A Fort Made of Books

Number Thirty-Six

2009-07-14T13:20:00.003-06:00

I had lunch at the Mekong restaurant in St. Louis today, where I am always torn between trying new things and revisiting old favorites. Everything they make is so good!

Today I picked entree number 36 off the menu. Sorry, I forget what it was called, and my grasp of Vietnamese lingo is tantamount to a random-syllable generator. I can only describe it as stir-fried chicken, carrots, broccoli, and snow pea pods in a deliciously seasoned oyster sauce. In a less public venue I might have licked the plate. That's how happy it made my taste buds.

When I took my Dad to the Mekong a couple months ago, he memorably remarked that eating the Pho Tai was like drinking perfume. It's true, in the sense of something that tastes as good as perfume smells when it isn't frightfully overdone. And the last time I was there, I caved in to my craving for curried squid, mussels, and scallops; this house specialty was as good as I remembered. I'm beginning to think that if they offered hot braised rat with a chaser of fermented horse piss, it would be worth trying.

Reading Sibelius' 3rd

2009-07-14T11:32:00.008-06:00

Deep-throated basses and cellos, in octaves, emerge from nothing with a crisp, jaunty theme in C major. Horns and violas join in, then violins. Flutes and oboes add a second, dancelike idea. The strings kick up their heels in a moment of folklike revelry. Horns shout out an exultant fanfare. All this happens in the first minute and a half. And that's just the First Group!

After a brutally blunt key change, the cellos sing a graceful "second theme" against a droning background with gently ticking violins. Then the lower strings begin what threatens to become an endlessly bustling pattern. Bits of previously-heard themes begin to float around. The violins announce one more lyrical theme. Then the exposition ends with a pause, followed by the violins and basses simultaneously playing ascending and descending scales, give or take a few chromatically added notes. It's a moment of almost frightening austerity, like a forked line drawn across an otherwise blank piece of paper.

The music has entered a frozen waste where all creation seems to hold its breath. The flute is the first creature to stir, quoting fragments of the bustling string pattern heard earlier. This pattern starts to move around among various sections of the orchestra, mostly of the stringed persuasion, while fragments of the other themes circulate like bits of separate conversations overheard on a constantly shifting breeze. What I have roughly designated as the "second theme" is the first to emerge intact from this chaos, still backed up by the bustling figure. The music seems to be trying to make a decision between e minor and C Major. After a passage of growing intensity, the jaunty opening theme arrives with the beginning of the recap. This time the bustling figure becomes the background for a review of the main themes, ending with a pizzicato version of the forked-line scale passage.

The last two minutes of the movement, then, are a coda, beginning in a slower tempo and with an entirely new theme. The nobility of this passage is breathtaking, like the farewell scene at the end of an epic movie. The movement ends with a touching triple-Amen in which the e minor/C Major dilemma is finally settled in favor of C.

Movement II, Andantino con moto quasi allegretto, begins with droning horns, plucked strings, and a delicately dancing pair of flutes. This dance becomes the main theme of the refrain in which a lonely sense of melancholy is wedded to a graceful dance full of lithe energy, wit, and pleasure. At times one can even sense a bubble of laughter floating deep in the dancer's belly, buoying him (or her) up but never breaking forth. The cellos introduce the melody of a mournful first episode in which, for some time, the woodwind choir has a sort of group solo.

After one last sigh from the cellos, the dance-refrain returns in a varied form, with a background of pizzicati and changes of key and instrumentation. The pizzicati continue into the second episode, also featuring rushing woodwind figures and thoughtful hesitations. Then the dance-refrain comes back for a third run, with both darker shadows and brighter highlights than before. The winds and strings answer each other back and forth in a brief but deadly-serious coda.

The third and final movement consists of a scherzo and a finale dovetailed together. Inspired perhaps by the finale of Beethoven's 9th, its opening is sprinkled with themes quoted from the earlier movements. The true scherzo theme isn't introduced until after the 1-minute mark. After this point we are mainly tantalized by partial glimpses of it, and the sense that its separate motives are growing together like different parts of an organism, or like patterns found throughout nature in varied scales and combinations.

The chorale-like theme of the finale emerges from this crysalis around 4:20 (in the performance referenced below). This stately theme, first introduced by the lower strings, completely takes over and drives the remainder of the movement to ever higher realms of nobility and victory. Within it the conflict between e minor and C Major, or (put another way) between F-sharp and F-natural, plays out all over again. You may start to wonder how long this can go on. The answer is limited only by one's attention span and the ability of the orchestra to repeat the chorale theme louder and more triumphantly than before. But just when you are beginning to sense this, Sibelius abruptly (not to say arbitrarily) ends the movement with a brassy, descending C-major triad. And that's as close to a resolution of the eternal conflict as we are likely to get, according to Sibelius at least.

The work I have been describing is the Symphony No. 3 in C, written in 1907 by Finnish composer Jean (or Jan) Sibelius, and first performed later that year. It splits the difference between the Romantic warmth of his earlier symphonies and the chilling spareness often noted in his later ones. Neither too hot nor too cold, it's just right.

Click here to see a Youtube playlist of Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting, and the Swedish Radio S. O. playing, this exquisite symphony. My only complaints are that (1) the sound is slightly muffled at the beginning of each video, and (2) the first movement is split between two videos. Other than that, it's an exciting account of a symphony I have loved almost as long as I have been reading symphonies with my ears. Here, for your immediate listening pleasure, is Movement II:

Word Nazi 2

2009-07-13T06:54:00.013-06:00

Language is important to me. As I've mentioned before, anything that contributes to the crumbling of language works on my nerves. Here are a few more examples.

I have always hated the phrase "as best I can," ever since I first spotted it - probably in a statement by President Bill Clinton. It seems to have taken on a kind of respectable currency. But it doesn't make grammatical sense. You can say "I'm doing the best I can," or you can claim to be doing something "as well as I can," but you braid these two expressions together at your own risk. Or rather, at the risk of eroding the power of words.

"As ___ I can" calls for an adverb (such as "well") and another "as." Meanwhile, "___ best I can" requires only a definite article, "the." The one is a comparison between what I'm doing and what I can do. The other uses a relative clause, "(that) I can," to qualify my claim to be doing "the very best." They aren't such dissimilar ideas that you should have trouble choosing between them. Either one will do in a given context. But if you mash them together, all you get is an ungrammatical cant phrase.

Other usages have become current without any consideration for the rules of language. When I read them or hear them, I don't think, "There goes the English language." It isn't just my language that I'm worried about. It's people's ability to order their thoughts, and to make meaningful connections between them. It is, in a nutshell, language itself that suffers.

For example, take the title of an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: "Let He Who Is Without Sin." Based on a biblical allusion, the implied ending of this sentence fragment is "Cast the First Stone." Apparently the TV show's budget didn't allow them to include the full sentence in the title, but that isn't my problem. My problem is with the word "He." I am morally certain the word should be "Him." And it isn't just a matter of misquoting John 8:7 (KJV: "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her"). It's a matter of confusing the case of the pronoun.

The cause of the confusion seems to be the phrase "who is without sin," inserted after the main clause beginning with "let." We expect "he who is without sin" to be correct, either because we vaguely remember John 8:7 or because "he who" sounds better than "him who." Or maybe we just think the subject of "cast" must be "he" rather than "him." The confusion could be cleared up simply by deleting the phrase "who is without sin." We would then see that "Let him cast the first stone" is correct grammar, a fact not altered by inserting the adjectival phrase "who is without sin."

I'm far from the first person to express irritation at the politically correct, gender-neutral use of "they" as a singular pronoun. Sentences such as, "The author should get their pronouns straight," and, "Anyone who has a problem with the gender-inclusive he can do thus to themselves," are an assault not only on the historic usage of the English language, but on the reasoning part of the human mind - the part where pronouns must agree with their antecedents in at least number, if we are to have any power to put thoughts together meaningfully.

Back when I watched TV, I used to bristle at the "headline-speak" frequently spoken by news presenters. Rather then telling us what had happened in complete sentences, they often resorted to titles and slogans such as, "In South Carolina, new questions about the governor's infidelity," and, "Heat wave in Oklahoma," etc. One or two additional words would have sufficed to turn those headlines into full sentences. And some sentences can be pretty clever, such as: "The panhandle is too hot to touch."

As Jesus points out in Luke 14:28, before you build a tower, you should count the cost, whether you have enough to complete it. Writers, likewise, should "count the cost" of sentences they have begun, and make sure they balance out at the end. When you see decent author lose track of whether a sentence's subject is plural or singular, you can reasonably deduce that he hasn't counted the cost. It's amazing to see how many talented, professional writers match a plural verb to a singular subject such as "John or Mary." John and Mary do this; John or Mary does this. It's a grammatical jungle out there, however. What do you do with "You or I" when the main verb is a form of "be"? Do you say "You or I are"? Can it be that you or I "am"? Or maybe you or I "is"?

But even more often, the problem is (again) the case of the pronoun "I." It really can't be as hard as today's prose makes it look. And yet "you and I" frequently pops up as the object of a verb or preposition, while at times the subject is "you and me." This gets past editors as well as authors. The head-scratching really starts to generate heat when words such as like, as, or than are involved, and in nominal sentences where the verb is a form of "be." Billy Joel actually has it correct when he croons: "It's only you and I." It is I. But, it is like me. "Like" seems to be one of those prepositions that demands an accusative object. So anything we compare to ourselves must be "just like you and me."

Sometimes you have to imagine the verb that would follow the pronoun. Should the sentence go "You are as tall as me" or "as tall as I"? Stick another "be" verb at the end and you'll see that "you are as tall as I (am)." Are you heavier than me or heavier than I? Same deal. If you keep this up, you will soon be smarter than I.

When you know how to put sentences together - when you really learn to think them through - you can make some interesting discoveries. Certain subtleties only open themselves to those who have trained themselves to see them. For example, take the sentence, "Like you and me, the newspaper has issues." It's a clever little thing, playing on a double meaning. The phrase "to have issues" can mean, in the case of the newspaper, to be published in one volume after another; or, in the case of you and me, to have problems in our relationship resulting from some past events.

Now suppose you flip the sentence around. "The newspaper has issues, like you and me." This sentence plays on the same double-meaning as before, but it links these ideas in a different way. The first sentence was a humorous way of saying that you and I have things to talk about. The bit about the newspaper is just a witty bit of double entendre, like "Make like a tree and leave." The second sentence, on the other hand, means that a journal's problems are related to people "like you and me." We are among the people the newspaper is failing to reach.

The difference is what is "like you and me." In the first sentence, it was the newspaper. In the second, it was issues. This also changes the trajectory of the double entendre. When the newspaper, like you and me, had issues, the two meanings of "issues" were carefully distributed between the newspaper and us. The problems were on our side; the published volumes were on the journal's side. But in the second issue, both meanings of "issues" apply to the newspaper, one after the other. The phrase "like you and I" simply reveals the trick, prompting us to see a new side of the words "The newspaper has issues."

One reason for the newspaper's trouble may be that people (like you and me) are losing our ability to connect thoughts, to express or interpret ideas, to think and communicate. If our society is going to correct this, its burden will be to teach its next generation a better grasp of language.

Movies I Walked Out Of

2009-07-13T06:12:00.004-06:00

For many years, I went to the movies at least once a week. Obviously, this set me at a considerable risk of seeing some films I didn't like, and of having to see other films more than once. But there have only been a handful of memorable instances in which I cared so little for a movie that I didn't stay in my seat to the end. These cinema walk-outs have gotten scarcer lately, perhaps because I see fewer movies these days, or perhaps because I have gotten better at spotting what movies I will and won't enjoy.

I nearly made it through Hannibal, the sequel to The Silence of the Lambs. It's not that I thought it was badly made. I just got disgusted with the graphic torture and the gore. I reached a point where I couldn't take any more -- somewhere around the point where Anthony Hopkins was feeding Ray Liotta parts of his own brain. I lingered in the exit, though, and poked my head back in a few minutes later to see Hopkins offering a piece of candied brain to a child. Then I left for good.

I made it through about fifteen minutes each of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Both comedies turned out to be so stomach-turningly raunchy that they made me squirm rather than laugh. I remember leaving Jay and Silent Bob with my face hidden, because I was actually afraid that someone I knew would spot me.

When I walked out of In the Cut, a Meg Ryan-Mark Ruffalo neo-noir flick, it was because I hadn't seen a single attractive image in half an hour. All the characters were awful people, everything they did was horrible, and the persistent darkness and grit and grime of the film's look were starting to get me down.

I can only remember walking out of one other movie, but I can't remember the title of it. It was another noir-type flick, sometime around 2000, with an Afro-American cast. Whatever it was, all I needed to see was the opening credits sequence to realize that it was a stinker. "Oy vay," I said to myself over a cheesy sequence of smoking-gun-themed special effects, "this is going to suck." I think the theatre management actually gave me a refund, enabling me to see a movie I really enjoyed.

One of the risks you take by seeing a movie a week is the risk of buying a ticket to a show you know nothing about. It's the kind of risk that has often paid off for me, but my luck isn't infallible. So, in a way, it's a blessing that Hollywood has lost its touch lately. Over the past couple years, weeks and even months have gone by when no film opened that I wanted to see. At first I found this painful, but now I count it a blessing. My film-a-week habit is well broken -- and with it, any likelihood that I'm going to catch myself fleeing one of those atrocious pictures.

Reading Bruckner's 5th

2009-07-11T09:03:00.030-06:00

Having tilted bravely at the Bruckner Problem (apropos his Fourth Symphony), I think we are well aware that Anton Bruckner was a composer who had problems. He was finicky, insecure, frequently crushed by the public's (and the critics') indifference to his music, and constantly driven to revise work he had already perfected.

At the time he wrote his B-flat Major Symphony No. 5 (1875-76), he had a lot to be troubled about. He was the defendant in a lawsuit. His career as an educator at Vienna University was proceeding turbulently. Without meaning to, he had made a great enemy in a music critic named Hanslick, who had set himself up as one of the cut-throat bastards of Western culture. (Hanslick is famous for saying Tchaikowsky's Violin Concerto "stinks to the ears.") And even his friends, such as Franz and Joseph Schalk, had a way of preying on Bruckner's insecurities.

Between them, and for other reasons, Bruckner never got to hear an orchestral performance of this symphony, though he lived until 1896. He did hear a two-piano version performed in 1887, but he was too sick for the orchestral premiere in 1894. So any hopes Bruckner may have attached to this symphony only added to his disappointments.

And then of course, this symphony has its own "Bruckner Problem." Naturally, the composer had some second thoughts, resulting in an "1878 version" of the symphony that has generally been the one performed, either in the 1935 Haas or the 1951 Nowak edition. Most performances of this symphony, and nearly all recordings, have been of one of these editions. The original score completed in 1876 is no longer extant, and can only be partly reconstructed from the fragments that remain. Meanwhile, the version that Franz Schalk conducted at the premiere, with probably unauthorized cuts and reorchestrations (or at best, revisions Bruckner accepted under duress), was published in 1896 as the "Schalk edition." This was the only version of the Fifth Symphony performed until the Haas edition came out. It is still occasionally played, and has been recorded as recently as 1998.

Though the Fifth Symphony is sometimes called his "Tragic" symphony, Bruckner did not take out his troubles on it by writing "autobiographical music" or by depicting everything that was going wrong for him. He did not write music of dark pathos or particularly bitter anguish. Rather, he worked out his pain in music of great thematic density, contrapuntal rigor, and formal sophistication. It is a symphony with large-scale symmetry: the outer and inner pairs of movements are united by similar themes and by their opening pizzicato patterns, for which the work has also been called the "Pizzicato" symphony. It has four sonata-form movements, and the finale also carries forward a sophisticated fugue. And it's an enormous work: for example, my CD of a 1993 recording of the Nowak edition runs close to an hour and a quarter. Two of the movements brush the 20-minute threshold, and the finale downright crosses it.

And now, here's a road map to the main points of interest in this symphony. The first movement opens with the only slow introduction in all of Bruckner's symphonies. The first thing you may hear, provided the volume is turned way up on your hi-fi system, is an oscillating bass pattern in the low, pizzicato strings. Over this, the other strings lay on the first glimpses of a vast, spacious, solemn edifice. After about a minute, an ascending arpeggio (broken chord) heralds the entry of the wind instruments, which contribute an impression of strength. At about the 2-minute mark, this opening Adagio gives way to the main sonata.

The initial, descending theme of the Allegro proves, later on, to be of no consequence at all. The music builds up quickly to an early climax, like the score to the moment in a sci-fi movie where one of the actors says, "I never imagined it like this," while gazing off-camera; cue special-effects sequence and BIG MUSIC. Right after this, say around 3:00, comes the first theme most listeners will readily identify on a drop-the-needle test. Bruckner creates space for it with one of those background string tremolos that he liked to use. This could be analyzed as a transitional theme, because it pulls the music from one key to the next with great efficiency. Bruckner makes a good deal of this theme, generating another minor climax before subsiding to a general pause - another favorite device of his, marking the break between the First Group and the Second.

The second theme involves the pizzicato strings in a sort of plucked chorale, full of searching and awe of the holy (in the sense of total otherness). In the absence of a score to guide my analysis, I can only guess that Bruckner achieved this effect through a combination of tonal instability (i.e., a readiness to slip into a different key at any moment) and indecision between major- and minor-key versions of the same chord. A countersubject is soon added to this theme, turning its almost monastic contemplation into something more personal, an expression I suppose of Bruckner's private yet very intense faith. Not for nothing is this symphony sometimes nicknamed "Church of Faith" - and yes, I believe that about exhausts the nicknames for this work.

Again, Bruckner brings the music down to silence, then introduces a Third Group: a key ingredient in his expanded take on sonata form. This one, arriving around 7:00, has an arch-shaped contour and is introduced by the woodwinds. Soon we are in full-blown codetta mode, with thrilling piles of brass notes, accelerations, crescendoes, and a gentle theme introduced by the horns and passed around among the wind instruments over, yes, another string tremolo.

Close to the ten-minute mark, development begins. We hear the ascending arpeggios from the slow intro, then the big theme from the First Group. Then, most interestingly, Bruckner takes us back to the beginning of the slow intro with its solemn string edifice, only this time the pizzicato-bass oscillation is transferred to the clarinet section. Soon we find our favorite First-Group theme flipped upside down. It goes right-way-up again at about 12:00, in time for some "serious development" (i.e. dramatic-sounding chord progressions). The pizzicato theme from the Second Group returns in the horns and woodwinds, sounding more chorale-like than ever.

By a little after 14:00, Bruckner is building up to a rather compressed recapitulation. The big theme from the first group appears without any of its erstwhile preliminaries. Then, in under a minute, he gets us back to the Second Group's chorale passage. Bruckner dwells on this theme considerably longer. It isn't until 17:00-ish that we hear the Third Group again. The accelerating part of the codetta is followed by an even faster coda that obsesses over the first theme, building almost steadily to an architecturally massive conclusion - saving an almost humorous moment when the momentum breaks for a gentle, upside-down repeat of the same theme. The last half-minute of the movement is basically closing chords.

In Movement II, Bruckner abandons Italian tempo markings and lapses into German. Sehr langsam translates as molto adagio. Again, it opens with a relatively soft, pizzicato accompaniment. The oboes, joined soon afterward by the bassoons, lay a theme over this whose rhythmic groups of two lie squarely across the accompaniment's groups of three. The tenderly solemn first theme, riddled with rhythmic challenges, dies away to another structural pause around 2:40, where the stronger, more assertive second theme arises in rich, homophonic harmony. This develops into a more contrapuntal passage with two melodic voices, often moving in canon, against a throbbing background. Here Bruckner's genius for large-scale musical architecture is seen to excellent advantage as he deliberately, yet enchantingly, builds this theme to a moving climax, then dies away for the development beginning around 6:00.

In the manner of a sonata-rondo, the second movement's development section takes us through the same material as the exposition, and in the same essential order. It abridges here, expands there, and airs the thematic material in different keys and instrumental combinations. I especially like the sense of weightlessness the second theme attains in this section. The recap, beginning around 13:30, doesn't so much take us back to a literal repeat of the expo as continue the development of the first theme. It strikes me just now that Elgar may have had parts of this first group in mind when he wrote his Enigma Variations. So much for that enigma! A more optimistic, major-key version of the first theme makes its debut around 15:30. Around 17:15 the pizzicato strings return to usher in a coda based on the first theme.

Movement III is a Scherzo and Trio, marked Allegro vivace, whose opening bass line is reminiscent of the pizzicato passage from the slow movement. The almost panicky first theme contrasts richly with the genteel dance that immediately follows it. The second part of the scherzo is rather like a sonata-form development section, elaborating and amplifying these themes. By about 3:45 we're ready for a recap and even a bit of coda. A general pause at 5:30-ish signals the advent of the central Trio, whose sinister opening gives way to a relaxed, easy-going dance tune. The second segment of the Trio revisits the same ideas with even more drama. Within two minutes, we're back in a varied repeat of the Scherzo, with an extended development and extra-thrilling coda.

Movement IV (Allegro molto) also begins with an Adagio introduction very similar to that of the first movement. In fact, the main difference, at first, is a couple of added clarinet "honks." The original intro soon breaks off for a review of the themes of the earlier movements. Then the clarinet proposes a fugue subject, taken up first by the basses, then the other string sections in ascending order. A general pause allows a theme, similar to the second theme of the Scherzo, to take its place in the sonata structure.

After another pause, a little before 6:00, the fugue subject returns, against an accompaniment of unison scalework. This subsides into another pause introducing the third theme, a majestic brass chorale decorated by halo-like echoes in the strings. Like the first movement's chorale theme, it carries a load of tonal instability, inherent in its very shape: its last few notes act as a very simple modulation. This theme serves as the second subject of the friggin' brilliant double fugue that occupies most of the movement. The scherzo-based, second theme reemerges around 15:15, more as a contrasting episode than anything else. We can safely regard this region of the movement as a development section, maintaining a sonata form while miraculously blending it with the fugue which returns in full force at about 17:45.

Listen for upside-down entries of the fugue subjects, as well as further right-side-up and upside-down reminiscences of the first movement's big theme. And try, just try, not to get caught up in the excitement of the accelerating coda with its colossal sonorities and air of unrestrained exultation. The last couple of minutes are so triumphant that you'll look back over the whole symphony and think, "Wow! Is it possible that a 74-minute symphony could go by so fast?" Before the closing chords - really, more like unison exclamation points over a thunderous timpani roll - the last thing you hear is yet another reminder of Movement I, making this whole symphony come across as a single unit and this movement as its triumphant coda.

IMAGES: Vienna University Square; Franz Schalk; Eduard Hanslick; Bruckner; a monument to Bruckner; two more images of Bruckner.

Reading Beethoven's 6th

2009-07-08T19:26:00.008-06:00

Further to Assignment 4 in our study of "How to Read a Symphony Like a Good Book," we come to yet another symphony with a nickname: Beethoven's Sixth Symphony in F, also known as the "Pastoral Symphony." It is well-known to millions of fans of the Disney animated film Fantasia, where it accompanies an episode featuring unicorns, satyrs, and the like. This is appropriate imagery for a work inspired by Beethoven's love of the countryside. The word "pastoral" suggests shepherds sitting on a grassy hillside, watching their sheep wandering up and down the valley, perhaps dancing while one of them plays a hand-carved flute, etc.

"Recollections of Country Life" was another title Beethoven gave the symphony at its 1808 premiere. Each of the five movements also has a title related to this theme: "Awakening of cheerful feelings on arriving in the country" ... "Scene by the stream" ... "Happy gathering of country folk" ... "Storm & tempest" ... "Shepherd song: joyful and thankful feelings after the storm." These titles, apt to be printed in a concert programme, supply the listener with a sketchy storyline to think about during the music. It's a concept known as programme music. There are no lyrics, no precise dramatic outline; but, influenced by the suggestion of the written programme, our minds conjure images and events to go with the symphony's themes and musical events.

Here is Herbert von Karajan conducting this entire symphony with, probably, the Berlin Philharmonic.The opening sonata movement is marked Allegro ma non troppo (fast but not too fast). Note the clever little imitation bird calls that decorate it. Can you imagine a more gracious, gentle, happy piece of music? What you may be too enchanted to notice is the groundbreaking techniques of "cellular" motivic development Beethoven used throughout this movement, endlessly repeating several short ideas in different combinations. The effect seems to parallel the organic growth and variety of nature itself.

Movement II, Andante molto mosso (a very brisk walking pace), is another sonata, this time in the key of B-flat. It depicts an idyllic walk along a bubbling stream. The effect of flowing water is achieved by two musicians playing muted cellos, while the rest of the cellists lay down a bass line of plucked strings. Listen for the tender bassoon solo at about 11:40 in the video above, introducing an open-hearted codetta theme. Also note the increasing use of the woodwinds to imitate birdcalls, culminating in a remarkable cadenza passage (video 19:40) in which flute, oboe, and clarinet soloists impersonate the nightingale, quail, and cuckoo.

Movement III, Allegro, is a Scherzo in F. It is an unusual structure for a Scherzo, however. First off, the Trio comes back for a second time. (Karajan & Co. omit the repeat.) Plus, both times, it is preempted by a faster passage in a contrasting meter, changing a dance of bucolic gentlefolk into a coarse peasant dance. On its last return, the Scherzo is interrupted by the approaching storm.

Movement IV follows without a break, with distant thunder growing into a tempest of seemingly unstoppable fury. Beethoven saved the piccolo, trombones, and timpani for this passage. The storm soon abates, flowing seamlessly into the finale with its chorale-like shepherds' song of joy and thanks. The movement is a "sonata rondo," such that the first theme serves both as a refrain (set off by contrasting episodes) and as the subject of a sonata (with the first episode ending on the dominant, the second modulating through several keys, and the third recapping the first episode in the tonic key of F). The movement climaxes in the ecstasy of its relatively long coda before ending peacefully except for, or perhaps in spite of, two loud final chords.

Next to Beethoven's Fifth, which was written at the same time and premiered at the same concert, the Sixth may seem pale and weak. It certainly did to that first audience in December 1808. But on its own terms, separated from the immediate presence of the Fifth Symphony, it is a lovely peace of music, filled with warmth, good humor, natural charm, and an undeniably peaceful outlook -- the fourth movement's thunderstorm notwithstanding. It's healthy, sunny, outdoorsy music that does the spirit good, and it shows a side of Beethoven's character without which he could not have lived to create so many emotionally turbulent masterpieces.

Reading Mozart's 35th

2009-07-08T07:58:00.015-06:00

Another gem from Mozart's early maturity is his D Major Symphony No. 35, nicknamed the "Haffner" symphony. Written in Vienna in 1782, it began life as a serenade commissioned by the prominent Salzburg family of Sigmund Haffner. (This serenade is not to be confused with the "Haffner Serenade" of 1776.) Mozart wrote the six-movement serenade in great haste during a busy summer, and posted it piecemeal to his father Leopold, who was handling the commission at the Salzburg end.

Later in the year, the younger Mozart reworked the serenade into a symphony by adding a few instruments, taking away a couple of movements, and removing the repeat signs at the end of the first movement's exposition. With a few other minor alterations, the erstwhile serenade was first performed as a symphony in Vienna in the spring of 1783, with a lot of other music stuck between its third and fourth movements, a then-typical programme for a symphonic concert.

Movement I is a sonata marked Allegro con spirito. It opens with one of Mozart's strongest and most memorable themes, presented by the full orchestra in unison. Combining leaping octaves, a descending scale, dotted rhythms, and a trill, this theme dominates the entire movement almost to the exclusion of any other. It is a theme that creates a character in the mind's eye: huge, assertive, given to explosions of jolly laughter. An upside-down version of this theme is the first thing we hear after the transition to the dominant key of A, giving us reason to expect this to be a monothematic movement like many of Haydn's sonatas. But Mozart is merely toying with our expectations, we find when he actually does introduce a contrasting second theme in bar 48, over a dominant (E) pedal in the key of A. This leads directly to a long codetta in which the first theme undergoes some further development, beginning in the original tonic key of D and finally coming to rest in A.

The development begins in bar 95, briefly subjecting the first theme to a variety of moods and keys, overlapping with itself and with other ideas, such as the yearning countersubject in the woodwinds during the transition back to D. The recap takes us back to the opening unison statement, departing surprisingly early from the expo's transition material so as to make way for the second theme, appearing now over a dominant (A) pedal in D major. Is this a theme at all, one may wonder, seeing as it's always combined with first-theme material? Well, that first theme never seems to be absent, but the hearer is apt to welcome this tune back as the second theme anyway. When the codetta returns, this time it begins in G and works its way back to D, complete with the same extra development of the first theme, some remarkable late-in-the-game chromaticism, and the concluding scales and chords solidly reasserting D major.

Movement II is another sonata, but a fairly slow one (Andante) in G major, scored for oboes, bassoons, horns, and strings. It isn't that Mozart omitted the flutes and clarinets; rather, he simply didn't bother to add them, as he did in the outer movements, when he adapted the serenade as a symphony. This movement seems to be one continuous outpouring of melody, with curious effects like when the oboes and bassoons imitate the distant howling of wolves. Nevertheless it follows a compact, efficient sonata plan, with the second theme in D hanging under a dominant (A) pedal in the first violins. The development section, all of 14 measures long, uses a simple chord progression, and perhaps the tiniest amount of thematic material, to change the new D major tonic at the end of the expo into the dominant of good ole G major for the recap. In the latter, the first group returns virtually unchanged from the expo, including the transition to D; only now, the second theme appears in G, hanging below a D pedal in the first violins. An altered version of the codetta finishes the movement firmly in its home key of G.

Movement III is the Menuetto, one of two originally included in the serenade. I have never heard the one Mozart didn't choose to keep in the symphony, so I can't say why he chose this one particularly. After hearing many, many, many, many symphonic Minuets, I find it hard to get awfully excited about one of them. Nevertheless, one can see Mozart making an effort to infuse this very brief, simple dance form with as much rhythmic and tonal variety as possible. Scored for the same forces as the slow movement, with the addition of trumpets and timpani, the third movement consists of a brisk Minuet in D surrounding a gentle Trio in A. And that's all I have to say about it.

The Presto finale opens with the strings in unison describing a descending D-major triad, stuttering a bit over the fifth. Repeat with an added chromatic neighbor-tone, and add some bustling figuration leading to a dominant cadence, and you have the first theme. The full orchestra joins for an ecstatic passage repeating the descending-D-triad idea and effecting a transition to A major. The second theme, appearing in bar 38, sounds like someone running on tiptoe, at first hesitantly, then with comical haste. After a repeat of this theme, the bustling strings build up to a quick, exciting codetta, ending the expo in A major -- again, without a repeat sign.

The development begins with a chromatically-colored transition back to D and what initially seems to be a literal repeat of the expo section, through the initial strings-only statement of the first theme. (This is a characteristic of the hybrid form called "sonata-rondo.") Two bars into the tutti repeat, however, it veers into new territory. Sudden hushed phrases set up a new axis of contrast, from loud to soft. Ascending triads in the lower strings suggest an inversion of the main theme. As these loud-soft and upside-down ideas play back and forth, the music evolves through the keys of E and F-sharp major. The second theme appears in a new guise (B minor), complete with its repeat, and the codetta follows, modulating to A and using that key as a springboard back into D for the recap.

Thematically, a recap seems hardly necessary after viewing the development's "bizarro" version of the entire expo section; but tonally, it is vital to restore our confidence in the key of D. To this end, Mozart includes not only the expo's transition to A, but a new transition back to D for the long-awaited tonic-key version of the second theme. Then he adds a coda to make our assurance doubly sure. Or rather, to make it unsure again, by means of some chromatic horseplay, before bringing back the first group one more time, with the transition passage converted into an extended dominant-tonic cadence.

In the following video, Karl Böhm conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in the first movement of this symphony. He, at least, seems to know what he's doing, as opposed to Frans Brüggen, who can be seen conducting all 4 movements in a Youtube playlist -- or rather, failing to conduct it with an ineptitude rarely captured on video.IMAGES: Views along the Sigmund-Haffner-Gasse in Salzburg, Austria.

Blog Design (or Lack Thereof)

2009-07-07T14:17:00.009-06:00

I haven't changed the design of my blog since it started. I suppose this is indecent of me. However, I've thought about doing it. For one mad moment, I replaced the heading of the blog with the following picture. It's got everything I wanted. It's got a long shelf of books. It's got the title and subtitle of the blog. It's just crummy, that's all. I find the text difficult to read, and the image doesn't fit the dimensions of the header correctly. Oh, well, back to the drawing board.

Meanwhile, here's a closer look at the photo of "me" that I just added to my Blogger profile. It's not actually me. It's just a picture that I found on Google Images while searching for something else. As soon as I spotted it, I said to myself: "Self, that's a perfect image for A Fort Made of Books!" Except, well, it's oriented the wrong way. So I can't use it in the header, either.

Web design is gnawing at the edges of my mind, these days. I'm going to have to bone up on it, because there's a good chance the Book Trolley is going to become its own site. Once again, I owe this sudden nudge toward creative ambition to the unresponsiveness of the editors at MuggleNet, who have been publishing my book reviews since September 2003, when I started submitting reviews under the uninspired title of "Suggested Reading." We've come a long way since then... but in the last year, we haven't gotten anywhere much! Which is why literally dozens of my reviews, targeted primarily at MuggleNet readers, have gotten no further than this blog.

Polysyllabic Cats

2009-07-07T09:57:00.010-06:00

My cats continue to gab as though "Meow" is a language. Or maybe I'm losing my mind. Either way, it's been highly entertaining.

A few days ago, I heard Sinead make a two-sentence speech, entirely made up of single-syllable meows. Both of them were inflected as questions (I thought at the time), with three "words" in the first sentence and four in the second. Basically, "Mau mau mau? Mau mau mau mau?" For a moment, the answer was right on the tip of my tongue.

Last night, however, I decided that cats must speak a tonal language. This on the evidence of a conversation involving multisyllabic meows with descending and ascending pitches. I think it was Tyrone who said, "Meow! Meow! Meow, meow." The first two meows started with a high-pitched grace note, then plunged to a low pitch before rising toward the middle. The second pair of meows rose, then fell in pitch in a gentle arch -- oddly like a dog howling. Other than a repeat of this entire statement, the rest of the conversation consisted of throat-trills of varying lengths and pitch-levels. So, maybe inflection has nothing to do with sentence structure (e.g. whether or not something is a question). Maybe the pitches are what make different meows mean different things.

A Far Side cartoon once depicted the findings of a mad scientist who invented a device to translate the barking of dogs into human language. It turned out they were just saying, "Hey! Hey!" After a great deal of observation and thought, I've decided that all cats' meows could be translated as "Hello!" And the inflection of the human word pretty much matches that of the meow.

So the plaintive "Meoooooww?" coming from the kitchen, under the cupboard where the Pounce is kept, translates as "Hello-o-o?" as in, "Yoo-hoo! Is anybody out there?" And the brusque "Meow!" of the cat impatiently waiting while you get the Pounce down means, "HEL-lo!" as in, "Dude, what's holding you up?" And then, of course, the harsh yowl of "meYOW!" when you step on his tail means, roughly, "Hel-LO!" as in, "Say hello to my leetle friends!"

Reading Mozart's 36th

2009-07-06T09:34:00.010-06:00

Ah, Linz! We'll always have Linz! Linz who, you ask? Linz, Austria, silly. It's, like, the third-largest city in the country, after Vienna and Graz; it's only slightly smaller than Little Rock, Arkansas! Who wouldn't enjoy a pleasure trip to the town whose bosom brought forth Johannes Kepler, Anton Bruckner, and... er... Adolf Hitler... (*audible gulp*)

Well, okay, but that didn't stop Mr. and Mrs. Wolfgang Mozart from dropping in toward the end of 1783. And anyway, Hitler hadn't been born yet. Maybe they should have kept going all the way to Vienna, but if they had, his wonderful Symphony No. 36 in C (nicknamed "the Linz Symphony") wouldn't exist.

They only meant to pause for a night or two en route from Salzburg to Vienna. But a funny thing happened in Linz. The mayor, or some local nobleman anyway, heard that the Mozarts were in town, and announced a concert to take place in 4 days' time. Caught flat-footed without a symphony up his sleeve, poor Wolfgang had to write this masterpiece in time for its first performance. Yes, folks, you heard me right. He wrote it in four days!

It's scored for a modest, classical orchestra consisting of pairs of oboes, bassoons, and horns, with a proportionate number of strings, plus two trumpets and timpani. It has the usual four movements, three of them in sonata form. In the video below, the supremely relaxed Carlos Kleiber conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in the first of four videos where, unfortunately, the breaks between the videos do not coincide with those between the movements.Movement I opens with a dignified Adagio, beginning emphatically but tending toward lyricism. The main Allegro spiritoso begins gently, though its main theme is well-calculated to bring out the exciting possibilities of trumpets, timpani, and C major. The second theme introduces a dialogue between winds and strings in which major and minor keys are set in contrast. This makes it an unusually sensitive movement for a C-major symphony; the second-group passages in the development are especially lyrical.

Movement II is an Andante in the 6/8 rhythm of a stylish, slow dance. Nevertheless, it is a sonata that graces us with its tender sentiments. I listen especially for the tiptoe passage -- you'll know it when you hear it -- and for the pounding of the horns and timpani of the codetta, in which the dreamy character of the movement seems to shake itself awake.

Movement III is the obligatory "Menuetto." (How many spellings does that word have, anyway?) Here Mozart demonstrates his ability to make much out of little, combining a descending phrase, a trill, and another pounding, repeated-note motif into a dance number full of charm and wit. The Trio spotlights an oboe soloist, later joined by a bassoon, with a truly lovely melody. Then, of course, the main Minuet returns in all its pomp, concluding however with a gentle phrase.

The Finale, the traditional Presto in sonata form, sets up a contrast between a gracious opening phrase and the brusque, muscular utterance that follows it. A similar polarity generates as much energy in a later C-major symphony by the same composer. This split-personality theme gives way directly to a bustling transition to the butter-smooth second theme. The exuberant codetta begins hushed, then bursts forth like a bottle of fizzing champagne. You may note that the second group contains more moments of harmonic and expressive richness somewhat unusual for a C-major symphony of the period, including a thread of chromatic motion.

The development interests itself solely with a musical idea from the transition passage, tossing it around between sections of the orchestra while passing through various keys and moods ranging from stern to waggishly humorous. Understandably, this bit of the transition is omitted in the recap, in which little other than a series of musical throat-clearings separates the first theme from the second. The movement ends with a coda in which the first theme returns in a burst of masculine joy that effectively synthesizes the two sides of its split personality.

You may or may not consider the city of Linz worthy of being included in your next tour of Europe. But if you don't drop in and visit this symphony, you're really missing something worth your while.

Reading Haydn's 45th

2009-07-04T12:08:00.005-06:00

Joseph Haydn wrote his f-sharp minor Symphony No. 45 in 1772, while he was in the service of an Austro-Hungarian prince named Nikolaus Esterházy. Esterházy was a wonderful patron of music, who kept a full orchestra on his payroll and who required, and received, a continuous outpouring of original symphonies, concertos, operas, masses, and chamber music by his Kapellmeister. He kept them on retainer year-round, not only to entertain his regular court in Eisenstadt, but also (and more constantly) at his summer palace of Eszterháza near the Hungarian town of Fertőd.

Begun as a hunting lodge, Eszterháza grew under Prince Nikolaus's guiding hand into a spectacular pleasure-palace, comparable to Versailles. Sometimes he had such a good time there that he didn't want to go back to Eisenstadt. This was the case in 1772, when Haydn found his orchestra on the brink of mutiny. They had been kept so long over their proposed date of return that they were pining for their wives, who had not been allowed to join them at Eszterháza. So Haydn composed this symphony, nicknamed "Farewell," as a hint to their princely patron.
It begins with an energetic sonata, marked Allegro assai (quite fast) in f-sharp minor, a key rarely used at the time because it presented tuning difficulties to some of the players. The passionate character of the music, together with its wide melodic leaps, rhythmic displacements, contrasts of loud and soft, sudden pauses, and intense unison passages, qualify this movement as an example of the Sturm und Drang style. It is essentially a monothematic sonata, its entire Exposition being derived from the broken-triad theme referenced above. As a special surprise, however, Haydn introduces a new theme at the end of the Development. The effect is particularly striking because of the calm and gentle nature of this new theme, in contrast to the "storm and stress" that grip the rest of the movement.
Movement II, Adagio, is a calm, tender piece in A major, immediately recognizable by its repeated grace-note figures that Wiki describes as "hicupping." Oddly enough, that image didn't come to my mind. The movement's harmony is unusually rich, far-reaching, and expressive for its time. Some of the most touching passages are those in which the texture thins to one line of melody over a bass line. In such intimate moments, it is hard not to feel the sense of loneliness that Haydn apparently meant to express.

Movement III is the expected Minuet. Haydn lavished on it the tempo-marking Allegretto, though a simple "Tempo di Minuetto" would usually do. Set in the fiendishly tricky key of F-sharp Major, whose key signature looks like a briar patch, it thrives on dynamic contrasts (loud vs. soft), unexpected harmonic twists, tied-across-the-bar rhythms, and a deliberately inconclusive-sounding final phrase of each section. The trio briefly spotlights the horns, and also contains the first strong hint of minor-key angst since the first movement.

Movement IV begins as a customary Haydn finale, marked Presto in cut time. Beginning, once again, in f-sharp minor, it follows sonata form with a seemingly unstoppable energy. It's really very exciting, and it comes to the point so directly that it seems close to being finished by about 2:45 or 3:00, when the Recap comes to a sudden halt on the dominant chord. Then Haydn does something totally unprecedented.
He ends the movement with a 5-minute-long coda in a slow (Adagio) 3/8 time, beginning in the key of A (relative major to f-sharp minor) and working its way toward F-sharp Major. Flamboyantly anticlimactic, this sweet, gentle music starts softly and grows ever softer. The instrumental texture grows thinner, too. You'll notice this even on an audio recording, such as this Youtube playlist of the entire symphony. What you can't fully appreciate without seeing a live performance, is that the players are actually leaving the stage, in ones and twos and sometimes whole sections at a time, as they reach the end of their parts. Some of them, notably the horns and oboes, get somewhat of a solo before they leave. Others simply, quietly, excuse themselves until, at last, only two solo violins are left to complete the work.

As a bit of stage business combined with a musical message that even a blind man can pick up, this finale basically told Prince Nikolaus: "Enough is enough. It's time to go home." And he got the message, evidently, because the whole court moved back to Eisenstadt the next day. Ah, the power of music!

Here's a video of the finale that you may enjoy. Daniel Barenboim conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in a New Years' Day concert, and plays the business of the departing musicians as slapstick comedy.

Reading Schubert's 4th

2009-07-02T12:55:00.015-06:00

Franz Schubert wrote his c-minor Fourth Symphony in 1816, when he was only 19 years old. He titled it his "Tragic" Symphony, though it takes a bit of imagination to hear anything tragic in it. Sure, it's in a minor key, like no other symphony by Schubert except the "Unfinished." Apart from that, the sense of nervous agitation in the first and especially the last movement, and the violence of the Minuetto, it doesn't present much that the modern ear can identify as tragedy. Perhaps, in the subtler "classic" idiom of Haydn and Mozart, wherein the young Schubert here demonstrates his mastery while beginning to stretch in a "romantic" direction, we must allow for a lower threshold of tragedy. Or perhaps we may count it a tragedy that Schubert never heard it performed. It didn't get a premiere until 1849, on the 21st anniversary of its composer's death.

Here is the first of four connected videos of Lorin Maazel conducting, and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra playing, each of the movements of this symphony. I apologize for the "skip" in the last movement. I thought it was well done, though at times I wondered how anyone could follow Maazel's gesture. The players are interesting to look at, particularly the principal oboist, who mugs like a cartoon character in the throes of apoplexy. But enough silliness. Let's talk about this symphony.

Movement I opens Adagio molto (very slowly), with an introduction full of tortured intervals and sudden falling motifs. From the opening loud unison C, it takes only ten measures to arrive at an equally loud G-flat Major chord, diabolically far from c minor. The obsessive muttering over the same, distressed phrase continues in that key, the upper and lower strings passing the melody back and forth, like an extremely bitter pill being rolled from one side of the mouth to another. Consider the musical tastebuds it pricks from the G-flat chord in measure 10 to the beginning of the Allegro vivace at the pickup to measure 30: First A-flat, then D-flat; then F, and D-flat again; then descending, with accompanying falling motifs, from A-flat through G-flat, F, and E-flat, to D; modulating simply but forcefully to G, the dominant of C-minor; and squeezing as much suspense out of that dominant as decently possible, before resolving back to C-minor at the beginning of the "fast, lively," main sonata movement.

As this opens, the violins introduce the First Theme, hushed yet passionate, over an agitated string accompaniment. The full orchestra breaks in at bar 39 for a loud transition passage full of descending arpeggios, alternating with soulful phrases based on the slow intro. In this way Schubert creates a semblance of thematic interest while shifting through a number of keys. He finally unveils the Second Theme at bar 67, beginning in the orthodox key of A-flat (the relative major of c minor). Again, this theme is introduced by strings alone, followed by a repeat with winds added.

But then, Schubert transgresses sonata-form orthodoxy just a bit, by beginning to develop fragments of this theme against a background of string tremolos, broken triads, and sustained clarinet notes. Again our toes touch ground in several keys before a series of explosive, unison notes (descending from G to C) heralds the codetta. This wraps up the exposition with a colossal chain of chromatic chord progressions, driven by the rhythms of a triumphal fanfare, arriving finally at a firm A-flat cadence. Or rather, not finally. Because just when you think the expo is finished, Schubert wittily tacks on an augmented-sixth-chord transition back to C minor.

At this point in the score, a repeat sign directs us back to the beginning of the Allegro vivace. Unhappily, Maazel and the BRSO (see video above) ignore this repeat and go directly into the Development, a nowadays-too-common form of abridgement that they also inflict on the fourth movement. In my opinion, more is lost than gained by omitting the repeat of the Exposition. We buy ourselves a bit of time, but at the expense of the composer's intended proportions, and of the chance to appreciate the double entendre of the final notes of this section. For on the first iteration, bars 131-133 form a remarkable transition back to the beginning of the sonata; while on the second, they function as the first tremor of the tonal earthquake of bars 134-138.

After this shock is over, you are prepared for absolutely anything to happen as the development commences. So the strings-only reprise of the first theme, transposed down a whole step to b-flat minor, comes as surprisingly unsurprising. Schubert expands the scope of this theme, however, moving the melody to the bass line, then treating it to a touch of fuguelike stretto, then pulling it apart and messing with the bits. Then the Recapitulation introduces it again, as at first, but in g minor this time. The recap proceeds as though the entire exposition had been ratcheted up one click around the circle of fifths, modulating predictably to E-flat (relative major of g minor) in time for the second theme, all the way up to the bar 236, where the big surprises begin.

At bar 236, instead of copying bars 89 ff. and pasting it up a fifth, Schubert unexpectedly veers into the same key in which we originally heard the codetta. Trust me, the sense of surprise will not be lost on your ears, even if you don't understand the key relationships involved. From bar 88 to 89 Schubert had shifted from a d-flat minor chord to E major; at bar 235-236, where we would expect the equivalent passage to move from a-flat minor to B major, it resolves instead to E major again, and we're suddenly back in the exact same music, key and all, as the end of the exposition. But this doesn't last long. When the music slams into C major at bar 244, it's for keeps this time. The riff that enabled the Exposition to end in A-flat is replaced by a simple cascade of descending thirds, keeping the codetta solidly in C major. Even with those chromatic chains still in there, it leads back time after time to the dominant G and the tonic C. As an extra bonus, as if that isn't convincing enough, Schubert adds a quick coda in which ascending scales reassert this dominant-tonic relationship, concluding with seven solid bars of the C-major chord.

I won't drag out my analysis of Movement II very much. It's a lyrical Rondo, marked Andante and in A-flat major, again opening with a theme introduced by the strings alone. This gentle refrain is contrasted with a stern episode in which variants of an anguished, ascending phrase and a three-note moaning motive call back and forth across a pounding 16th-note accompaniment by the second violins and violas. After the second such episode, the final refrain is accompanied by a similar 16th-note figure, transformed however into something sunnier. The movement ends with a sweet coda in which the woodwinds trade fragments of the refrain theme over a triplet accompaniment in the strings.

Movement III, a minuet marked Allegro vivace, is one of those pieces that looks different on paper than it sounds. This will be because of the harsh accents that make much of it sound more like 2/4 time than the 3/4 in which it is written. In its loud unisons, its twisty chromaticism, and its heavy-footed rhythm it sounds more like something to hide from than something to dance to. I don't mean this as a criticism; I like this movement. But Schubert must have been thinking on a Scherzo brainwave, rather than a Minuet one, when he wrote this. It's an angry, threatening, possibly inebriated dance, in which even the relatively calm bits take on a sarcastic resonance. The Trio is much more classically ordered, but even it has its mysterious side, its hint of uncertainty and even menace. Schubert also added tonal variety to the symphony by placing this movement in the key of E-flat, rather than (according to classical precedent) the symphony's main key of c minor or C major.

The Allegro finale is an extremely busy-sounding movement. The strings saw away almost constantly in rapid 8th notes, accompanying a theme that either comically or tragically vibrates with nervous energy. Even the major-key, skippy bits seem only to smile over an internal panic. By bar 63, the music seems to be positively hopping up and down with anxiety, flapping its hands in a birdlike manner. In bar 85 we encounter a second theme in the predictable key of A-flat, but more interestingly, a theme broken up between the first violins and the clarinet, like two children cheerfully calling back and forth over the hubbub. This theme grows and develops, building eventually to the explosive codetta, beginning at bar 129. Here phrases that seem related to the first theme pile up at great length (and height) to a huge E-flat-major cadence.

Then, following a repeat of the Exposition (omitted by Maazel & co.), the Development begins with the movement's first moment of relative calm. It is, however, a calm disturbed by sneaky presentiments. After a moment of complete silence, the "skippy bits" from the first group resurface in the unexpected key of A major, then in F, then in D-flat, before dissolving into motives that Schubert subjects to some of the craftiest development in his symphonic career -- all by way of modulating to C major for the Recapitulation.

Once again, Schubert gets around the problem of how to round off the movement in the same key of C by veering, quite early, into a minor and letting the remainder of the recap play out a third lower than the expo. So the second theme, instead of its original key of A-flat, returns in F; and the codetta ratchets itself up chromatically, not to E-flat, but at last to C. I suppose this "transpose the whole exposition" procedure saved Schubert a lot of trouble; he certainly used it a lot. The result, however, is a bit unexpected. The final cadence is delayed by a coda, in which Schubert plays around with the C/A-flat key relationship. It's a highly amusing game that makes this symphony's concluding pages especially colorful and impressive.

Since my teen years, this work has been one of those old friends who is always welcome to drop in. It's nice to catch up with it once in a while. Lasting about half an hour, it never overstays its welcome. Scored for a classical-sized orchestra with pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets, and bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings (with the basses doubling the cellos an octave down), it adheres to the traditional number (four) and order of movements (slow movement second, minuet third). It exhibits classic proportions and key relationships, but with a presentiment of the romantic era with its richer harmonies, its coarser dynamics and textural contrasts, and its emotions more vivid because less veiled.

If you had first heard this symphony after listening to loads of Haydn and Mozart, you would have thought: "Gee, I never realized Haydn felt that strongly," or perhaps, "Whoa, Mozart's taste really isn't what I thought it was." But only someone ignorant of Beethoven's first eight symphonies (which had all been written by 1814) would have thought so. Young Schubert was independently working through some of the same discoveries Beethoven had already made. His revolutionary achievements would mostly go unnoticed until decades later. But now we can appreciate this moment in Schubert's formation, and in the formation of Romantic Music, on its own terms. Isn't it wonderful?

IMAGES: Schubert, Schubert, Schubert, and Schubert. This image (at left) is supposed to represent Schubert at about the age when he wrote this symphony. It's very pretty but... well, really! It's kind of hard to believe, isn't it?

Public Enemies

2009-07-01T09:56:00.006-06:00

Last night I took myself to a midnight movie premiere. The show was the 1930s cops-and-robbers epic Public Enemies, directed by Michael Mann, whose films are typically long, stylish, brooding affairs punctuated by intense action sequences. This one follows the parallel careers of bank robber John Dillinger and the FBI agent in charge of catching him, Melvin Purvis, from October 1933 (when Dillinger engineered a prison breakout) to July 1934 (when he was shot dead outside a movie theater).

Ah, the cast. It isn't often that one sees a film so lavishly and successfully cast. Johnny Depp makes magic as Dillinger in a portrayal that combines tenderness, humor, tragedy, and sheer magnetic masculinity in a way he has never managed before. Only someone who could play Jack Sparrow and Sweeney Todd could turn the word "Coffee" into a laugh line and (by expressing a sociopathic indifference to human life) send shivers down your spine, and within the same brief scene. To his poetically inarticulate love speeches he brings a sizzle worthy of Brando; and in spite of one crushing loss after another, he saves up his tears until just the right moment to ensure that the audience will be on his side, forever.

Appearing opposite him is Christian Bale, who actually looks and sounds like a different person for the first time (as opposed to getting by on sheer incandescent energy). His Purvis is soft-spoken, unflappable, ethically ambiguous, with a soft South Carolina accent and a remarkable restraint. Not once does he pull his trademark "whispering and screaming at the same time" trick. Attaboy.

As Dillinger's criminal associates, we get to see Stephen Dorff, David Wenham, Jason Clarke, Giovanni Ribisi, Stephen "Baby Face" Graham, and Channing "P retty Boy" Tatum. As his two girlfriends we see the sultry Marion Cotillard and the perky Leelee Sobieski. His slick-as-butter lawyer is unforgettably portrayed by Peter Gerety. Meanwhile, on the side of the law, we get to watch a virtually unrecognizable Billy Crudup do a loathesome turn as J. Edgar Hoover. Rory Cochrane and Shawn Hatosy play a couple of ill-fated agents. Stephen Lang, who lately played "Stonewall" Jackson in one of the most tiresome Civil War movies I ever saw, recovers his manliness as Agent Winstead who, you can tell from his first squint, is going to kill John Dillinger in the end. Matt Craven plays one of Winstead's stooges. And Lili Taylor plays a female sheriff who was too far ahead of her time for her own good.

The movie is not altogether historical, of course. The escape attempt with guns carved out of soap? In real life it ended badly. The scene where Dillinger brazenly waltzes through the very FBI office that is tracking him down? Completely made-up. And Melvin Purvis couldn't have gotten command of the Dillinger task force as a reward for killing Pretty Boy Floyd, because Floyd was killed some months after Dillinger. Various members of the gang came to different fates, at different times, than as depicted in the movie.

But some things in Public Enemies are disturbingly real. The innocent civilians gunned down by the FBI by mistake, while the real bad guys got away? That happened. The girlfriend who kept the secret of Dillinger's hide-out all the way to prison? Real. The gangster movie, Manhattan Melodrama, which Dillinger went to see with his other girlfriend right before he was shot? Eerily appropriate... but also real. It's even possible that the movie holds back from portraying the full truth about Purvis's methods -- for example, he is alleged to have ordered Charles Floyd's execution without a trial -- but sometimes, the truth is so strange that fiction must stop short of it, in order to be believed.

It was a long, stylish, brooding movie punctuated by intense action sequences. No surprise there! The look of it was exquisite. The camera work was sometimes bumpier than it strictly had to be, but often strikingly effective. There were a couple of dolly-shots in which someone is walking straight toward the camera, in close-up, and they frankly made my eyes water. And there was a bit of blood and gore, as bullets made exit wounds out of people's torsos and faces. But I thought the nudity was admirably restrained; Marion Cotillard, for example, may someday be able to watch this movie with her children, in spite of a bedroom scene and a bathtub scene, the latter ending with someone saying, "Lady, put some clothes on!"

The story neither rushes nor drags, but unfolds at just the right pace, especially as the suspense builds toward Dillinger's sticky end. The clips from Manhattan Melodrama are a perfect touch, given the similarity in looks between the leads in both films. With a large cast of characters moving on complex trajectories, it is a film full of subtle variations in look and feeling. It makes the dawning of the age of Federal Crime, and the prosecution thereof, seem like the passing of a golden age (though it was only golden for the criminals who profited from it); it makes Dillinger, dangerous crook that he was, seem like a dashing, daring, Robin Hood-like hero; it makes you fear for the conscience of the Special Agent hunting him; and when Dillinger goes down, and Purvis walks away, you may be surprised by which one the film makes you pity.

Public Enemies is a great film: a feast for the eyes and for the mind. I'll expect it to get lots of nominations and rewards, when the time comes for that kind of stuff.

Five Book Reviews

2009-06-30T08:53:00.016-06:00

Sense and Sensibility
by Jane Austen
Recommended Ages: 12+

Originally titled Elinor and Marianne, this book's final title refers to the same two sisters. Elinor, the eldest of three Dashwood girls, believes in governing her emotions with restraint and good sense. Marianne, like their widowed mother, wears her heart on her sleeve and would regard a lack of "sensibility" (i.e., outward demonstrations of emotion) as a betrayal of her noble feelings. Elinor believes in being discreet, keeping confidences, and sparing other people pain no matter how much it hurts herself; Marianne believes in all kinds of romantic ideas, such as the impossibility of falling a second time after once being passionately in love. As both sisters are tested in love and the hope of marriage, each learns the limits and drawbacks of her philosophy.

The girls' father wished, on his deathbed, that they be well taken care of. Nevertheless their hypocritical half-brother and his greedy wife have done as little as they can for Mrs. Dashwood and her three daughters. Supported by a meager income, the ladies move to a cottage in Devonshire, owned by a distant cousin who occupies the nearby manor house. There, in a series of visits, dinner parties, and country walks they get mixed up in a romantic comedy that strains Elinor's composure and runs Marianne through the emotional mangle.

All right, so Edward Ferrars loves Elinor, but he can't marry her because (a) his snobby mother wouldn't approve the match, and (b) he has already promised himself to an even less suitable girl named Lucy. The despicable Lucy puts Elinor in the painful position of having to give comfort to the person who is breaking her heart. But she won't let on that it hurts, because she doesn't want to make everyone feel worse, since Marianne shows every sign of dying of a broken heart thanks to a handsome scoundrel named Willoughby. And don't let's forget Colonel Brandon, who in spite of his advanced age of thirty-six, seems to have romantic intentions toward one of the sisters.

So the well-to-do heir of the Ferrars fortune must risk being cut off entirely, and adopting the life of an impoverished clergyman, in order to make one woman happy... but which will it be? Colonel Brandon, a well-to-do man with a sad secret in his past, wants nothing better than to make one of the Dashwood sisters happy... but which will it be? Some of the characters are playing the marriage game for personal gain, some in hopes of love and happiness, and some (such as Mrs. Ferrars) for family pride and glory. Some of them will lose the game. Some will win, and regret it later. But one thing you can count on: what becomes of Elinor and Marianne will remain in suspense until near the end, and it will challenge their resolutions on "second attachments" and on whether feelings should be expressed or suppressed.

This book was my second visit to the world of Jane Austen, after Pride and Prejudice. I'll admit that I liked it a bit less than Pride and Prejudice. As a main character, Elinor Dashwood didn't have quite the sparkle of Elizabeth Bennet. But it was still a very enjoyable novel, filled with droll characters, acute observations of the attraction and repulsion of social bodies (mainly orbiting the supper table and the drawing room), and the complex laws that govern tricky transactions in the late-18th-century world of feminine emotions, manners, morals, money, rank, and personal honor. It also has a subtle wit that sometimes gleams with a razor edge, as in this bit:

After a proper resistance on the part of Mrs Ferrars, just so violent and so steady as to preserve her from that reproach which she always seemed fearful of incurring, the reproach of being too amiable, Edward was admitted to her presence, and pronounced to be again her son.

Her family had of late been exceedingly fluctuating. For many years of her life she had had two sons; but the crime and annihilation of Edward a few weeks ago, had robbed her of one; the similar annihilation of Robert had left her for a fortnight without any; and now, by the resuscitation of Edward, she had one again.

In spite of his being allowed once more to live, however, he did not feel the continuance of his existance secure, till he had revealed his present engagement, for the publication of that circumstance, he feared, might give a sudden turn to his constitution, and carry him off as rapidly as before.

I would have laughed heartily at this, even before the publication of the recent spoof novel, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, which inspired me to think: "This calls for Sense and Sensibility and Vampires!" Ha, ha. Seriously, though, Jane Austen writes in a highly engaging style. She makes you care about her characters and their emotional entanglements. She makes you grin at their foibles, pointed up with such ready wit.

And should anyone complain that Austen's books don't set a good enough example for today's young women, do consider that they view reality entirely from the point of view of young women. In Austen's time, social convention prevented women from discussing social and political issues. So the focus is entirely on the human dynamics of men and women relating to each other. Plus, Austen herself knew so little about what men discussed among themselves that there isn't a single scene, in all of her works, in which a female character is not present. (I owe this factoid to an editorial preface to Emma, which I am reading now.) Compare that to the many male-centered fantasy-adventure books that make you forget that women exist, and then ask yourself: which type of fantasy brings more joy to young women?

To a modern-day reader (of either sex) the world of Jane Austen is a wonderful fantasy world, all the more wonderful because of its place in our history. And though the heroes and heroines in each of her novels quest for nothing more than marital happiness (perhaps with a side of financial security), they are not banal. Such a grail remains elusive today, in spite of the "progress" our society has made in sexual freedom. This novel proves that pursuit of that grail, in a fantasy world where honor and purity matter, can still be vibrantly entertaining and true to life.

London Calling
by Edward Bloor
Recommended Ages: 12+

Such books as Tangerine, Crusader, and Story Time have made the name of Edward Bloor synonymous with "Uh-oh, better keep a hanky handy." This book, told by a man in the year 2019 as a memoir of his present-day boyhood, stays true to tradition. It ventures boldly into territory that would scare away most children's authors today. It depicts alcoholism, depression, crisis of faith, broken marriage, survivors' guilt, and school bullying so severe that it makes a boy ill. It tackles historical revisionism, the horrors of war, the death of loved ones, treason, espionage, pimping, and well-known historical figures (such as JFK's father) selling out to the Nazis. It begins in a malfunctioning school setting (also a common theme in Bloor's work), and ventures into big questions such as the possibility of time travel, the existence of angels, and the question everyone will be asked when they die (What did you do to help?)

Put that way, it sounds like an awfully heavy book: maybe too heavy to pick up. But it actually isn't. Through the main character, Martin Conway, we see an intelligent mind questioning established beliefs and, instead of rejecting the beliefs, learning to live with the questions. We see a boy crushed by shame and depression, then pulled into an adventure so strange that he fears for his own sanity. We see a complex father-son relationship, a passive victim learning to stand up for himself, a young man whose destiny seems predestined taking control and breaking free of his family's sacred history. But all that merely adds emotional depth to what is basically a story about a kid who, aided by a vintage radio, goes back in time and witnesses the German bombing of London in 1940. And somehow, even without being able to affect anything that happened in the past, Martin -- or is it Johnny? -- uses what he observes to make a difference.

The fact is, this book works because it isn't about an issue. The fact that all those issues are swirling around in John Martin Conway's life only makes him credible as an American kid of today. And it helps us to care about him, care enough to be moved by his struggle and growth, his disappointments and triumphs. This book will be especially appealing (and challenging) to Catholic youth, with its spin on their church's teaching on heaven, hell, and purgatory. Families of other faiths will be challenged to consider and discuss what it implies about what happens after death and why.

The Forgotten Beasts of Eld
by Patricia A. McKillip
Recommended Ages: 14+

I had this book on my shelf for several years before I got around to reading it. When one of my co-workers saw me reading it in the break room he said, "I've had that book on my shelf for years, but I've never gotten around to reading it." Now, I realize this doesn't constitute a scientific poll, but I reckon there are a lot of people who can say the same thing. If you've been tripping over The Forgotten Beasts of Eld while deciding what to read next, stop. Pull it down from that shelf, crack it open, and read the first chapter. You may be surprised at how hard it is to put down.

Patricia McKillip's choice of words isn't always ideal. She was the author I had in mind when I kvetched that one should use "often" instead of "frequently," "always" instead of "perpetually," and so on. But these little slips were the exception, not the rule. I wouldn't have noticed them if they hadn't stuck out like a few lumps in an otherwise smooth batter. On the contrary, every page of McKillip's prose is a garden of delight for the senses. Her writing is sheer poetry, though not in verse form. And her story is poetic too, worthy of a Greek playwright, with an elegant dramatic shape and a way of drawing you into its emotional connections. It is passionate, touching, dangerous stuff that makes the breath catch in your throat. At both the level of words and sentences, and that of the overall plot, it is writing transformed into magic.

And still, you have no idea what the story is about. Would you read it if I didn't tell you? I should hope so. But let me clinch the deal by mentioning that it is about a wizard woman named Sybel, who lives on a lonely mountaintop with a menagerie of magical creatures whom she, like her father and grandfather before her, holds to her will through her power of calling things by name. Into her lonely sanctuary comes a man whose family has been fighting for the throne of Eldwold. Coren presses an infant into her arms, telling her to raise the child with love, and to protect him from being used as a royal pawn by King Drede and his counselors.

Young Tamlorn grows up chasing goats on the mountainside, getting his skinned knees treated by the local witch, and teaching Sybel to love with all her heart. But the outside world and its conflicting interests soon intrude. Drede comes to fetch his son and prepare him to be king. Coren comes to fetch Sybel and make her his wife. And in between, an evil wizard plays a trick on Sybel that will unsettle everything. Because of this, a young wizard woman who has but slowly learned to love, quickly learns to hate. Her anger threatens to ignite a war in which the two people she loves most will be sworn enemies.

You will feel Sybel's bitter, burning anger. You will cringe as the shadow of great tragedy draws near. And you will swiftly accept each surprise revelation that will decide what becomes of Sybel's love and hate. Meanwhile, you may enjoy the company of her strange, mythical beasts, such as the boar of wisdom and the giant, protective hawk. Some of the creatures she summons are more disturbing, particularly the one whose name is best spoken backward, just to be safe.

Because it depicts two contrasting magical professions -- namely, wizard and witch -- you may appreciate having an Occult Content Advisory to prepare you for the spiritually and ethically questionable magics you will find herein. But if you can tolerate a bit of hocus-pocus, in the service of a poetically rich fantasy tale, you'll be glad you finally pulled The Forgotten Beasts of Eld out of your bookcase.

Od Magic
by Patricia A. McKillip
Recommended Ages: 14+

I really must be more careful about how I throw around words like "best" and "favorite." But from a fairly early chapter in this book, I was already thinking about using them in this review. Let's call it the best book I have read since the last book I anointed "best of the year so far." If you're a mature Harry Potter fan, looking out for something similar, yet ready to sink your teeth into heavier and headier fare, I think you'll be equally pleased. For here is a story about a school of magic -- but one in an altogether original fantasy world, flavored with exotic spices and tinged with Patricia McKillip's unique style of poetic prose.

How can I begin to summarize this tale? It's got an awful lot going on. But I suppose your first question will be why the first word of the title is spelled with only one d. That's because "Od" is the name of a wizard, a female wizard, who started the school of magic in Kelior, the capital city of the kingdom of Numis. Since Od saved Numis from being overthrown in battle, the king permitted her to open her school in the shadow of his palace, and under royal protection. Hundreds of years later, the practice of magic in Numis has become so closely tied to the throne that only magic done in service of the king, and under the guidance of his royal wizards, is allowed.

Problem No. 1: Od is still alive and moving around the country, surrounded by animals she has helped and healed. No one sees her for years at a time. The last person to glimpse her was a young wizard named Yar, 19 years ago, just after he had saved the city from another dire threat. Yar was on his way to study at Od's school when he spotted a monster attacking the city, and stopped it using powers he didn't know he had. His reward (from Od) was to enter her school through the elusive "door under the shoe," through the abandoned cobbler's shop where the school was first started. Yar's reward from the king was to have all magical initiative, curiosity, and creativity trained out of him, and to be kept at the school as a teacher so that the king's wizards could keep an eye on him.

Problem No. 2: Brendan Vetch, the school's new gardener, has amazing powers even he doesn't know about. The first person since Yar to see Od and to find the door under the shoe, Brendan just wants to talk to plants. He doesn't realize that the weight of loneliness and grief inside him is actually a huge source of power. Doesn't realize, that is, until a fire breaks out, and Brendan unthinkingly uses that power to stop it. His reward is to become an outlaw, hunted by the king's men as a threat to the royal monopoly on magic.

Problem No. 3: Tyramin, a mysterious master of illusion, sweeps into town with a troupe of dancers and jugglers, enchanting the senses of the citizens with a display of swirling silks, sparks, flames, flights of birds, and showers of flowers. Some say he uses real magical power to pull off his illusions. If so, then he too is committing a crime against the king. But when one of the top police officers in the city goes to investigate Tyramin's powers, he falls under the spell of the magician's daughter.

Problem No. 4: The king's daughter Sulys has been learning her great-grandmother's brand of "little magics" from a faraway country. How will she keep this a secret when she is supposed to marry Valoren, the king's chief magical adviser? And how can she break this secret to her father and her husband-to-be when they are always too busy to hear a word she says? Sulys tries to get their attention, but as bad luck would have it, the king and his counselors are in an uproar over Tyramin and Brendan -- who they think have abducted her.

Problem No. 5: Do we really need another problem to keep this story moving at a frantic pace? Maybe not, but we get one anyway, when a lady doing research for a biography of Od stumbles across some disturbing clues about the powerful magical beings that live in the northern mountains, within the borders of Numis but outside the king's control. Are they a threat that must be destroyed, or an opportunity for discovery and wonder? This will become the burning question as Brendan, Yar, and Valoren converge on them in a race to determine what future magic will have in the kingdom of Numis.

Magic, mystery, a state crisis, romantic complications, and a series of perfectly-timed misunderstandings combine to make all these problems as tricky as they can be, all at the same time. The city of Kelior fills up with policemen, wizards, and soldiers serving conflicting agendas, searching for people who aren't missing, turning innocent people into desperate fugitives. Lovers find their loyalties tested. Students, teachers, rulers, and subjects find their roles reversed. And all of it happens amid the glittering, perfumed glory of McKillip's prose.

For the sake of full disclosure, I'm putting out an Occult Content Advisory on this book. At least some of the magic in it seems to come from a world outside or before ours, inhabited by indescribable beings whose thoughts exist beyond language. Some of the magic involves talking to plants and animals, and listening to what they say back. There is a bit of divination in it, and the character of Od resembles the holy figures of certain religious traditions as she slips into and out of history, sometimes in disguise.

But as I say all this, I know too well that it will increase more people's interest in the book than otherwise. And that's all right. For, though I distrust some of the spiritual implications of this book, I enjoyed it for its value as art and entertainment. In fact, I enjoyed it enough to deem it one of the best handful of books I have read this year. That's odd magic indeed!

Night Watch
by Terry Pratchett
Recommended Ages: 14+

Several years ago, I read straight through the first 26 Discworld novels. My reviews of them, spread out between here, here, here, and here, were essentially the egg out of which the Book Trolley hatched. So I owe a lot to Discworld. Nevertheless, I haven't cracked a single book in the series since then, the Tiffany Aching trilogy excepted. I have been content to let subsequent installments in Pratchett's fantasy-philosophy-humor extravaganza pile up on my shelf, so that I can guiltily look at them while I pick other things to read.

Why did I stop reading Discworld? Any answer that I can give must have the word "momentum" in it. But the only excuse that really matters is that I have been reading other books. Hundreds of them. Why did I start reading Discworld again? At least partly, I was prompted by the news that Terry Pratchett had decided to stop writing them. He really has no choice, since Alzheimer's disease is taking the ability from him. Little as I suspect he believes in prayer, I ask my faithful readers to "do a lap around the rosary" for Mr. Pratchett and his loved ones.

The news of his condition is deeply saddening, but this book will cheer you up. Published in 2002, it shows the author still in full possession of his gifts as a storyteller and humorist. And since I haven't visited Discworld since 2002 or -03, it's worth saying that it took me no time to get back into it. The characters of Sam Vimes, Carrot, Nobby, Fred Colon, Lord Vetinari, etc., reprised their roles in my mental cinema without any need for lengthy recap. They came to life again, and immediately began to entertain, as if six or seven years hadn't passed since my mind's eye last opened on the city of Ankh-Morpork.

Appropriately, this book takes City Watch Commander Vimes back to an Ankh-Morpork he only distantly remembers. As he pursues a serial killer across the rooftop of Unseen University's library, Vimes and his suspect are transported back in time by a freak magical accident. Desperate to get back to his own time, Vimes makes a deal with the "history monks" to see the city through a tricky historical crossroads. First he must insinuate himself into the Night Watch, where he meets himself as a rookie copper. The elder Vimes quickly realizes that he must play the role of the seasoned veteran who taught his younger self everything he knows!

But that's not the tricky part. The tricky part has to do with a riot that marks the end of one Patrician's reign and the beginning of another's. The old Patrician, Lord Winder, has grown so paranoid that his latest laws will lead, inevitably, to a revolt. Disarming the citizens, enforcing a strict curfew, allowing his soldiers to fire on peaceful demonstrators, and creating a "law within the law" whose enforcers apply hideous methods of interrogation... it's only a matter of time until Winder gets himself assassinated.

Meanwhile, the people of the city are primed for a riot. Vimes knows it's going to happen, because he has already lived through it once. He knows that the man whose identity he has assumed -- John Keel, a natural leader of men -- will be pivotal in saving many innocent lives. And he knows that before the night of chaos ends, John Keel will be dead.

While Ankh-Morpork's society trembles on the brink of collapse, you will tremble on the edge of your chair or sofa. Vimes has only a handful of days to rise from a stranger found naked in the street to the inspiring leader who kept a quarter of the city safe through a night of cavalry attacks and siege warfare. Only John Keel could forestall a riot between the citizens and police at just that moment in history... only John Keel could organize the denizens of so many barricaded streets to defend themselves... only John Keel could keep the young Samuel Vimes alive, and teach him how to be a good copper, in those few days... and unless Sam Vimes can become John Keel, history will change and the child his wife was about to bring into the world may never exist.

That's enough of a taste, I think, of what this book is about. Rely on Terry Pratchett to make it relentlessly funny, frequently moving, constantly exciting, and endlessly thought-provoking. It has its share of naughty innuendoes, yet the merits of Vimes' philosophy and ethics could stimulate serious debate. Its huge gallery of characters contains fine observations of many personality types, while also leaving plenty of room for broad humor. The plot exhibits many gears of varying shapes and sizes turning at different speeds, yet it all seems to move together smoothly and in order. And the possibility that the Ankh-Morpork we know could be wiped from history, provides material for some really nifty suspense.

It's a good enough book to make you feel really, really bad about what its author is now going through... and really, really good about what he could do, even 27 (or 31?) books into this consistently entertaining series.

Another Book Spree

2009-06-29T04:33:00.004-06:00

This morning, when I was too restless to stay in bed, I poked around at Borders-dot-com and had a little book-buying spree. Addiction is terrible. I need help!

With the help of a coupon/promotion code for 30% off the highest-price book on my order, I managed to scrape together 5 books for under $38. Plus, I saved shipping and handling by having my order shipped to the store closest to where I work. So, while I would have gotten lower prices if I had ordered used copies, I probably saved big-time on postage.

I know you're dying to find out what books I ordered, so I won't keep you in suspense any longer. My first pick was Dragon and Liberator, the final book in the "Dragonback" series by Timothy Zahn, currently available online only for $5.99 in paperback. Then I snapped up the paperback edition of Queste, the latest from Angie Sage's "Septimus Heap" series, due to be released on July 1 -- just in time for my order.

My third selection was The Hour of the Outlaw by Maiya Williams, the third book in a kids' time-travel series that I have enjoyed so far. Fourth was Terry Pratchett's Johnny and the Bomb, which I am embarrassed to have to order after having picked a used copy of Johnny and the Dead online, only to realize that I already had it and was still missing this part of the "Johnny Maxwell" trilogy.

And finally, I sprang for the hardcover of Jenny Nimmo's Charlie Bone and the Shadow, the latest installment in the "Children of the Red King" series. I have always begrudged the cost of hardcover editions, especially new and at full price, but the 30% promo code eased my pain. Besides, there isn't much choice, since this is one of those series that never seems to come out in paperback until the very last book is in print.

The Fatted Calf

2009-06-27T20:30:00.007-06:00

Coming soon to a pulpit near you (if you live near St. Louis): the following sermon on Luke 15:11-32.

Then He said: "A certain man had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the portion of goods that falls to me.' So he divided to them his livelihood. And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country, and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living. But when he had spent all, there arose a severe famine in that land, and he began to be in want. Then he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate, and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, and I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired servants."'

"And he arose and came to his father. But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight, and am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his servants, 'Bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet. And bring the fatted calf here and kill it, and let us eat and be merry; for this my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' And they began to be merry.

"Now his older son was in the field. And as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and because he has received him safe and sound, your father has killed the fatted calf.' But he was angry and would not go in. Therefore his father came out and pleaded with him. So he answered and said to his father, 'Lo, these many years I have been serving you; I never transgressed your commandment at any time; and yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might make merry with my friends. But as soon as this son of yours came, who has devoured your livelihood with harlots, you killed the fatted calf for him.' And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that I have is yours. It was right that we should make merry and be glad, for your brother was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found.'"

“Finding the Lost.” That is often the title, or theme, placed over the parable Jesus told in today’s Gospel lesson. This theme stretches to cover two other parables in the earlier verses of Luke 15. First there is the parable of the lost sheep, where the shepherd rejoices over the one sheep he has lost and found rather than over the other ninety-nine. Then there is the parable of the lost coin, where the woman rejoices over the one coin she has lost and found rather than over the other nine. And finally there is this parable of the man who had two sons. He kills the fatted calf and throws a joyful party, not for the son who dutifully stayed at home, but for the one who ran off with his share of the family fortune—who wasted everything he owned—and who came back humiliated, destitute, ashamed. These parables go together. Jesus tells us that there is joy in heaven over every sinner who repents, rather than over many righteous people who need no repentance. And the father tells his resentful son: “It was right that we should make merry and be glad, for your brother was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found.”

These three lost-and-found parables can be very comforting to troubled, guilty sinners. They illustrate that God chooses us by grace, without any regard for our record of conduct, good or bad. They show how highly our Father treasures us, and how through Christ He has mercifully reached out to save us from sin. These parables show that our Lord is pleased with sinners. He is pleased to seek us out when we are lost in our sins, pleased to bring us to repentance, pleased to snatch us out of deadly peril by the faith-creating power of His Word, pleased to fold us into His forgiving embrace. Jesus spoke these parables, after all, in response to the Pharisees’ complaint: “This Man receives sinners and eats with them.” Indeed, He receives sinners! He loathes and rejects the self-righteous. He delights in the sinner who repents. He covers our sins with His own righteousness, and saves us by grace, through faith.

If that was all this parable had to teach us, you would hear a very short sermon today. In fact, it would be over already. But there is more in the lost-and-found parables than tender comfort. There is also stern warning. And, lest we place ourselves with the Pharisees and the jealous son from the parable, we should consider whether that warning is addressed to us.

Christians, Protestants especially, have had a long time to get used to the idea that God is gracious to sinners. It isn’t breaking news. The Lutheran Reformation happened nearly 500 years ago. The lost-and-found parables of Luke 15 have been read in church longer still. Hymn writers have had centuries to canvas the topic, from “Jesus sinners doth receive” to “Amazing grace”—where the words “I once was lost but now am found” echo the end of today’s Gospel. Those new to the faith are often overwhelmed by the feelings of peace, freedom, and holy joy that come from the message that Christ chooses repentant sinners over paragons of perfect piety. The rest of us, however, may find it hard to feel a thrill about a message we have heard, perhaps, every year of our lives. Familiarity breeds contempt. And a habit of practicing the Christian faith can breed a little Pharisee in us, too.

At a certain point in our religious formation, many of us say to ourselves: “All right. I’ve learned the Christian faith. Now it’s time to put it into practice.” We tire of being reminded, over and over, of the same old doctrines. If we could ask our preachers to do us one favor, it would probably be to put more stress on how to live the faith. We have gotten fairly good at it already. Perhaps we think that, if only we could get a little better at living the Christian life, we’d have it made in the shade. And since we’ve made so much progress already, why must the pastor browbeat us with the law? Why must he strain the limits of our comprehension with discussion of such fine points of doctrine? Why must we endure another year of the same old liturgy and the old-fashioned, unpopular hymns?

How about some practical advice on how to improve my marriage, how to talk to my kids, how to keep the government from taking away all my money? How about some crusading for political issues like abortion, women’s rights, serving in a war, or gay marriage? How about changing the way our church does things, so it can attract new people and look successful again? How about even making some inconvenient doctrines go away, like closed communion, the literal six-day creation, and the rule against men and women living together outside of marriage? Wouldn’t that make it easier for us to address our loved ones, who have strayed into other churches, or who have shacked up together, or who have learned the theory of evolution in school? If God is so big on finding the lost, wouldn’t He get behind this? If Jesus is so happy to mix with sinners, wouldn’t He want this too?

Maybe you haven’t personally considered these thoughts. But believe me, the church has mulled them over. Not just Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians, but Protestant Church as well. Not just the Protestant Church, but Lutheranism. Not just Lutheranism, but a major slice of the Missouri Synod. Voices representing our church body, right here in this city. And we aren’t far from agreeing with them. The message that “Jesus receives sinners and eats with them” can lead us to the point where we regard nothing as being really sinful, except maybe being hung up on moral and doctrinal rules. The message that heaven rejoices to find the lost can lead us to the point where the only thing we care about is getting more people to join our church, by whatever means necessary. How we worship, what we teach, and the pattern of life we strive to follow, can be reduced to questions of “style” and “emphasis” until, for the sake of finding the lost, we lose ourselves. Our generation invites us daily to be lost again, lost to the power of Law and Gospel, lost to the blessings of Word and Sacrament, lost to the heritage of sacred liturgy and pure teaching that are our strongest support in times of conflict, doubt, temptation, and death.

And then again, we the faithful, stick-in-the-mud Lutherans, run the danger of being like the embittered son who complained when his father forgave the prodigal brother, or like the Pharisees who complained when Jesus ate with sinners and tax collectors, or like the “ninety-nine just persons who need no repentance.” We’ve been around the block, spiritually. Most of us are not new converts. Most of us are not ready to confess some deep, mortifying shame like the sin of the prodigal son. Most of us probably think we’re doing more or less all right in our moral and spiritual lives. We are not in the habit of crawling to God and groveling in abject humility, as the prodigal son intended to do when he returned to his father. As a matter of form, yes, we will admit that we are “by nature” sinners, and that we “have sinned,” etc., etc. We may even think, “That’s right,” when we confess that we deserve nothing but God’s punishment, now and forever. But most of the time, we are not troubled by such thoughts. And sometimes, we are scandalized by what we see or hear about the behavior of others, especially when those people remain in good standing with the church. What happens to the consciousness of our own sinfulness when we are thinking and feeling these things?

Christ tells the parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the prodigal son not only to comfort people, like the prostitutes and tax collectors, who were sorry about their sins. He also tells it as a warning to the Pharisees, who complain about how much time and attention Jesus spends on such well-known and obvious sinners. And this story is repeated for our benefit, not only for the comfort’s sake, but also for the warning. The danger of the Pharisees and the ninety-nine just persons is also our danger. On account of Christ, God is pleased with sinners. He shows particular favor, also known as grace, to all humble, repentant sinners who trust in His forgiveness for Jesus’ sake. He is pleased with them for Jesus’ sake, because of what Jesus has done for them.

But He is not pleased, nor do the angels in heaven rejoice, when a doctrinally-instructed, morally-upright, religious person justifies himself, and needs no rescue. In fact, God is offended by such a righteousness. It is the one sin that still separates sinners from God, because it reckons the holy work, life, suffering, and death of Jesus to be worth nothing. It is the one sin that is not forgiven, because it casts aside God’s forgiveness. Beware lest we become like the Pharisees, who see no need for repentance, as if we had achieved righteousness enough by practicing our faith. No amount of practice can do that. The most fitting attitude for us is that of the prodigal son, who turned back to his father to beg for forgiveness. That is to say, repentance befits us. And never forget that every moment we spend in communion with God, is the result of Him going out and finding us, stooping to pick us up and brush us off, forgiving us, and joyfully treasuring us in His heart.

God once slaughtered the fatted calf for all sinners, all His lost lambs and prodigal children. He gave His only-begotten Son for all of us. When Christ was sacrificed on account of sin, God became our Father, running to meet us and to embrace us as His sons and heirs. Without this amazing grace of God, we could scarcely hope to be treated as slaves. But in Christ, God kissed us, clothed us in righteousness, decked us in gifts of the Holy Spirit like precious jewels. He proclaimed a feast where His servants on earth and heaven celebrate together. Rejoice! For we who were dead have been made alive; we who were lost have been found. This is God’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes!

Meatloaf Surprise

2009-06-25T22:21:00.005-06:00

I'm looking for a name for whatever I just cooked tonight. It isn't just meatloaf, because it has a lot of veggies in it. It isn't vegetarian meatloaf, though, because it does have meat. "Omnivore Meat Loaf" and "Untitled Hot Food Thing" don't seem to do it justice either. Maybe we should call it "Gleeg" and get on with it.

It started with a lot of impulse shopping in the produce section at my local super-dupermarket. I didn't really know what I meant to do with it all until I spotted a bottle of chili sauce on a shelf. So I added a couple pounds of ground beef to the cart, and brought it all home.

First, I chopped up a big, sweet, Vidalia onion. I didn't make any effort to chop it particularly fine, or to make the pieces uniform in size or shape. I did the same thing with three stalks of celery, one large carrot, and two bell peppers (one orange, one yellow--just for interest; the color doesn't really matter). I combined all these veggie chunks in the bottom of a big, deep-dish lasagna pan. Then I added some seasoned bread crumbs, cracked a couple of eggs into it, poured in about a third of a bottle of chili sauce, and stirred it all around with a fork. Finally, I smashed it all into the ground beef, mixing everything as well as I could and forming it into a lump with space all around, between the lump and the sides of the pan. I emptied the rest of the bottle of chili sauce over the top, spread it around with the back of a spoon, and sprinkled a little sage over it before popping the pan into a 350-degree oven.

An hour later, more or less, I shut the oven off. I left the Gleeg inside, however, because I was talking on the phone with my Dad & couldn't be bothered with it for the moment. All in all it probably spent two hours in that oven, but only half of that with the gas on. So it was just the right temperature to eat when I got around to it. After having my fill, I was able to put up three manly-sized servings for later.

It's an interesting concoction. It can't at all be confused with meatloaf. There's way too much veg in it. In fact, the bite-sized chunks of carrot, onion, and so forth seemed to take up almost half of the food by volume. They were tender but not mushy; enough firmness remained in them that you could really sink your teeth into them. Each bite of pepper or onions caused a small explosion of tasty juices inside the mouth. Slices of the Gleeg didn't stay together quite as well as the traditional meatloaf, but the overall flavor and texture were satisfying. And I felt almost virtuous -- having my meatloaf and vegetables together. It was like a stew you could cut with a knife. Or a casserole you can serve by the slice.

EDIT: It turns out that the word "Gleeg" is part of a phras e which, spoken aloud, is supposed to cause the world to explode. I suppose we'd better rule that name out, then. Any other suggestions? (For similar reasons, we should also avoid Ämälän. If you know what I'm talking about, I love you.)

Second-Hand Smoke Break

2009-06-25T22:00:00.004-06:00

It happened while my car was in the shop for repairs. I had to take a bus and a train to work, and because of the transit schedule, I was obliged to show up a whole hour before my scheduled shift. I was just opening my locker to get out the book I was going to read in the break room, when a voice on the public address system announced that the premises were being evacuated.

It was no biggie... just a gas leak... Everybody had to leave the building. The Fire Department and the gas company did their thing. Then they let us back in, after about half an hour of sitting around, gossiping in whatever shade we could find. Those who had 'em, smoked 'em. It was like everyone got to take a 30-minute smoke break at the same time. Only, just my luck, I wasn't on the clock.

Oh, yeah -- and I don't smoke.

It was an odd event, anyway. A rare chance to join in fellowship with most of my coworkers. And I picked a good seat to watch from. I would just like to suggest that, the next time somebody decides to rupture a gas line where I work, they wait until I'm on the clock...

The Proposal

2009-06-25T14:23:00.007-06:00

Today I got my car back from Marty's. It's nice to be on my own wheels again! The last several days have been relatively challenging. It takes an extra hour (each way) to get to and from work by bus and train. When I had a commitment at 6:45 after a shift ending at 5:00, I had to take a taxi, to the tune of $20. So, basically, it took me more time and money to get less done. It is good to have a car!

I celebrated by taking it, and myself, to a movie. We, or rather I, saw The Proposal, a romantic comedy starring Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds. It's amazing what will work as a romantic comedy these days. A boss blackmailing her assistant into marrying her so she doesn't get deported for visa reasons? Wow. If the gender roles were switched, it would be a political drama. But since Sandra plays the conveniently babe-a-licious boss, and Ryan plays the more-than-necessarily studly secretary, it works out in the end -- especially with the help of the latter's quirky family, played by Craig T. Nelson, Mary Steenburgen, and Betty White.

It's more or less a family-friendly film. Some families might want to steer clear of it because of a few touches of adult humor, including a gross-out striptease and a farcical nude collision between the two main characters. Then there's my handy "occult content advisory." Granny is part Native Alaskan, and her spirituality becomes ridiculously explicit. But my biggest concern is still the political implications -- and yes, I am at least partly talking about sexual politics.

It isn't just the obvious problem (that these two conspire to commit immigration fraud, which the film frankly informs us is a serious crime). There is also the not-so-obvious problem that Bullock's character, as Reynolds' boss, uses her ability to help or hinder his career to get him to marry her. How we can even gradually, grudgingly begin to sympathize with them, or cheer their romance on, is a mystery. We should be appalled by the main characters' ethics. But instead, we are won over by their charm and comic timing.

You could argue, perhaps, that every movie character we fall in love with is a flawed. There is always something clever, something artistic, something magical about a movie that makes us love them warts and all. But I wonder if there's a line that shouldn't be crossed. I wonder if there's ever a point where the cleverness becomes diabolical, the artistry artful, the magic black and evil. I wonder whether some warts are so malignant that a film should strive to make the character human, but go no further. Bottom line: Would we laugh if the guy was on top?

Tested at the Bus Stop

2009-06-23T17:40:00.004-06:00

On the curb outside the bus station where I caught my ride home this afternoon, an odd-looking man was shuffling around. He didn't seem to be able to stand still. He had a big, silly grin on his face. He kept muttering to himself, and frequently shifted position in a way that seemed, by turns, like laughing, dancing, and spastically twitching. He could have been a four-year-old needing to go to the potty.

Only once did I get close enough to him to hear what he was saying to himself. He called out to me with this interesting observation: "I just realized that twelve plus five is twenty-two!"

I'm not qualified to make a diagnosis here, but I suspect this man was mentally ill.

I spent the rest of my time waiting for the bus, thinking about what if anything I could do for him. From past experience working with the mentally ill, I understand that the cops could pick him up and take him to the emergency room, if someone phoned in a concern about the man's behavior. Then he could be placed under court-ordered medical care.

But this could only be done on the grounds that he was a danger to himself or to others, and/or "persistently or acutely disabled" -- essentially, unable to take proper care of himself. And I couldn't see any harm in this guy. He seemed to be in a happy mood, though perhaps a little too happy. His remark about 12+5=22 was a classic sign of disorganized thought. But he wasn't threatening anybody; he wasn't running out into traffic; and he appeared to be waiting for a bus -- so, presumably, he could at least handle public transport. I decided to wait and see.

Well, the bus came and I got on. Other passengers boarded. The strange man didn't come aboard. Perhaps he wasn't functioning so well after all. Maybe that disability clause really did apply to him. By the time I realized it might actually be my business to do something about it, I was motoring away. Obviously I don't know where he went from there. Hopefully he will get compassionate help.

Car Trouble

2009-06-23T14:03:00.002-06:00

I'm having car trouble again. On Sunday morning I realized that my left and center brake lights had been on all night. They stayed on all day as well, whether my car was on or not. They stayed on all night. And on Monday, the car would not start because (no surprise here) the battery was drained.

This was only the culmination of some irritating electrical problems in my 2002 Hyundai Accent. Also problematic, at this hot and sticky time of year, was the fact that the dashboard fan would not blow. It would start blowing, sometimes, when I drove over a pothole. In fact, I had formed a habit of aiming at certain particularly jarring potholes on my route to work, so I could enjoy a refreshing air-cooled environment for at least half the ride.

The air conditioning was not at fault. I knew this because, when the fan did start blowing, the air was immediately cold. But after years and years of having a fan always blowing on me while driving, whether I had AC or not, driving without a fan made me feel like I was being smothered. In St. Louis's hottest, muggiest weather of the year, and in city traffic that often seems more stop than go, it was hard to get to work without sweating through my clean clothes.

So, now that things have come to such a pass that I can't drive my car at all, I've finally made up my mind to go back to Marty's and have some electrical work done on it. Of course that means a few more days of riding the buses -- an even bigger challenge now than last winter, since many bus routes have been shut down since then. To catch the nearest bus from Marty's, after dropping off my car, I would have had to walk over 2 miles. God bless the folks at the garage, who gave me a lift to the bus station! And bless also the folks at the Autotire Care Center at Hampton & Scanlan, who gave me a free jump-start after I exhausted myself in four (4!!!!) unsuccessful attempts to push-start my car.

Who Shall Eat Bread in the Kingdom of God?

2009-06-21T01:43:00.007-06:00

Coming soon to a pulpit near you ... that is, if you live near St. Louis ... here is this morning's sermon based on Luke 14:15-24, and preached by yours truly.

Now when one of those who sat at the table with Him heard these things, he said to Him, "Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God!" Then He said to him, "A certain man gave a great supper and invited many, and sent his servant at supper time to say to those who were invited, 'Come, for all things are now ready.' But they all with one accord began to make excuses. The first said to him, 'I have bought a piece of ground, and I must go and see it. I ask you to have me excused.' And another said, 'I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to test them. I ask you to have me excused.' Still another said, 'I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.' So that servant came and reported these things to his master. Then the master of the house, being angry, said to his servant, 'Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in here the poor and the maimed and the lame and the blind.' And the servant said, 'Master, it is done as you commanded, and still there is room.' Then the master said to the servant, 'Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled. For I say to you that none of those men who were invited shall taste my supper.'"

Jesus’ parable of the great supper, which we heard a few minutes ago, could well be interpreted as a summons to go to church and receive His gifts in Word and Sacrament. This, in itself, would be a good message, and I have preached it that way myself. But in discussing the excuses the invited guests gave for not attending the banquet, we tend to attack today’s excuses for skipping church. So you can easily end up with sermon that only applies to those who are not present to hear it! What could be more useless? How would such a sermon contribute to our spiritual growth? Should we be armed with reasons to sneer at absent ones? Should we feel good about ourselves because we made the effort to be here? If that is a message I have ever preached, I am sorry for it.

But now I recognize the reason the Holy Spirit put today’s Gospel lesson in our way. He arranged for us to hear this parable of the great supper, today and every year, and for good reason. The message the Spirit wants you to hear runs directly opposite to what you would learn from a sermon against making excuses to skip church. We are not to give ourselves credit for being here. No one owes us an “attaboy” or “attagirl.”

It is the Holy Spirit who has brought us here today. He has gathered us to share in Christ’s blessings. He has drawn us against our selfish inclinations. Many of us would rather have stayed in bed an hour or two longer. Right now you could be reading the newspaper over a cup of coffee and a plate of bacon and eggs. Weather permitting, you could be out riding a bicycle or mowing your lawn. You could be watching a pre-pre-pre-game show on TV, or cooking and cleaning to get ready for company, or going shopping, or visiting with friends. And yet here you are. The Holy Ghost has taken you captive at least this far: you have come together for this hour of fellowship, to be fed spiritual bread and to be cleansed in spiritual waters. You have come to receive forgiveness, and to be formed in your inner self by the Word of Christ. This is not something to congratulate yourself on. This is the Holy Spirit’s doing.

You see, the man in the parable is Christ. The great supper is our participation in the Kingdom of God, in which we are gathered here and now. And the servant who carried the invitation to us is the Spirit. As we learn in Luther’s Small Catechism, it is the Holy Ghost who “calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies” each and all of us in the holy church of Christ.

So we are greatly blessed. We are privileged beyond all that we deserve. For without the Spirit at work in us, we would be like the people who received those fancy, engraved invitations. It is supposed to be a shocking story. It is supposed to seem improbable. How could these people refuse such a lavish invitation? Well, they had all kinds of reasons. New land, new cattle, a new wife: basically, anything in the world that would naturally preoccupy us. Incredible as it must seem, this is simply human nature.

We would give any excuse, we would let anything come between us and kingdom of God. No matter how foolish, no matter how mundane, no matter how petty, our hearts are set on things that steer us away from our Lord’s wedding feast. By nature, we are focused on getting possessions, keeping them, showing them off, and looking at them. We want to feel good, no matter what it costs or who suffers thereby. We want to have things our own way. We want this, we want that, and without the perspective the Word of God brings us, we would never realize how ridiculous and small and ugly are the little worlds we build around ourselves. The Law of God calls us to look at ourselves from God’s perspective, and to be ashamed.

It is natural to respond to God’s Word as those who were first invited to the feast. We would rather stay away, because we don’t like the feelings of guilt or inferiority that it can bring. We may have been the first on the guest list, as lifelong church members and even heirs of many generations of devout Christians. Or we may have been like those who were called to the feast at the last minute, late-blooming Christians with no religious background to speak of. But in every case, we are here because the Holy Spirit went out into the streets and lanes of the city. We are here because God chose the poor and the maimed and the lame and the blind. We are here because, out from along the highways and hedges, on the very fringes of hell, the living voice of Jesus reached out and dragged us, shoved us, compelled us to come in. This is the only way God knows to lay His table.

We are sinners. We are losers. We are poor, weak, silly, helpless things. We grope in darkness. We stumble feebly. We can scarcely take two steps without getting lost. I say this not just of who we were before the Lord shined His light on us. I say this of the way we are now, sinning daily, stumbling hourly, confessing our utter sinfulness in one breath and congratulating ourselves for it in the next. Our highest acts of worship are polluted with sin, from the impure thoughts that enter us between “hallowed be Thy name” and “Thy kingdom come,” to the sense of having done something to please God when we condescend to accept His Sacrament. We look with superiority on those who do not attend church, on those who attend churches that mix human teachings with God’s Word, and on those who worship false gods. Or we rely on the repetition of ritual, the accumulation of good-works brownie points, or the self-denial of abstaining from this and cutting back on that, in order to feel more secure in our spiritual life. God calls us ever, ever, and ever to receive freely what He gives without limit and without cost. And we keep trying to give Him change back.

Where the banquet parable hits us is in the twisted little place in each of our hearts, the part that never, but never, gives up trying to make a deal with God. But the deal is already sealed. And neither you nor I contributed one penny. Jesus bought the whole kit and caboodle with His priceless body and His precious blood. He paid the whole world’s debt to God, a debt that makes our national debt look like a delinquent phone bill. He suffered. He died. He was buried with sinners. And when the last drop of blood grew still in his veins, God screwed the cap on the red ink and broke open the black. In His books, your ticket is already fully paid. While we were yet sinners, in flight from the kingdom of God, Christ died for the ungodly and reconciled us to the Father. And so God brings in the blind, the powerless, the nobodies—in a word, us—and serves us the feast of all feasts.

Just before Jesus spoke this parable, one of the people dining with him blurted out these words: “Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God!” This statement seems pompous and foolish, since the parable was Jesus’ reply. But it is true in a sense. Blessed indeed are we, when we receive the living bread of Christ through His Word and Sacrament, bread that shall fill us up to everlasting life. We are more blessed than we realize, for we are only here to share in this feast because God has brought us. And even now, perhaps, we could desire the bread of God’s kingdom more than we do. How many Sundays do we gather for only this light snack of the Word, as opposed to the full meal where Christ’s body and blood are the main course? We are more blessed than ever. We could be more blessed still. But whenever you hear, or eat and drink, of Christ the crucified, you are dining on heavenly food.

Anything else, no matter how tasty or filling, is junk food that will eventually go to your hips. But by God’s awesome grace, you are so blessed that—regardless of who you are and what you have done—He has brought you to His feast, and filled you with all that you need. He has forgiven you. He has given you a new heart. He has planted Christ within you, so the peace of God that passes all understanding will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Word Nazi

2009-06-20T11:24:00.005-06:00

I'm not one of those linguistic Fascists who insists on using words that have Anglo-Saxon roots, as opposed to Greek, Latin, or French ones. But I do have some hangups about words.

It irritates me when I hear the word "often" pronounced with an audible t. I was brought up saying the word as though it rhymed with "soften," which every anglophone knows has a silent t. On the other hand, I rather like the comparative form "oftener," though it goes against the "by the book" grammatical rule that insists that "more often" is more correct. I reckon if "softener" is a word, why not "oftener"?

The other day I was reading a book written in gorgeous prose, but some of the sentences had a few too many -ly adverbs for their own good. One of them was "perpetually." I thought the sentence would have flowed better, had the author chosen "always" instead.

Somewhere in the same book I discovered a sentence where the words "motionless" and "dimensionless" appeared. The poetry of the sentence could have been improved by changing the first word to "still," just as "always" would have improved on "perpetually." The shorter, more common word has a wider range of connotation. It opens up in the imagination like a delicate flower. "Motionless," in contrast, is a frigid, clinical word that triggers only one very literal image in the mind. It kills the sentence. On the other hand, "dimensionless" is fine. It's an unusual enough word, covering such a strange concept, that its keen specificity doesn't drag on the imaginative impact of the sentence.

Then take the word "presently." I hate that word. Except in the context of, say, 19th- or early 20th-century British prose, where it falls naturally out of characters' mouths, it sounds conscious and affected. Also, seven out of ten Americans who use it, use it badly. The word means "soon," people. It does not mean "at this present time." So unless you're deliberately aiming for a tone of old-fashioned formality, you're better off using "soon."

As I have observed in at least one book review on this blog, it also irritates me to find the word "betimes" misused. There is practically no reason to use this word today, except to prepare people to understand when they come across it in Dickens. It means "bright and early." But nowadays, people seem to confuse it with "sometimes," especially when they are trying to imitate an archaic style of speaking.

To me this is almost as irritating as when people bandy about "thee" and "thou," and verb forms ending in -eth and -est, without much regard for number or case. I'll forgo a snarky analysis of how these words ought to be used, in favor of simply saying: Before using these archaic forms, you had better observe how they go together by reading literature that uses them idiomatically.

Finally, I've been dying to take a poke at the name of a canned beverage I frequently enjoy. Seemingly hailing from the same realm of compulsively hedged language as the classic "imitation American flavor pasturized process cheese food," let's all give a warm welcome to "Tropicana Fruit Punch Juice Drink," a "fruit punch flavored juice beverage from concentrate with other natural flavors." Wow! Do you think the language has been tortured enough? Far be it from thee to let fall the simple words "fruit punch" or "juice," without enough qualifying language to satisfy a bevy of lawyers!

Dumb Headline

2009-06-18T23:20:00.005-06:00

Today the internet presented me with yet another object of ridicule, from an already endless supply. It was an advertisement with (roughly) the headline: NEW FOOD SPRINKLE TRICKS BRAIN TO STOP OVEREATING.

First of all, my brain doesn't overeat. I do. Wouldn't it be a nice thing if my brain would go and stuff itself on brain food while the rest of me stayed skinny!

Second, I'm just waiting to see a testimonial for this miracle food-sprinkle: "I can't get enough of it!"

Third, it doesn't take brain-tricking chemicals to turn a food sprinkle into an overeating deterrent. Sprinkle it with anything that tastes really, really bad. Even better if it looks, feels, and smells nasty. Something, for example, like crystallized cat urine. Sprinkle it on everything you eat... trust me, you won't gorge yourself.

Hot & Cold Mystery Meat

2009-06-17T20:34:00.008-06:00

I happen to be uniquely placed to divulge two of the spookiest mysteries in the American pantry. Namely: "What's in that hot mystery meat you used to be able to buy at roadside stands throughout the summer - you know, that sloppy-Joe-like, barbecue stuff?" And: "What's in that cold mystery meat that used to turn up, now and then, in the meat department at your friendly local supermarket? - you know, that pinkish-gray bread spread?"

How do I know these secrets? Two different connections. First - I have relatives who used to be in the summer roadside-stand hot mystery-meat business, and their recipe has been passed down to me. Second - I once had a job in your friendly local supermarket's meat department, where I learned that recipe as well. Prepare yourself for enlightenment.

HOT MYSTERY MEAT: Combine a mess of ground beef, ketchup, chili powder, and reconstituted dried onions in a large pot. Cook until cooked. The beef need only be browned & drained ahead of time if you choose to worry about fat calories and such things. If you're going to be serving it at a roadside stand, don't bother - other people's arteries! Anyway, use an ice-cream scoop to measure servings onto cheap, storebought buns on a paper plate, perhaps with a side of "baked" (i.e. canned, heated on the stovetop) beans and a slice of dill pickle.

COLD MYSTERY MEAT: This recipe works best when your icebox is stuffed with packages of wieners, franks, lunch meat, and other processed-meat products that say "fully cooked" on their label. Round up the ones, regardless of type, that are at or near their "best by" date. Run them through a meat grinder. Mix them thoroughly with a reasonable amount of white salad dressing, sweet pickle relish, and powdered gelatin (cherry-flavored). Press the resulting grayish-pink mush into clear plastic tubs and label them in a way that encourages people to consume it quickly. For example, in a grocery-store context, the label could say: "BUY ONE, GET ONE FREE!"