A trip to the library....

Popped into the library today to pick up some DVDs for a friend who has been secluded in the local Senior's home as a result of breaking her leg, and is beginning to get 'cabin fever'!

While there I found three books awaiting me - books that I had just ordered a few days ago, inspired by a little roving through literary type blogs one evening last week.

I was astounded at the size of 'Jonathon Strange and Mr. Norrell' (Susanna Clarke) but encouraged by the Sunday Times' blurb that claimed this large tome to be 'a fabulous book....dazzlimg....highly original and compelling'.

And so I am prepared to take it on!  It may take me all summer but the library lady checked and said it was probably good for two renewals (nine weeks).  One thousand and six pages!!! 

I am going to have to stem this Protestant Ethic I harbour that (even at ninety) every day must be productive if I am going to sleep self-satisfied and with a clear concscience. I shall ignore the ethics and put aside more time for reading.....

 I am still intriqued by Jack Miles' Biography of God as the 'protagonist of the greatest book'.  

 And his introductory essay to his latest work as editor of the Norton Anthology of World Religions - 'Why God will not Die' and I gather the answer to that  lies in the belief that 

"our ignorance still exceeds our knowledge, 

and we still have eminently good reason to fear the unknown"  

....and how we reasonably cope with the "impossibility of our ever living a perfectly rational life"..

Towards the end of the essay Miles quotes Mary Oliver - "what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"  and continues....

"We never truly know how to reply to that challenge, do we, since more knowledge - the knowledge we do not have - could always justify holding current plans in abeyance just a little longer.  But when life refuses to wait any longer and the great game  begins whether you have suited up or not, than a demand arises that religion - or some expedient no more fully rational than religion - must meet.  You're going to go with something.........science keeps revealing how much we don't know.  Yet humans seek closure."   

And I guess that's why I was at the Church doing Bulletins for tomorrow's service, changing the hangings back to Green after the Red of Pentecost, checking the candles 

and putting flowers on the altar..............

I also brought home Arthur Ransome's 'We didn't mean to Go to Sea', which should provide a little light hearted diversion from great tomes and heavy philosphical thinking!!!!!!!

Yesterday, a real treat, - Simon Rattle and Barbara Hannigan (a Nova Scotia Canadian) in a cabaret type late night performance with six instruments from the Berlin Philharmoniker....

Wonderful!

Advertised as being very British and a little naughty....