I’ve heard some folks asking what it looks like when Christian writers weave their faith into novels as a theme.
So often, we are clumsy about this. Very clumsy. We try too hard. Protest too much. Just to moments of conversion and theology without having an organic reason to do so. In short, we cheat. We twist the story and the characters to have our moment of moral parable.
Flannery O’Connor doesn’t do this. Tolkein doesn’t do this. Lewis does a bit, but we forgive him because Narnia is so cool. So when did we lose confidence in the power of stories and characters to express truth with integrity?
All of this talk about writing is fine and dandy, but ultimately unhelpful without any examples. What does it look like when a master craftsman integrates faith seamlessly into a novel? Look no further than Michael Flynn’s recent literary scifi masterpiece Eifelheim.
Robert Bruce caught me in a revealing misread of his latest poem at Knife Gun Pen: Everything Will Conspire to Stop You. My misread says more about me than Robert’s poem, I think. A poetry criticism Freudian slip of sorts.
It seems things got pretty serious around here last week. And that’s a good reminder for writers. The business of writing can be a serious business at times.
But all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. And Jill’s not much fun either. Pretty soon all they do is fetch water and break their crowns and make unscheduled and expensive visits to the dentist. Anyone up for a little game this week?
In my last sentence tip, I completely oversimplified one effect of short sentences. You have to start somewhere right? I freely admit that I oversimplified things on purpose.
There’s a story about George Washington Carver. He asked God to reveal the secrets of the universe, and God was silent. He asked God to reveal the secrets of science and biology, and God was silent. Then he asked God to reveal the secrets of the peanut, and God did.
I don’t care about peanuts. But you could say I’ve spent the last ten years asking God to help me understand the secrets of a sentence. And I’ve worked hard to show God that I’m serious about the question.
Along the way, I’ve learned some tricks about how sentences work, and I thought I would share those in a regular series called simply “Sentence Tips.”
Here’s a different thought. (Does that make me a non-conformist?)
I heard this on a podcast from Stanford. (Either I’m a geek or these podcasts are so good everyone should buy an Ipod just to hear them. Or maybe both.) Robert Sutton talks about creativity and innovation. And he talks about the importance of conformity. Let me distill those thoughts down to two platitudes (but don’t conform to them!):
Creativity leads to growth, but tends to be unstable.
Conformity provides stabilization, but can lead to stagnation.
I’ve heard some folks asking what it looks like when Christian writers weave their faith into novels as a theme.
