One Hundred Years of War

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding  

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing           

Memory and desire, stirring       

Dull roots with spring rain.          

Winter kept us warm, covering          

Earth in forgetful snow, feeding               

A little life with dried tubers.

T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land. 1922

 Friends, family, distant, relations, coworkers, former classmates and anyone reading this.


   One hundred years ago, the world ended. In August, 1914 Western Civilization came to the beginning of its end.  Nearly 100 years of (relative) peace ended in a four year orgy of destruction, and nothing has been quite the same since the nightmare ended.  This is The Great War, later to be called the First World War, to distinguish it from its sequel ,its child, its result, the Second World War.

  Some historians will argue with you that the First World War actually began in 1754 with what Americans and British call the French and Indian War and the rest of Europe refer to as the Seven Years War. This is partly true, in the sense that the French and Indian War covered at least two continents, but once France and England had a prolonged scuffle over who owned what land in the New World, everyone carried on as before. The Great war was different, it is the first of the wars that broke the world.

   2014 also marks 100 years since the the most successful failure in exploration and discovery occurred. On the cusp of this great war in August 1914 Sir Ernest Shackleton and his companions set out on the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. Their mission was to be first men to cross the continent of Antarctica.  They ended up getting stuck in pack ice for two years and having to row back to civilization in a life boat. The miraculous thing was, all of them survived. The whole endeavor was so remarkable that T.S. Eliot even makes a veiled reference to Shackleton's Expedition in his seminal poem The Waste Land. This small group of men were probably the last tiny capsule of innocence, locked away in the fastness of polar ice and unaware of the crisis through which the world they knew was passing.

  I plan to take a journey through these two events. Show their causes, their effects, and get intimately involved with the people who lived through it. My guidebooks are The First World War by John Keegan, and South, by Ernest Shackleton.  Please follow me, friends, for however long it takes to walk this road.

 I cannot say how long it will take or how frequently I will write. But I will say I plan to at least write something when I come to the end of each chapter.  Another post should follow in a few days.

On Anniversaries

Much that once was is lost, for none now live to remember it. 

   I intended to write this back in April, for the centennial of the sinking of the Titanic.  Here it is now, and I shall expand on the original subject.

The past is the key to the present and the future, for instruction and inspiration.

   I consider myself privileged to be alive for the 100 year anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.   One of my coworkers rolled her eyes and referred sarcastically to this obsession with the Titanic. Later on she said the movie was "just about her screwing around."  It's not about the ship, dearie, or the movies, it's about the real stories of real people.  If your lot wasn't so jaded and modernized you might realize that. Oh, and as for the movie, it's so much more than Rose and Jack.  It's the story of every person who was there.  And, I do like the fact that Rose takes Jack's name at the end and calls herself Rose Dawson.

 Although if you want love stories on Titanic, look no further than Isidor and Ida Strauss.  Mr. and Mrs. Strauss were in their 60s in 1912, and he was one of the owners of Macy's department store.  Ida refused to leave her husband when the call for women and children to the boats was given. They were last seen sitting on deck chairs holding hands before they were swept away by rising water.  I assume what is commonly referred to as "the old couple scene" in the movie (an older couple lying on a bed together as the water rushes in) is supposed to be Mr. and Mrs. Strauss. I can give you more, but I shall not belabor the point. 

 The point I was trying to make was how soon we forget.  In the weeks leading up to the centennial, I was shocked at the number of people I saw on the internet that had no idea Titanic was a real event, they thought it was just a movie.  My father said some of his students did not know it was a real event. One of the most famous, most tragic, and most costly (in monetary as well as human life) peacetime maritime disasters in history and you thought it was just a movie? My generation causes me to despair nearly every day, but this was worse than usual.  

  Moving on, the subject of anniversaries.  As I said, I consider myself privileged to see the centennial of the Titanic. I hope, if I live that long, the world lasts that long, or if the Lord tarries ect. to see the Bicentennial of the siege of the Alamo in 2036.  I will be in Texas that day, come the proverbial hell or high water. 

  On my Facebook page, I am currently covering the anniversary of the Falklands War. Thank goodness I caught it in time. And thank God he gave me open eyes and an inquisitive mind to follow the trail that began with a few sentences I saw in an old letter.  If I knew then what I know now, I would have done my final project for Latin American History on the Falklands War (and my perspective would have discomfited my very liberal teacher) The Falklands War is rather dear to me at the moment because of its causes, it was almost an aftershock of the World Wars.  Also, it is a highly controversial subject among the Lib Dems  because they think the British were so evil and colonial and they were so cruel to the Argentinians who were just trying to take back what was theirs and Margaret Thatcher personally murdered each Argentinian that died. Whatever, they are more than welcome to go live in Argentina themselves. 

  Speaking of the World Wars, we are two years away from the 100 year anniversary of the War to End all Wars, World War I.  In a way, it was more heinous and violent than its successor. People do not realize that this war, more than any other, practically changed the world overnight.  Nearly 100 years of peace ended in a four year orgy of destruction and when the world woke from the nightmare, nothing would ever again be as it was.  Take a look at the literature written immediately after.  T.S. Eliot's The Wasteland is a good place to start.

  There are no World War 1 veterans left alive, the last one died last year aged 110.  Are we going to forget so quickly what must be remembered? The past is the key to the present.  It is the key so we do not make past mistakes again. And it is the key because the past give us heroes. People to look up to, to emulate, stories that inspire us to act as they would have done in similar situations.  

Semper Recordor

The Wizards, the Vampires, the Eldar and the Eldila

There is a common saying that I have found to be generally true, the book is better than the movie.  Occasionally, there is a movie that is better than the book.  I have yet to experience one myself, but I am told there are a few out there.  That being said, I do wonder why people cannot bother to read a few select books that are based on very popular movies.

   I am writing in particular about The Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia.  I am astounded by the number of people who have repeatedly seen the movies based on these books and can quote them verbatim but have never read or so much as touched the books.  They are, not surprisingly, people of my generation. Those of my parent's generation, really anyone born in the English-speaking world between about 1940 and 1980 grew up either reading The Hobbit and The Chronicles of Narnia or having them read to them. Sometime shortly around the time I was born, however, there was a disconnect.

  There have been many occasions when I have been in a discussion about these movies and I will mention something from the books.  The person with whom I am conversing will stammer and said "Well...I never read the books."  I don't know who is more embarrassed, me or them.  I remember two occasions in particular.  One we were discussing the most recent Narnia movie and I said "Yes I hope that they get a good Puddleglum for the next one.  A decent Marsh-Wiggle will make or break the movie." After a strained pause and a nervous laugh the reply was "I never read the books." I sighed inwardly and hastily steered the conversation elsewhere.  It seemed a safer option than tersely replying "Yeah, well maybe you should." and stalking away.  The other occasion I remember we were discussing The Lord of the Rings, and somehow the back stories of the characters came up.  I said something to the effect of :"Well yes, because Aragorn was a Numenorean." One of the people involved in the conversation replied rather jovially "Numa-numa-what? I never read the books." I counted to ten and ended the conversation soon after that.  Again, these were people of my age. Somehow I get the feeling that people my parents age and older would have understood me.

  Or is that true?  I was going to say that it is because people of my generation want the world fed to them in 30-second sounds bites and have not the patience to read a large tome or series of books through. But then I remembered the Narnia and Middle-Earth of my generation.  I am referring to the crap that is Twilight and the tripe that is Harry Potter. Yes! People my generation will read Harry Potter until the Crack of Doom and stand in line overnight to read the next Twilight novel before their friends do. The problem lies not in the media (for these two are movies as well) but in the content.

  Ten years ago when I was an old teenager and Harry Potter had first come out, I remember the controversy among Christians whether or not they should let their children read it.  The most common argument was "At least they are reading." What? That's the best you can do?! (Actually, if it is that hard to get your children to put down the video came console and read a book you have other problems.)  Instead of that, they should have been saying to their children "That's a good story, but here is a better one."  The crap that is Twilight and the tripe that is Harry Potter is just detailed and deep enough to be mildly interesting.  I can give you a laundry list of stories that are so much more than that.

 Enter the arguments that The Lord of the Rings is not a Christian story, Tolkien was a Catholic, I hate allegory, blah, blah, blah I have heard the same song and dance a hundred times. C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia are defenitely Christian stories, and not just for children although that is the target audience.  Some of the more sweet and complex Christian themes in them I did not see until I was older, and their majesty and sublimity caused me to sink to my knees. And once we are grown, Lewis' Ransom Trilogy (I dislike calling it The Space Trilogy because it is so much more than science fiction) is like Narnia the Sequel, or Learning about Aslan in Our Own World.  Even the protagonist is named Ransom for a reason. As for The Lord of the Rings, sure it's not a Christian story, JRRT never meant it to be.  He says so himself in the preface when he goes into detail about allegory versus applicability.  There are certainly applicable Christian themes.  And while we are on the subject of themes, the themes of LOTR are much better than anything in Twilight or Harry Potter.  Themes like good will always triumph over evil in the end; we do good things because they are right, not because people will like us or we will be rewarded; that above the reek and ruin of evil in the world exists a realm of light and glory that evil can never touch but only look at and gnaw on itself in repulsion; that one day the world will be remade and renewed and all that was ruined at the beginning will be healed.

  So I ask you, is it really that much harder to read about those things than it is to read or watch movies about wizards in school or sparkly vampires?

 Oh, and speaking of wizards, Gandalf would have never called anyone a Muggle. 

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year, Part II

    Three years ago I wrote an essay titled It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. In that essay I described why I liked Christmas so much and the reasons it should be such an important holiday.  I am now going to expand on that theme.  Earlier this year, I read an amazing book, The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton.  Two chapters in particular threw all the details of Christmas into an even clearer and sublime light than even I had cast them. 

The End of the World

    Chesterton begins his discourse by describing the defeat of Carthage by Rome.  He describes that the citizens of Carthage were worshipers of Moloch, also known as Baal, the most vile and dark of the heathen gods of the middle east. How the evils of their worship poisoned their whole society into something terrible, where human life was considered very cheap and babies were thrown in furnaces to appease Moloch and his sinister consort Tanit.  When Hannibal invaded Rome it was seen as a threat to all that was good and light in the world, everything was about to be swallowed in darkness. Then, by some miracle, Hannibal was defeated and Carthage itself was razed to the ground and never recovered.  The best and brightest of human civilization had defeated darkness once and for all.

 Or had it?A culture that began and ended with domesticity, whose household gods defeated the demons of Hannibal's Carthage began a slow moral decay. Greek and oriental vices and immorality began to invade as the new fads of society. Every new fad that came from the fringes of the empire, new eastern philosophy, new secret mystery religions, any and all things new were used to stab awake their drowsy apathy. This could truly have been the end of the world.*

    Chesterton compares Mythology to a search, a search for man's purpose in the world. There comes a time in a civilization, if it lasts long enough, when men tire of playing mythology and pretending that the tree is a maiden and the moon made love to a man, it is then that men seek stranger obscenities to cure their jadedness. They tire of walking in their sleep of ordinary life and begin to wake themselves with nightmares such as gladiators and mystery religions.The noble mythology of man was dying and would have left a vacuum had it not been replaced with something far, far more wondrous, theology.  

   Paganism was dying because society itself was maturing.   The mythology that had been around for millenia, or not quite religious paganism, was the young world's riot with ideas and images rather like a young man's riot with wine and lovemaking.  Youthful irresponsibility more than malicious immorality. As society matured, like an individual matures, it began to see the weaknesses and insufficiency of this lifestyle.  So as society began to decay, it got bored with it’s old lifestyle and started to turn to obscenities to cure it's boredom.
 

    The urban mob became 'enlightened', in other words, they lost the mental power to create legends. Rather like jaded grown ups who lament the loss of their childhood yet despise the idea of fairy tales; or today's historical and literary revisionists that delight in tearing down heroes but then wonder why people seem to have no sense of morality.  The people mourned the loss of the gods and consoled themselves with bread and circuses.  A similar thing is happening in our own present day.  We became 'enlightened' and 'free thinkers'.  We threw God out of society (since He is un-progressive unscientific) and as a result, condemned any ideas of being in awe of things supernatural or worshiping something larger than ourselves or our social systems.  In the deadness that has resulted, we console ourselves with celebrities, sports, and reality TV.

 "But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons." Galatians 4:4

The God in the Cave

   The world was dying, when news came out of the east that would shake the whole earth to the very core, and strike fear into the hearts of the demon-worshipers and the philosophers.  God really was dead, some even claimed to see Him die.  But, they added, He then became alive again.  No longer would humanity have to seek for the reason of their existence, He had been found, in a cave, under a star.  The shepherds had found their Good Shepherd, and the philosophers, their endless searching over, would kneel before Him, for the Desire of the Ages had come. 

   This new sect calling themselves "Christians" were invited to set up an image of their God along with all the others in the temple.  They refused, saying that their God was alive, and not a dead image.  Not only that, but he was the only God, and would suffer no worship of another.  This refusal to integrate was the turning point of history. If the Christians had accepted and tossed their God in with all the rest, the would have been subsumed into the melting pot of gods that was already evaporating.   This new claim of only one God who had come as a helpless baby to save us from ourselves was the one thing that would revolutionize the whole world.  

   The Birth of Christ in a cave can be equated to the start of a revolution.  He was announced with shouts and songs of angels, and the shouting of that night still hangs in the air today.  Christians are on the whole meek and mild and love their neighbors.  However, their refusal to kneel to other gods, or go against the commands of their own God, is as much a challenge as anything. A challenge to fight against all error and evil. Christianity proclaims peace on earth but never forgets why there was a war in heaven.

     Christmas is most wonderful because it remembers the day when the whole world was saved from itself.  The world nearly died once of broad-mindedness and the brotherhood of all religions. Christ was born to revolutionize that and show us that while we must love our enemies and be innocent as doves, we must also fight to the death for what is true, good and right. As Joy Davidman Lewis states when discussing how disappointed the Jewish leaders were with Jesus when he would not overthrow Rome and be their King "He offered them not all the longed-for kingdoms of the earth, but only-only!- the salvation of their own souls."

*It is telling that at this time many high-society Roman women began to convert to Judaism.

This is the Season Dearest to the Heart

As I stated when I posted the first portion of Kortirion Among the Trees, there is another part that I like to read at Christmas time.  Again, I prefer the second version of this poem to the first or third.  In the third version of the poem, Tolkien refers to "The funeral candles of the Silver Wain" (meaning the Big Dipper) and I think that is a rather poor description of the night sky in winter, which is my favorite season.  But then, John could be quite a humbug when it came to winter.  And even Jack Lewis, who loved snow and Christmas almost as much as I do, turned into a real Scrooge while Joy was ill (as I saw this summer from some of his writings). But that is neither here nor there, and they are allowed to be that way.  Here is the winter part of the second draft of Kortirion Among the Trees, starting at line 85.

  This is the season dearest to the heart,
  And time most fitting to the ancient town,
  With waning musics sweet that slow depart
  Winding with echoed sadness faintly down
  The paths of stranded mist.  O gentle time,
  When the late mornings are begemmed with rime,
  And early shadows fold the distant woods!
  The Elves go silent by, their shining hair
  They cloak in twilight under secret hoods
  Of grey, and filmy purple, and long bands
  Of frosted starlight sewn by silver hands.

  And oft they dance beneath the roofless sky,
  When naked elms entwine in branching lace
  The Seven Stars, and through the boughs the eye
  Stares golden-beaming in the round moon's face.
  O holy Elves and fair immortal Folk,
  You sing then ancient songs that once awoke
  Under primeval stars before the Dawn;
  You whirl then dancing with the eddying wind,
  As once you danced upon the shimmering lawn
 ***
(Line 119)
The seven candles of the Silver Wain,
Like lighted tapers in a darkened fane,
Now flare above the fallen year.
Thought court and street now cold and empty lie,
And Elves dance seldom neath the barren sky,
Yet under the white moon there is a sound
Of buried music still beneath the ground.
When winter comes, I would meet winter here.

Quoted from The Book of Lost Tales, pages 38 and 39.

An Awkward Musical Situation

  We had a massive power failure at work this past Thursday. It was a little annoying and kind of fun.  I had just come in from my break and was heating some water for tea in the microwave. Suddenly there were several loud pops and bangs, and the lights started flashing on and off while the microwave bleeped at me and the vending machines started making strange noises at me. 

   It took me a few moments to realize that the appliances were not staging a massive revolution against mankind, there was just some sort of power surge going on.  I pulled my water from the microwave, dumped it, and came out of the break room rather wide eyed asking what was going on.  The building looked like a disco with lights flickering on and off.  My computer was one of the few that stayed on, so I sat down at my desk ready to go back to work in the dark. I had enough light from my computer screen. But then they told us to turn off everything so, no working.

    After a call to my mother and some protracted playing with my phone, I got bored, so I wheeled my chair to where a group of my coworkers were talking and laughing. I picked up a couple of new jokes from one of the IT guys: If a dwarf fortune-teller escaped from jail would he be a small medium at large? (Ok so that is an old one, but it was funny at the time.) What's brown and sticky?...a stick.  I really like that one. 

 Then several of us pulled out our iPhones, iPods and smart phones and started playing with our music. Everyone was playing Brittany Spears, Maroon Five (Maroon something, I don't remember the name) Psychedelic Firs (never even heard of them, but the group was obviously named by someone on a really bad trip). Everyone was playing music and saying "Oh I love that song! Here I have this one!" "Oh that's my favorite song!". I pulled out my phone and began trying to find something to impress everyone else with.  That was when I became painfully aware of the fact that all of my music is rather.....well.....nerdy, and UNpopular. Enya, Mannheim Steamroller Secret Garden, the Band Perry, Loreena McKennit,  fiddle music of Natalie McMaster and Popcorn Behavior, modern classical piano such as Michelle McLaughlin or Philip Wesley, regular classical like Handel's Water Music or all six of Bach's Cello Suites. I suddenly realized that not only were none of them probably familiar with any of this, it was also incredibly dorky. Ah well! I like what I like, even if it isn't popular. I suppose it all goes with my plaid fixation or my reading gigantic books during lunch.

  In hindsight, I suppose I could have played them a little Celine Dion, Hayley Westenra or Josh Groban, that is about as popular as my music gets. I am fairly certain that they would have found Simon & Garfunkel's I Am A Rock fitting for my cube that is a bit separated from most of the others. (Nota Bene: The cube is not separated from the rest by my own choosing, it's just they way the office is arranged. I may indeed have my books and poetry to protect me, but I did NOT make a special request at work to be separated from the rest. I find it....kind of  lonely at times, really.)

Next time, I am going to find the most annoying, geeky thing I can, jack up the volume, and hit "play". Maybe Roisin Dubh (Little Black Rose) as done by Cherish the Ladies.

Post Script: The spell check has been driving me insane through this whole post.  Why is realize spelled with a Z but choose is spelled with and S?

Kortirion Among the Trees

The following is the excerpt of a poem penned by J.R.R. Tolkien titled Kortirion among the trees. I prefer the second version.  The first version is a but rough, but that is to be expected. I do not know why he wrote a third version, the second, in my opinion, is perfect.  The third version, while better polished, is far more depressing.  but then, that was Reuel all over. Here is a beautiful description about the coming of Autumn, and I always read it when I sense the first breath of autumn in the air, which I did earlier this week. Another part of this poem, which begins "This is the season dearest ti the heart" is a matchless description of winter, and I always read it at Christmas.

Kortirion Among the Trees (beginning at line 53)

Once Spring was here with joy, and all was fair
Among the trees; but Summer drowsing by the stream
Heard trembling in her heart the secret player
Pipe, out beyond the tangle of her forest dream,
The long-drawn tune that elvish voices made
Foreseeing Winter through the leafy glade;
The late flowers nodding on the ruined walls
Then stooping heard afar that haunting flute
Beyond the sunny aisles and tree-propped halls;
For thin and clear and cold the note,
As strand of silver glass remote.

Then all thy trees Kortirion, were bent,
And shook with sudden whispering lament:
For passing were the days, and doomed the nights
When flitting ghost-moths danced as satellites
Round tapers in the moveless air;
And doomed already were the radiant dawns,
The fingered sunlight drawn across the lawns;
The odour and the slumbrous noise of meads,

Where all the sorrel, flowers and pluméd weeds

Go down before the scyther's share.
When cool October robed her dewy furze
In netted sheen of gold-shot gossamers,
Then the wide-umbraged elms began to fail;
Their mourning multitude of leaves grew pale,
Seeing afar the icy spears
Of Winter marching blue behind the sun
Of bright All-Hallows.  Then their hour was done,
And wanly borne on wings of amber pale
They beat the wide airs of the fading vale,
And flew like birds across the misty meres.