I Contain Multitudes – I Am Legion

     Here it is – Like Whitman, I contain multitudes. I am Legion.

    “That’s not funny, Carter. I’ve always said you were Satanic.

    Yeah, yeah, yeah. Give me my influences. Give me my heroes. Le t me name them:

    Archibald MacLeish – librarian poet
    Madeline L’Engle – universalist author, Christian author
    Burroughs – both Edgar Rice and William
    William Booth – the only General I would follow

    Howard Zinn – historian
    Marc Chagall – dreamer, poet, painter, fool

    “You’re a fool, Carter. Everything you say only confirms it the more…”

    Gustavo Gutiérrez – Dominican liberationist
        and
    Roger Corman – the king of cult

    “You go too far.”

    Give me scream queens. Give me Elvira,
    Give me Neil Young and Nick Cave.
    Give me Camus and Kierkegaard
    Give me the blessed Saint Francis and Sister Death

    “Stop. Stop. You’re only embarrassing yourself with this… contortion. This confession.”

    Kropotkin. Cash. Dylan.
    Brian Wilson. John Coltrane and John Yoder (though, I acknowledge the danger)
    Umberto Eco, and Echo and the Bunnymen

    “I don’t even know these names. No one cares.”

    Poe, and King, and Dick
    Sartre, Beauvoir, Silverstein
    Give me Black Francis screaming into the void

    “You need to stop. This is unhealthy.”

    Give me Martin Luther King Junior

    “He was an adulterer”

    I know, but give me Tillich.

    “Pornographer.”

    I know, but give me…

    “No. I will give you nothing.”

    Give me Jesus.

    “Jesus! The Blasphemy you breathe…”

The Stand and The Politics of Jesus

I’ve read Stephen King’s apocalyptic magnum opus, The Stand, repeatedly. More than half a dozen times. It’s a powerful piece of work. Maybe he does, as he admits, have a case of “diarrhea of the word processor,” maybe 1141 pages (in the uncut 1990 paperback edition) is going on a little long. Maybe. But the book affects me; I am hung upon this “long tale of dark Christianity”.

I've also been reading John Howard Yoder’s book The Politics of Jesus and it strikes me that there is some significant overlap. Absurd, I know, but it’s there. 

As the book nears its climax,   Stu, Larry, Glen, and Ralph (along with the dog, Kojak) set off on foot from Boulder, Colorado - sent out like the disciples of Jesus (“go in the clothes that you stand in. Carry nothing.”) - towards the Dark Man and his legions in Las Vegas, and the threat of death by crucifixion.  Before leaving, Larry Underwood asks, “Do we have a choice?”

Their spiritual guide, Mother Abigail, says, “A choice? There’s always a choice. That’s God’s way, always will be. Your will is still free. Do as you will. There’s no set of leg-irons on you. But...this is what God wants of you.” (King 905)

It’s a foolish quest. But they go, and willingly, towards an uncertain end. 

Yoder writes in The Politics of Jesus: “The key to the obedience of God’s people is not their effectiveness, but their patience. The triumph of the right is assured not by the might that comes to the aid of the right, which is of course the justification of the use of violence and other kinds of power in every human conflict. The triumph of the right, although it is assured, is sure because of the power of the resurrection and not because of any calculation of causes and effects, nor because of the inherently greater strength of the good guys. The relationship between the obedience of God’s people and the triumph of God’s cause is not a relationship of cause and effect but one of cross and resurrection.” (Yoder 232)

A great combination of thoughts in this time of plague and quarantine and Easter. 

What I’m Reading: Not Stephen King

Boo.

You, sir, are a scoundrel and a cheat. And what is more, you are a coward. Afraid to trust the merits of your own work, you attempted to trade on a similarity of names. And I while I don’t know if the cover design was yours or the Magic Pen Designs named on the copyright page, I’m sure it was no accident that your cover apes the style of books written by the more famous Stephen King. Stephen R. King (yes, you duped me. I didn’t notice that initial until I’d returned home from the library) you are no Stephen King.

Books I Read This Year (2016)

I set a goal for myself to read 100 books a year. Some years I make that goal. Some years I do not. This year I did, though I didn't intend to set out to read the entire Stephen King canon. What can I say? Things happen. (And I didn't quite read everything he's published... )

American Folk Songs for Christmas – Ruth Crawford Seeger
Treasury of Christmas Music – William L. Reed
The International Book of Christmas Carols – Walter Ehret
The Return of the Star of Bethlehem – Kenneth Boa
Towards a Church of the Poor – Julio de Santa Anna
Sharing the Word through the Liturgical Year – Gustavo Gutiérrez
Nosferatu: An Opera Libretto – Dana Gioia
The Night Church – Whitley Strieber
God Eating: A Study in Christianity and Cannibalism – J.T. Lloyd
We Should All Be Feminists – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas  - Troy Little
Bible Stories for Adults – James K. Morrow
Swell Foop – Piers Anthony
Pop Sonnets: Shakespearean Spins on Your Favorite Songs – Erik Didriksen
Emma – Howard Zinn
The Children of Men – P.D. James
The Invisible Man – H.G. Wells
The Lottery and Other Stories – Shirley Jackson
Stephen King: The First Decade – Joseph Reino
Sphere – Michael Chrichton
Chomsky on Anarchism – Noam Chomsky
The Complete Fiction – H.P. Lovecraft
The Wolf’s Hour – Robert McCammon
Crazy Horse: The Strange Man of the Oglalas – Mari Sandoz
Selected Stories: Family Matters – Symphony Space
The Best American Travel Writing -  Bill Bryson
Sylvester and the Magic Pebble – William Steig
Resurrection – Leo Tolstoy
House of Leaves – Mark Danielewski
Many Waters – Madeline L’Engle
A Swiftly Tilting Planet – Madeline L’Engle
Wind in the Door – Madeline L’Engle
A Wrinkle in Time – Madeline L’Engle
Chairman Mao Meets the Apostle Paul: Christianity, Communism and the Hope of China – Khiok-Khng Yeo
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
Pontypool Changes Everything – Tony Burgess
The Oath – Frank Peretti
Will & Kate – Dawn Volz
Bob Dylan and Philosphy: It’s All Right Ma, I’m Only Thinking – Peter J. Vernezze, Carl J. Porter, James S. Spiegel
Dr. Faustus – Christopher Marlow
Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life – Herman Melville
The Producers – Mel Brooks
Leaving Iowa – Tim Clue
The Orthodox Heretic – Peter Rollins
Wool – Hugh Howely
Joe Hill: The IWW & the Making of a Revolutionary Working Class Counterculture – Franklin Rosemont
Praying with John of the Cross – Wayne Simsic
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang – Ian Fleming
Life and Fate – Vasily Grossman
Lost Horizons – James Hilton
How to Pray when You’re Pissed at God: Or Anyone Else for that Matter – Ian Punnett
The Haunted House and Other Spooky Poems and Tales – Vic Crume
The Shroud Codex  - Jerome R. Corsi
Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse – John Joseph Adams
Mein Kampf – Adolf Hitler
Prophet – Frank Peretti
Countdown to Sunday: A Daily Guide for Those Who Dare To Preach – Chris Erdman
Hitler: 1936 – 1945 Nemesis – Ian Kershaw
Hitler: 1889 – 1936 Hubris – Ian Kershaw

Stephen King -
The Gunsligner
The Drawing of the Three
The Waste Lands
Wizard and Glass
Wolves of the Calla
Song of Susanna
The Bazaar of Bad Dreams
The Tommyknockers
Misery
Skeleton Crew
Doctor Sleep
The Shining
Insomnia
The Dead Zone
Four Past Midnight
Rose Madder
Nightmares and Dreamscapes
Mr. Mercedes
The Dark Half
Dream Catcher
‘Salem’s Lot
From a Buick 8
The Regulators
Hearts in Atlantis
Gerald’s Game
Everything’s Eventual
Blockade Billy
The Eyes of the Dragon
Desperation
Cujo
Black House
The Talisman
The Long Walk
Roadwork
Rage
The Running Man
Lisey’s Story
Under the Dome
Different Seasons
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon
The Stand
11 / 22 / 63

Stephen King Blows the Death of St. Paul

I've been reading (and re-reading) my way through the works, old and new, of Stephen King. I like his books; I like them not in spite of, but precisely for all the schlock and the horror, for all the vulgarity and mayhem. I like them because they are intelligent books, and filled with deep insight and humor.  And hope. There is a good deal of hope in King's horror.

But occasionally good Mr. King blows it.

This morning I'm careening towards the conclusion of one of my favorites, 'Salem's Lot (1975) and find the following (mis)statement:

"It's as old as Macedonia," Father Callahan said, "Hanging the body of your enemy or betrayer upside down so that his head faces earth instead of heaven. St. Paul was crucified that way, on an X-shaped cross with his legs broken." (332)

Whoooops!

According to Christian tradition, St. Paul was tortured and then beheaded. According to the early church historian Eusebius, Paul was killed during the reign of Nero ca. AD 65 - 68. (Eccl. Hist. 2.25.5).  It was St. Peter who, according to tradition, was crucified upside down. And it is St. Andrew who is usually associated with the X-shaped cross.

Self Righteousness and Kung Fu - Good Words from Stephen King

So... I'm reading Stephen King's novel, The Stand, again (for something like the tenth time, I think).  Some friends question why I would read such trash, others would question why I'd read it more than once. And the answer is, "it's a great story" and because "there's really good stuff in there."  Seriously.

Take this bit of great advice (found on page 799 in my 1991, "complete and uncut" paperback version):

"And your choice is made?"
"Yes."
"For good?"
"Yes, it is."
"Then live with it," the Judge said with great relish. "For God's sake, Larry, grow up. Develop a little self-righteousness. A lot of that is an ugly thing, God knows, but a little applied over all your scruples is an absolute necessity! It is to the soul what a good sun-block is to the skin during the heat of the summer. You can only captain your own soul, and from time to time some smart-ass psychologist will question your ability to do even that."

Good advice there.

Take, also, this paraphrased version of Psalm 23 (on page 1003); it's just fun:

"The Lord is my shepherd...I shall not want for nothing. He makes me lie down in the green pastures. He greases up my head with oil. He gives me kung-fu in the face of my enemies. Amen."

Kung-fu in the face of my enemies! Praise God.

What I’m Reading: Pontypool Changes Everything

“A face is a marvelous thing for those who possess it. It is really the only thing that distinguishes us. Not quite enough to recommend us, just a trickster feature of our anatomy that makes everyone appear famous. But still, the face is beautiful. A sensitive sign of obscure integration. And every once in a while that integration is challenged” (Burgess 184).

Zombies are the thing these days–though maybe the craze is starting to wane. Even so, we’re fascinated by the bleak, apocalyptic horror of the zombie story. They’re not like other monsters, not like other supernatural creatures of the night; they’re worse, more frightening because they are us. “[W]hat is especially terrifying with zombies is that their monstrous state is their human state, it never transforms or goes away” (Paffenroth 9).

Most Zombie books, graphic novels, movies, video games focus on the horror that arises from the disintegration of human society – the collapse of modern culture and the breakdown of human relationships. But Pontypool (both the novel (1995) and the movie (2009) are different; indeed, as the full title of the novel declares, Pontypool Changes Everything. Pontypool features that same psychological terror–the horror of watching human characters, not only being eaten by the undead, but also the horror of humans slaughtering creatures that still so closely resemble us humans, that is humanity consuming itself. (Paffenroth 9) But even more the disintegration of human civilization, Pontypool is about the disintegration of human language.

The novel is not a ‘regular’ novel. It’s a bit like the Dadaist poetry of Tristan Tzara and the cut-up writings of William Burroughs. It’s a pile up of nonsense, non-sequiturs like a multiple vehicle collision on the highway that eventually creates something that resembles reality, albeit a terrible, burnt out, wrecked and ruined reality. The movie, the screenplay of which was also written by Tony Burgess, is more straightforward, more linear than the novel, but is still fairly unlike most other zombie films.

“I’m not the person who wrote this book,” says Burgess in the afterward to a 2009 edition of the novel; “I remember him. He had just graduated with a degree in semiotics, which is to say he was insufferably preoccupied with literary malformations… He wanted to magnify the least recognizable parts of his thoughts and feelings” (Burgess 253).

In Pontypool, the zombies are not brought to unlife by mysterious radiation from a space probe returning from Venus (as in George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead) or some sort of divine wrath, not by a disease or virus (as in Romero’s Dawn of the Dead) or some sort of biological weapon (as in Resident Evil or 28 Days Later). But neither is it left forever unexplained (as in The Walking Dead graphic novels and television series). In Pontypool the zombie virus is spread through language; the ‘virus’ infects words; its victims lose the ability to understand or communicate and are driven to states of rage and brutal animalistic violence, including the inevitable cannibalism.

“That night I had terrible dreams I was killing people. When I awoke it took some serious self-examination to convince myself that I was not repressing real acts of murder. So completely vivid was my sense of guilt that I felt nothing short of running through a full account of my life could provide me with the peace of mind I needed to fall back asleep. In spite of the three hours I spent combing over the details, I have, to this day, a persistent certainty that hidden inside me is the revolting knowledge of days when I wasn’t quite myself. I now suspect that my inexplicable bouts of exhaustion are due to the massive effort of keeping those days behind me” (Burgess 10).

Acclaimed horror writer, Stephen King says that we should “[b]egin by assuming that the tale of horror, no matter how primitive, is allegorical by its very nature; that it is symbolic” (King 31). The monster, the horror at the symbolic, dark heart of Pontypool is the fear that the world that we inhabit is inevitably and utterly incomprehensible, that we cannot make sense of the universe. In the end everything is madness and frenzy, and rage, and despair.

“You can’t pretend that you don’t feel very sorry for this man and his self-portrait. He has completely lost the ability to take care of himself. He will die soon, and the fact that that is merely all he ever wanted doesn’t make you feel any less protective of him now. You remember looking in the mirror and feeling awe: the self-portrait is complete.You think that you have found the face that can finally say goodbye” (Burgess 109).

“There is no life without prayer. Without prayer there is only madness and horror.” -Vasilii Rozanov

Burgess, Tony. Pontypool Changes Everything. Toronto, Canada: ECW Press. 1998. 2009. Print.

King, Stephen. Danse Macabre. New York, NY: Berkley Books. 1981. Print.

Paffenroth, Kim. The Gospel of the Living Dead: George Romero’s Visions of Hell on Earth. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press. 2006. Print.

The Boogens

It’s October again.  Wow how the year disappears.  But October means monster / horror movies. Actually, I watch scary movies all throughout the year, but in October I like to try to write a little bit about them.  I have in the past tried to watch and then write about one every day of the month, but I don’t think I’ll be able to do that much this year.  Still, I’ll get up as many as I can.

Last night I watched the 1981 horror (cough, cough) film The Boogens.  I chose to watch this one for two reasons. 1) One of the gentlemen who comes to hang out at the Salvation Army during the afternoon to talk with us recommended it, and 2) Stephen King apparently described it as a “wildly energetic monster movie” and said, “I recommend The Boogens …cheerfully and heartily.”

I say that he “apparently” described it thus because I can’t track down the source – apparently he said in the now defunct Twilight Zone Magazine.  Part of the quotation can be found in the promotional posters for the film – so I think it’s a mostly trustworthy quote.

But, good golly! was he wrong (if he actually said it.)

The Boogens, directed by James L. Conway, tries to meld the tropes of an 80s slasher flick (isolated location, sex obsessed young adults, POV shots) with the menace of a creature feature.  It’s set in and around an abandoned silver mine in Colorado and features a subterranean creature with fierce teeth and claws.  It’s as if he tried to combine My Bloody Valentine (slasher film set in a mine) with Tremors (subterranean monsters). 

There’s not a lot of story here – an abandoned mine is re-opened about 100 years after a cave in trapped a number of miners.  There’s a creepy old guy sneaking around warning people about the danger of the mine.  And soon there are creepy crawlies coming up out of the dark to kill people.

 It almost could have been an episode of Scooby Doo. Except episodes of Scooby Doo are only half an hour long.  The Boogens takes twice that to actually get going.  The last 15 minutes almost (almost…) make a decent movie.

Also.. I can't tell ... the way it's written in the title, it looks as if it should be pronounced B-ooooh-gens, but the ONE TIME that it's said in the movie it's pronounced B-oh-gens.

Ghost Brothers of Darkland County - A Musical of Haunting and Hope

My wonderful wife surprised me last night with tickets to see Ghost Brothers of Darkland County – the musical written by Stephen King, John Mellancamp, and T-Bone Burnett.  Wow – oh- wow, do I love her!  Ghost Brothers combines all of my favorite things – Americana music, gothic horror, theater, and theological explorations. 

The music of the show is a variety of bluegrass, country, rock, gospel, and zydeco songs.  And though my wife (who has an aversion to music that veers towards ‘country / western’) was ‘nervous’ about the accordion, harmonica, and banjo listed in the program, she said that it was much better than she anticipated.  I loved it.  Seriously great tunes!  Especially the songs, That’s Me (sung by a devilish character known as The Shape), Home Again, and What Kind of Man am I?  The gospel number Tear This Cabin Down is powerful – and, along with Home Again – probably suitable for use in church on Sunday.

The play itself bears a striking resemblance to another of my favorite plays – J. B. -a play in verse by the poet,Archibald MacLeish.  J.B. is set in an abandoned circus tent, with has-been actors taking on the roles of God and Satan to tell the story of Job.  Instead of a circus tent however, Ghost Brothers is told through an old-time radio drama (complete with a sound effects crew standing by to create sound of breaking bones, doors slamming, tree frogs and etc…)

Photo from Ghost Brothers of Darkland County home page

An additional similarity to MacLeish’s play is found in the ‘supernatural’ characters representing good and evil, light and dark, God and Satan – They are The Zydeco Cowboy (light) and The Shape (dark).  In the production we saw they were played as a sort of dueling Hank Williams (Zydeco Cowboy) and Tom Waits (The Shape) – a point I liked very much.

Ghost Brothers of Darkland County is a story of brothers – resonating, most obviously, with the story of Cain and Able, but also with stories like John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, and Thorton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth, with nods towards southern authors like William Faulkner and Flannery O’Conner.   But it’s also the story of a father and his sons, and a story about the past, and how the past is passed. It is gone. It cannot be changed. It’s a story about lies and truth that comes too late.  It’s a story about redemption (or the lack thereof) and, despite its ghost story trappings and murderous narrative, a story about hope and moving forward.

This is an odd duck in the world of musical theater – there are no big dance numbers, there’s no orchestra (just a four piece band, right on the stage).  It’s violent.  It’s rough, but also tender and haunting (and not just because of the ghosts…) 

Another point of interest for this geek– the father, Joe McCandless – was played by Bruce Greenwood (recognized by science fiction fans as Captain Christopher Pike in the two most recent Star Trek movies.)

The Shining – Making Disappointing Changes to the Story

Stephen King never really liked Stanley Kubrick’s film adaptation of The Shining.  Though King said it was an inarguably brilliant film, he still described it as “maddening, perverse, and disappointing (King, 214).[i]” And with good reason.  Kubrick’s film took King’s basic story (creepy hotel, isolated family, horror, madness, murder) and made something altogether very different than the story that King wrote.

The differences between their two works are really quite interesting.  Stephen King is an emotional writer –he writes with pathos, he wants his readers to feel with and for his characters.  Stanley Kubrick’s films are emotionally detached – almost clinical.  King wrote about supernatural horrors that began to affect the psychological state of the family.  Kubrick, skeptical about all things supernatural, made The Shining into a psychological horror story (with a few ambiguous elements of supernatural activity). 

Some of the changes Kubrick made to King’s story were done for practical reasons – the topiary creatures that menace the family in King’s novel, for instance, were replaced by an enormous hedge maze in the film.  The limits of the special effects industry in 1980 made the change necessary; there was no good way to make the topiary creatures look frightening and realistic.  But the change that Kubrick made, again, reflects the differences between the two artists.  Monster topiary animals that come to life are a supernatural horror appropriate to King.  The hedge maze that Kubrick substituted is symbol of that twisted mind that is lost and unable to escape from the mental maze of insanity. 

Both are powerful work, different as they are.  Both are frightening – though for different reasons and in different ways.

And here I make a left turn from the thousands and thousands of essays, books, and blogs that have been written about The Shining (in any of its various incarnations – Novel, Movie, Television Miniseries) to wonder if the Gospel writer Mark would have felt something similar to Stephen King’s disappointment had he seen (if he saw) the versions of the gospel story produced by Matthew or Luke.  Would he have been disgusted by the changes made to his artistic work by these later authors?

Just something I thought about as I watched The Shining again. 

You might also want to look into Room 237.

Other Monster Movies in October this year:

Absentia

Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell

The ABCs of Death 

The Absent 

American Mary

Osombie 

Kill, Baby, Kill 

Evil Dead 2

Pig Hunt 

The Re-Animator

Satan’s Little Helper

Axe Giant

---

[i] King, Stephen Danse Macabre Berkley Publishing Group, New York, NY, 1981. 

Room 237: Making the Text Plastic

Stanley Kubrick faked the Apollo Moon landing – but was unable to live with the secrecy imposed upon him by the US government, so he revealed the truth of his involvement through clues embedded in the movie The Shining.  The Shining is a message about the Nazis’ holocaust of the Jews during World War II; - it’s obvious from all the occurrences of the number 42 as well as the repeated instances of 7 and its multiples.  The Shining is about the US extermination of American Indians, it’s a Freudian analysis of fairy tales.  It’s a horror movie, it’s a social critique, it’s a coded message.

What is going on here?

The documentary film Room 237 (2012) explores a variety of perceived interpretations, fringe interpretations of Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 film adaptation of Stephen King’s novel (1977).  Room 237 is a magnificently clever film that makes its source material into a plastic, malleable text, twisting and stretching it into fantastic and fanciful new shapes.  It makes interpretation into a wonderful game, a novelty. Each of the alternate interpretations of The Shining on view in Room 237 is stranger than the last.  That’s not surprising really; The Shining is already a complicated film that resists definitive interpretation.

Room 237 fascinates me as a preacher.  Much of my work is interpretation. And not only do I work on interpreting the Bible for myself – so that I can present it intelligibly to my congregation, but I also look at the way that others interpret this shared text – the Bible.  I want to understand the ‘rules’ that constrain our interpretive work.  What keeps us from turning the Bible into Room 237?

Honestly, it’s very easy to turn the Bible into a plastic, malleable text, to twist it and stretch it into fantastic and fanciful new shapes.  I’ve written about some of those here in this blog before – interpretations that find spaceships crash landing on the earth with superior space people – Adam and Eve to populate the Earth. Or interpretations that decode the scriptures to reveal that Jesus was thwarted by the Romans in his attempt to reclaim the throne of David and so sent his wife and two sons into hiding in France . And there are numerous other perceived interpretations, fringe interpretations that could be listed here, some that are merely odd but also others that have had horrific and tragic consequences. 

We appreciate Stanley Kubrick’s films because they are complex and because they resist simple, easy answers.  The same is true of the Bible.  It stimulates our thinking and our imaginations with its complexities and puzzles.  But how firm or how loose are the rules governing interpretation?  How free are we as the audience of The Shining or readers of the scriptures to disregard authorial / directorial intent when forming our interpretation?  How are we to find the meaning in these texts when there is such a multiplicity of meanings being proposed? Which one is correct?  Are they all correct?  Are they all wrong?  How do we know?

Carrie: From a New Perspective

It’s time again for monster movies in October. To be honest, I watch monster and horror movies all year, but in October I try to write a little bit about them.

Brian De Palma’s film version(1976) of Stephen King’s first published novel – Carrie (1974) is dated in many ways, clothing and music fashions have changed, and some of the acting seems a little corny now, but it remains a powerful and frightening movie.  De Palma allowed the film to move ever so slowly towards it inevitable climax, a conclusion that the audience knows but is powerless to prevent.  We are trapped and can only watch in horror as that one pitiful girl’s dream come true turns into a nasty nightmare of blood and revenge.  Carrie is regularly mentioned in lists of the greatest horror movies – or even movies in general.

I’ve read the novel, and I’ve seen De Palma’s film before.  (I’ve even seen the wretched sequel The Rage: Carrie 2 (1999) but we won’t speak of that.)  But this time Carrie hit me in altogether new ways.  It shocked and saddened me – and frightened me – as if I had been watching it for the first time.

Perhaps it’s because this year marks 20 years since I graduated from high school.  (I missed the reunion.  I was at a men’s camp in Omaha, taking pictures of various things and talking with good friends).  Can it really have been so long already?  I was never quite the social outcast that Carrie White was.  But I was scrawny (the epitome of the 90 lbs. weakling) and I was the new kid often enough to know some of her painful story.  I remember the stronger boys laughing at me in the locker room.  I remember being laughed at in the hallways. I survived.  I moved on, grew up – but I do remember what that felt like, even if it’s been 20 years. 

Bullying is a hot-topic these days. Maybe we’re finally starting to realize and to take seriously the fact that kids can be cruel – very cruel - and that high school really is hell. 

But I think what really affected me as I watched Carrie again, is that I now have a daughter of my own, a daughter who is in her freshman year of high school.  I want to protect her and shield her from those inevitable abuses and cruelties.  And I know that I can’t, not always.

The audience watching Carrie is unable to communicate to young Carrie White on the screen.  We know what’s coming.  We know this story – both from our own lives and experiences and also from having seen the movie or read the book.  We know the cruelties that she will face – and we can do absolutely nothing to stop them.  We cannot change the outcome of the movie. We cannot stop that bucket of blood.  We cannot stop her lashing out in anger and shame. We cannot prevent the inevitable deaths.

If I could communicate to Carrie I would tell her that high school ends and that life can get better.  But I can’t.  Her rage will burn and people will die. That’s why Carrie is so horrifying and sad.  But I can communicate to my daughter, and I do.  I tell her that I love her and that, yes, high school really is hell, but life can get better. 

(I don't know about you, but I don't see the need for a remake. ...)

The Existential Life and Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill

What I really lack is to be clear in my mind what I am to do, not what I am to know, except in so far as a certain knowledge must precede every action. The thing is to understand myself, to see what God really wishes me to do: the thing is to find a truth which is true for me, to find the idea for which I can live and die. ... I certainly do not deny that I still recognize an imperative of knowledge and that through it one can work upon men, but it must be taken up into my life, and that is what I now recognize as the most important thing.

—Søren Kierkegaard, Letter to Peter Wilhelm Lund dated August 31, 1835,

Creepshow (1982) is more than just another horror movie.  When director George Romero and writer Stephen King came together to produce this now classic movie, they made something more profound than most creature-features.   It is, of course, a horror movie, (more accurately, an anthology of five short films tied together with the comic book motif). How could it be otherwise with Romero and King at the wheel?  And fans of the horror genre will appreciate the blood and gore and zombies and other various horror tropes.  But the second of the collected stories, The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill, filmed with a blend of comedy and horror, is something more than the sum of its horror cliché parts.  The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill is almost philosophical.

Based on a previously published short story by Stephen King[i], The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill tells the tale of a dimwitted yokel living alone on his farm in rural Main. When he discovers a meteorite that has crashed on his property he sees this as his opportunity to become rich by selling the space rock to the “department of meteors” at the local community college.  He dreams of receiving the extravagant sum of Two Hundred Dollars for his extraordinary find.

But his dreams of wealth are dashed when the meteorite breaks in half and spills out a phosphorescent blue goo over the ground and over Jordy’s hands.  The “department of meteors” wouldn’t be interested in a broken space rock.  He chides himself for being a “lunk-head.” 

“Still,” he says in spite of his disappointment, “I got to try.” He struggles on with his limited abilities and his limited imagination, trying to find that one thing me must do - the one true thing which will give his life meaning and purpose. 

This is the existentialist’s quest: to find something that will give meaning to this life.  And Jordy Verrill is the quintessential existential man – disoriented and confused in the face of a meaningless and absurd world.   

And it is absurd.  The meteorite that Jordy Verrill discovered is contaminated with some sort of extraterrestrial life that begins immediately to grow everywhere.  Even on Jordy himself (“No!” he screams in an off-camera scene, “Not there!)  This green growth spreads across his body, his house, and his farm.  By morning everything is covered and Jordy has become a monstrous plant-man.  As he gropes for a shotgun to put an end to his misery he pleads “Please God, let my luck be in just this once, please God, just this once…” 

Jordy’s television and radio play in the background of several scenes. If you give careful attention you can see that even in these background sounds and images, the horror and absurdity existential life is described.

A wrestling match between Bob Backlund and Samoan No. 1 (is anything in life more absurd than professional wrestling?)

A Star is Born (1937)

…everyone in this world who has ever dreamed about better things has been laughed at, don't you know that? But there's a difference between dreaming and doing. The dreamers just sit around and moon about how wonderful it would be if only things were different.

Christian homily
Look up. Lift up your head. You will succeed.  Be confident of this one thing: that God who has begun a good thing in you will complete it   The hope in this inspirational message, delivered by a smiling priest, is cut by the ironic voice-over announcement that follows. “Pre-recorded.”  It wasn’t a message for Jordy.  It was just a senseless voice carried through the airwaves.

Farm and Weather Report

And in today’s weather…well not much for the outdoor types but you farmers are going to love this. The current 30 day forecast released by the U.S. Meteorological station in Portland calls for moderating temperatures and lots of rain.  Castle County is going to turn green so fast in the next month that it’s going to be almost miraculous.   

And that’s the lonesome death of Jordy Verrill, absurd and meaningless. He lived and died alone in a strange and incomprehensible universe. The world itself is meaningless and amoral (not immoral. They are different).  The universe doesn’t care one way or another about Jordy Verrill.  The meteorite that crashed on his farm was neither a gift nor a curse. It was just absurd. 

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[i]  Weeds by Stephen King – which in turn is loosely based on the story The Color out of Space by H.P. Lovecraft.  The title is based on the song The Lonesome Death of Hattie Caroll by Bob Dylan.

Wendy Says that Everything's Gonna' be All Right

Just doodling around - here's a doodle of Shelley Duvall in The Shining.

I've recently watched both film versions of Stephen King's book and I still prefer the book.  Ain't that the way it always goes?

Jack: The most terrible nightmare I ever had! It's the most horrible dream I ever had!
Wendy: It's okay, it's okay now. Really.
Jack: I dreamed that I – that I killed you and Danny. But I didn't just kill you. I cut you up into little pieces. Oh my God! I must be losing my mind.
Wendy: Everything's gonna be all right.

On Stephen King and Whistling and Writing

I should not read Stephen King.  Not when I'm attempting to write. 

I bought his newest collection of stories, Full Dark, No Stars, the other day and I've already read it through. If nothing else, Stephen King knows how to tell a story.  I am pulled so easily, (so willingly?) into his tales.

And I am envious of the -apparent- ease with which he does this to me. He makes it look so easy, like whistling.  You know how to whistle don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and blow and out comes the story. After I've read just a few pages of his books, I want to burn everything I've ever written. 

And I know, of course, that even for the master of the popular novel writing is not simply a matter of whistling down the words, but involves hard work - maybe not the manual labor of blue collars and calloused hands - but real work none the less.  The ease is only apparent. Because he is good at what he does, he makes it look easy.

I've been asked several times in the past 11 days what my NaNoWriMo novel is about.  And my answer so far as been, "about 18, 5000 words..." (or whatever my current word count happened to be at the time.)  I've not even told my wife.  I'm afraid that if I do I'll loose the story, that I'll have "wasted" my words explaining the story instead of using them to tell the story. 

So, if you've been one to ask me about my story and I've dismissed your question with a bit of a joke, I apologize.  It's not you. Its' me.   

Now I'm going to quit wasting my time and my words in writing about writing and I'm going to go back to writing ...

My Favorite Vampire Books

I spent a good portion of today in a bus full of teenagers and young adults.  We're heading to Omaha, Nebraska for a band trip.  (Why else would anyone go to Omaha?)  The bus smelled, of course, like teenage boys, gym shoes and beef jerky.  I tried to ignore it.  I spent part of the time writing my presentation material for next weekend's theology conference in Ohio (I know. I'm traveling everywhere.) and part of the time reading a new book:

Abraham Lincoln - Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahme-Smith (author of another recent favorite, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies)

And I am enjoying it very much.  I frequently read books about American History, and have read several about our esteemed 16th president, and it is fun to see how the fiction of this story weaves in and around the events of reality.  The telling rings true enough that I could will myself to believe it.

Facts

1.  For over 250 years, between 1607 and 1865, vampires thrived in the shadows of America.  Few humans believed in them.
2.  Abraham Lincoln was one of the gifted vampire hunters of his day, and kept a secret journal about his lifelong war against them.

3.  Rumors of the journal's existence have long been a favorite topic among historians and Lincoln biographers.  Most dismiss it as myth.

I'm a little more than half way through it.  I've heard rumors that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is going to become a movie and that sounds cool, but Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter!  Doesn't that just sound like a great movie?  Yes.  The answer is, Yes.

As I've been enjoying this vampire book, I've been thinking about others that I have read and enjoyed or not enjoyed.  Earlier this year I read Dracula: The Undead.  I didn't care for that one so much.  Strike that.  I didn't like it at all. I wanted to, but there was nothing good about it.

99 Coffins by David Wellington in a setting similar to ALVH.  Through a series of flashbacks we follow a unit of vampire soldiers in the Civil War discovered entombed in coffins beneath the Gettysburg battleground.  I've also read Wellington's Monster Island - a zombie novel, and I liked it as well.  I recommend both of these.

I read the entire Twilight series.  I know.  I know. You've just lost all respect for me.  I've lost all credibility.  But if you've been reading this blog in recent months you are aware that I'm quite willing to subject myself to godawful fiction on behalf of others.  I read Stephanie Meyer's books for the young ladies in my Sunday School class.  They were very excited about the series, and when they discovered that I like vampire stories they were quick to suggest them to me - to foist them upon me.  I read them and shared my impressions.  The girls were not impressed with what I had to say.   

There is of course, the great-granddaddy classic: Dracula. I first read this when I was 11.  I was engrossed. I loved it.  I read it late into the night in my basement room by the light of a small bedside lamp. And when I turned the final page, I closed it and started over again. 

In high school I read Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire.  I actually read the entire series, but the only one that I really liked - the only one that really resonated for me was this first volume.  I understood Louis' despair, or at least I thought I did.  I was a gloomy, moody, lonely teenager. 

Stephen King's Salem's Lot is a wonder.  Wow.  Moving the vampire story from the Gothic and Edwardian London and Transylvania to small town America was such a brilliant thing.  We take it for granted now, but it was a bold shift in the vampire story.  No longer were they somewhere over there in cobwebby castles in countries with difficult names.  Now they were here.  I can't read that book without hearing (or re-hearing, rather, in my memory) the music of Gustav Holst The Planets Suite.  I listened to that over and over as I read Salem's Lot and now the two are permanently entwined for me.  I also can't read it without crying a little bit for Father Callahan.  I appreciate very much that he gets to find some redemption in The Dark Tower series.

Another more recent vampire story that I have enjoyed is The Historian the debut novel of Elizabeth Kostova.  I love everything about this book: the attention to historical detail, the slow deliberate pacing of discovery, the connection made between the reader (me) and the characters.  It's a vampire story, a detective story, a Gothic romance, a travelogue, and a historical thriller.  It's great.

Other great ones include I Am Legend by Richard Matheson (which has inspired 3 filmed interpretations, none of which have I enjoyed.)  And - chuckle all you want.  I like it. - Bunnicula by James Howe. That little vampire bunny was so much fun.