press, 1991), pp. 26-27, for citation of this letter. Kaplan adds the following footnote that is useful to see the critical response its discovery generated:
This is a fascinating letter. Its origin is unclear, and also its recipient. O’Sullivan and Scott (Letters I, p. 90) suggest it was written to Ida Baker. They mention . . . “on either side of the paper wrapped around it she wrote, ‘never to be read, on your honour as my friend, while I am still alive. K. Mansfield.’” Cited by Alpers, Life, p. 91. Tomalin is dubious, however, about the sincerity of Mansfield’s angst in this letter, believing the letter might have played a role in her efforts to rid herself of her husband, George Bowden. (p. 27)
Ibid, pp. 19 – 35, in particular p. 26.
See Alison Laurie’s essay, Katherine Mansfield – A Lesbian Writer, reprinted in ENGL 316 – New Zealand Literature 3: Katherine Mansfield Anthology (University of Canterbury: Dept. of English, 1999), pp. 213 – 224, in particular p. 219.
Ibid, p. 214.
Ibid, p. 28.
Ibid, ‘Introduction’, p. 5.
From Wilde’s De Profundis. I feel that this quotation is especially significant in relation to Mansfield’s philosophies on life, experience, art, and fame. I think that this quote also applies to Laurie’s reading of Mansfield’s “construction of a heterosexual self”. I feel that M. constructed herself through experience, sexual or otherwise, as a means to exist in a constant state of fiction that she could control as a living art form. While this may sound vague, I think it explains a lot about her journals and letters, and her adventurous and imaginative nature, that remains unexplainable. In light of her battle through adulthood and adolescence with misunderstanding, sickness, tragedy, and toward her later years – the constant worry of imminent death from her tuberculosis, I feel that the construction of any self, would be a conceptually imaginative one that centred around a world that was as far away as possible, from the grim reality of her deteriorating physical state. The constant presence of the ticking clock would also motivate an over-immersion in experience and life, which was as sensually aesthetic as possible.
These men are Garnet Trowell, George Bowden, and John Middleton Murry. Laurie goes as far as to justify her accusatory claims about Murry’s ‘latent’ homosexuality, using as evidence his confession in a private journal that he had been homosexually raped and also his rejection of D. H. Lawrence’s sexual advances, (which Laurie perceives as a “homophobic” reaction, p. 221, ENGL 316 Anthology). She also cites Mansfield’s propensity for pseudonyms and affectionate pet/nick-names: “she referred to him as ‘Betsy’” (p. 222), among other names.
These are the reviews so far. Quoted verbatim from source below [caveat = not my issue re. grammar etc!].
Review one from Sonar 4 Publications, Shells Walter
"When one thinks of horror, there are so many extremes that can be done in writing. The Masters of Horror: The Anthology is no different. The 16 authors that fill this anthology bring terror, darkness and a whole lot of push that any horror lover would want. Authors such as Carole Gill with her story ‘ Truth Hurts’ , William Cook with ‘Devil Inside’ and several more stories bring the horror genre into its true form.
The one thing that stands out about this anthology is that no two stories are the same. Yes, they are horror, but each one brings in a new tasty scary delight. Triskaideka Books has done an amazing job of bringing all this talent into one anthology. There is no anthology out such as this and one that needs to be on everyone’s bookshelf at one time or another. Jumping into this world of darkness only brings forward the most compelling and interesting tales seen in a long time. It is worth the read and worth keeping for years to come."
Second review from A. R. Braun
"This was an entertaining read from beginning to end. The stories lurking within truly creeped me out on so many levels. There’s still a bit of proofreading to be done, but what published book is typoless? Sixteen authors contributed to this antho’ guaranteed to rob you of sleep at night by bringing you the nightmare you’ve most feared…
The first three stories are excellent. I especially loved Carole Gill’s “Truth Hurts,” where a woman writing about douchey vampires gets her comeuppance. A man is seduced by the lamia in “Ladies of the Scale” by Bob Morgan Jr., and Lee Pletzer’s “Teeth” will make you think twice about taking your son fishing again. A boy gets revenge on abusive adults in “Devil Inside” by William Cook, and we go on a Lovecraftian journey with Jason Warden’s amazing story, “Once Seen.” K.K.’s “The Visitation” will have you shuddering, and Mark Edward Hall’s “The Fear” makes a case against hunting for a lost relative. Other great, creepy tales are “Wounds” by Joseph Mulak and “The Barnes Family Reunion” by Angel Leigh McCoy.
One of my favorite parts of the book is the unrestrained gore, but if psychological is your thing, you’ll also find compelling stories within. When this book comes out, any horror fan would be a fool not to get a copy.
More reviews will be available on the website, including interviews with the authors."
The Before & After Writing Method or, The Legacy Method by William Cook
This method is best applied by short-story authors who wish to enlarge the scope of their prose. This method should be applied to enlarge/lengthen a story already written.
After following the steps outlined below you should have enough material to create a 3-part Novel. A 12-chapter template for each story is used, comprising 36 chapters upon completion. (Approx. 6-7 pages per chapter to create a 250 page novel)
With this method, even a newspaper size story can be enlarged to the point where ideas are exhausted (if at all) – the application of the method can be repeated an infinite number of times within the scope of one novel-sized narrative. Think hierarchy.
Essentially, the following steps should be taken to achieve the desired outcome:
1.Write short story (If written, read carefully and take notes). Any
story will do although the B & A method works best on strong character driven narrative.
2.Carefully think about the characters in the story and take notes
(e.g. Names, description, events, etc).
3.Do the same with the setting.
4.Think and write down what the main character’s life previously
(i.e., the time before the primary story) entailed – how did he/she arrive at the point where the initial story occurs.
5.Write a brief timeline of the character’s life taking into account
their age during the first story.
6.Outline the events that possibly lead up to the first storywritten.
7.Outline multiple scenarios then choose the most believable.This is
the basis for the ‘Before’ story.
8.Number twelve chapter headings (e.g. 1-12) and ‘back-fill’ usingthe
proposed basis for the ‘Before’ story. Work backwards from the primary story using the timeline as a guide to the character’s/s life and the events therein that make up the first part of the novel.
9.When complete edit once and then read both stories front-to-
back starting with the ‘Before’ story, taking notes and thinking about the characters/events that will make up the ‘After’ story.
10. Use the same method, except in reverse, to write the ‘After’ story.
You may want to change the order of the three parts chronologically and switch order between the parts upon completion.
The Masters of Horror Anthology which contains my story "Devil Inside," as well as many other great stories, is now available. The print version doesn't come out till the end of April. but the digital version of the book is available now from Smashwords for $1.99. It's available in several formats including PDF, Kindle, LRM (sony), E-Pub, PDB (Palm) as well as others. Check it out if you are so inclined. You can get it here.
Hi, it's been a while as I have been working frantically to complete my novel before Christmas time. It has been a 'work in progress' for the past four years and i'm pleased to say that the end is nigh. I am editing the last draft and will have it ready for submission to publishers in the New Year. As you can probably guess from the book cover mock-up (by yours truly) and the working title, it is a novel about a killer. Actually about a family of killers to be exact, told through the journals of a budding serial killer whose twin brother is also afflicted with the same unfortunate disposition.
I guess you could place this novel under the genre banner of 'Serial Killer Fiction,' or crime fiction. I realise that this field is littered with cliched monsters all trying to replicate the success of Harris's Hannibal Lecter trilogy +, hopefully I might have succeeded in providing a new twist to the genre - or at least to the smaller sub-genre of 'First-person Serial Killer Fiction.' Whew, anyway - worth a crack, so there it is.
If I don't have any success with publishers I will probably post it here in installments for at least some people to read and hopefully enjoy.
If anyone has any publishing contacts who might be interested in this kind of work please let me know via 3cagency@gmail.com. Also, what do you think of the cover?
This seat is hard, my shins are cold, my socks are low & black with grime, my shoes are stiff, my knees ache with the weight of my worn corduroys — the night is warm & noisy, so dark it is, that abstract & absolute light which is darkness — it is so dark tonight . . . Wait! There is light, a shimmering speck, by Jehovah! & Then cans twang bottles clang & smash, paper blows its rustled way wrapping around my lower leg like a flaky piece of skin or the slap of a bird’s flapping wing & then it’s taken by another breeze in the black city night — that light small speck I saw is extinguished now by the black hulk of a looming tower block — frail barks flounder in darkness, speech silent for a still savage moment . . .
My neck is sore I crane it skyward searching the churning ether for that noisy light . . .
BOOM!!!
ZOHAR!!!
A shock of burning white light— the infinite brightness violently broke through into vision — the corneas ripped from their lethargic slumber — the howling light turns blue, bouncing off the geometric multiplicity of the chainlink fence I clutch at, frantically gasping at the light on the other side — arcing shadows dance beneath the light’s accusing glare . . . lingering — I am shaking I am fear I am death I am insane I am paralysed I can’t move I can’t see I am dead I am about to be killed. . .
Mother?
Father?
MotherFatherMother
HELP!!!
PLEASE!!!
PLEASE!!!
PLEASE!!! Please . . .?
I’m still on the bench seat in the trash-blown park, my legs nailed to my seat to the concrete thru right to burning hell . . . — STAY WHERE YOU ARE — DO NOT MOVE — IF YOU DO SO YOUR LIFE WILL BE TERMINATED — I REPEAT DO NOT MOVE —footsteps shuffling then a broken run, boots slapping asphalt louder, quite, yes there they are a stampede, ground rumbles thunderclaps hammer on steel, bombs drop resound — No, nononononono . . .
The light goes off. I am released. The sound breaks like a truck passing — a distant rumble then the noise of the dead man’s bones return to their creaking — halfalive halfalive halfalive — my breath is smoke, my eyes throb, my brain burns, my heart tries to saw its way out through my crumbling ribcage — I release a sigh, exhale, to end all sighs.
I close my eyes & feel & smell the dirty hot warm air of hell caressing my face, my hair, creeping up my trouser leg, crawling across my heaving gut & across my bruised bare chest — a massive hole now gaping blackly just above the left nipple, the icon of Mary grinning in the growing light — I lay back on the hard bench — the smog flavored morning bleeds light across the bay, a tugboat blares its horn through the fog, the trash barge shunts its bulk through the mist across the harbor to refuse island, car lights cut across the motorway invading the sleeping city, a silver-snake of train thunders past on the stilt-tracks, police sirens blare in the distance & a cold wind wipes my face.
A gull floating in on the light & breeze, eyes me suspiciously, dips its wings & turns circles above me looking down with malice & a perceptible hunger as it stretches its sharp red beak screaming at me — CAWCAWCAWCAWCAW . . . all black & white — Babylon fading . . .
In the context of the nature/nurture argument in education, this essay will attempt to explain what ‘child art’ is and how it came to exist. A basic summary of the nature/nurture argument is as follows. The naturists believe that childhood is a natural stage of development that generates its own unique experience relative to the individual child. It is a privileged stage of life; the role of education in this respect is to encourage such development with as little interference as possible. The nurturists argue that education should impart knowledge and social skills in preparation for participation in society. Children are presumed capable of learning these skills and knowledge at all stages of development to varying degrees. The polarities between these two sides show the reactive state of educational beliefs and theory. It is within this context that concepts such as ‘child art’ have evolved.
To begin this discussion it is necessary to trace the origins of the educational ideas that produced such concepts as ‘child art’. One of the early arguments, of a distinctly educational viewpoint on natural development and child rearing, is that of Jean Jacques Rousseau. His educational romance Emile, presents an unconventional (at the time of writing) view of educational and social reformation, based on his beliefs about ‘nature’ and individual freedom. His views on childhood education were centred on the notion that natural development, encouraged in accordance with the individual’s own nature, could only be achieved through “well-regulated liberty”[1]. He viewed freedom as being something controlled by the rationale of the upper classes, and the ‘unnatural’ constraints and lies imposed on individual truth, by religion and the state. Rousseau was looking for the universal nature of truth common to all “men;” it was in this search that he saw the promise of a new and ideal society. He saw childhood education as the means by which to change society through ‘natural’ development. The emphasis was on learning by individual experience, and the treatment of children in accordance with evolutionary stages of development, free from the influence of social constructs of adult morality and reason:
Natural growth calls for quite a different kind of training. The mind should be left undisturbed till its faculties have developed; for while it is blind it cannot see the torch you offer it, nor can it follow through the vast expanse of ideas a path so faintly traced by reason that the best eyes can scarcely follow it. (Emile, p. 200)
The implications and influence on pedagogical education, generated by Rousseau’s romantic notions of natural and evolutionary development, show in the ideas of educators that followed, like Freidrich Froebel, Franz Cizek, and Wilhelm Viola. Rousseau’s celebration of “natural liberty” and childhood education paved the way for notions of education, like ‘art education’ and ‘child art’, to emerge in response to the apparent need for a form of expression that was natural, and relevant, to the early stages of childhood development. As Stuart Macdonald has pointed out, ”the concept that art education for the child should differ from that for adolescents and adults stemmed from Rousseau’s scheme of education in Emile ” [2]. It must be noted that Rousseau did not place any importance or relevance on ‘art’ in relation to a child’s natural development. In fact, he saw it (‘art’) as a corrupting influence that was morally ‘bad’ and detrimental to nature at that stage of a human’s life. Rousseau’s naturist ideas were largely idealistic and romantic, and because of this, they were not coherent enough at the time to justify as a form of education for children. Froebel, along with others, developed the ideas expressed by Rousseau as a basis for such an education. Froebel believed that drawing was the means by which children developed naturally. He developed the concept of ‘Kindergarten’ as a place for individual children to develop in accordance with the laws of nature. Froebel’s ideas were scientific in that he used esoteric precepts of psychology, in relation to understanding what a child’s drawing represented:
Beautiful drawing . . . demands the spontaneous, skilled use of the senses . . . the development required for drawing, conditions in the same way a harmoniously unfolded soul, a feeling, experiencing mind, as well as a thoughtfully comparing, intelligent, and perceptive intellect, forming judgement, correct conclusion, and so, finally, an idea of that which is to be formed . . .
As can be seen, his naturist idealism peppered with psychological jargon, shines through in his views about the importance of child drawings. His educational philosophy, which is based on the notion that the child is a self-determined vessel of creativity, inspired other educators and artists later on like Franz Cizek, Paul Klee, Alexander Bain, and the Bloomsbury group, to name a few. Like Froebel and Rousseau, Herbert Spencer championed the naturist ideals about drawing and childhood education, except he “modified [it] . . . from the scientific viewpoint of a nineteenth century evolutionist”[3].
Spencer saw children’s drawing as an evolutionary process. In fact, he believed it was the main factor in human development. He was of the opinion that the science of psychology was the means by which education could develop, and a culture could come to understand itself, through the interpretation of children’s drawings. Thus, childhood art education became important as a tool to understanding and determining “self-culture” and progressing as a culture in general.
Spencer’s educational theories attacked the nurturist arguments of mass-education theorists like Henry Cole, who ran state controlled institutions that were geared up for social and industrial production. Spencer’s ideas were also nurturist, in the sense that they supported utilitarian ideas of training children to be productive members of society. However, his ideas were more naturist in origin (following on from Rousseau’s ‘nature of the child’), in that they argued that there is a natural development process (“phylogenesis”) in drawing, that should be integrated into childhood education. Spencer’s ideas are also important to the concept of ‘child art’ because any development (according to him) in the individual, and therefore the whole society, could be influenced and reflected by the drawings of the child. While it must be said at this stage that the drawings of children were not yet considered as art works, there was great importance placed on their significance as indicators of cultural and biological development. Although there was a large void of disagreement between the two factions of thought (nature & nurture), ‘art education’ became an increasingly important concept to the curriculum of schools and to the educational theories of both sides. Cole is important here in this instance for he implemented the establishment of art schools in England, art training for teachers, and compulsory art education as a subject on an equal footing with other subjects. This is important in relation to the origins of ‘child art’ as well, because it generated interest in children’s drawings and paintings, in such a way that they became viewed as ‘art works’. In other words, this social change provided the impetus and the infrastructure, wherein the claims and ideas about ‘art’ education and making ‘art-works’, as being essential to a child’s ‘natural’ development, began to be seen as educationally beneficial and logically defensible. With this implementation, and despite the negative impact on the radically nurturist Kensington system, ‘Art education’ (rather than ‘drawing education’) became to be a valid and accepted part of the infrastructure of educational teaching and training (educators). Alexander Bain helped this along by following on where Spencer left off. In maintaining that “Drawing was not a universal mind-trainer, but also that art appreciation, or the cultivation of ‘Art-Emotion’ as he put it, was the important factor in education, not Drawing” [4]. His idea was that art education provided the means by which children could have fun and express themselves creatively. Other educational thought developed along the same lines until the idea of art education was more acceptable in Victorian education circles. So far, children’s drawings were still not considered viable art forms, like other established adult art works and movements. The rise in anthropological studies and scientific (in particular, psychological) research changed all that with their growing interest in child drawing as an important means of developmental research. The influential and growing relationship, between education and science, meant that this perceived importance transferred to the educators, curriculum, and to the type of experience drawing was considered as. The Kensington attitude toward children’s drawings, as only having commercial value in industry, was its main weak point as it was in contrast to developmental (and naturist) scientific beliefs, which had popular and governmental support. ‘Art’ began to evolve as a practice along with the changing times. The continuing (but waning) influence of Romanticism encouraged a new style of expression that was more ‘primitive’ and ‘natural’, with an emphasis on the individual, freedom (in thought and from authority), and the ‘symbolic’. Like science, ‘art movements’ represented new ideas and invention, which had profound influence on the intellectual culture in which they existed. Children’s drawings were beginning to be seen, like the cave drawings of ‘primitive man’, in the context of symbolic interpretation and meaning. Comparisons between ancient ‘primitive’ cultures and children’s drawings increased, as artists became interested in ‘primitivism’ and the symbolic nature of cultural artefacts. The connection became apparent and soon artists saw in children’s works, that which they tried so hard to replicate in their own ‘art works’. Children were seen as ‘artists’, naturally endowed with ‘artistic talent’, who could perceive their social and natural environment with an innocently naïve sense of truth and insight, reminiscent of primitive adult cultures from the past (Palaeolithic Age) and the present (Aborigine). This increasing concern with ‘culture’ and of children as artists whose work represents “the primordial origins of art”[5], was typical of artists like Pablo Picasso, Paul Klee, and many others, who delighted and strove for the same kind of rawness and meaning in their own work. Like the nature/nurture arguments, these new theories on ‘art’ became embroiled with debate as to what the work in question signified. One thing that came from the debates of the modern movements, was that ‘primitive art’, and therefore ‘child art’, were viable art forms. Herbert Read suggested that “a growing appreciation of primitive art, tribal art and revolutionary developments in modern painting helped to bring children’s art within the general range of aesthetic appreciation” [6]. Franz Cizek, perhaps more so than others, defined what ‘child art’ was and what he thought it should be:
Child Art was disregarded, ridiculed, and scoffed at. Even now people visit me who, when I show them real infantile work, only laugh. I estimate very highly those things done by small children. They are the first and purest source of artistic creation . . .
and more definitively:
Child Art is an art which only the child can produce. There is something that the child can also perform, but that we do not call art. It is imitation, it is artificial. [7]
Cizek approached art education with a naturist view. His theory on child art, obviously influenced by naturist idealism, was a reaction against logic-bound, scientifically based, notions of education and child development. Whilst he still used scientific concepts to explain art, he based his ideas on naturist convictions, “all true art contains psychology, but so wonderfully dosed as only nature can dose” [8]. With the conviction of his own ideas and studies and the views of his other artisan comrades, Cizek concluded that children were naturally gifted as artists and producers of art works. He saw this quality in children in somewhat phenomenological terms, in that it was separate from the adult art world. Children were individuals who perceived the world on a more instinctual and natural plane than adults did. Paradoxically, it was this adult experienced (and therefore morally corrupt, re. Rousseau) world, that must not influence the children’s. Cizek believed in the innate will of the child to be creative and to develop ‘naturally’ (re, Froebel) and in the power of nature to develop humans free from unnatural and socially constructed constraints (i.e., morals, sin, reason etc). Cizek’s theories on art education and child art, may display inconsistencies and contradiction, but to explain them, along with all the other flaws in the other theories mentioned, would take more word space than this essay will allow. The major flaw in Cizek’s theory was that his own adult influence was a major factor in the production of paintings and drawings by his child students. Obvious training in technical aspects and adult ideas of artistic practice and formality/tradition were reflected in the children’s highly stylised and competent works. So what was essentially a naturist theory of art education, based on his own ideas and those of Rousseau and Froebel, was in practice a nurturist based exercise in art training that steered the children far from their natural stages of creative development (maybe?). Cizeks’ theory provided a model for future art educators to base their justifications of their discipline on. This artistic ideology was the high-water mark of naturist education theory, just as Cole’s was the nurturist extreme. The gradual shift of focus in the ideology and allegiances of the education theorists, anthropologists, and from artists, culminated in debate to look for connections between ‘primitivism’ and the adolescent production of ‘art’. Artistic movements, more so perhaps than educators, contributed to the evolution of childhood art education and concepts about ‘child art’ through their assimilation and recognition of the drawing and painting of children as a viable art form.
NOTES:
[1] See Readings in the History of Educational Thought, ‘Rosseau’, edited by Alan Cohen & Norman Garner (London: University of London Press Ltd) p. 91.
[2] See The History and Philosophy of Art Education, Ch. 18, ‘The Recognition of Child Art’, by Stuart Macdonald (London: University of London Press ltd.) p. 318.
[3] Ibid, p. 321.
[4] Ibid, pp. 324 - 325.
[5] Quote from Paul Klee.
[6] See The History and Philosophy of Art Education, Ch. 18, ‘The Recognition of Child Art’, by Stuart Macdonald (London: University of London Press ltd.) p. 329.
[7] See Child Art, by Wilhelm Viola, Ch. IV, ‘From Talks With Cizek’ (London: University of London Press, 1948) pp. 32 – 34.
John of Patmos was a writer and a seer; also rumoured to be the Apostle, the Divine, and later the Saint. Whoever he really was — it is apparent from most accounts that no one really knows with any surety — ‘he’ was and is the author of the Apocalypse known as Revelation. It is a distinctive piece of religious doctrine, different and distant in tone and brevity from the other works contained in the Old and New Testament, making it ironically one of the most quoted and read books of the Bible. Its apparent prophetic nature and strange twists of style and image figuratively transport the reader to a world of imaginative and spiritual possibilities. ‘Cleaved’ between realms of belief and amazement, most readers, religious or not, become mesmerised by the violent ‘vision’ of John. It is according to the text itself a divinely inspired apocalyptic version of human existence, which, ultimately, defies any definitive interpretation of meaning. It does however invite a non-theological literary or aesthetic estimation of its value, because of its highly evocative rhetorical style, according to principles and theories known to a student of literature and the arts. The contention of this essay is to discuss certain aspects of Revelation and the King James Bible, [1] with the aid of relevant literary perspectives, both modern and classical.
This essay does not attempt an interpretation of the meaning of the text, as this is rather pointless in terms of my own limited biblical knowledge and the vast screeds of criticism already available on the subject. Nor do I intend to give a biographical account of the authors’ lives to contextualise meaning, due largely to the doubtful nature of the authors’ identities of the two main texts I use. The fact that understanding the text in terms of meaning is difficult, leads me to look at the style and technicality of such an artefact, in order to understand its value as a literary work. Aesthetic criteria or a technical analysis applied to the text of Revelation reveals that its most noticeable feature is its ‘sublimity’ in accordance with various theories of rhetoric and the sublime from classical through to modern times. Despite its religious nature, obvious allegiances to rhetorical principles make it both an aesthetically appreciable work of literature, and a mystically devout theological transcript.
Similarly, like Revelation, the question of authorship has been a point of conjecture by critics regarding another classical text: Peri Hypsous or On the Sublime. [2] Originally, thought to be written by Cassius Longinus, and then later regarded as the work of an unknown Greek author in the 1st Century BC. It is the first real treatment of the concept of ‘hypsous’, otherwise known as the sublime. Saint John the apostle and evangelist is regarded as being the writer of Revelation and, like Longinus, his authority has also been called into question by scholars and historians alike. [3] Aside from the confusion about the authors of the texts, they both appear to be written about the same period by ‘cultured Greeks’ as D.H. Lawrence calls them. [4] Rhetorical antecedents inform both texts: On the Sublime follows traditional lines of Greek literary criticism from Homer through Aristotle and Horace to Longinus. [5] Revelation is the apocalyptic pinnacle of prophetic verse. The use of metaphor, symbol, and analogy making it a rhetorically proficient and profound text.
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To say that Revelation is sublime is to pose a hypothetical argument, as well as an aesthetic value judgement, which is exactly what this essay intends to do. The fact that rhetorically aesthetic criterion from antiquity like Longinus’ can be applied to a religious 17th Century text like the King James Bible, reflects the timeless nature of certain fundamental principles of literary excellence, and also the literary appeal of the KJB to 18th Century aestheticians and writers like Edmund Burke. The tone and didactic confidence of the voice of John, combined with the depth and omnipresence of his subject, makes for strong verse, well within the range of most theories of the sublime:
Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand . . . Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty. (Rev 1:3-8)
The difference between a classical theory of poetic language like Longinus’ and an aesthetic theory like Burke’s is that the latter post-dates the former which as a consequence is relevant to the author’s (John’s) use of literary device. Because it may predate John’s work, Longinus’ theory quite possibly could have been an influence on his method, whether by direct contact or just a temporal culmination of traditional, cultural and contemporary literary practice and theory. Certain aspects of Longinus’ ideas, his regional location and era, and his own treatment of Genesis puts his work in the context of John’s literary and social knowledge. However, Burke’s treatise is applicable in discerning sublimity within the text, from an 18th Century perspective of psychological and aesthetic understanding. The other obvious difference is that one concentrates on linguistic function, whereas the other’s focus is on artistic and physiological effect.
Whether Longinus has any direct bearing on Revelation is purely hypothetical and debatable, yet as far as literary tradition goes, every work (divine or not) is logically influenced by a genealogy of ideas, linguistics and inspirational textual precursors. To ascertain the sublimity of Revelation in a literary context, I will apply select aspects of Longinus and Burke’s individual theories of the sublime, providing two different perspectives of the primary text. The interesting facet of my discussion is that both interpretations, using precepts divided by a millennium and a half of Western literary tradition, have essentially the same conclusion. That is, Revelation is interpretable as a text that uses a concept of the sublime, similar to Longinus’ and Burke’s, as a literary mode.
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Longinus suggests in his treatise On the Sublime that art is the mediator of the innate ability to perceive, convey, and utilise the sublime. There are five sources of the sublime, the first two being innate, the last three the ’product of art’. They are: “the ability to form grand conceptions . . . stimulus of powerful and inspired passion . . . the proper formation of two types of figure, figures of thought and figures of speech, together with the creation of a noble diction, which in its turn may be resolved into the choice of words, the use of imagery, and the elaboration of the style. The fifth source of grandeur, which embraces all those I have already mentioned, is the total effect resulting from dignity and elevation.” [6] The first two of these precepts is characteristic of Revelation and to most of the other apocalyptic works of the Bible. These two aspects are almost stereotypical character traits of the religious prophet also; John reveals himself to have these ‘innate’ abilities in his writing. This divine aspect of Longinus’ theory connects the sublime via literature to religion, as David Norton points out in A History of the Bible as Literature:
Longinus pushes both these sources towards divinity. Sublimity is not just ‘the echo of a noble mind’ (Ch. 9, p. 109); it ‘carries one up to where one is close to the majestic mind of God’ (Ch. 36, p. 147) . . . Sublimity bespeaks divinity. So too does the Bible. It was [and still is] difficult, following Longinus, not to think of the Bible as sublime, especially as he himself, in a famous passage, had taken one of his examples of sublimity from the Bible. [7]
One passage from Longinus almost describes exactly John’s reaction and mimetic experience, as a noble vessel for Christ’s spirit and the ‘word of God’:
certain emanations are conveyed from the genius of the men of old into the souls of those who emulate them, and, breathing in these influences, even those who show very few signs of inspiration derive some degree of divine enthusiasm from the grandeur of their predecessors. (Ch. 13, p.119)
John’s own inspiration to write, stems from the direct influence of his religious idol Christ, and his sublime experience of the ultimate artistic creator — God:
I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book. (Rev. 1:9-10)
The ability to conceptualise and vocalise the grand thoughts of Christ and God is echoed in this passage from Revelation. According to Longinus, this very act characterizes ‘nobility of the soul’.
John’s descriptions of ‘beasts’ with “seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion”(Rev. 15:1-2); are typical of the imagery he uses to induce a sense of the sublime, in order to convey the severity of God’s judgement and to emphasize the horror of hell and its minions. The ‘inspired passion’ of the narrator is obvious enough. The symbolic imagery, vigour of speech, intensity of vision and hyperbolic emotion, pervades the text. For example: “And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength. And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead” (Rev. 1:16-17).
For Longinus, rhetorical figures invoke the sublime when their utility is well hidden; the fact that John’s text is one complete metaphor makes it sublime in its simplicity and in its technical covetousness. The phrasing of the verse is neither too alliterative, unless to impress the sound of the sense, or too plain as to be mediocre. There is an economy of words that enforces the repetition of images and ideas of a profound nature on the mind of the reader. Sections throughout have a bard-like quality to their diction that seems to lull the reader into a trance-like state, with the hypnotic (over) tones of a satanic tempter:
And the angel said unto me, Wherefore didst thou marvel? I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns. The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition: and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose names were not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is. (Rev. 17:7 -8)
As the last book of the KJB, Revelation needed to be special — to be able to impress upon the mind of the reader the severe consequences of faithlessness and the words and miracle of John’s ‘vision’. It serves to heighten the sense of Christian beliefs by describing, in vividly imaginative terms, the antithetical options available to the unrepentant.
Whether written in terms of a-priori aesthetic or doctrinal ideals, Revelation inspires an imaginative interpretation in the literary-minded reader, rather than a spiritual awakening or re-enforcement of belief from a theological perspective. However, even from an aesthetically focused viewpoint, the most ‘disinterested’ objectivity of an art critic sways with the imagination’s subjective metamorphosis of the mystical symbols of the Apocalypse. The power of evocative images, prophetic language of a delusional seer, combined with the wrathful plans of a despotic God, causes the reader to fall back on either their logical beliefs or imagination to make sense of it all. Caught somewhere between these systems of mind, is the nagging doubt that this strangely compelling narrative is too fantastic to be factual, or too profound to be fiction. In other words, it leads us to believe in something or to question the text’s validity as a work of literature.
In terms of Longinus’ ideas of rhetoric and sublimity, Revelation could well have been an example in his treatise if it had been written a few centuries earlier. In order to understand the sublime, if we ever can, we must have some notion of what exists beyond our physical world. Longinus explains that this “beyond” is metaphorical, the sublime—illusion, a human construct designed to extend the imagination and the limits of our world. The sublime is that which defies logical sense and the imagining of what the ethereal sublime actually is. What is God, what is hell? It is that whose infinite presence reduces all else to disillusion, a force that affects the individual’s own system of values and beliefs in relation to their existence. This consideration produces prophets, seers, and artists like John. This thing called the sublime, whether by Longinus or Burke’s definition, is only a name applied to a feeling one gets when encountering something beyond the grasp of our words. Whatever it is can really only be described in literary terms, as Ludwig Wittgenstein suggests:
That the world is my world, shows itself in the fact that the limits of the language (the language which I understand) mean the limits of my world. [8]
These limits of expression, these experiences of the sublime feeling, are what Burke attempts to harness by literary definition; beginning where Longinus left off and where John had already gone in Revelation.
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Given Burke’s criteria for the sublime in A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, parts of the Revelation at the end of the New Testament are sublime. It is an example of a text that emphasises the sublimity and grandeur of a supernatural world and an omnipresent God. Burke’s account of the sublime, places importance on the perception of subjects in relation to physiological senses. This notion of Burke’s differs from the concept of the sublime established by Longinus. Burke notes physiological states and sensory experience as a-priori conditions for the sublime, whereas before, the experience lay in the interpretation of the word image.
The primary source of the sublime, for Burke, is ‘power,’ with its main effect being ‘terror’ or ‘astonishment.’ The sublime, according to Burke, is “an idea belonging to self-preservation”(Enquiry, p. 79) that produces terror, fear, pain, and is characterised by obscurity, danger, power, greatness of dimension, vastness of extent, infinity (eternity) and magnificence. Further features of the sublime are loudness (of sound), suddenness (of movement or sound), intermittent light (and sound), darkness, confusion, and dullness in colour. The most important passion caused by the sublime, is that which is described by Burke under the heading of “Terror”:
No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear. For fear being an apprehension of pain or death, it operates in a manner that resembles actual pain. Whatever therefore is terrible, with regard to sight, is sublime too. [9]
The self-realisation of human mortality and frailty, in the face of the immortal and numinous ‘idea’ of a wrathful unseen God, is what instils fear in our hearts, with the result that we experience the sublime sensation of terror or horror. Therefore, anything that is sublime for Burke inspires fear or inflicts pain upon our senses. As pointed out earlier these are what he calls “the passions which concern self-preservation”, (36) and these passions are what Burke considers, “the most powerful of all the passions”. In Revelation, these passions of fear operate in tandem with what Burke terms ‘astonishment’, the state when “the mind is so entirely filled with its object, that it cannot entertain any other, nor by consequence reason on that object which employs it” (Enquiry, p.53). This passion of fear is caused by the overwhelming vastness of dimension and sublimity in nature, in contrast to human powerlessness and inferiority in the face of its power and majesty. Revelation has twice the sublimity of a response to nature; it is an emotional response to God, nightmarish in its imagery and effect:
And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves . . . And after three days and an half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them. And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them. And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven. (Rev., 11:9—13)
As Burke points out (in the section on vastness), things of “magnitude” are sublime, and so too is the “last extreme of littleness”. He sums up by comparing it to the “still diminishing scale of existence” (Enquiry, II, VII, 66). The obscurity of God’s presence and the clarity of his wrath are enough to render him near entirely sublime, in accordance with Burke’s account, as is his power and ability to inspire in most creatures “the passion of self-preservation”. The figure of God (because of his great power) is the most sublime and all-powerful character of Revelation. Burke states in the Enquiry, “power is undoubtedly a capital source of the sublime” (II, V, 64). It is this section on ‘Power’, which is the most relevant to this discussion of Revelation as a sublime work:
And indeed, the ideas of pain, and above all of death, are so very affecting, that whilst we remain in the presence of whatever is supposed to have the power of inflicting either, it is impossible to be free from terror. (Enquiry, p.59)
The power of God, over Satan and his legion of sinners, is emphasised by John. The superiority of God’s power is what makes pain and redemption possible for all things inferior to his hierarchical force, i.e. us (humans), apart from the unredeemable Satan of course. As Burke points out, “wheresoever we find strength, and in what light soever we look upon power, we shall all along observe the sublime and the concomitant of terror “ (II, V, 61). The terror in Revelation is in the fear of God’s power. After all, the wielding of redemption by death has to be the most sublime way to enter the ‘temple’ of heaven, which is also a place so sublime it is beyond human imagining:
And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God, and from his power; and no man was able to enter into the temple, till the seven plagues of the seven angels were fulfilled. (Rev., 15:8)
Given Burke’s account of the criteria for the sublime, Revelation is an example of a sublime work. The representation of power is the most significant characteristic of the work’s sublimity. Similarly, the depiction of terror, fear, power, darkness, depth, vastness, privation, and obscurity, all come together in the text to fulfil the criteria of what Burke considers the sublime.
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Either the reader who comes to the Book of Revelation is a scholar, a Christian, or just curious as to how it all ends (the Bible and the world, as we know it). The non-Christian reader might look at the Bible because it is a book. Flicking through the lucid and profound chapters of Genesis, maybe appreciating some of the Psalms or the Book of Job, noticing the ‘poetic’ qualities of the text as they proceed. By taking the Aristotelian shortcut of a traditional ‘speed-reading’: perusing the beginning, the middle, and finally the end, the reader is shocked out of a conventional reading by the violent confusion and sublimity of Revelation. It has the effect of making one reflect on what they have read prior, in order to understand its complex and quite surrealistic images and density. It also turns the reader around, driving them back to the other books of the Bible, to cross-reference the highly symbolic words and events.
Of course, such a reading presumes that the Bible is a complete narrative and not an anthology of religious texts from different eras and peoples. If Revelation itself were read separately, it would be no harder or less difficult to read, than say The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot. On its own, Revelation is probably more appreciable as a literary work without the detritus balance of the hefty Bible. What is unavailable to the imagination is what makes it such a sublime text according to Longinus and Burke. The variations of interpretation extend its range beyond a factual account of “the word of God”, to the unlimited possibilities of human creativity and existence. Whether this effect is caused by the passionately obscure ‘apocalyptic’ style — the English translation of a Greek text — or the possibility the literary mode of the Longinian sublime was used to provoke aesthetic and/or spiritual reaction, is beyond definition. What is not beyond recognition is the fact that the reader brings to the text, much in the same way as the writer does, influences and contexts from the sphere of their own experience and expectations.
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NOTES/WORKS CITED
[1] The Holy Bible,The King James Version, (Cambridge: Cambridge) 1769. 12:7-11. From hereon all references to the Authorised King James Version of the Holy Bible will be referenced with the abbreviation KJB.
[2] See Aristotle/Horace/ Longinus, Classical Literary Criticism, translated by T. S. Dorsch (London: Penguin Books, 1965) pp. 97-158.
[3] All historical and factual data given henceforth, regarding biblical characters, authors, events, places and times, is from: William Smith; revised and edited by F.N. and M.A. Peloubet, Smith’s Bible dictionary [computer file], electronic ed., Logos Library System, (Nashville: Thomas Nelson) 1997.
[4] See Apocalypse and the Writings on Revelation, by D.H. Lawrence, ed. by Mara Kalnins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980), p. 66:18-19. An interesting, lively, subjective and comprehensive account of Lawrence’s beliefs and studies about Revelation. Provides an account of commentaries and conjecture regarding aspects covered briefly in this essay, i.e. authorship, literary attributes and attitudes.
[5] Hereon, for the sake of convenience, I shall use ‘Longinus’ as the author’s name of On the Sublime as no other name is forthcoming.
[6] See Aristotle/Hrace/ Longinus, Classical Literary Criticism, translated by T. S. Dorsch (London: Penguin Books, 1965) p. 108.
[7] See A History of the Bible as literature: Volume Two, From 1700 to the Present Day, by David Norton (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp.6—7.
[8] See Tractatus Logico Philosophicus, by Ludwig Wittgenstein (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd, 1933), p.151.
[9] Edmund Burke, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas on the Beautiful and the Sublime, ed. Adam Phillips, Oxford World’s Classics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998) p. 53. From hereon, the abbreviated title Enquiry, will be used for this edition.
