Because I couldn't find the other thread and I have a book to recommend.



I don't read very much contemporary American literature, but that could well be because I hadn't found this book until now. The form takes some getting used to, but the interwoven stories and discourses on topics ranging from theology to physics to epistemology are really quite fascinating. Lost in the middle somewhere is a neat little narrative about an author chronicling one man's struggle with faith, meaning, and purpose in life. Doctorow does seem to reach a bit with his artistic flourishes - why, for instance, even include the lyrics used by a jazz ensemble? - but the majority of the novel is enjoyable, instructive, and at times quite beautiful.

The most intriguing part of this novel is the use of multiple narrators - borrowing the perspectives not only of his characters, but also the theological musings of a rabbi and a priest; the scientific wonder of Albert Einstein; the metaphysical reason of Wittgenstein; and the calm acceptance of a young Jewish boy in a Nazi-run ghetto.

An excerpt:

quote:

Pem's Remarks to the Bishop's Examiners: "The sensation of God in us is a total sensation given to the whole being, revelatory, inspired. That is the usual answer to the questioning intellect, which by itself cannot realize sacred truth. But is the intellect not subsumed? Does the whole being not include the intellect? Why wouldn't the glory of God shine through to the human mind? I take the position that true faith is not a supersessional knowledge. It cannt discard the intellect. It cannot answer the intellect with a patronizing smile. I look for parity here. I will not claim that your access to the numinous is a delusion if you will not tell me my intellect is irrelevant... The biblical stories, the Gospel stories, were the original understandings, they were the science and religion, they were everything, they were all anyone had. But they didn't write themselves. We have to acknowledge the storytellers' work. If not in all stories, certainly in all mystery stories, the writer works backward. The ending is known and the story is designed to arrive at the ending. If you know the people of the world speak many languages, that is the ending: The story of the Tower of Babel gets you there. The known ending of life is death: The story of Adam and Eve arrives at that ending. Why do we suffer, why must we die? Well, you see, there was this Garden... The ending of the story implies that there might have been a different ending. That's the little ten-cent trick. You allow as how since things worked out this way, they could have worked out another way. You create conflict and suspense where there wasn't any. You've turned the human condition into a sequential narrative of how it came to be. Well, the way I read it, God dealt from a stacked deck. Adam and Eve never had a chance. The story of the Fall is a parable of the glory and torment of human consciousness. But that's all it is... Migod, there is no one more dangerous than the storyteller. No, I'll amend that, than the storyteller's editor. Augustine, who edits Genesis 2-4 into original sin. What a nifty little act of deconstruction - passing it on to children, like HIV. As the doctrine of universal damnation, the Fall becomes an instrument of social control. God appoints his agents plenipotentiaries to dispense salvation or withhold it. I don't know about you, dear colleagues, but history has a way of turning a harsh light on my faith. We are bound to a theology hard-pressed to hold the line against incredulous common sense. So for instance newborn babies who die unbaptized as Catholics are condemned to the limboic upper reaches of hell? I mean... but in all its denominations, punitive fantasies of original sin have begotten and still beget generations of terrorized children and haunted adults, and give those Calvinist graveyards in New England a particular poignancy as they call to mind the witch burnings, scourgings, and self-denials of the ordinary joy and wonder of life on earth to which the undoctrinated mind is naturally heir... How, given the mournful history of this nonsense, can we presume to exalt our religious vision over the ordinary pursuits of our rational minds?

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