From: owner-aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com (aml-list-digest) To: aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com Subject: aml-list-digest V1 #81 Reply-To: aml-list Sender: owner-aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com Errors-To: owner-aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com Precedence: bulk aml-list-digest Monday, June 26 2000 Volume 01 : Number 081 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 11:07:46 -0600 From: Jacob Proffitt Subject: Re: [AML] Race and Culture in LDS Lit. On Thu, 22 Jun 2000 15:10:44 -0600, Bill Willson wrote: >I wasn't referring to just this country when I made my statements about = the >white minority, even though my particular reality call took place in San >Francisco. I was referring to the entire human race. However the fact >remains, those who live in Utah and have never been anywhere else for = any >length of real time, IMHO, live in a racial cocoon. I think your assessment of Utah is as much a stereotype as the racial and cultural prejudices we are discussing. Come visit us in West Valley sometime for example. Go to the mall, or KMart or Shop Ko or = particularly =46ood 4 Less. You will find an incredible mix of race, culture and = language presented there. Not many African Americans, but quite a few pacific islanders, hispanic, and slavic people present, most of them speaking a language other than english. In our church building we have a Samoan = ward. I still do a double take when I see a man in a dress at church (made of = fine suit material, BTW--very interesting cultural adaptation). Can you avoid other races and cultures in Utah? Sure, but you can do = that anywhere through a self-selection process. Jacob Proffitt - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 11:51:23 -0600 From: Jacob Proffitt Subject: Re: [AML] Where's our LDS Pulitzer prize winner? On Thu, 22 Jun 2000 16:39:45 -0600, Terry L Jeffress wrote: >But these people do have an affect on the market. In my ward, the young >women's president told the youth (both boys and girls) that reading = fiction >is a sin because they should be reading the scriptures, and that writing >fiction attempts to take over God's role as a creator. I still have to = deal >with my kids telling me how sinful I am for reading fiction. Brigham Young on reading material: =46rom the DISCOURSES OF BRIGHAM YOUNG 2:93-94 "Shall I sit down and read the Bible, the Book of Mormon, and the Book of Covenants all the time?" says one. Yes, if you please, and when you have done, you may be nothing but a sectarian after all. It is your duty to = study to know everything upon the face of the earth in addition to reading = those books. We should not only study good, and its effects upon our race, but also evil, and its consequences.=20 9:173. I would advise you to read books that are worth reading; read reliable history, and search wisdom out of the best books you can procure.=20 Novel reading--is it profitable? I would rather that persons read novels than read nothing. [Jacob Proffitt] - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 13:52:17 -0500 From: "Todd Robert Petersen" Subject: Re: [AML] Where's our LDS Pulitzer prize winner? D Michael Martindale wrote: >> I don't understand what you mean. I see no reason to deal with such an >> extreme opinion except to ignore it. How will these people affect LDS >> literature, other than just not being part of the market? Terry Jeffress countered: > But these people do have an affect on the market. In my ward, the young > women's president told the youth (both boys and girls) that reading fiction > is a sin because they should be reading the scriptures, and that writing > fiction attempts to take over God's role as a creator. I still have to deal > with my kids telling me how sinful I am for reading fiction. I have two quotations from Brigham Young for that Young Women's President and for Terry's kids. That should solve the problem (that is if she's the kind of woman who listens to the brethren). I'm not always convinced that self-righteous people are. "Shall I sit down and read the Bible, the Book of Mormon, and the Book of Covenants all the time?" says one. Yes, if you please, and when you have done, you may be nothing but a sectarian after all. It is your duty to study to know everything upon the face of the earth in addition to reading those books. We should not only study good, and its effects upon our race, but also evil, and its consequences." The other is a paraphrase: I'd rather have people read novels than nothing at all. And by novels Brigham Young was talking about romance potboilers for the most part. So Terry, have at her. (In righteousness, I mean, showing an increase of love afterwards.) Todd Robert Petersen - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 11:54:25 -0700 From: eedh Subject: Re: [AML] Where's our LDS Pulitzer prize winner? Terry L Jeffress wrote: > > But these people do have an affect on the market. In my ward, the young > women's president told the youth (both boys and girls) that reading fiction > is a sin because they should be reading the scriptures, and that writing > fiction attempts to take over God's role as a creator. I still have to deal > with my kids telling me how sinful I am for reading fiction. > Earlier I wrote: "This horrifies me! Where is this place? Please tell me it's not Utah." Now I add: I'm more than horrified. I'm fighting mad. I ran to my bookshelf and found this quote from *The Teachings of Spencer W. Kimball* (P. 384. The capitalized emphasis is mine.): "There is available a wide selection of books which will give development to the aesthetic and the cultural. Music, drama, poetry, FICTION, and other cultural fields are available to everyone. The contributions come to us from great minds and great hearts and great sufferers and great thinkers. "In addition to all the serious study there should be time for just plain reading for pleasure. Here one needs assistance to select that which is pleasurable in a worthwhile way. THERE ARE COUNTLESS WORKS OF FICTION WHICH HELP US TO UNDERSTAND OURSELVES AND OTHERS BETTER, AND TO GET REAL PLEASURE IN THE LEARNING." - -Beth Hatch - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 15:17:44 -0600 From: "Morgan Adair" Subject: Re: [AML] (Andrew's Poll) Best Mormon Novel of the 90s Record one vote for=20 Van Wagoner, Robert Hodgson. "Dancing Naked" Signature, 1999. I'm sure I'll find other Mormon novels from the '90s that I like, once = I've read more=20 of them, but of the ones I've read, this is by far the best. MBA - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 15:33:06 -0600 From: "Clark Goble" Subject: RE: [AML] _The Real World_ ___ Ivan ___ | I think many of the "young adults" in our church are less | naive then we (or MTV) would like to believe. ___ I think that for MTV and perhaps the majority we are na=EFve in that we are not sexually adventurous. So the woman in question was na=EFve because she didn't have much experience with homosexuals. I suspect race has a lot to do with it as well, although I don't recall that really being much of an issue for her - but I admit I've no paid that close attention. I suspect this is the view that comes through most non-Mormon literature. We aren't exposed to crime and sex like everyone else is. This makes us overly trusting (which we in general are) and ignorant (which in general we are). Those aren't necessarily bad things, except when we end up encountering such things. Then we don't know how to react. ___ Ivan ___ | I just have no real desire to watch MTV anymore (where have all | the videos gone?) ___ MTV2. It's just that most cable companies don't carry it. ___ Ivan ___ | I think a returned missionary who had served in a foreign country | (male or female) would have made an interesting addition and | wouldn't have seemed so naieve and sheltered ___ I don't think that's really true. Most missionaries are pretty sheltered in terms of how they encounter things. Yes they see more than the average American does, but in a really different way. Of course I think those experiences are great and give us knowledge other Americans don't. But as I said, MTV is really equating na=EFve with not being worldly. It's the old in the world but not of the world thing. MTV is at present giving a great example of how Mormons attempt to deal with that command. Who knows, in some ways perhaps this girl will end up doing the youth of the church a great service by showing how it can be done. All too often we try to be 'not of the world' by not being in the world. (i.e. insular and cliquish) - -- Clark Goble --- d.c.g@att.net ----------------------------------- - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 16:04:27 -0600 From: "J. Scott Bronson" Subject: [AML] Re: Writing About Religion I got the same message Skip Hamilton got from Kristen. Here is the response I sent to her the other day: > I think it is never easy to write about religion. And I'm not > sure people should. [snip] > I suspect that the strongest writing we will ever get that can > be said to be "about" religion will be either expository or, if > fiction, bitter. Why? I've never read Dante's "Inferno" but is it bitter? Is Shakespeare bitter when he writes about Christ in his plays? I remember kneeling onstage during a rehearsal of King Lear, watching Ivan Crosland, as Lear, take Edgar's arms and hold them out -- like wings -- like the bar of a cross -- and ask that muddy, naked man, "What hast thou been?" Then Edgar describes a person who is a servingman who has committed many sins. I realized that night that he was associating himself with Christ's lot. They were both innocent men, servants to one degree or another who were made to suffer for the sins of others. It was a tearful epiphany for me. > It is easier to write about God with clarity when you are > writing about disappointment and estrangement, because you can feel > those things so strongly, so vividly, and put words to them with > such passion. Perhaps this is your experience, but it's not mine. I've just finished a play called Tombs, that is largely a conversation between Christ and his mother in Joseph's tomb. I wrote vividly, with passion and not a bit of it had anything to do with disappointment or estrangement. > The Lord himself says that the attention a proud prayer gets > for his piousness will be his reward - a temporal reward for a temporal > act. But that real prayer takes place in closets, in private joy, > in personal sorrow. He says we are to make public our faith, and to fear not what man can do. Boyd K. Packer said, "Because of what [artists] do, we are able to feel and learn very quickly through music, through art, through poetry some spiritual things that we would otherwise learn very slowly. All of us are indebted to them for their generous service." > So, how are you going to write about such things if they are > true? And how dare you write about them if they are not? How dare I not? I have a testimony. This is the best way I know how to express it. What am I to do? > What good, pray tell, does it do to trump up a bunch of fictional > miracles for the sake of a story, or a story for the sake of a > bunch of fictional miracles? Is that supposed to do anybody > any good? So, what good is *any* writing then? > I would not choose to write about these > things. They were too specific, too subtle, too personal. They > could not be generalized The best fiction is not general; it is specific. > A story that demands the number of coincidences and > sudden breaks that allowed our studio to become a reality for us, for > example, would make a story that would seem too facile. Why? You're assuming that all the readers out there are cynical heathens who laugh at truth and righteousness. Why? > As I read her, I wondered if I could write my own God as > passionately, as concretely as she writes her own bitterness and > disappointment. I don't think I can. I'm not sure I should. But what else is there? All good stories are Jesus stories. "The Iron Giant." Sacrifice, redemption, forgiveness. Good stories are about these things. And these things point to Christ. You are writing about religion, or God, or you're not writing about anything. All of your [Kristen's] books are about Eve leading Adam back to the Garden. And they give me a great deal of pleasure, because they resonate with my spirit ... and they lead me to Christ. That's what good they are. scott [bronson] - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 16:19:39 -0600 From: "J. Scott Bronson" Subject: Re: [AML] Revealing Ourselves in Writing > In what ways do we as LDS writers reveal > ourselves in our writing? It's not just LDS writers. All writers, I believe, reveal their deepest feelings about Life, the Universe, and Everything in their writing. Scott Card calls it their "world view." I agree with Card's contention that writers can't help but reveal their deepest rooted understandings in their writings. How these things are revealed would take more time and brain power than I've got right now. However, I think it would be a fascinating project to explicate someone's world view through an intricate analysis of their writing. scott - - AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature http://www.xmission.com/~aml/aml-list.htm ------------------------------ End of aml-list-digest V1 #81 *****************************