books – Jane Tawel

To My Friends Reading Here, Feast on This

by Jane Tawel

assorted title book lot — https://unsplash.com/photos/eeSdJfLfx1A

A friend posted an article today entitled, “The Case Against Shakespeare” and the article, (not my friend) both angered and saddened me. The bottom line of this article was that we shouldn’t “force” any one to read the classics like Shakespeare because this keeps someone from learning to love to read. Now if I only take that one argument, all I need is a subscription to Netflix and a video game to prove the author wrong on why people don’t read anymore. However, one thing made my head want to explode, and of course I had to write about it. Of course I wanted to share my meager but impassioned thoughts with my trusted WordPress friends, my community of writers who keep the love of art and life alive in the little corner of the world in which I choose to dialogue with others and the platform upon which I have the occasional soliloquy published on.

I am grateful for the community of like and sometimes unlike souls that I have found amongst you. Keep writing, keep teaching, keep yelling into the howl, or lighting candles on the dark way, or dancing in the rain, or just sharing where you are at and who you are today. And I am grateful to each of you for including me in the “company of fools and players” that we create together here and sincerely and humbly thankful for you, whether you like Shakespeare or not.

Cheers — Jane

My Convoluted Case FOR Shakespeare

The author of this article, “The Case Against Shakespeare”, may have a point about Shakespeare but his analysis of literature and what it’s purpose is and why it should be read and how it should be taught breaks my heart and makes my poor Literature / Writing teacher’s mind go ballistic. I have spent a life time trying to help students and sundry others try to overcome this philosophy. So, as I teach my students to write boldly, I shall simply say, the author could not be more wrong. I hope to encourage him and others to rethink the purpose of reading, much in the way we should all constantly rethink the purpose of our lives.

One point of his only I will take up, and that is the author’s comment that “literature doesn’t exist for its symbols and imagery, nor are they the reason authors write”(Stratton). Woe! (Sound of hair being torn out!) The person who is not taught the importance of symbol and metaphor, imagery and the allusive allure of alliteration is not being fed by the best in our literary history; but instead, in the cause of “getting ahead”. That deprived person is being starved by an education focused on a future practical use of that person’s brain or brawn, not focused on their well-being, their being well, and the fact that every human being has always wanted to be much more than a cog in a well-oiled machine or a pamphlet that is glanced at then tossed in the trash. We long to be poetry, to have poetic justice, to be understood in all of our mystery and meaningfulness, and to think that we can be taught to read without being taught how to learn any of that about the human condition or the world or the universe or the mysteries beyond is a tragedy long in the making.

To be taught and coaxed, goaded and coddled in not books, but literature, not reading, but exploring and expanding the mind, heart, and soul — this is the charge of those of us in the past and present to pass on to our future and our children and our children’s children. We all must keep desiring the wherewithal of how to spend a lifetime in the exploration of the changes in the meaning behind the meaning, the sublimity of poetry, the divine essence beyond mere rational debate of the written word, comparable to that of the played symphony or the painted masterpiece. The person who is not taught and encouraged in this philosophy, is not merely uneducated in the type of classical, heady stuff that endures the passage of time, but unschooled in what it means to be the best human being a person can be. That is what Shakespeare can teach us today, yes, after all these years.

And of course, this poor human who is taught merely to read, and not to delve into the unfathomable treasures hidden in the deeps of the written word, that one will never have those moments of divine revelation, the sublimity of being awed by the essence of “The Why”, nor the hope that we really are more than black and white words on a page; much more than simplistic, useful, practical, or merely entertaining and entertained commodities.

Why one can not even understand what it means to be nothing more than “dust in the wind” or to have “everything to a season”, or to, as the poet read at the recent inauguration of a U.S. President, what it means to “brave the belly of the beast” and be as brave as we must be on ‘The Hill We Climb”(Gorman). No, one can not simply be taught to read, but must be taught how to read and above all Why to read. One can not be left to wade in the shallow end forever, to never know what it is to dive and swim. We must not be afraid of not knowing and not understanding, but we should be terrified of never immersing ourselves in the deep waters of great literature and poetry, never climbing to the apex of the mountain ranges of great artists, past and present, and still always to aim to climb higher and higher, and always finding more mystery there, even on the pinnacles of greatness.

The person who is not stretched early to expand the mind through literature and plays, poetry and Psalms, has a bleak, spirit-less life ahead of him or her. How to read Holy Scripture without being taught how to read poetry? How to listen to Amanda Gorman without first trying to stretch the brain on the poetry of Shakespeare or Frost, Whitman or Hughes or Angelou or the Psalms of David or prophetic metaphors of Isaiah? How to hope and dream for a better world without understanding the complicated but profound works of Dickens or Gabriel Marquez, Dumas, or Dostoevsky? How to understand America without being taught how to read Twain, Fitzgerald, Steinbeck? How to understand China without attempting to understand Wang Wei or Cao Xueqin? How to understand Latin or South America if one hasn’t been taught the poem “They Have Threatened Us with Resurrection”, by Julia Esquivel? How to march for Black Lives Matter without reading the essays of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. or the poetry of Langston Hughes? How to know what it is to be from somewhere that you aren’t, to be someone you aren’t, and then how to realize that once you walk in someone else’s moccasins in the poetry of Native American poet Laureate, Jo Harjo or immerse yourself in some other place or time’s literature, and to find that one can turn a corner or turn a page and be stunned by the realization that we are all so much more alike than we could have ever guessed, and we are all much more unique and special than we could ever hope for!

Spending a lifetime trying to read anything without a basic understanding and at least grudging admiration of symbol and metaphor and imagery, is like spending a lifetime trying to dine on steak and potatoes or baguettes and cheese or sushi and cupcakes by trying to suck on them out of a baby bottle. Not being taught the joys of chewing on poetry and imbibing great literature is like having your teeth ripped out and not being allowed to taste when you masticate.

Let alone personal enjoyment, we haven’t even begun to wonder how one would find expression of one’s own deepest emotions and thoughts, in any relationship of love, whether of a God or of a mate or of a friend or of a tree or of cat or dog or garden or sunset — of anything or anyone that awes us. How would we enthuse over all of that which exists beyond the mundane, that which surpasses and endures the test of time?

And why can’t one be entertained by C.S. Lewis, or Lewis Carroll, or Stevenson, or Barrie, or Nikki Grimes or Rowling and still learn about symbolism, metaphor, allusion, and irony (God knows, we need to learn something about irony in America!)

By all means if someone can find writers today who do poetry as well as Shakespeare or Dickinson or Frost or Neruda or the Psalms or even Silverstein, by all means, teach it and read it. Feel free to add to Dostoevsky and Steinbeck and Dickens and Forster and Angelou, some novels by Atwood or Ishiguro for deep thinking. Include with the reading of Wordsworth and Cummings, modern poets like Claudia Rankine or Amanda Gorman, and with Shakespeare and Chekhov, plays by Miller or Shephard, along with the Shakespearean-worthy plays by Tony Kushner or Lin-Manuel Miranda (although on my salary I doubt I will ever actually see “Hamilton”). Teach everything but Shakespeare if you don’t have the heart for it, but for pity’s sake, don’t throw the baby out with the bath-water, nor the metaphors out with the dated conversations or jokes.

If it is tough to read or hard to understand, remind yourself there is nothing harder to understand than the human being; and nothing tougher than going through life without beauty and mystery, or empathy and wonder. Poetry and great literature will help you with all the tough parts, and if it doesn’t always exactly make life easier, it certainly will make it more worthwhile.

The dearth of education today lies in our thinking that all we have to do is teach reading and practical skills, not how to think, or how to feel and express those thoughts and feelings to others. The lack is not in not learning to love reading, but in not learning that by reading great literature, or by attempting to write down ourselves on page or screen, those ideas and ideals that require poetry and metaphor and imagery — in this lies something worth working at, something worth learning, yay, even something to be challenged by, to love and at times even to cherish. We must attempt, first the taking in, and then the expression of those human creative endeavors that try to narrate something more lasting and meaningful than an entertainment interrupted by yet another car insurance commercial. By those excellent and artistic forms of muse-inspired communications, we are enlarged, we are made to be “more”.

We have to learn, or relearn, be inspired by or remember how to find those things worth reading that teach and inspire us to live with meaning into a life that is richer, fuller, and paradoxically, metaphorically more human and more divine.

The world is full of that which we can not understand with a mere glance, nor a nod to being simply knowledgeable. We must teach and inspire within ourselves and others the hope and faith that there is more to living life than acquiring a desire to use and gain more “stuff” by our knowledge.

We will only truly gain the fullness of a life well-lived when we learn to desire to be awed. As the Bard himself says in one of the plays people don’t think we should read, “the time of life is short; to spend that shortness basely, were too long”.

The mystery of that which defies all comprehension but that which is expressed by our artists, by the shared hopes, dreams and experiences of humankind, and by the ineffable faith and progress of our greatest ideas and ideals, the stuff of our lives set to poetry awaits our engagement to be One with the Sublime. Reading the “good stuff” can even just be a rollicking good time, and vastly more fun than the literary junk food we are led to believe we can get by on. Let’s stop teaching others to spit out the good food of great art before they even try it. We all need to know how to look for the tastiest morsels, how to “taste and see that it is good”*.

As for me, to riff on the Bard once more, “if poetry and literature be the food of love, give me excess of it; that surfeiting, the appetite may sicken and so die”.

Here’s to the banquet feast of the written word. Feast on!

https://thehill.com/homenews/news/535052-read-transcript-of-amanda-gormans-inaugural-poem

Quotes from “Henry IV” and “Twelfth Night” by William Shakespeare

“The Case Against Shakespeare”. Stratton, Allan. The Walrus. March 31, 2021

*Psalm 34:8

Dr. Seuss Becomes the Protagonist

Because I just had to on this one, let me just say: About the hullabaloo on the six Seuss books, none of which are my favorites and probably aren’t anybody’s favorites anyway. It is the Dr. Seuss Enterprise itself removing a few of the books because of stereotypes in the drawings that were once accepted and now are hurtful and seen as prejudice-causing. This makes Dr. Seuss the protagonist in this story. Now about the antagonists.

Whatever the heck do people think they mean by “cancel culture” of which term is just another labeling devise I have no desire to understand. Children should be protected by parents as they see fit, no matter the genre anyway. And we should all want to help children be better equipped for the future of living and loving and growing together than their parents were. That’s called “love culture” and “progressive culture”.

When children grow up, they will hopefully have been educated to make their own better and best decisions, apart from whatever “culture” is prevalent in their home or their neighborhood. Children will still enjoy all the classic Seuss books for many years to come, I have no doubt, and learn the important lessons many of those books teach besides how to read. I hope children also learn from the Dr. Seuss Enterprise’s decision to do the right thing at the right time. I don’t really understand this whole labeling of things — if something in any one’s, nation’s, religion’s history is now no longer, as Phil. 4:8 says, “true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy” then we should as moral, ethical caring- for -other -human beings let it go into the past and be honorably or dishonorably buried there. That’s not censuring, that’s not banning, that is not taking down important monuments. That is simply doing the right thing at the right time for the right reasons.

I think some people need to stop letting their hearts be three sizes too small as if Seuss’ Grinch were autobiographical and imitate the protagonist in my own favorite Seuss book, “Horton Hears a Who”. Because folks, “a person’s a person no matter how small” and sacrificing as Horton does for the smallest, weakest, and most vulnerable in our midst is what makes true heroes and heroines, no matter who is writing the stories.

Holding Pattern

By Jane Tawel

Richard Foster, in his book, Celebration of Discipline, advises to “hold things lightly in your hands”.

I’m trying to visualize what that might mean. What if my goal was: Instead of buying, borrow from the library or a friend; instead of owning, rent; instead of grasping at more, let go of more; and instead of being busier, become less needed.

I have a couple of friends, Deanne and Richard and Florence, who are trying to help me let go of the thousands of books I have. I love books. I mean, I really love them. I love holding them, snuggling with them, touching them, writing cute notes and serious notes inside them, laughing with them, crying with them, thinking through important stuff with them, delighting in them, digesting them, getting excited by them, and fondly telling others about them. I have read books with my children, I have taught books, shared books with book clubs and small groups, discussed books, and written about books. Books are the first thing I like to see (after coffee) in the morning and the last thing I like to see before I turn off the light at night ( I don’t need to technically see my cute husband, he just spoons right in when he comes to bed).

Some of my books are here to stay until I see if I have grandkids to read them to. Some of my books, I read and use over and over again, like Dallas Willard’s The Divine Conspiracy or The Lord of the Rings Trilogy or The Phantom Tollbooth. But some books I could and should let go of but I just don’t want to. I like them. They are like childhood friends, or mentors — we’ve grown up together and are still growing up together. Books are like children who are always well-behaved and who always like me.

But speaking of children, what I am really having a hard time with and always have and fear I always will, is holding my children lightly in my hands. There is that constant throbbing underneath the surface that if I do not hold them secured by the three tightened strands of worry, prayer, and good advice, that there will come that knock on the door followed by the worst words any parent ever hears from the officer on the other side. Loosen just one of those strands tying my child to safety, good choices and eternal happiness and the whole balloon of her or his life will float wildly into the path of onrushing metaphoric air traffic, and burst into a million pieces scattered upon an uncaring, unfeeling earth. A good parent is the constant securer of tethered lines.

When I first began the journey of motherhood, I made a pact with God. I said, “anything, anything at all, God, but my children”. Well, wouldn’t it be nice if God-pacts worked? Wouldn’t every parent who ever lived, say,” anything, anything at all but my children, God”. Wouldn’t the parents of Rwanda and the past parents of the Holocaust and the future parents of kids with leukemia be happy? Like Abraham, a parent could sacrifice a sheep, cut it in half, spread the blood down a line, and then walk in between the cut sacrifice, forming a covenant with God that our offspring would multiply and live long on the earth and forever in the heavens.

When I pray for my children, I beg God to keep them safe for another day and then I beg God to let them walk in relationship with Him so that we might spend eternity together in His presence. One morning lately as I was praying and begging for my children, God sent one of those piercing arrow moments to my heart and as clear as day, I knew He was saying, “Jane, this agony and longing that you feel for your own children’s safety and salvation, this is what I want you to feel for every child of Mine.”

So maybe God doesn’t really expect me to hold my children lightly in my hands. Maybe He just wants for me to hold every child of His as tightly, as tethered, as cherished, as agonizingly beloved, as I do my own child. Maybe God wants me to keep grasping all of the ropes that bind His children to Him, and hold on to His God-tethers until my hands bleed. As His God-hands bled out His life when He tethered my life to His cross.The cross was and is The Savior’s three strands, holding me tightly, and never, ever letting me go.

So I will pray and train to hold things lightly– things like houses and clothes and washing machines and car bumpers and even salaries — okay, I’ll work on holding the books lightly as well. I will hold all The Stuff so very, very loosely, that my hands seem as if they have been injected with helium, floating freely and carelessly above the pleasures and wants of this world and present life.

But I will clutch to the heart of Christ in me, the children of this world. The children from my womb, the children in the streets, the children scarred by war, the children wasting in nursing homes, the children in the churches and the children in the Pentagon, the children in Russia and North Korea and Central America and San Francisco, the homeless children and the multi-homed children, the Republican children and the Democratic children, the children with cancer and the children with trust funds, the children who know Him and the children who seek Him — I will ask God to secure the tethers of their lives, and I will worry, pray and when possible, offer advice. Mostly, I will ask God to help me love each child as He has so dearly loved each of His children– firmly, tightly, with a hold as hard as nails.

I will make a pact with God. I will make a covenant and it is this: God, I don’t know. I simply, don’t know much at all. But You do. I will trust You, to care for and deeply love my children, because they were never really mine. My beloved children have always been first and foremost, Your beloved children. I will not wrest the ropes binding my children to You from your nail-scarred hands because I somehow foolishly think I love them more than You love them. And I will beg You to help me treat my children, as You have treated me, with truth when I know it, with help whenever I can give it, with guidance when it is accepted, with my presence when it is asked for, with my silence when they need to be still, and with love that knows no limits and which is never, ever, ever loosely offered. I will ask You, my Father, to make a way in me to love each of Your children as I so love my own flesh and blood. Create in me a Love like Yours — Love that binds a child so tightly to the Parent’s heart, that nothing can separate them from that Love, not even death. “For neither height, nor depth, nor anything in all creation can separate us from the Love of God that is in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:39)

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