On Beauty (Michelle)

As Jillian so rightly pointed out, the blog has been quiet for awhile now. And that is fine; sometimes, writers need quiet, and this writer, at least, did and still does. The Internet, with its manifold blessings, can be quite a source of unnecessary chatter, and I have been fleeing its many voices. I am in a stage where signing onto Facebook makes my skin crawl, where "going invisible" on Gmail gives me express pleasure...and where airing my views on the blog seems a highly unattractive prospect. Even if I do really only have 3-5 readers, give or take 0.7, who are really friends whom I don't mind confiding in at all!

But here's the thing...I didn't decide to start writing in this space because I wanted lots of people to hear me, but on the off chance that something I had to say, or something I stumbled across and passed along, might be worth being heard by someone, some day, because the barometric pressure was right, because it was raining, because there was a beetle crawling on the window, or for some other equally arbitrary reason. It was the idea of Whitman's spider, flinging "filament, filament, filament, out of itself / Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them...Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul."

And that purpose has not gone stale --- in fact, it is the fresher because I feel a certain dread of all the blanched fields of information and opinion and banal fact available on the internet. Because I am more certain that I'm offering what I'm about to offer because it is a good, a beautiful thing, and I don't offer it because I need someone to know that I offered it.

Perhaps this sounds insufferable, but I don't mean to be. I just figure, if I find something nice, why not pass it along?

So, reader, I just read a fantastic book: On Beauty and Being Just, by Elaine Scarry. It's one of those rare books that is quiet to read, that shuts out other voices with its still, careful reasoning. It's philosophy, or literary criticism, but either way, I found it incredibly refreshing and moving in many places. Scarry treats issues such as the implications of beauty that fades (and feelings brought about by it); the connection between beauty and justice; the way beauty is a pact between object and beholder which imparts life to both.

Here is a sample from the beginning of the monograph:

Beauty brings copies of itself into being. It makes us draw it, take photographs of it, or describe it to other people. Sometimes it gives rise to exact replication and other times to resemblances and still other times to things whose connection to the original site of inspiration is unrecognizable. A beautiful face drawn by Verrocchio suddenly glides into the perceptual field of a young boy named Leonardo. The boy copies the face, then copies the face again. Then again and again and again. He does the same thing when a beautiful living plant --- a violet, a wild rose --- glides into his field of vision, or a living face: he makes a first copy, a second copy, a third, a fourth, a fifth. He draws it over and over, just as Pater (who tells us about Leonardo) replicates --- now in sentences --- Leonardo's acts, so that the essay reenacts its subject, becoming a sequence of faces: an angel, a Medusa, a woman and child, a Madonna, John the Baptist, St. Anne, La Gioconda. Before long the means are found to replicate, thousands of times over, both the sentences and the faces, so that traces of Pater's paragraphs and Leonardo's drawings inhabit all the pockets of hte world (as pieces of them float in the paragraph now before you).

Even the physical book is quite beautiful as it's currently published --- on lovely thick acid-free paper, with a smooth cover bearing a painting of various birds' eggs. Because a book on beauty ought to be materially beautiful if at all possible --- I don't think that's too shallow and worldly to say.

At Long Last (Jillian)

Things have been pretty quiet on this blog for quite some time now. So, I thought I'd begin again. Today's item of notice: according to the Daily Telegraph, the one millionth word is about to be added (officially, I assume) to the English language. The candidates include: "noob", "defriend", and "greenwashing." Huh. Interesting how language evolves and, apparently, expands like the universe.

I love words, don't you?

Skellig the Opera (Michelle)

David Almond's Skellig is a wonderful, lyrical book. And now, apparently, it's an opera --- which I actually think makes complete sense.

Here at the Guardian's Books Blog you'll find Almond's reflections on the process of adaptation. It's fascinating and rich, whether you're interested in adaptation or not. I'm always intrigued by the ways in which a single story can exist in multiple media; but I'm also intrigued by the analogy that Almond draws between his own writing and music before he ever dreamed that Skellig could be an opera. In writing like Hemingway or Flannery O'Conner, he was also writing like Purcell or Monteverdi. An amazing act of analogy.

A Bit of Card on Character (Michelle)

I have just spent a (frankly unpleasant) day held captive to Orson Scott Card's Speaker for the Dead. I just couldn't put the darn thing down, which meant that in the course of one day, I have witnessed quite a few horrors. I don't usually resent being drawn into a novel as though it were a black hole --- quite the contrary --- but today I did. I still don't know if I liked it or not, retaining the prisoner's dull hatred for her captor that prevents me from making a clear judgment.

Some interesting reflections on character, though, from the novel's preface. (I'm working with a 1991 TOR paperback.)

Most novels get by with showing the relationship between two or, at most, three characters. This is because the difficulty of creating a character increases with each new major character that is added to the tale. Characters, as most writers understand, are truly developed through their relationships with others. If there are only two significant characters, then there is only one relationship to be explored. If there are three characters, however, there are four relationships: Between A and B, between B and C, between C and A, and finally the relationsihp when all three are together.

Even this does not begin to explain the complexity---for in real life, at least, most people change, at least subtly when they are with different people...Our whole demeanor changes, our mannerisms, our figures of speech, when we move from one context to another. Listen to someone you know when they pick up the telephone. We have special voices for different people; our attitudes, our moods change depending on whom we are with.

So when a storyteller has to create three characters, each different relationship requires that each character in it must be transformed, however subtly, depending on how the relationship is shaping his or her present identity. Thus, in a three-character story, a storyteller who wishes to convince us of the reality of these characters really has to come up with a dozen different personas, four for each of them.

Something to think about. Something sobering, because as I try to count my main characters, I am seized with fear that I have at least four. I try to comfort myself with remembering that Dickens certainly doesn't follow the three-character rule. Then I remember that I'm not Dickens.

Comfort Reading (Michelle)

I've figured out why Stephenie Meyer feels like my big sister: she loves all the same books.

Here's her list of favorites on Amazon. It's legit --- the link to this Amazon list comes from her website.

Believing (Michelle)

In Dorothy Sayers' Gaudy Night, the detective Lord Peter Wimsey urges Harriet Vane, a writer of mysteries, to stop writing clockwork whodunits and explore real characters and real emotions in her mysteries. She responds that she could do it, but it would "hurt like hell." He answers: "What difference would that make, if it made a better book?"

You can, of course, as a writer, hide from personal and universal realities as easily as you can as a non-writer. But it's a dangerous business, putting your pen to paper (to paraphrase Bilbo) --- if you're really trying to do it well, there's no knowing where it might lead to.

I'm discovering at the moment, for example, that writing does not allow you to get away with only saying you believe something. Without giving away the interminably dull details of my novel, it's supposed to have an unlikely happy ending driven by, let's say sloppily, love.

Trouble is, I can't envision it; and I have finally figured out that this is because I don't believe sufficiently in the incredible redeeming power of a single act of love. Oh, I want to believe it, which is probably why the novel exists at all, but I don't believe it enough yet to write about it.

But I kind of hope that by writing about it, I'll believe it.

So apparently, writing can demand rigorous integrity of you, force you to admit your failings. It can utterly change you. And yes, it can hurt like hell.

p.s. I really, really wanted to use the tag "Agatha Christie's writing desk" again. Soo...I figured since I was talking about mystery novels...it sort of counts...?

Birds (Michelle)

Pennsylvania has finally surrendered to spring, and the yard is full of dandelions, greenery, and birds. I watched six goldfinches jockeying for position in a flowering tree the other day, and I am trying to learn a few birdsongs. My sister and her children are embarrassingly good at identifying birdsongs --- while I'm still not entirely convinced that kildeer is even a bird, really.

So, spring is sprung, and it's appropriate to return to the subject of birds.

Here, Adam O'Riordan at the Guardian's books blog wonders why birds remain such powerful, fertile images.

Here, there are recordings of birdsongs. As a novelist, at least, I find that I am constantly in need of expanding my concrete knowledge of the world --- to describe not a tree, but an oak, a maple, an ash. Likewise, with birds --- who croaks, who warbles, who screams.

Guerilla Theater (Michelle)

My lovely and talented friend Kelsey posted this video on her Facebook profile. If you are unfamiliar with the concept of "guerilla theater," basically it involves organizing some kind of performance that appears to happen spontaneously in a public place with a highly unsuspecting audience. The wonderful occurrence in this video happened in a train station in Antwerp.



Mostly, I just deeply deeply wish I could have been there. Life should be like this more often. We live in limbo between the artificial and the mundane anyway, so why not enjoy it?

Elizabeth Gilbert on Creativity

Elizabeth Gilbert, author of the recent best-seller Eat, Pray, Love, discusses modern ideas of creativity and possible alternatives to the soul-crushing pressure of trying to be a Genius or Artist-Hero. She talks about the subject with a lot of warmth and humor, and I at least was very moved by it. One of those hand-comes-out-and-takes-yours moments.




This is a rather lovely video from TED.com, a collection of interesting talks by interesting people distributed under the Creative Commons copyright.

Why NOT combine jewel thieves, flying buses, wormholes, and man-eating aliens? (Michelle)

So, a few days ago I watched an interview with Russell T Davies in which he discussed the (then) upcoming (now past) Doctor Who Easter special, "Planet of the Dead." This is (more or less) how he summarized it:

So, the Doctor gets on a bus which, by coincidence, has also been boarded by an international jewel thief. They're actually in the middle of a police chase when the bus is transported through a wormhole to an alien planet, and they have to somehow get this bus moving when it's buried in sand, and the Swarm is on the way, so it's a race against time...really, a cautionary tale about the sort of thing that could happen to anyone.

Perhaps this sounds like drivel to you, but plots like this are the reason I doubt that I will ever get tired of Doctor Who --- it is composed of sheer narrative exuberance. This is how Doctor Who "saved my writing": at a time when I was very, very tired, and very, very sad, it helped me remember that story-telling is, above all, tremendous fun.

Russell T Davies' creations constantly remind me to enjoy my writing and my imagination, because the stories seem to start from this place of, "Hmm, what would I like to write about? Oh! I know! Jewel thieves! That's fun...and...wormholes! That's fun too! And desert planets! We could even film in Dubai, maybe..." And yet, from this place of ludicrous, larger-than-life, over-the-top, incredibly hyphenated narrative exuberance, comes what Julie Gardner calls "full-blooded emotion." It's possible to enjoy a rip-roaring good yarn and at the same time think about really important things like, say, the transience of the created universe.

Er...I'm trying to think of some clever way to end this post, but all my ideas are sort of trite. Another "All hail the BBC?" Another apology for posting on Doctor Who again? Mostly, I'm just wondering why I feel the need to start so many posts with "So." I think it's some leftover Anglo-Saxon impulse. Perhaps I should switch to "Hwaet" whenever I want to say "So."

Eating Words (Michelle)

A small point, but one that can't escape the perfectionist:

I discover on revisiting The Sun Also Rises that the main character's name is not Nick but Jake. Whoops; embarrassing error. And the "selfish, thoughtless whatsername" is Brett, in case anyone was wondering. And Brett's not so bad...she's just lost like everybody else in that book.

I Shall Not Live in Vain (Michelle)

Just because we're all about redefining "success," here at Daedalus Notes...

Here's one from Emily Dickinson:

If I can stop one heart from breaking (#919)

If I can stop one Heart from breaking
I shall not live in vain
If I can ease one Life the Aching
Or cool one Pain

Or help one fainting Robin
Unto his Nest again
I shall not live in vain.

(c. 1864)

Just a Story? (Michelle)

A friend sent me this article by Alexander McCall Smith, author of (among other things) The Ladies' No. 1 Detective Agency. Smith discusses the deep connections that readers can feel to fictional characters.

My friend sent this to me with a note saying that she thought of me. This is ignominious proof of my tendency to become over-involved with fiction, and while I do continue to insist that I am not in love with Doctor Who, no one ever believes me. (It's terribly insulting.) I know I'm not the only one who knows the difference between fiction and fact but doesn't necessarily feel that difference. I knew someone in college who with every fiber of her being wanted to stand between Nick and the thoughtless, selfish whatsername in The Sun Also Rises.

In any case, Smith's basic basic point is that we respond to stories as if they're real. This is simply how they're made. He writes:

The truth is that for many of us fiction is in some sense real, and that what happens to fictional people is, in a curious way, happening in the real world.

It's trompe l'oeil again. We cry or laugh because we accept, however momentarily, that it's real. Smith teases out some of the interesting ways in which detective fiction specifically relies on this as a genre.

Writing is a moral act: What you write has a real effect on others, often to a rather surprising extent.

Write responsibly, I guess.

Moments of Clarity in Battlestar Galactica (Jillian)

I have a confession to make.

For months now, I have been exploring the re-vamped sci-fi series, on recommendation from my roommate's family who have had a score of brilliant things to say about the show. It has been an experiment for me, a case study to view another corner of the realm of science fiction. After Star Wars and Doctor Who, I have to say, Battlestar Galactica has been a challenge to get close to. Get too close and you might actually pull back a bloody stump… or end up with piercing headache.

Humans, Cylons and Survivors in Battlestar Galactica, Season 3
(Click on the picture to appreciate its full glory!)

Yet somehow, I've stuck with it. And despite the brutality, often-gratuitous sexuality, and the general dark side of the human race, I think I have been won over… cautiously so. It has been a struggle, especially since many/most of the characters in this wide dramatis personae have moved up and down on my scale of respect for a whole slew of reasons. I could go into a great detail about the self-destruction and horrible wrongness I see leak out of every character, but that would make for a very long blog entry, and I doubt anyone would want to continue reading.

In a nutshell, Battlestar is a scenario about the last of the human race struggling to survive after their homeworlds have been destroyed by human-looking, vendetta-bent Cylon robots ("toasters" as the humans call them). Unlike Doctor Who, it generally tells a story of despair, where characters are more inclined to attack one another than look toward self-unifying hope. In this sense it is brutally honest, at the end of your rope, constantly running from the barrage of Cylon attacks, the world has already crumbled around you. People are broken. People hurt each other. People have little else to turn to rather than their own sorrow, their own losses, their own entitlements. Fathers and sons bash heads (that would be Admiral Adama and his son Lee, in charge of the pilots); women are men with female parts - brutalizing each other, smoking cigars (Starbuck), throwing punches (also Starbuck); we can't tell what the Cylons are "planning" and we really don't want to know; marriages crumble; the young and untested die; motives fluctuate and only serve to hurt others (Gaius Baltar); and the list goes on and on. On the edge, the humans are allowed to stick to their personal vendettas, racisms, vices, etc. There has been far too much sex, betrayal, violence, murder, torture, rape, suicide, mistrust and hopelessness.

And yet, surprisingly enough, I did not set out to write about Battlestar's flaws. I have just finished the third season, and I have to say I am beginning to see some light shining through all of that darkness. Light that I can use. Light that keeps me interested in the unfolding mystery and the pilgrimage of the humans to their mythical Earth.

1. There are 12 Cylon models (each a different person, of course), of which there are infinite copies. When one is killed, the consciousness is downloaded into another body. These resurrections, taking place in a human-sized tank, are not pleasant. The Cylons carry with them their experiences and their agony into the next life. The battle is never over, and easy it is not. They are far from perfect creatures, and their contempt of human kind is overwhelmingly dark, and the idea that they are one side of the struggle, questioning their own existence makes them more interesting.

2. There is a bigger story at work, even if several characters like to scoff about it. Worshipping a pantheon of Greek/Roman gods, these 12 colonies are making way to Earth. The president of the Colonies, Laura Roslin, fulfills the prophecy of a leader dying of cancer who will bring them to Earth. Miracles abound which neither purpose-seeking Cylons nor the thick-headed humans understand: the mysterious cosmic road signs in nebulas and temples waiting for them on random planets; dreams and visions; the fate of the one half-human, half-Cylon child named Hera; the question regarding the identities of the last five Cylons. This story cannot fit into a box. It is written out, preordained, and while it may seem like the human race is dwindling, it is actually meant to survive.

3. In addition to that idea, the idea that the Cylons (particularly the models played by none other than Lucy Lawless called Three) question the purpose of their existence is deeply interesting to me. Three is searching for answers. She begins to commit suicide on a regular basis in order to revisit the dreams she's had: "There is something miraculous between life and death."

4. Finding purpose in death. Despite the destruction, there are a few characters over the course of three seasons who have stepped up to sacrifice themselves for the survival of humanity, and to meet death not as a way to end their own suffering and confusion but to carry it to the next level. And to that end, seeing that the crumbling roots of one's past is actually a part of the future. In this season, Kara Thrace ("Starbuck"), the cigar-smoking, mistake-driven, hard-edged woman, with a failing marriage and life-long bitterness is lost in a battle… pretty much allows herself to die. She returns to lead the way to Earth. She, who spent her life running from her gifts and hurting people before she got hurt herself, is one of the saviors of humanity. To take that step, to make the sacrifice, and stare cosmic truth in the face is not the end of her story, but the beginning.

5. The revelation of the final five Cylons. Not even the Cylons know who they are. They are a sacred mystery. "Humans" must come to grips with the fact that once that "switch" goes off, their lives have changed… and were woven into the fabric of humanity for a specific (albeit elusive) purpose. The mystery of who keeps us going. Who are they turning into? What will they bring about? And what is going to happen for the future of humanity?

I could go on, but I find these themes to be compelling… even if they appear against the backdrop of a very dark reality. But that is the nature of a space drama, isn't it? Where space surrounds, there always seems to be war and suffering. The specks of light against the black. There is light out there! Even if this Battlestar reality doesn't have a Time Lord appearing in the middle of things to talk sense into their lives. (But wouldn't that be just brilliant?!) It is still a story with a purpose, even if it is buried in the shock-value. All it requires is patience and the willingness to dig a little deep and cling to those specks of light wherever they appear!

And, by all means, temper it with the musings and wanderings of a Time Lord, his TARDIS and companions!

The Doctor (center) and his companions, Doctor Who Series 4
(Click on the pic to appreciate its full glory!)

Neil Gaiman on Colbert (Michelle)

If you scroll past the pictures of Neil Gaiman's daughter with and without braces, you will find here on his blog a video of his recent appearance on the Colbert Report. It's pretty fantastic, of course, especially if it's true that the Tom Bombadil thing was utterly unrehearsed.

Gaiman recently won the Newbery for The Graveyard Book, and is also the author of Stardust, Coraline, Neverwhere, and the Sandman series, among other things.

Colbert himself is of course poised to take over the world.

Quotes Not of the Week (Michelle)

So, if you read this blog assiduously [crickets chirping], you may notice that the Quote of the Week has been the same for almost two weeks now. This is due to all kinds of unfortunate situations beyond my control, including mad busy-ness and touring of various and sundry university campuses, but the main reason is that I haven't found anything that has made my heart sing. Can you imagine? Surely the universe is required to furnish me with at least one quote about writing that makes my heart sing per week!

So, I am stuck, but my stuck-ness is of an unusual variety. You see, I find lots of candidates. I have heard and read many interesting things about writing in the past two weeks, but they have all inspired me by requiring me to disagree with them. And therefore I feel some compunction about posting them as the Quote of the Week.

And yet, who am I to judge? Perhaps you may find some of them helpful, or maybe you'll be spurred to work by the sheer force of your disagreement. So, here I present some of the Failed Candidates for Quote of the Week. Consider it the Anti-Quote of the Week Post.

In no particular order:

• "The 'true' story is not the one that exists in my mind; it is certainly not the written words on the bound paper that you hold in your hands. The story in my mind is nothing but a hope; the text of the story is the tool I created in order to try to make that hope a reality. The story itself, the true story, is the one that the audience members create in their minds, guided and shaped by my text, bu tthen transformed, elucidated, expanded, edited, and clarified by their own experience, their own desires, their own hopes and fears."
  --- Orson Scott Card, Introduction to Ender's Game
  This one almost made it into Quote of the Week, actually. But it occurred to me that this can't be the whole story, since many of us write first of all for ourselves, in a room with a closed door, and have no audience (YET!). And surely we aren't suggesting that those stories aren't real, just because there's nobody out there who has yet been touched or moved by them. Think of the details on the ceilings of medieval cathedrals so far away that nobody but the angels in the rafters can appreciate it; even invisible art is art.
• "I learned to separate the story from the writing, probably the most important thing that any storyteller can learn --- that there are a thousand right ways to tell as tory, and ten million wrong ones, and you're a lot more likely to find one of the latter than the former your first time through the tale."
  --- Orson Scott Card, Introduction to Ender's Game
  Well, obviously I just finished reading Ender's Game. I was intrigued by this quote, and there's probably a good portion of truth in it, but frankly I just found it horribly stressful. You could go crazy wondering whether you've stumbled onto the "right" or "wrong" way to tell the story in your early drafts. Just write it, and if you need to revise it, you'll figure it out. Or just write it, and let others be judgmental. Are "right" and "wrong" really helpful questions to bring to the early stages of creation? This blog seems really to be about those early stages, after all. So, thank you, Mr. Card, you sound awesome, but I ultimately am trying not to think too much about this quote.
• "There just can't be that many novels in the world."
  I heard this one, believe it or not, from a creative writing professor! In fairness, she was half-joking, talking about how she tried to keep every short story from growing into a novel. But, being fresh-faced, naive, and foolish, I was still shocked. Of COURSE there can be an INFINITE number of novels in the world! Whether they'll all be published is an economic question, of course, but the endless fertility of stories is a good thing, right?
• "An artist has 'wasted his heart' on the artist's life."
  This was loosely quoted by somebody else from the poet Charles Wright. I was pretty moved by it, but also fairly depressed.
• "Fine writing is, next to fine doing, the best thing in the world."
  --- Keats
  Obviously, there's nothing wrong with this quote. But I got it off a Page-a-Day Schott's Miscellany Calendar, and it's SO vague! It would be such a cop-out Quote of the Week. It would be filler. I detest filler. I'd rather have the sincerely, personally chosen Robin McKinley quote up indefinitely than fill the blog with bland bilge-water that nobody could possibly disagree with.

So, there you are. The Quotes Not of the Week.

Er...if you have any favorite, insightful quotes about writing and/or art, do send them my way...!

Remnants (Jillian)

I have come to learn that Agatha Christie's writing desk is currently up for auction. It's made me think of our connections to historical figures (in Abraham Lincoln's pocket watch or Henry VIII's suit of armor... and practically anyone you can name alive or dead under the sun) but most especially writers and artists - how we strive to collect their works and the tools they used to create those works. There is this overwhelming sense of reaching outwards for remnants of those that inspire us... not necessarily to be a part of that creation, but to feel it up close, under the finger tips.


It's also unmistakably creepy. This was the writing desk that launched many of Agatha's novels. The novels remain. The desk is here. But Agatha is gone. And yet, it goes to prove Time is not as impenetrable as we think it is. She is right there... in the dust and the pen markings. Not so far away.

Duck or Dog? (Jillian)

Not meaning to totally steal the scene today, but the Telegraph has an article about a pet duck that thinks she is one of the dogs - likes to be walked on a leash and competes with her fellow pets for food, etc. Isn't this world amazingly hilarious?

More Monsters (Michelle)

Nothing deep today, I'm afraid, just a collection of whimsies.

First of all, a big thank you to Yahoo for continuing to keep us informed of which automotive vehicles, specifically, would be endangered by various prehistoric creatures. This time we've got a pliosaur from Svalbard called Predator X. I'm not making this up. What a marvelous beginning to a short story this would make: "On the snowy plains of Svalbard, the men are restless. They fear the predator..."

For those of you less into EXTREME dinosaurs, Yahoo has also been kind enough to supply us with information on the iddlest biddlest wittle dinosaur that would nevertheless bite your ankles off here.

I'm a bit frustrated with my own writing at the moment and am somewhat convinced that David Bowie's "Heroes," if written by me, would begin: "I...I wish I could swim. Like a person, who's learned how to swim." I'm sure I'll be posting whatever wisdom I manage to grub out of these difficult days in the near future, but meanwhile, pliosaurs from Svalbard will have to keep us happy.

Note from a Celt (Jillian)

For a week now, I've tried to conjure up a poignant subject in honor of St. Patrick's Day. What I have however is just an amalgam of whimsy. And I think that is perfect in itself!

I have Celtic and Saxon ancestors - primarily English, Scottish and Irish. Who knows - perhaps there is a little Welsh in there, too. I have always been fascinated with this aspect of my heritage, regardless of how little I actually knew. My father used to listen to NPR's Thistle and Shamrock on Sunday afternoons, and that was the start to my undying passion for Celtic music - reels and melancholy songs in the "old language." I remember watching the embarrassingly campy NBC movie Leprechauns (not to be confused with the horror film) in 1999 (starring Whoopie Goldberg, Zoe Wanamaker and Randy Quaid of all people), but somehow making it a tradition to watch our video-taped version of it every year. In high school, I began a story in which an American teenager goes to Ireland to meet his mother's side of the family. The novel I completed for my undergraduate thesis involved characters born out of my conception of Irish rural culture - their fierce devotion to each other, the song-like wonder of their names. Even now, I feel the urge to "go back" to Ireland, dig deeper in my studies to somehow be a part of such a mysterious and yet beautiful place.

A few items that build up the fires of imagination (at least for me):

1. The Celts in Ireland were the first in the Isles to be Christianized (by St. Patrick). It was the faithfulness of Irish monks that eventually brought Christianity to England.

2. Ireland was never conquered by the Romans or by the Saxons; hence a culture that evolved separately and distinctly.

3. There is nothing like a Celtic band playing a rousing, joyous reel to turn the tide of a bad day!

4. I love making Irish Soda bread and kneading the dough with my hands. Is it strange to think lumps of baked dough completely beautiful?

5. One day I hope to learn Irish and Scottish Gaelic. Until then, I am content to be swept away in the beauty of the language(s) anyway! ("tighin air m'huir am fear phosas mi..." - Capercaillie)

6. One day I hope to visit Ireland.

7. The hauntingly beautiful Book of Kells:


8. If you've never seen The Quiet Man (starring John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara) please do! An American finding his identity in his Irish roots. Lovely and human!

9. The film Once. Bittersweetness!

10. Celtic knots and crosses. I have them everywhere!

The list goes on! By all means it shouldn't stop here!


Slainte Mhath!