Two friends have sent me links to an article that appeared in the New York Times and the Philadelphia Inquirer which reports that the Archdiocese of Philadelphia has suspended twenty-one priests for the sexual molestation of children. This after the cardinal had stated that there were no guilty priests currently in the ministry in that diocese. The suspension is said to be the largest thus far in the priest sexual abuse scandal.
The report simply confirms what I and others have known for some time; namely, that the lies, the cover-up and the systematic protection of pedophiles among the Catholic clergy continue. Cardinal Rigali now brands himself as an active co-conspirator, having first attempted to deny the existence of these monsters, then having covered up for them, and only now having admitted to their crimes. As I have said before: If Rigali admits to twenty-one, then there are twenty-one more whom he has not yet exposed, and twenty-one more of whom he is not yet aware. The pattern is disgustingly consistent and predictable. The Catholic Church remains a conspiracy against the innocence of children, and the 'penitential Mass' which Rigali promises makes no difference, and only adds to the mounting hypocrisy.
Recently I wrote a screenplay on the subject of priest sexual abuse of children, and in the course of it, I found myself meditating on the extent of the clergy's criminal culpability. The Church continues to insist that the number of priest pedophiles is tiny, and their crimes, the rare exceptions. This is simply a lie, as the figures show. But there is a further lie beyond this numerical one. The character in my screenplay, a convicted priest molester, asserts that all of the Catholic clergy are guilty. His lawyer responds, surely, not all. To which the priest replies that those who did not commit the crimes covered them up, and those who did not cover them up knew about them, and those who did not know about them did not want to know. Priests, bishops, cardinals, popes, all are guilty.
I surprised myself when I wrote those lines, but upon reflection, I realize the truth of them. Catholic priests live in close-knit communities, sharing the same residence, the same meals, the same free time, the same common rooms. They eat together, pray together, play cards and talk and drive and get drunk together. In short, they live together, just as intimately and casually as does any family. Is it conceivable that in such a community, child rapists could exist unknown to the others? Ask yourself: When a community of priests finds a man suddenly transferred into its midst bearing with him the stench of scandal, watches his interactions with the boys of the parish, notes his behavior, his interests, his associations, and then sees him transferred out again just as suddenly, is it possible that they have no idea why?
To put it another way: Could you have a child rapist living in your home for months or years without knowing or at least suspecting what he was? Yet every rectory, every residence was a family, and in each and every one, pedophiles lived and prayed and ate and played and got drunk with the other priests. Those who did not commit the crimes covered them up, and those who did not cover them up knew about them and those who did not know about them did not want to know.
This last group is nearly the worst. They are moral cowards, accomplices to the molestations every bit as much as if they had lured the boys in or drugged them or held them down. Their stench almost equals that of the rapists, because they forfeited their vocation, their manliness, their morality, their humanity and their souls in turning their backs on what they knew or suspected was happening. They cannot hide behind their ignorance since their ignorance was willful. They left the innocent to their molesters, and now they claim they knew nothing. They are, in effect, like the Germans who claimed they knew nothing about the trains, about the camps, about the ovens. And, if Dante is correct, the hottest places in hell are reserved for them.
When will the scandal end? When the Church as it is currently constituted ends. When will the slate be wiped clean? For all the penitential Masses in the world, it will remain smudged with the tears and the tortured memories of violated children until the Church is cleansed of its clergy. To my mind, the only hope for the future of the Roman Church lies where it began: with the spirit of the Gospels in which Jesus said that if anyone violates a child it would be better for him that a stone were tied around his neck and he were thrown into the sea. All of the guilty lot of the Catholic clergy must be submerged beneath their collective guilt, they must be exposed, punished and repudiated by the faithful, if the Church is ever to emerge again pure and cleansed, and reclaim its right to minister to innocents.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Changes
When I was in high school some friends dragged me to see Phil Ochs in concert at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia. I had never heard of him and had no idea what he was about. That concert proved to be a turning point in my life.
I remember the ushers at the Academy, mostly retired men, yelling, booing and cursing as Ochs performed his songs, alone on stage, and I thought: "This is interesting. This guy must be onto something." He was. I thought then and still think that Phil Ochs was the purest, most honest and most talented of the protest singers of the Sixties and Seventies. His impact on me was profound; in a word, he radicalized me that night at the old Academy of Music.
He sang about the war in Vietnam, America's imperialism, economic injustice,the hypocrisy of liberals, the numbing effects of mass media and the individual's alienation from society in a voice that was clear, delicate and, to my ears, pristine and powerful in its warbling timbre. The consciousness his singing and his earnestness engendered in me remained a part of my psyche and my identity for decades.
Phil Ochs set me on a journey into political activism, social consciousness and radical thought that helped define me as a person in my young years. I joined the student protest movement, inspired by his song, "I'm Gonna Say It Now," I enlisted in the Civil Rights struggle under the influence of his "Mississippi," and I threw myself headlong into the anti-war movement, singing his "Draft Dodger Rag" and "I Ain't Marchin Anymore." Having heard him sing "Small Circle of Friends," I wrote a play about the disease of detachment which was plaguing society in those days. The play was put on television, launching my career as a dramatist, which I follow to this day. And I still find myself singing his lovely ballad, "Changes," and his haunting signature song, with which he closed that concert, "While I'm Here," to my little boy.
I saw Phil Ochs once more in person, at the Vietnam Moratorium protest rally in Washington D.C. A fully committed student radical by that time, I caravanned with friends down to the capital and camped out by the Reflecting Pond. There was a big elevated stage on which speakers harangued the crowd and bands performed. I can still see Phil Ochs in a capacious plaid Jeff cap singing "Mississippi," the refrain modified to make it a condemnation of President Nixon: "Richard Nixon, find yourself another country to be part of." As he sang, I glanced up past the Lincoln Memorial to see a regiment of National Guardsmen marching towards us in perfect alignment. We were soon surrounded, hemmed in by bayonets and tear-gassed by taunting D.C cops. Hundreds of kids were rounded up and crowded into RFK Stadium. I narrowly escaped arrest - I was on the back side of the stage hoping to meet Phil Ochs as he exited.
The other night I saw the new documentary about Phil Ochs, and it was both an informative and emotional experience for me. I went in order to learn more about this young man who played such a large part in my life, and I was not disappointed. I did not know, for example, that he was a Jew, that his father was a failed physician and manic depressive, that Phil Ochs never intended to be a musician and acquired his first guitar by winning a bet with his college roommate who taught him to play. I did not know how he hungered for fame, about his intense rivalry with Bob Dylan, and the details of his untimely death.
The last time I saw Phil Ochs perform was on a children's television program about poetry. He sang his version of Poe's "The Bells," which had been a favorite poem of my childhood, and "The Highwayman," a maudlin little saga, but one that lent itself well to his musical setting of it. It must have been near the end of his life, and I thought as I watched him that his career must be in sorry shape. However, the film made it clear that Ochs was always available to sing for a good cause, no matter how humble, and I suppose he could not resist the opportunity to bring his music to a new generation of children.
I lost track of him as I graduated from college, lived in Europe, volunteered in Africa and returned to Paris to attend grad school. It was then, while I was studying at the Paris Film Conservatory and working part-time in a grocery store, that, on my way to work I picked up the International Herald Tribune, and read of his suicide at the age of thirty-five. I was deeply struck by the news, and I could not help but mention it, as I held the paper, to my boss, the owner of the store. "Quelle idée," he remarked, genuinely unable to understand why such a talented young man should kill himself. I supposed, as many people did, that Ochs had found himself increasingly irrelevant, a rebel without a cause. And while that is undeniably true, the film made it clear that there was more to it than that. Though I am far removed from the politics of my youth now, I found this rediscovery of Phil Ochs oddly moving. Indeed, I choked up as the film recounted his gradual descent into manic depression, drunkenness and despair. He was, as he says in his song, "the victim of the vine of changes." As I myself have been.
In a real sense, Phil Ochs' music was my youth, my vocal vibrancy, my political consciousness, my social conscience, and my conviction that all that was wrong about America had to and could be put right if only enough of us joined together in a spirit of righteousness and hope. I suppose it was for the memory of that belief that my throat tightened and I had to fight back tears during the film. Those days, that spirit, are gone, but my re-encounter with Phil Ochs makes me realize that I, and my country, were permanently changed by the experience which he sang and we lived. Changed for the better I think; at least I hope, for the better.
I remember the ushers at the Academy, mostly retired men, yelling, booing and cursing as Ochs performed his songs, alone on stage, and I thought: "This is interesting. This guy must be onto something." He was. I thought then and still think that Phil Ochs was the purest, most honest and most talented of the protest singers of the Sixties and Seventies. His impact on me was profound; in a word, he radicalized me that night at the old Academy of Music.
He sang about the war in Vietnam, America's imperialism, economic injustice,the hypocrisy of liberals, the numbing effects of mass media and the individual's alienation from society in a voice that was clear, delicate and, to my ears, pristine and powerful in its warbling timbre. The consciousness his singing and his earnestness engendered in me remained a part of my psyche and my identity for decades.
Phil Ochs set me on a journey into political activism, social consciousness and radical thought that helped define me as a person in my young years. I joined the student protest movement, inspired by his song, "I'm Gonna Say It Now," I enlisted in the Civil Rights struggle under the influence of his "Mississippi," and I threw myself headlong into the anti-war movement, singing his "Draft Dodger Rag" and "I Ain't Marchin Anymore." Having heard him sing "Small Circle of Friends," I wrote a play about the disease of detachment which was plaguing society in those days. The play was put on television, launching my career as a dramatist, which I follow to this day. And I still find myself singing his lovely ballad, "Changes," and his haunting signature song, with which he closed that concert, "While I'm Here," to my little boy.
I saw Phil Ochs once more in person, at the Vietnam Moratorium protest rally in Washington D.C. A fully committed student radical by that time, I caravanned with friends down to the capital and camped out by the Reflecting Pond. There was a big elevated stage on which speakers harangued the crowd and bands performed. I can still see Phil Ochs in a capacious plaid Jeff cap singing "Mississippi," the refrain modified to make it a condemnation of President Nixon: "Richard Nixon, find yourself another country to be part of." As he sang, I glanced up past the Lincoln Memorial to see a regiment of National Guardsmen marching towards us in perfect alignment. We were soon surrounded, hemmed in by bayonets and tear-gassed by taunting D.C cops. Hundreds of kids were rounded up and crowded into RFK Stadium. I narrowly escaped arrest - I was on the back side of the stage hoping to meet Phil Ochs as he exited.
The other night I saw the new documentary about Phil Ochs, and it was both an informative and emotional experience for me. I went in order to learn more about this young man who played such a large part in my life, and I was not disappointed. I did not know, for example, that he was a Jew, that his father was a failed physician and manic depressive, that Phil Ochs never intended to be a musician and acquired his first guitar by winning a bet with his college roommate who taught him to play. I did not know how he hungered for fame, about his intense rivalry with Bob Dylan, and the details of his untimely death.
The last time I saw Phil Ochs perform was on a children's television program about poetry. He sang his version of Poe's "The Bells," which had been a favorite poem of my childhood, and "The Highwayman," a maudlin little saga, but one that lent itself well to his musical setting of it. It must have been near the end of his life, and I thought as I watched him that his career must be in sorry shape. However, the film made it clear that Ochs was always available to sing for a good cause, no matter how humble, and I suppose he could not resist the opportunity to bring his music to a new generation of children.
I lost track of him as I graduated from college, lived in Europe, volunteered in Africa and returned to Paris to attend grad school. It was then, while I was studying at the Paris Film Conservatory and working part-time in a grocery store, that, on my way to work I picked up the International Herald Tribune, and read of his suicide at the age of thirty-five. I was deeply struck by the news, and I could not help but mention it, as I held the paper, to my boss, the owner of the store. "Quelle idée," he remarked, genuinely unable to understand why such a talented young man should kill himself. I supposed, as many people did, that Ochs had found himself increasingly irrelevant, a rebel without a cause. And while that is undeniably true, the film made it clear that there was more to it than that. Though I am far removed from the politics of my youth now, I found this rediscovery of Phil Ochs oddly moving. Indeed, I choked up as the film recounted his gradual descent into manic depression, drunkenness and despair. He was, as he says in his song, "the victim of the vine of changes." As I myself have been.
In a real sense, Phil Ochs' music was my youth, my vocal vibrancy, my political consciousness, my social conscience, and my conviction that all that was wrong about America had to and could be put right if only enough of us joined together in a spirit of righteousness and hope. I suppose it was for the memory of that belief that my throat tightened and I had to fight back tears during the film. Those days, that spirit, are gone, but my re-encounter with Phil Ochs makes me realize that I, and my country, were permanently changed by the experience which he sang and we lived. Changed for the better I think; at least I hope, for the better.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Brothers keepers
I attended a Catholic high school in Philadelphia run by the Christian Brothers. Known best, I suppose, for their undrinkable swill of wine, the Brothers are a very old teaching order of men who conduct a network of schools, colleges and reformatories around the world.
When I was a student at West Philadelphia Catholic High School for Boys in the 1960s, the Brothers still wore black cassocks and a peculiar little white celluloid collar in the shape of a pair of tombstones. They affected religious names like Pius and Fidelis of Mary, lived communally in a rectory adjacent to the school, and observed a vow of celibacy.
Most of us boys were in awe of them, as we had been conditioned to regard all members of the clergy, male and female, as a special species apart from humanity. In fact, when I was very young and in a Catholic elementary school, I thought there were four types of human beings: men, women, priests and nuns. The Brothers were no exception. As Catholic clergy, they seemed to us, and to our parents, to exist in a world apart; celibate, sequestered, indeed, secretive in their daily routine and communal activities.
We boys also feared the Christian Brothers, and with good reason. In those days (though I understand that this has changed) they enforced discipline with intimidation, bullying and brutality. That some people still look back on such behavior with a kind of grim fondness is a curious and, in my view, pitiable practice. Often I witnessed the brow-beatings and physical beatings which misbehavior or lack of respect provoked. I watched a Brother slap a friend of mine so hard that the boy was propelled out of his chair, hitting his head on the chalkboard, nearly knocking him out. I witnessed another Brother hit a boy across the buttocks with a two-by-four plank (which he called the Board of Education), and when the boy, at the last instant, put his hand behind him to shield himself, the blow crushed his graduation ring on his finger, so that he had to be taken to the hospital to have it cut off.
Insults, mockeries, slappings and beatings were part of the routine of the school. In fairness, however, I must add that we received a good quality of education, and many of us were fond of the Brothers who taught us, considered them friends and advisers, and remain grateful to them for the sense of discipline and self-control which their treatment of us engendered. It was not all fear and trembling; the Brothers seemed genuinely to enjoy teaching us, could be great fun, and made deep and lasting impressions on most of us.
But there was one aspect of the Brothers' lives that, while apparent to a few of us at the time, did not become clear until much later. Many of the Brothers -- I would say, most of them -- were gay. Some were so flamboyantly so that their homosexuality, in some cases their femininity, was evident to even the most thick-headed and naive among us. Others were more adept at concealing it. But in the decades since my graduation, it has become clear to me that most of them had entered the order either to deny their sexuality, or to gain access to boys.
Looking back on my years at the Brothers' school, I can recall that there were one or two incidents which must have involved sexual scandal between Brothers and boys. I remember that one Brother simply disappeared from the school, which was then flooded with rumors that he had seduced a boy. If that was so, it was quickly and thoroughly covered up. That others did so I have no doubt, and either got away with it or had their crimes concealed, as is the long established practice of the Church. There can be little doubt, as well, that Brothers engaged in homosexual activity within the confines of the communal residence. Personally, I know of at least one such incident. When we add to this the fact, of which I am aware, that alcohol was widely and lavishly used by the Brothers, sexual activity would seem to have been inevitable.
Some years after I left the school, in the Eighties I think it was, the Christian Brothers imploded. The order dissolved in a whirlpool of self-examination and self-scrutiny; most of the Brothers left, and many of the others dispersed into communities of laymen outside the strict control of the archdiocese. They changed their names, abandoned their clerical garb, and the order itself seemed paralyzed by self-doubt and a desperate search for identity.
Why this was so I never learned. Even the former Brothers with whom I remained in touch would not discuss it. It was as if what had happened was some shameful secret, some mutual admission of concupiscence, that none of them wanted to disclose; indeed, it was almost as if they had sworn an oath of secrecy.
In looking back on my experience with them, however, I think that what probably happened was that increasing instances of sexual molestation of boys caused the Brothers (who may have been more honest among themselves than were the priests) to examine as an order their behavior and the reasons for the members assuming their vocations. I suspect that in the course of that self-examination they were forced to admit that the motives for their having joined the brotherhood were grounded more in their sexuality than in their spirituality. In short: They had to confront the fact that they had become Brothers for the wrong reason.
And so a large number of them quit the order and returned to lay life. There, I expect, they either married in order to continue their self-deception (I know of one or two instances of this), or admitted finally to their homosexuality and entered that lifestyle. But this is only what I surmise; I do not claim to know it for a fact, and would appreciate hearing from former Brothers or people close to the order who can throw light upon the subject.
However the larger issue does seem clear: Like the priests and nuns with whom they served, the Brothers' vocations were motivated in large part by a conflict over their sexual identities which they strove either to legitimize (indeed, to sanctify) by their religious service; or, more diabolically, their joining was nothing less than a calculated attempt on their part to gain easy access to adolescent boys in order to satisfy their own bestial appetites. In concert with this, the Church of course displayed its habitual crass and cruel cynicism by concealing, abetting and even spreading the disease of child abuse, while holding up the Brothers as pure examples of the celibate service of God.
Let me state again that I do not say that all of the Brothers were either gay or pedophiles, but in my experience, a large number were gay and a few, I suspect, were pedophiles. Of some I have nothing but fond and grateful memories, since those men, whose vocation to educate boys was true and noble, expressed a genuine desire to teach and guide us. I could name them here (some undoubtedly were gay), since they remain in my memory and in my esteem. But it seems to me that they were in the minority, and that the sense of guilt suffered and crimes committed by their fellows, together with the heinous efforts of the hierarchy to aid and protect them, unfortunately must outweigh the selfless service of the remainder.
Once again, I do not claim to know these things; only that I have reason to believe that they are so. Therefore, I invite anyone who knew the Brothers in the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties to write and inform me. Is my recollection that most of the Brothers were gay correct? And why, in fact, did the Brothers undergo such seismic shaking as I was aware of in the years following my experience with them? I would very much like to know.
When I was a student at West Philadelphia Catholic High School for Boys in the 1960s, the Brothers still wore black cassocks and a peculiar little white celluloid collar in the shape of a pair of tombstones. They affected religious names like Pius and Fidelis of Mary, lived communally in a rectory adjacent to the school, and observed a vow of celibacy.
Most of us boys were in awe of them, as we had been conditioned to regard all members of the clergy, male and female, as a special species apart from humanity. In fact, when I was very young and in a Catholic elementary school, I thought there were four types of human beings: men, women, priests and nuns. The Brothers were no exception. As Catholic clergy, they seemed to us, and to our parents, to exist in a world apart; celibate, sequestered, indeed, secretive in their daily routine and communal activities.
We boys also feared the Christian Brothers, and with good reason. In those days (though I understand that this has changed) they enforced discipline with intimidation, bullying and brutality. That some people still look back on such behavior with a kind of grim fondness is a curious and, in my view, pitiable practice. Often I witnessed the brow-beatings and physical beatings which misbehavior or lack of respect provoked. I watched a Brother slap a friend of mine so hard that the boy was propelled out of his chair, hitting his head on the chalkboard, nearly knocking him out. I witnessed another Brother hit a boy across the buttocks with a two-by-four plank (which he called the Board of Education), and when the boy, at the last instant, put his hand behind him to shield himself, the blow crushed his graduation ring on his finger, so that he had to be taken to the hospital to have it cut off.
Insults, mockeries, slappings and beatings were part of the routine of the school. In fairness, however, I must add that we received a good quality of education, and many of us were fond of the Brothers who taught us, considered them friends and advisers, and remain grateful to them for the sense of discipline and self-control which their treatment of us engendered. It was not all fear and trembling; the Brothers seemed genuinely to enjoy teaching us, could be great fun, and made deep and lasting impressions on most of us.
But there was one aspect of the Brothers' lives that, while apparent to a few of us at the time, did not become clear until much later. Many of the Brothers -- I would say, most of them -- were gay. Some were so flamboyantly so that their homosexuality, in some cases their femininity, was evident to even the most thick-headed and naive among us. Others were more adept at concealing it. But in the decades since my graduation, it has become clear to me that most of them had entered the order either to deny their sexuality, or to gain access to boys.
Looking back on my years at the Brothers' school, I can recall that there were one or two incidents which must have involved sexual scandal between Brothers and boys. I remember that one Brother simply disappeared from the school, which was then flooded with rumors that he had seduced a boy. If that was so, it was quickly and thoroughly covered up. That others did so I have no doubt, and either got away with it or had their crimes concealed, as is the long established practice of the Church. There can be little doubt, as well, that Brothers engaged in homosexual activity within the confines of the communal residence. Personally, I know of at least one such incident. When we add to this the fact, of which I am aware, that alcohol was widely and lavishly used by the Brothers, sexual activity would seem to have been inevitable.
Some years after I left the school, in the Eighties I think it was, the Christian Brothers imploded. The order dissolved in a whirlpool of self-examination and self-scrutiny; most of the Brothers left, and many of the others dispersed into communities of laymen outside the strict control of the archdiocese. They changed their names, abandoned their clerical garb, and the order itself seemed paralyzed by self-doubt and a desperate search for identity.
Why this was so I never learned. Even the former Brothers with whom I remained in touch would not discuss it. It was as if what had happened was some shameful secret, some mutual admission of concupiscence, that none of them wanted to disclose; indeed, it was almost as if they had sworn an oath of secrecy.
In looking back on my experience with them, however, I think that what probably happened was that increasing instances of sexual molestation of boys caused the Brothers (who may have been more honest among themselves than were the priests) to examine as an order their behavior and the reasons for the members assuming their vocations. I suspect that in the course of that self-examination they were forced to admit that the motives for their having joined the brotherhood were grounded more in their sexuality than in their spirituality. In short: They had to confront the fact that they had become Brothers for the wrong reason.
And so a large number of them quit the order and returned to lay life. There, I expect, they either married in order to continue their self-deception (I know of one or two instances of this), or admitted finally to their homosexuality and entered that lifestyle. But this is only what I surmise; I do not claim to know it for a fact, and would appreciate hearing from former Brothers or people close to the order who can throw light upon the subject.
However the larger issue does seem clear: Like the priests and nuns with whom they served, the Brothers' vocations were motivated in large part by a conflict over their sexual identities which they strove either to legitimize (indeed, to sanctify) by their religious service; or, more diabolically, their joining was nothing less than a calculated attempt on their part to gain easy access to adolescent boys in order to satisfy their own bestial appetites. In concert with this, the Church of course displayed its habitual crass and cruel cynicism by concealing, abetting and even spreading the disease of child abuse, while holding up the Brothers as pure examples of the celibate service of God.
Let me state again that I do not say that all of the Brothers were either gay or pedophiles, but in my experience, a large number were gay and a few, I suspect, were pedophiles. Of some I have nothing but fond and grateful memories, since those men, whose vocation to educate boys was true and noble, expressed a genuine desire to teach and guide us. I could name them here (some undoubtedly were gay), since they remain in my memory and in my esteem. But it seems to me that they were in the minority, and that the sense of guilt suffered and crimes committed by their fellows, together with the heinous efforts of the hierarchy to aid and protect them, unfortunately must outweigh the selfless service of the remainder.
Once again, I do not claim to know these things; only that I have reason to believe that they are so. Therefore, I invite anyone who knew the Brothers in the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties to write and inform me. Is my recollection that most of the Brothers were gay correct? And why, in fact, did the Brothers undergo such seismic shaking as I was aware of in the years following my experience with them? I would very much like to know.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Hardly Biutiful
Last night I saw Inarritu's new film, "Biutiful," starring Javier Bardem. I won't say much about it except that my greatest regret is that I did not walk out after the first excruciating hour (of two-and-a-half). I don't know who thinks this sort of film edifying, enlightening or beautiful, I but am not one of them. I found it self-indulgent, plangent, over-wrought and utterly lacking in either insight or revelation.
Leaving aside the fact that fully forty minutes of this hyper-depressing tale could have been cut without loss, I find myself still wondering what it was all meant to be about. There was absolutely no logic to the structure, which meandered from doldrum to doldrum apparently without concern for either the characters or the audience, leading me to observe to my companion that the film might never actually end. There was no reason for it to do so, since there was neither plan nor point in its interminable concatenation of scenes. "We could be here until next year," I whispered, and, indeed, by the time the film finally panted to a conclusion, it felt as if we had been.
I don't want to devote much more time to it. Bardem, who has shown himself to be a very good actor, was inexorably blue (literally and figuratively), maintained an unchanging dreary expression, unshaved, unrelieved, and uninspired. His wife, as a character, is not to be mentioned: so utterly worthless and hapless as to be comical in her more plaintive moments. A whining bipolar whore who alternately dotes on, beats and abandons her children, she claims resurrection by virtue of staring into a light box. This would have been funny if there were not children involved.
As for the two-score Chinese peasants washed up on the shores of Barcelona (one of whom ends up stuck to the ceiling in the main character's apartment); the main character's claim to be able to speak to the dead (for money), a subplot that goes nowhere; the homosexual subplot of the Chinese sweatshop managers that goes nowhere; the politically correct subplot of the Senegalese drug traffickers, that goes nowhere (the wife of one is last seen taking a train from Barcelona to Senegal - a train!); and the repeated scenes of domestic eating, bloody urination, counting and recounting Euros, the less said the better.
To those of you who may have seen the film I offer this warning: Forget opening the fridge in your bare feet -- watch out for the damn space heaters.
Leaving aside the fact that fully forty minutes of this hyper-depressing tale could have been cut without loss, I find myself still wondering what it was all meant to be about. There was absolutely no logic to the structure, which meandered from doldrum to doldrum apparently without concern for either the characters or the audience, leading me to observe to my companion that the film might never actually end. There was no reason for it to do so, since there was neither plan nor point in its interminable concatenation of scenes. "We could be here until next year," I whispered, and, indeed, by the time the film finally panted to a conclusion, it felt as if we had been.
I don't want to devote much more time to it. Bardem, who has shown himself to be a very good actor, was inexorably blue (literally and figuratively), maintained an unchanging dreary expression, unshaved, unrelieved, and uninspired. His wife, as a character, is not to be mentioned: so utterly worthless and hapless as to be comical in her more plaintive moments. A whining bipolar whore who alternately dotes on, beats and abandons her children, she claims resurrection by virtue of staring into a light box. This would have been funny if there were not children involved.
As for the two-score Chinese peasants washed up on the shores of Barcelona (one of whom ends up stuck to the ceiling in the main character's apartment); the main character's claim to be able to speak to the dead (for money), a subplot that goes nowhere; the homosexual subplot of the Chinese sweatshop managers that goes nowhere; the politically correct subplot of the Senegalese drug traffickers, that goes nowhere (the wife of one is last seen taking a train from Barcelona to Senegal - a train!); and the repeated scenes of domestic eating, bloody urination, counting and recounting Euros, the less said the better.
To those of you who may have seen the film I offer this warning: Forget opening the fridge in your bare feet -- watch out for the damn space heaters.
Decline and Fall
Somehow I had managed to get through my entire education and the decades since without having read Edward Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." Such gaps in my learning sometimes assault me, and remind me that I am not nearly as smart as I allow myself, at the best of times, to think. But when my son mentioned that he was reading it, I realized my deficit and resolved to redress it.
Unfortunately, the very large volume of reading I have to do for work leaves me little time to read for pleasure. Then, on a visit to a record store (Remember those?) to buy my little one some Beatles and Stones to feed his growing appetite for what he thinks of as classics, I wandered over to the spoken word section, and found there a six-CD recording of Gibbon's masterwork. This was my chance, I realized: "Decline and Fall" in the car during my commutes, with scarcely an effort on my part. I bought it, and put it into the CD player.
That was six-CD's ago, and I am much the better for it. The book is, in fact, a monument; itself a kind of Coliseum of history and literature. How I missed it for so long I cannot say, but I wish that someone in my endless years of education had forced me, or at least encouraged me, to read it.
The prose, alone, is worth the time, and the reading, by a Welsh actor named Philip Madoc, makes it even more so. The book was written between 1770 and 1790, and the sad fact is that no one writes like this anymore. It is quite simply the most elegant, lyrical and lucid prose I have read in a very long time. In American literature, only William James's "Varieties of Religious Experience" and Grant's "Memoirs" come close for clarity and beauty of expression. Gibbons' prose reminds us of the vast riches of the English language, and Madoc's reading, of the lustrous beauty of it. If God had a voice and could speak, this is what he would sound like.
As for its historicity, I have some reservations. Gibbon engages at times in such sweeping generalizations of so breathtaking a scope as no modern historian would permit himself. Nonetheless, his portraits and insights, his judgments and conclusions evince a wisdom and depth of reflection that set the work apart. It is beautiful literature and compelling history.
That said, I find, regretfully, that I must agree with those who cite "Decline and Fall" as a cautionary tale to our own civilization. Gibbon, of course, did not have America in mind when he wrote his history, but some of his more insightful observations seem to have been written as if he had. When Gibbon reflects that Rome had lost its spirit of vigor, that its citizens had chosen the common level over the pursuit of excellence, and that their focus on pleasures and material comfort had sapped the empire of its strength, he may as well have been talking about us. Continual involvement in foreign wars, together with a complacent and comfortable life at home contributed to the empire's fall. Not to mention the accumulation of debt which made Rome weak internally, and vulnerable to its barbarian neighbors; the systematic destruction of the best in society together with the punishing of excellence and initiative, and the increasing laxity and ignorance of its citizens marked the empire for inevitable doom.
Foreign wars, domestic laxity, debt, popular ignorance, and the pursuit of the common and comfortable instead of the fostering of excellence... it sounds all too familiar. I think that Gibbon would recognize the symptoms today, and that he would offer his opinion that the decline of our civilization is as unmistakable as the fall is inevitable.
Unfortunately, the very large volume of reading I have to do for work leaves me little time to read for pleasure. Then, on a visit to a record store (Remember those?) to buy my little one some Beatles and Stones to feed his growing appetite for what he thinks of as classics, I wandered over to the spoken word section, and found there a six-CD recording of Gibbon's masterwork. This was my chance, I realized: "Decline and Fall" in the car during my commutes, with scarcely an effort on my part. I bought it, and put it into the CD player.
That was six-CD's ago, and I am much the better for it. The book is, in fact, a monument; itself a kind of Coliseum of history and literature. How I missed it for so long I cannot say, but I wish that someone in my endless years of education had forced me, or at least encouraged me, to read it.
The prose, alone, is worth the time, and the reading, by a Welsh actor named Philip Madoc, makes it even more so. The book was written between 1770 and 1790, and the sad fact is that no one writes like this anymore. It is quite simply the most elegant, lyrical and lucid prose I have read in a very long time. In American literature, only William James's "Varieties of Religious Experience" and Grant's "Memoirs" come close for clarity and beauty of expression. Gibbons' prose reminds us of the vast riches of the English language, and Madoc's reading, of the lustrous beauty of it. If God had a voice and could speak, this is what he would sound like.
As for its historicity, I have some reservations. Gibbon engages at times in such sweeping generalizations of so breathtaking a scope as no modern historian would permit himself. Nonetheless, his portraits and insights, his judgments and conclusions evince a wisdom and depth of reflection that set the work apart. It is beautiful literature and compelling history.
That said, I find, regretfully, that I must agree with those who cite "Decline and Fall" as a cautionary tale to our own civilization. Gibbon, of course, did not have America in mind when he wrote his history, but some of his more insightful observations seem to have been written as if he had. When Gibbon reflects that Rome had lost its spirit of vigor, that its citizens had chosen the common level over the pursuit of excellence, and that their focus on pleasures and material comfort had sapped the empire of its strength, he may as well have been talking about us. Continual involvement in foreign wars, together with a complacent and comfortable life at home contributed to the empire's fall. Not to mention the accumulation of debt which made Rome weak internally, and vulnerable to its barbarian neighbors; the systematic destruction of the best in society together with the punishing of excellence and initiative, and the increasing laxity and ignorance of its citizens marked the empire for inevitable doom.
Foreign wars, domestic laxity, debt, popular ignorance, and the pursuit of the common and comfortable instead of the fostering of excellence... it sounds all too familiar. I think that Gibbon would recognize the symptoms today, and that he would offer his opinion that the decline of our civilization is as unmistakable as the fall is inevitable.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Dance with me
I have a subscription to the dance series at the Music Center in Los Angeles. Last Friday I attended a performance by the Brazilian company, Grupo Corpo. It was rather extraordinary. They manage to combine classical ballet with modern and traditional forms of Brazilian dance, in a synthesis that, at moments, is breathtaking in its virtuosity. Some of the moves which characterize their style I had never seen before, a sort of bossa nova-tango-rumba gliding bow-bend articulation of the body which is typically rounded in its execution and spiked with lifts that appear to defy both muscularity and gravity. I found it all fascinating and revealing.
Prior to that I had seen Corella Ballet Castilla y León, a youthful Spanish company, and they were superb. Their vigor, inventiveness and almost gleeful energy was infectious, and the audience, including my eight-year-old son, cheered them heartily. In a program that spanned a very traditional tutu-ruffled choreography of Bruch's Violin Concerto (one of my many guilty pleasures) to an electrifying Flamenco pas de deux, to a post-modern evocation of the French high speed train, they displayed the kind of courage, creativity and exuberance that only a troupe of young dancers is capable of.
Before them the Hubbard Street Dance Theater of Chicago brought a truly wonderful program of modern and interpretive dance to the Ahmanson Theater. One number in particular, which opened with an apparently endless line of dancers simply stepping one foot at a time to their right as they crossed the stage reminded me of a Samuel Beckett play, spare, eloquent, almost silent in its simplicity. After this they did a comic rendering of Ravel's Bolero, in which a female tries to crash a party to which she has not been invited. I would not have thought there was any life left in the Bolero, which was originally written as a dance piece, but Hubbard Street, by not taking it seriously, revived it to the delight of the audience.
Next comes the Nederlands Dans Theater, and after them the Alvin Ailey. I have never seen the Nederlands, though I hear they are very good, but I make a point of seeing Alvin Ailey every time they are in town. They always offer something new, as one year, for example, they interpreted Charlie Parker's enforced stay in the state mental institution at Camarillo, and they usually close with their venerable Revelations, which, though performed for some twenty years, is invariably as welcome as the Spring.
My point in mentioning all this is twofold. First, it seems to me that some of the most interesting and exciting work being done in the performing arts today is taking place in dance. And second, I want to urge everyone to support the dance, which is in danger of strangling to death in this country on shoestrings of budget. Dance is as ancient and omnipresent as the human race itself, perhaps the oldest art form of all. Every culture, every society, has danced; indeed, I daresay, whether we do so in public or not, every human being who ever lived has danced at some point in his life. Movement to music, or simply to rhythm, is a natural part of the human experience -- it is in our blood and bones, and there are moments in life, of exaltation, awe, abstraction or despair, when we can do nothing other than move to the ebb and flow of emotion, ideas and expectation.
And so, I ask all of you who are kind enough to read this blog, to attend dance, support dance, and get up off your duffs and dance. Our nation and our souls will be better for it.
Prior to that I had seen Corella Ballet Castilla y León, a youthful Spanish company, and they were superb. Their vigor, inventiveness and almost gleeful energy was infectious, and the audience, including my eight-year-old son, cheered them heartily. In a program that spanned a very traditional tutu-ruffled choreography of Bruch's Violin Concerto (one of my many guilty pleasures) to an electrifying Flamenco pas de deux, to a post-modern evocation of the French high speed train, they displayed the kind of courage, creativity and exuberance that only a troupe of young dancers is capable of.
Before them the Hubbard Street Dance Theater of Chicago brought a truly wonderful program of modern and interpretive dance to the Ahmanson Theater. One number in particular, which opened with an apparently endless line of dancers simply stepping one foot at a time to their right as they crossed the stage reminded me of a Samuel Beckett play, spare, eloquent, almost silent in its simplicity. After this they did a comic rendering of Ravel's Bolero, in which a female tries to crash a party to which she has not been invited. I would not have thought there was any life left in the Bolero, which was originally written as a dance piece, but Hubbard Street, by not taking it seriously, revived it to the delight of the audience.
Next comes the Nederlands Dans Theater, and after them the Alvin Ailey. I have never seen the Nederlands, though I hear they are very good, but I make a point of seeing Alvin Ailey every time they are in town. They always offer something new, as one year, for example, they interpreted Charlie Parker's enforced stay in the state mental institution at Camarillo, and they usually close with their venerable Revelations, which, though performed for some twenty years, is invariably as welcome as the Spring.
My point in mentioning all this is twofold. First, it seems to me that some of the most interesting and exciting work being done in the performing arts today is taking place in dance. And second, I want to urge everyone to support the dance, which is in danger of strangling to death in this country on shoestrings of budget. Dance is as ancient and omnipresent as the human race itself, perhaps the oldest art form of all. Every culture, every society, has danced; indeed, I daresay, whether we do so in public or not, every human being who ever lived has danced at some point in his life. Movement to music, or simply to rhythm, is a natural part of the human experience -- it is in our blood and bones, and there are moments in life, of exaltation, awe, abstraction or despair, when we can do nothing other than move to the ebb and flow of emotion, ideas and expectation.
And so, I ask all of you who are kind enough to read this blog, to attend dance, support dance, and get up off your duffs and dance. Our nation and our souls will be better for it.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Pure Art
I have said that music is the highest form of art, and that poetry, being the closest to music, is the highest form of literature. This morning, as I was engaged in my quarterly chore of cleaning out the garage, I began to wonder why this should be so.
The answer, I think, must lie in that which music and poetry have in common. At first blush, this would seem to be rhythm. And while rhythm is at the heart of music, and may be said to be its essential quality, it is an aspect of poetry merely, though an important one. It may not be too much to say that this is why music is a higher art form than poetry: because, as it is essentially rhythm, music is purer than poetry, which is essentially language. But that language always and importantly embraces rhythm, and that, together with its intensity and the clarity and aptness of its images, is what raises poetry above the other forms of literature.
Now music, too, can contain images, and there are many wonderful examples of this, such as Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony, Debussy's 'Images,' Mussorgsky's 'Pictures at an Exhibition,' Ravel's 'Le tombeau de Couperin,' and Vaughan Williams' Arctic Symphony. But when music sets out deliberately to paint a picture, it becomes program music, and to my mind, this form is inferior to what is often called pure music. It is for this reason that I consider Beethoven's Sixth to be the least important of his symphonies, since it is the most specific and concrete. In contrast, the organ music of Bach or the late Beethoven string quartets, especially the 0p. 131, are, to my mind, pure music; that is, unrelated to any material sense or experience. Because this is so, they are essentially spiritual in nature, and represent the highest realization of art.
It is when poetry approaches to a pure form -- that is, when the language is either so rarefied as to be almost detached from the images it seeks to convey to the mind, or when the language itself becomes almost one with those images -- that it finds its highest incarnation. This is seldom attempted, and even less often achieved.
I think G. M. Hopkins comes closest to achieving it in his spiritual sonnets, such as 'When kingfishers catch fire, when dragonflies draw flame,' and in 'God's grandeur.' In such works, the purity of language and the intensity with which words and images are interwoven renders the poetry pure in a musical sense. On one level the language is itself a kind of music, while on another, words and images become nearly the same thing. It is not that Hopkins' poetry is pure because it is spiritual; it is spiritual because it is pure.
And so, I suppose, as I was filling up the rented Dumpster in my driveway, I concluded that it is purity, spirituality and rhythm which the greatest music and the greatest poetry have in common. It is to these qualities that the best art attains, and this, in turn, raises the question: Why?
The answer is, I think, that the true nature and aspire of great art lies not in any sense experience or even in any idea, but, rather, in a reality that lies outside of those. What I am suggesting is that art is not born in the human heart or mind, but in the human soul, and represents a longing to embrace that soul's essential nature, and express the truth which the action of that nature in life implies. Art is truth in action, and in music and poetry, it is truth in rhythm. For life is made of rhythms: the rhythms of nature, the seasons, the revolution of the Earth, the beating of the heart, breathing and crying and laughing. It is the eternal cycle of coming into being, becoming being and going out of being -- life is rhythm. This is why music is such a natural and universal experience for man, since it echoes or replicates the inherent rhythm of living.
The best music -- and the best poetry -- reproduce this essential organic rhythm in its purest and most revealing form. For this reason, program music, being reflective of specific images or events, is inferior to pure music; since we sense in the purest music that native rhythm which in an undeniable way forms the foundation of our existence. This leads me to the assertion that the creation of art is not essentially a matter of expression but of inspiration; that is, the highest artistic impulses derive from outside man, and do not spring from inside him. They are, if you will, inhaled from a rarefied atmosphere which is the soul's natural domain. This, in turn, leads to the inescapable conclusion that there is a spiritual reality which transcends the material, and to the expression of which all art aspires.
Pure art lies closest to our souls. We recognize ourselves in its forms, and it reminds us, indeed, I think, proves, that we are essentially spiritual creatures, with a spiritual consciousness, and a spiritual destiny.
The answer, I think, must lie in that which music and poetry have in common. At first blush, this would seem to be rhythm. And while rhythm is at the heart of music, and may be said to be its essential quality, it is an aspect of poetry merely, though an important one. It may not be too much to say that this is why music is a higher art form than poetry: because, as it is essentially rhythm, music is purer than poetry, which is essentially language. But that language always and importantly embraces rhythm, and that, together with its intensity and the clarity and aptness of its images, is what raises poetry above the other forms of literature.
Now music, too, can contain images, and there are many wonderful examples of this, such as Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony, Debussy's 'Images,' Mussorgsky's 'Pictures at an Exhibition,' Ravel's 'Le tombeau de Couperin,' and Vaughan Williams' Arctic Symphony. But when music sets out deliberately to paint a picture, it becomes program music, and to my mind, this form is inferior to what is often called pure music. It is for this reason that I consider Beethoven's Sixth to be the least important of his symphonies, since it is the most specific and concrete. In contrast, the organ music of Bach or the late Beethoven string quartets, especially the 0p. 131, are, to my mind, pure music; that is, unrelated to any material sense or experience. Because this is so, they are essentially spiritual in nature, and represent the highest realization of art.
It is when poetry approaches to a pure form -- that is, when the language is either so rarefied as to be almost detached from the images it seeks to convey to the mind, or when the language itself becomes almost one with those images -- that it finds its highest incarnation. This is seldom attempted, and even less often achieved.
I think G. M. Hopkins comes closest to achieving it in his spiritual sonnets, such as 'When kingfishers catch fire, when dragonflies draw flame,' and in 'God's grandeur.' In such works, the purity of language and the intensity with which words and images are interwoven renders the poetry pure in a musical sense. On one level the language is itself a kind of music, while on another, words and images become nearly the same thing. It is not that Hopkins' poetry is pure because it is spiritual; it is spiritual because it is pure.
And so, I suppose, as I was filling up the rented Dumpster in my driveway, I concluded that it is purity, spirituality and rhythm which the greatest music and the greatest poetry have in common. It is to these qualities that the best art attains, and this, in turn, raises the question: Why?
The answer is, I think, that the true nature and aspire of great art lies not in any sense experience or even in any idea, but, rather, in a reality that lies outside of those. What I am suggesting is that art is not born in the human heart or mind, but in the human soul, and represents a longing to embrace that soul's essential nature, and express the truth which the action of that nature in life implies. Art is truth in action, and in music and poetry, it is truth in rhythm. For life is made of rhythms: the rhythms of nature, the seasons, the revolution of the Earth, the beating of the heart, breathing and crying and laughing. It is the eternal cycle of coming into being, becoming being and going out of being -- life is rhythm. This is why music is such a natural and universal experience for man, since it echoes or replicates the inherent rhythm of living.
The best music -- and the best poetry -- reproduce this essential organic rhythm in its purest and most revealing form. For this reason, program music, being reflective of specific images or events, is inferior to pure music; since we sense in the purest music that native rhythm which in an undeniable way forms the foundation of our existence. This leads me to the assertion that the creation of art is not essentially a matter of expression but of inspiration; that is, the highest artistic impulses derive from outside man, and do not spring from inside him. They are, if you will, inhaled from a rarefied atmosphere which is the soul's natural domain. This, in turn, leads to the inescapable conclusion that there is a spiritual reality which transcends the material, and to the expression of which all art aspires.
Pure art lies closest to our souls. We recognize ourselves in its forms, and it reminds us, indeed, I think, proves, that we are essentially spiritual creatures, with a spiritual consciousness, and a spiritual destiny.
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