Karen Armstrong: 2008 TED Prize wish: Charter for Compassio

Another cop out, yes, but this is still something I think everybody should see. This lecture here is directly related to the subject matter of Armstrong's book The Case for God, which I think everybody should read. Both contain very thought-provoking and ground-breaking insight on what it actually means to believe, and an inspiring call to action to live a life of compassion. So until I get my act together, please enjoy this TED talk!

Hi folks,

It's been two and a half months since I've posted on here, I know. I promise though, I will post on here very soon, ideally this Sunday. So whatever you do, don't give up on me!

-Liam

And Now for Obligatory...

...New Years resolutions. I guess it's the last thing I can do before embarking on the New Year. People think it's a silly waste of time, and most of the time, it seems like they're right. But like my friend Kierra mentioned, if you actually give it some serious thought, have a concrete plan with specific steps and a time for when you're going to do them, your chances of actually achieving them increases. Plus I'm a sentimental fellow, so I also enjoy the notion of New Years Resolutions on an aesthetic level. It seems right to make goals at the beginning of a new year. To most of us it's more than just a unit of measurement; it's a symbol for change. Otherwise people would call it Following Year, not New Year. That being said, here are my resolutions:

-I'm going to observe Lent. Usually I just give something up, something minor like drinking or movies or whatever. This year I'd like to make a sacrifice of my time and energy, something infinitely more valuable than some small possession. I'd like to
observe this time a little more traditionally, as in going to Church, prayer and contemplation etc. I would like to try fasting on specific dates, but we'll see how that goes. The life of a student, specifically a student actor whose time is almost completely devoured by a mainstage, can't always afford the luxury of voluntary poverty and self-denial (in some ways, the job's already been done for me!) I am doing this for a couple reasons. First of all, I'd like to see if I actually can do it, after being estranged from religion for so long, to see if practicing Christianity still has any relevance in my own life. In light of the ideas I've been going over from Karen Armstrong's book, I've been inspired to seek some spiritual guidance if I ever hope to cultivate this aspect in my life, because I think without it I would not have the ability or experience to do it on my own. When people are initiated into Buddhism, they are required to take refuge in the Buddha, the Teachings of the Buddha, and the Sangha, which is the spiritual Community. In the Gospels Jesus Christ said that when "two or more are gathered in my name, I am there". Community is emphasized in all religions from east to west, so it seems like it would be counterproductive to make this effort alone. We are social animals after all. Part of a religious effort requires one to reach out, seek out and find oneself in the Other. Although there is a place for solitude, if a religion can't help you function properly among other people, it's not a very good one. and if nothing else, this is to see if I can sustain a routine like this for at least forty days and forty nights. There's a time limit to it, so if it doesn't work out, it'll be over and I won't be obliged to continue with it. I'm doing this as an experiment, essentially. The last time I went to church several years ago, it did absolutely nothing for me. But that could be for a number of reasons. What's to say it'll be that way now, after everything I've learned in that time?

-In the summer time, I am going to devote more time to my visual art, and writing. The winter at school is for the theatre and I don't want to take any focus away from it, so I've reserved Summer for painting and drawing, something which I've neglected for way too long, much to my own detriment. I feel like drawing feeds my imagination and complements my storytelling in ways that I could not do without it. So there it is.

-I will learn at least one new recipe from my More-With-Less cookbook. I think this is doable.

-I will use my bike. Now that I have a light and gloves for the cold I'm better equipped. Now if only I could find my helmet...

-as I said a few posts ago, if I'm not doing anything in the Fringe Festival, I'm going to try my hand at the 3-Day Novel Writing contest. You heard me. Anybody want to join me?


I'm telling you this, readers, not to show off so people will be all "ooo look at everything Liam's going to accomplish this year", (especially if I don't accomplish these things, and then won't I be a supreme ass?) I'm telling you this because you have a part to play as well. If I didn't say anything to my friends, I would probably be less motivated to do it. I haven't hammered out all the details for these goals yet, but I need people around me to support me so I don't give up, and actually follow through. If anybody has any resolutions they need support with let me know and I'll gladly do the same. I guess they're not so much new Years resolutions as they are things I've wanted to do for myself and this seems like the right time in my life to do them, and they just happen to coincide with the oncoming year. They're more like New Years projects than resolutions. The term New Years Resolution does smack of triviality nowadays, doesn't it? Well, there's no reason why it can't be reclaimed. After all, 2010 is the Year of Extraordinary Thinking: so what better time to start than now?

Have a good night, everybody!

Reflections on The Case For God by Karen Armstrong

I have been inclined to agree with the argument that all religions essentially preached a similar (if not the same) message of compassion, and more importantly that their founders were all inspired by the same experience. This is an idea that many liberal-minded intellectuals, artists, and spiritual authorities like the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu seem to advocate. But I was always troubled by it; without absolute certainty, it seemed like wishful thinking. There was always an irrational fear at the back of my head and the bottom of my heart that what if maybe, just maybe, one of these many many fundamentalist sectarian groups are right, and the rest of us are all right screwed? Again, it's an irrational fear, but it was there nonetheless. Even if they're not, how could anybody prove that the religious figures of the ancient world thought in these high-minded terms that we yearn for today? After all, Yahweh, the God of the tribe of Israel was just another tribal deity competing for mastery over the cosmos in the pantheon of Middle-eastern believers; a symbolic measure taken by these people to galvanize themselves as a nation. Pragmatically speaking, what did it matter whether it was true or not, as long as it got the job done? What this book illustrated for me was that in fact these religions were indeed inspired by a similar spiritual experience, and there is more historical evidence for it now.

The main points I learned in this book are as follows:
-our concept of God as we know it is a modern construct
-our understanding of the words 'belief' and 'faith' is also a modern construct
-literal interpretation and fundamentalism is a modern construct
-Armstrong employs the ancient Greek idea that all methods of understanding used by human beings fall under the categories of logos and mythos. Religion, like art, falls under the latter, and the reason why people misunderstand it is because they misplace it in the former.
-religion is something that you do, and that it takes practice and skill like anything else. Rather than a set of arbitrary laws and abstract concepts, it is a technique to unlocking a person's faith and spirituality, and if any method fails to do so, if it fails to yield practical results, then it is not doing its job. Armstrong explains that this is how the believers of the ancient world thought about religion, and seeing as they are chronologically closer to the wellspring of these spiritual ideas, their opinion does carry a lot of weight for me today. Any of the rituals that religious people partake in would seem absurd and abstract if observed from the outside with a logical mind. A religious experience for the people of the ancient world evoked a sense of Mystery, a "Cloud of Unknowing" as Armstrong puts it, a depth that cannot be explained rationally and has its place in our world, even though crusaders of Reason try to eradicate it.

Probably the most radical effect that Armstrong's arguments have is that they completely changed the way I think about the words 'belief', 'faith' and 'God'. Armstrong states that our understanding of these words are all the product of our modern age, which began some 500 odd years ago. Belief, she says,did not always mean assenting to something and accepting it as true. The word might have had a completely different connotation in the ancient world. Belief is related to the word "lief" which is related to the word "love". The Latin word for believe is "credere", which meant something else as well. To say credo, "I believe", it actually was closer to "I engage myself","I commit", "I trust". So from this we can deduce that at no point does the Bible ask us to believe in the modern sense, which is to accept as true. Rather, what it asks us is to commit ourselves and invest ourselves in the words of the text. Belief to the people of the ancient world, was not blind faith. If anything it was closer to wrestling with God the way Jacob did. It required study, testing, and if necessary, doubt. It needed thorough scrutiny, a delving into the subject to reach a higher plane of being. The pre-modern Christian thinkers tried to understand their God through apophatic methods, which is the knowledge of God gained through negation. Rather than come to a conclusion about what God was, they would set up a concept, and then knock it down, saying God is not this, God is not that. The exercise was to demonstrate that human language could not accurately explain who or what God is, and the exercise culminates in a loss of words and a religious silence. And this inability to put one's finger on it did not frustrate these practitioners. They were alright with the feeling of uncertainty which Modernism seems to abhor. In fact, they delighted in it. Reaching that awed silence was the whole point.

Religion for the pre-modern world was something that required exhaustive creative work for it actually pay off. It was based on practical solutions to problems that arose in those particular moments in time and space. The pre-Rabbinical Jews went to the Temple to re-enact the creation myth in order to become closer to their God. It was never meant to be a literal account for how the world begun.

the concept of 'God' as we most traditionally know it, is also a modern construct. It came out of peoples' desire for absolute certainty in an increasingly uncertain world. The Scientific Revolution was in full swing, and it seemed that as Reason became the great beacon of light in the world to yield hard, tangible facts, peoples' concepts of religion had to keep up. Religion as an institution had to keep up, because the Church was a player that had to remain in power. In time, religion melded with science, and people tried to argue with Reason to prove the existence of God. As a result, the word 'belief' turned into the acceptance of something being true, and logic was what everything hinged upon. God became an idol of the vanity of human beings, a larger more powerful version of ourselves, and just another creature in all of creation who could killed with enough effort.

Fundamentalism as we know it today came out of post-revolutionary America as a political and cultural fight for survival, while the God of the modern age became something that people could disprove as easily as prove. Armstrong chronicles how atheism in the modern sense, the wilfull denial of a God came into being. Today, atheism has taken on a guise not unlike fundamentalism. Individuals like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens launch an assault on religion and God and claim that these are responsible for so much bloodshed in the world. While they're not entirely wrong, Armstrong asserts that they are missing the larger picture, not just in the way that most religious people aren't as crazy as the Taliban and the hell-fire preaching Televangelists, but also that the whole notion of God that they are attacking is inaccurate. She also says that there are less staunch Atheistic thinkers out there from whom religious people would benefit in an open dialogue, and that they too play a part in our spiritual evolution.

Armstrong basically does a broad sweep of the history of Western religious thought, beginning in the Paleolithic era, steering eastward to the early Indian philosophy which the Upanishads were based on, back west to the roots of Jewish religion, to the Greek philosophers, to the early Christian Church, to Islam, to the Middle Ages, and up to the Modern Age that began in the 16th century to the Enlightenment, and culminated in the end of the 20th century and into the 21st, looking at post-modern philosophers as well. Among the people she cites are the likes of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Jesus Christ, St. Paul, Augustine, Muhammad, Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis, Descartes, Copernicus, Galileo, Luther, Calvin, Hegel, Voltaire, Marx, Darwin, Nietzsche, Einstein, Heidegger, and even Richard Dawkins! She points out all the places where religion was warped for political and tribalistic agendas, from the Crusades up to the September 11 terrorist attacks. It also illustrates the different religious experiences that people had all over the ancient world, and the striking resemblance they all had with each other, even though they were culturally and geographically worlds apart. The whole book is thoroughly researched and brimming with insight. It felt like a story as well, with a soaring narrative that brought me along with its key characters as I skipped across the history of Western civilization.

I knew that God was an idea that evolved throughout time and was subject to change based on the Zeitgeist of society at any given point. This troubled me, because I wanted a more concrete idea, somewhere along the road that I could pinpoint and say "there! That's what it's all about!" I knew that Jesus was a man, and it troubled me deeply because I so badly wanted a Son of God but knew better. But now I feel like my intellect and my non-rational need for faith are not irreconcilable. Peoples' ideas about God are the product of their time, and not from divine intervention, and I'm okay with it now because I don't have to relinquish my yearning for God because of it.

This understanding I've gained from reading this book hasn't made me a better or happier person, nor has it really changed the things I hold to be true in my life. It hasn't solved the question of whether there is a primordial, Unmoved Mover of the universe, and whether this universe is ruled by fate or chance, and I have not subscribed to a particular faith. But I think it has caused a slight shift in my way of thinking, which although is small now like a slight change in degree, may prove significant and radically alter things further down the road. Of course, it is too soon to say. Ultimately what this book did for me was release me from the need to be certain for the time being. It has also given me a LOT to think about for a long time to come, and I feel incredibly happy and relieved for it.

She obviously goes into waaay more detail and covers way more subjects then I mentioned here, so please go read it. It's very well written, and I highly recommend it, whether you're a theist, atheist, agnostic, or are simply curious about the subject.

So long, Swine '09!

Well, I was going to write a reflection on 2009 on New Years' Eve, but time was a luxury I couldn't afford at that point. But now I'm back in Vic and more or less settled in, so I can now get on with it.Thankfully there isn't enough of 2010 yet so I still can still make some timely commentary. I'm just fashionably late, that's all. ;)

I feel like I should say something big and important, but I have no idea what. Much has happened this year, as it does every year, and no grand account of it could really suffice. Plus I'm too lazy.

So we'll have to settle for this brief summary. the first half of the year was kind of sucky. I hate to say it because it had some really good moments in it, but the less desirable parts seem clearer in my mind. Essentially I came to really question whether I wanted to stay on the path I was following. This is pretty huge, especially considering that pathway is several thousands of dollars a year and will guarantee none of that money back when I get to the next level. By the time summer came around, I was pretty beat and in need of a rest. The universe had other plans, however. I was to do Summerstock, and it was too late to back out. But I did it, and that was when things turned around for me. Even though I didn't get the mental rest I was hoping for, I became gradually more optimistic as the summer went on. By the fall things were going very well and by the end of it, I feel like the personal progress I made, though seemingly small, was significant. I wrote 3 short stories, and was in 5 shows this year, one after the other (and two of them actually concurrent) with no hope of rest until Christmas holidays. But Time, being what it was, went on, and Christmas finally came. It was a very good holiday though.


I could make some sweeping commentary on world events, but I haven't enough understanding of the world. So I'll try to recount some of its most momentous moments, stream of consciousness style: A recession hit the honey-moon period with Obama eventually ended an almost revolution went down in Iran following the country's incendiary election results a handful of celebrities died people got swine flu the crew of the Starship Enterprise boldly went where no one had gone before...again...for the first time...(and it was awesome by the way!) Afghanistan had its sophomoric election leaving a bitter and jaded taste in a lot of peoples' mouths Lady Gaga shot sparks out of her boobs Peter Mansbridge stood up on CBC the Olympic Torch started its journey across Canada Jon and Kate called it quits a bunch of powerful people met in Copenhagen and seemed to do very little while they were there Obama managed to get his health-care legislation passed in his final act of arrogance of the year Mr. Harper prorogued parliament and yes. Mickey Rooney is still alive.

I always wanted to have some 'Best of 2009' spiel, but I have no idea what I would do. I can't say anything about the movies, or the music. Not even theatre, for that matter. I'm no critic and I didn't really have my ear to the ground....in any area, really. I can tell you about the books I read though. Specifically the books that shall we say had the biggest effect on me this year.

So without further adieu, the Top Five Books of 2009 (in chronological order) are:

5. Respect for Acting by Uta Hagen
I explained why this book is so meaningful to me way back in a Summer entry. Basically it renewed my faith in acting as an
art form.

4. Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
What a powerful story! As I said in an earlier post, I don't condone what Christopher McCandless did per se, but I can't help
but admire this young madman, and how damned hard he tried to live up to his ideals, at all costs. He has inspired me
do the same (maybe with less success, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't try!) Krakauer's prose is brilliant and he's the
perfect man to tell McCandless' story, given his own background. I rarely cry when reading books, but this was
definitely one of them.

3. The Unfinished Canadian by Andrew Cohen
In my effort to better understand Canada, at least literarily, this book launched my enterprise. He presents some
provocative ideas on how we as a people can "find ourselves", some of those ideas controversial but definitely insightful.

2. Playing Shakespeare by John Barton
This book, coupled with the Playing Shakespeare TV mini-series (from which the book is transcribed almost word for word)
almost singlehandedly decoded the acting of Shakespeare for me. Well, the theory side of it, anyway. The practice I learned
in class and onstage. John Barton and his students (including Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart and Judi Dench) showed to me
how brilliant Shakespeare can be, provided it's executed with skill and talent.

1. The Case For God by Karen Armstrong
I read this at the end of the holiday, and although it might be too soon to say, but it has made the biggest impact on me
that a book has made in a while. When I finished it I knew that it had significantly altered the way I think about belief,
religion and God. I'd like to go further into what this book is all about and what it means to me, so I'll have to devote an
entire entry to it...

I read some other books worth noting, like Watchmen, Tales of the Perilous Realm by Tolkien, Paradise Lost, and Up Till Now by William Shatner. Boo yeah. Reading is fun!

Anyway, it was a good year, but now it's time to look forward and press onward, as per usual. So say we all.

The King of the North

There was once a King of the North and he was very mighty. His palace was made of marble, metal and wood, but most of all wood, of which he was very fond. He had many royal carpenters and woodworkers whom he kept close at hand. The King of the North lived with his wife and Queen. They had many servants between them, and a vast fleet of ships at the King’s command (made only of the finest timbers of the Northern Wood), and a huge hoard of treasure, which the King guarded jealously. He had wealth, power and fame throughout the world, more than anybody could imagine. And now he was soon to be expecting a child.

It was only weeks until Christmas, and the Queen’s belly had grown large as a sail in the wind. The baby would come at any moment. “I do hope he comes out right on Christmas morning!” the King would say, drawing circles around his wife’s belly with his mighty hand. He was very proud to have a Christmas baby, and not just any Christmas baby, but an heir-to-his-entire-Northern-Kingdom Christmas baby. They invited the other rich Kings and dignitaries of the world to visit them for a baby shower. The biggest, mightiest ships would sail in carrying exotic spices and treasure, all for the infant. The King seldom let anybody else visit, and when they did it was only if the visitors had mighty gifts to give, which would be thrown on top of his already humungous pile of goods. When the lowly, poor and sick would knock at his door, a servant would open up and say “Go away! Can’t you see it’s Christmas? The King is trying to spend time with his family!”

The King commanded his carpenters to build a Nursery, a mighty Nursery fit only for the offspring of the King of the North. He wanted the best trees in the world to be hewn down for this Nursery, which meant the trees in the Valley of the North Wind, the very seat of the North Pole. His carpenters warned him against it. That was the one forest no one on Earth, not even the King of the North may cut down. They implored, they begged him not to do it. Some even outright refused, and the ones who did he sent straight to the stocks, stark naked in the snow. They begged and they begged until he rose from his throne and said “Enough! Is there a tree on earth that is too noble for my Child?” To which one carpenter said “It is not the trees that we fear, but the Northern Wind.” The King’s face turned cold and hard like a grim monument. “Shall man bow to the winds? Or does he make them his subject as well? Does he not yoke the wind to move these mighty timbers across the sea? Thus are both the forest and the wind made the humble servants of Man.” So spake the King, and nobody dared dispute this point. “And furthermore” he added, “This must be completed by Christmas Eve, for my child shall be born on Christmas morning.” The carpenters exchanged glances and bowed before their sovereign.

So his carpenters and woodsmen went into the Forest in the Valley and began cutting down the trees to build the mighty Nursery for the King’s child. It took two weeks to complete it, running on the schedule that the King set for them, and by Christmas Eve, there was a great wooden hall erected on the ridge overlooking the Valley. Down below there was a wide-open clearing where the trees had been, now nothing but dwarfish stumps. Right on cue, the Queen felt the baby coming, so the King rushed her to the Nursery on a mighty horse-drawn sleigh. On the entire ride to the Nursery, which was a league from the palace, the baby was trying to get out, but the King commanded that she keep him in until morning. The Queen nearly hurled him off the sleigh at this remark, had the midwife not been there to pacify her. When they reached the Nursery, the midwife suggested it was best that King go back to the palace and return in the morning, which he agreed to without a second’s hesitation.

That night, Christmas Eve, he slept not a wink, but celebrated with his guests in the hall. They feasted on meats, wine and nog, singing gay songs and dancing on the table. At length the King left his guests and stepped outside to see the Nursery. Truth be told he was very anxious about the whole business, and wanted to see his wife with a child in her arms. The light of a fire, a mere dot of light, flickered through the windows of the mighty Nursery a league a way. He smiled—an oafish, drunken smile, but genuine no less—before going back in and joining the throng.

And then midnight struck.

At once, all the fires burning in the hall went out, plunging them in darkness. A great shrieking noise rattled the windows throughout the palace like a howling banshee. The other kings yelped and hid under the tables. “The Second Coming! The Second Coming!” They shouted. The front door burst open and a fierce, icy gale blasted through turning their wine and nog to frost in their hands. The King, all warm from his drink and not fearing the cold, staggered out through the open door, which had come off its hinges. He looked to the Valley and saw no light coming from the mighty Nursery any longer. He hitched his mightiest horses to his mightiest sleigh and sped thither with all his might. Driving a sleigh while drunk is no easy or advisable task, but the King managed. It swerved and zigzagged often but he did his best to navigate through the snow and the pinesm and finally before dawn he reached the Nursery up atop the ridge. His feet were blue from wearing only slippers, and a small icicle had grown on the tip of his nose.

When he came to the front entrance, he saw the same thing as had happened in his palace. The door was wrenched open, barely hanging to its hinges, and inside was darkness, but for the arctic moon spying through the windows. In the middle sat an empty crib, and beside it, the midwife lay unconscious on the ground. The Queen sat in the rocking chair, weeping. She clutched her now flat belly, empty, drooping like a sail with all the wind sucked out. The King’s eyes grew wide, to take in what the dark and the drink had hidden from him. He approached her cautiously, and touched her belly. “Where is my child?” He asked, his voice trembling. The Queen continued to weep. “WHERE IS MY CHILD?!” He bellowed. This cry was answered with an even louder one: “YOU THINK YOU CAN SHOUT ME DOWN, DO YOU?” It was a deep, deep, deep voice, like something submerged at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean, with no warmth or light in it. Within it the King could hear high tones whistling like a storm. It chilled the King’s bones until he felt like they would shatter like glass. He turned around to see the source of this voice, and it was the very doorway itself. “I am the Northern Wind, and you have sinned against me.” The King dashed to the door and tried to pull it closed, but the Wind knocked him on his back. “I AM THE NORTHERN WIND AND YOU WILL NOT SHUT ME UP AND KEEP ME OUT.” The Wind had fashioned a mouth for itself out of this Nursery-door. The whistles blew in through the windows, till the entire house was but the very jaws of the Wind. “I have taken your child,” said the Wind. “I have taken it and hidden it among the children of the world, so you may never find it.”
“And what is my crime, you devil of the North?” the King shouted.
“Your arrogance. You turned away the lowly, the sick, and the weary, and you have hewn down the trees in my Valley when you knew it was forbidden. You have taken my children, so I have robbed you of yours. Now you and your wife must suffer for your arrogance.” With that, the wind sucked itself out from every crack and slammed the door behind it, leaving the king on his back, and the Queen sobbing by the crib. The dawn had come, and it was Christmas Day.

The King and Queen rode back all day. The Queen was barely alive now, but the King burned deep down inside, and every breath further steeled his will. He would not rest until he retrieved his child, even if it meant knocking on every door, going into every house, turning it upside down and shaking it if he had to. He sent envoys to every country, and threatened open war to anybody who refused to give up his baby. The mighty King of the North would not be denied his property.

A year passed, and every envoy returned with nothing. Most of them did not even set sail, because the North wind refused to move them. He also told the other winds to refuse them as well. The ones who traveled on foot either lost their bearing in fierce storms, or were eaten up by bears. The ones that did make it through found nothing. No other ruler of any other country said they had a share of the King’s child. Some welcomed an inspection, but most of them just laughed and shut the door on them. The King’s wrath would not be so easily sated however. He gathered his mighty fleet together to war against the other nations, North Wind or no North Wind. He hewed down another quarter of the Valley forest for new oars, oars that could thrust the ships through any windless sea. But the North Wind rose up in anger and stirred the Sea to such a fury that almost the entire fleet was dashed to pieces and swallowed up in a mighty maelstrom. Meanwhile the Queen said not a word, and would only eat when the servants forced her to. She would not bake, nor tell her cooks what her recipes were, so the meals were never as exquisite as when she made them.

Near the end of the year, the King decided to end this war in one fell swoop. He ordered all of the trees in the Valley to be cut down and burned in a large pyre for his child, so the smoke could rise high into the sky and choke the Northern Wind. On Christmas Eve his men went down into the Valley and one by one the treetops plummeted to the ground, and they dragged each one through the snow into a mighty infernal heap in the middle. The flames rose higher and higher and the smoke grew thicker. The King stood on a ridge and looked down, and then looked over to the Nursery to see if his wife was watching. The pyre raged for hours.

And then midnight struck.

The giant inferno vanished right before the men’s eyes, like a candle snuffed out in a careless breath. Another blast of wind came through the Valley and blew his men away, clean off the face of the Earth. The dumbstruck King heard a scream coming from the Nursery. He sped down into the Valley on his sleigh, and up again, urging the horses along a steep road. He reached the Nursery and saw the same sight as he did one year ago. Only this time, the house was empty. Completely, empty. This, he did not expect. “Where is my wife? I thought I heard her scream. Or was it just the Wind again, playing nasty tricks on me?”
“It was I,” came that same fell voice. “I took your wife from you.”
“So this was for burning your trees down?”
“This was for your neglect. You were so bent on revenge, that you neglected the dearest person in the world to you, and so you are not worthy of her any longer.”
The King dropped to his knees, his anger vanished in an instant. “Please, take my palace, my horses, my kingdom. I love none of them as much as I love her!”
“If this were so,” said the Wind, “You would have comforted her for the loss of your child, and not let her waste away here in the Nursery while you made war. But you could not let go of your pride.”
The King began to sob and whimper. “Very well. You are the true King of the North. You have won and I am nothing. Is this what you wanted? Please let me see my wife…”
“I have lost as much as you. The Valley is empty now, a graveyard of my children, and I will blow a dirge for them day and night here. It is too late for you. I have scattered your wife among the stars. She is in a far better place, though away from you.” The Wind ceased and moved down into the Valley to mourn the trees. The King wept until dawn. When the sun came up he went down into the Valley and walked to the pyre, now a mighty pile of black, charred trees. He felt very weak at the sight of this. His eyes were now open to what he had done to this place. He reached down into the rubble and pulled out a stick, one that the flames had not licked but rather lay buried in the snow. He used this as a walking stick, and made his way back to his palace on foot.

The palace was empty. All of the servants had either been blown away or fled, or left for new jobs with better pay. The King sat on his bed and took off the charred bark to reveal its bright, smooth insides. He got an idea to take a knife to it. He whittled away at the stick until it would resemble something. This helped to take his mind off of his despair, at least for a little while, and it was his favourite pastime, though he had not made anything since he was a child. The hours passed, until finally at the top of the stick emerged a figurine, a wooden Queen for him. This pleased him greatly. He continued to carve away at this stick; he carved elaborate patterns down its length, pictures of trees, of snow and horses until it was no longer a stick, but a staff. The designs were crude and clumsy, but the King didn’t mind. It was his world, with the Queen at the top. His heart was broken, but this gave him some tiny consolation.

That night, he took the staff to the Valley, and repented before the Nursery.
“Here is a humble gift for my wife, O Northern Wind,” he said. The Wind said nothing. The King laid it down on the steps before the door, and returned to his palace. The next day, he went into the Valley and picked up a larger branch, and pulled it back with his sleigh. He broke it into pieces, and carved little figurines out of it. He made horses, birds, and flutes, each one more and more refined as he went on. He took these to the Nursery and offered them again. “These are gifts for my child. Please take them and give them to him, wherever he is. Again, he laid them down on the steps before the door, and returned to his palace. The next day the King went down into the Valley again, and took an even larger branch, and made larger things out of it: ships, dragons, and trees. He took these once again to the Nursery, and when he got there, he was shocked to see that the gifts from the previous nights were gone. He didn’t want to get his hopes up, but it looked as though the Wind had taken them. The King got to his knees, and prayed: “Please, Northern Wind, let me see my wife again, and my child for the first time.” The Wind said nothing. The King’s hopes sunk, as other possibilities crept into his mind. A raccoon or a bear might have picked them up, and given them to their Queens and children for Christmas. Or the Wind may have just blown them away and buried them in the snow. The King returned to the palace.

His hope had not died completely though. Just because the Wind did not answer his prayer, it did not mean that the Wind didn’t take the gifts to the King’s beloved. The King gathered all of the pieces of wood from the Valley that were not completely burned in the fire, and took them to his palace. He made most of the same things as he had done before, but he was perfecting his technique as he went on. He became more and more meticulous and less and less satisfied with each offering, knowing he could do better, knowing his wife and child deserved better. When he ran out of wood, he took apart the remaining ships in his fleet and dragged the timbers to his palace. Soon the wood would turn into hobby-horses, soldiers, tortoises, and then made cabinets, chairs, a doll’s house and a puppet theatre. This gave him the idea to take the fabrics from the wife’s clothes, from the linen closets and even his own, to make little puppets, dolls, hats, masks. When he ran out, he made a crude spinning wheel and learned to weave his own fabrics. He imagined all of the different things a child could want, and then proceeded to make them. Whether his child was a boy or a girl, short, tall, fat, scrawny, adventurous or timid, he had something for it.

Years went by, and his gifts became finer and finer, and on each Christmas Eve he traveled to the Nursery with his stock of gifts, and when he returned in the morning, they would be gone, and every year he would pray to see his wife and child again, and every year the Wind would say nothing. The King grew old. Every year his face would grow another wrinkle, like the rings in a tree. With every year his beard thickened and turned grey. But he was strong still, hauling the timbers, traveling greater and greater lengths to fashion his toys. Soon his supply was greater than his ability to carry it on Christmas Eve, so he would take only portions each year. He could not let it grow too high though, for he could not stand to see them for long, gathering dust, reminding him of his loneliness. He would not stop either. Soon he ran out of ships, so he started taking apart his palace. The metals he reforged: all of the mighty apparel for war that stood idle in his armory he took and melted down into tin soldiers with little muskets, trumpets and horns. The marble he made, naturally, into marbles. The wood of course he continued to use with great reverence. He took apart his palace plank by plank, and moved right into the Nursery, converting it into a workshop. He went on this way each year, working day after day until Christmas, and offering up whatever he had, until he had nothing left but his shop, and his creations. This could have been a lovely souvenir shop for anybody visiting the Kingdom, only nobody did. All the other Kings and Queens and dignitaries of the world never heard from the King again, and some even said “good riddance to bad royalty!” The people of world heard about the King burning down the Forest of the Valley of the North, so every Christmas they erected a pine tree in their homes to commemorate these mighty trees now gone from this world.

In time, the North Wind eventually stopped taking the King’s gifts. The King was down to his crown because there was nothing left to use. On Christmas Eve he removed it from his head and officially renounced his Kingship. “North Wind, You are the true King of the North, I am a humble man; I just never knew it until now.” He stood on top of the Shop and offered it up to the Wind. He stood up there, waiting, for one whole hour.

Then the Wind blew by and knocked it out of his hands. The crown went tumbling off the roof and down a slope leading out of the Valley and into the Wide World. The crownless Old Man yelped. He climbed down as fast as his bones could move him and pursued the crown, which was still rolling along. He followed the crown into a forest—nothing as great as the goodly Valley Pines, but a forest nonetheless. The crown stopped every now and then, getting caught in a bush or a hollow or a under a fallen tree. But every time the Old Man saw its glint in the dim light and reached for it, something kept it from him: first, the Man upset the snow sitting above on the tree branches and it fell on him. By the time he could climb out of it the crown was in the clutches of a white fox. He tracked it to a frozen waterfall, at the bottom of which a frozen brook ran. The crown slipped from the fox’s teeth rolled onto the stream and went its way, slipping and tumbling down the slope, and the Man went slipping and tumbling after it, with much pain and discomfort, (his limbs not as couched with fat as they once were). The man crashed into a snow-bank, face first. When he came to, he saw the stream had led to a clearing overlooking the wood. Here the Man could look out and spy the land before him to the South. The Sun had fallen by now, and little lights shone here and there along the hills lining the countryside, miles away. Smoke rose from them, like chimney tops. He had never seen these before, not in his entire life and career as the King: the only world he had ever really known lay within the walls of his own Kingdom. He longed to see these lights on the hillsides up close—perhaps meet the ones who kept them. They must be villages, he thought. The only fire of his was that of his lonely forge, his only company the wooden figurines and dolls he had crafted. He imagined the people gathered around these lights, singing, telling stories from days past, conjuring visions for the future, holding each other close. He watched the little columns of smoke spiral up into the sky, which by now was decked with stars. They were clear and bright in the crisp, cold air. He had never seen them so clearly before: thousands of them, everywhere he looked there they were, glittering in an ocean on high and he had never felt as unmighty as he did that moment. They shone especially bright over the lights below, as if mimicking their terrestrial counterparts. The fox returned and carried away the crown while the Man looked on, struck dumb. The forest was very, very, very still.

And then midnight struck.

A tiny, slight breeze danced through and whispered in the man’s ear in the tiniest, slightest voice. He gasped and nearly fell off the edge. “There is one way.” Before the Man knew it he was swept off his feet and rolled through the air, back to his workshop. “Gather your things,” said the Wind, as the Man struggled to gather his wits. But before there was any chance of that happening, from the other side of the Valley came a ship, speeding through the air toward him. Where it came from he did not know, for it was not one of his own. It had a hull of white timbers and silver sails that surged with the North Wind’s breath. It was a magnificent sight not of this world, and it docked right in front of the Nursery. A causeway lowered itself from the deck, while the Man brought all of the gifts onboard at the Wind’s urging. Once he was on with all of the gifts he had crafted over all the years, the vessel rose and rolled through the cloudless sky.
“Northern Wind, where is this ship taking me?”
“To find your child, you must follow the map your wife has laid out for you.”
“What map? My wife never laid out a— ” Before he could finish, something caught his eye. Among the multitude of stars there was one that burned a little brighter on the nearer end of heaven. Perhaps this was it, he thought. Directions—it had to be! At this point the Old Man was willing to believe anything. He set sail for the village that lay beneath the star.

Within minutes they were hanging over the village. The Old Man lowered a ladder with a sack over his shoulder, ready to adorn his one and only child. When he landed, he peered inside the nearest window of the nearest house, and on the first try the Old Man saw a child sleeping, a boy. But before he could act, there were things the Man had to consider: how would he know that it was his child when he saw it? He had no idea how many children there were in the world, but he assumed a lot. How could he possibly find his among them? The Wind said nothing of how, so the Man chose to trust the map in the sky and perhaps he reach his destination on his own.

This boy lay in bed, shivering without a blanket. So naturally, the Man took out the most beautiful, and more importantly the warmest quilt he had. This one he didn’t make, only his wife could have made one this beautiful. It was thick and soft, but light as a feather, and it was made for this child. How could it not be? The window was open (in fact, it had no latch at all to keep it closed), so he snuck the blanket in, draped it over the boy and tucked him in. As soon as he finished this, a star above him burned a little brighter for a moment. Was this boy in fact his child? He examined the child’s features, searching for something familiar. Somehow it didn’t matter. In a way he could not explain at that moment, it was his boy. And then the star dimmed, and one beside it lit up. The Wind came down from the ship, and nudged the Man to move on. The next star hung over the house of a girl, nine or ten perhaps, who could have very well been his child in the peace of that night. He gave her the first doll he laboured over for hours to perfection, laying it beside her in bed. He was extremely pleased at the thought of her discovering it tomorrow. He slipped away as quietly as he could, and made for the next house. Again, the star above burned brighter before taking its place among the rest, making way for the next one. For every child in that village there was a star, and when the village was taken care of, a star would burn somewhere else in the firmament. The Man climbed back into the ship, his sack empty, and ready for the next port.

He went on for what seemed like years, yet nighttime remained, as far as the man could tell. The moon itself stood still, while the stars waited patiently above each household, whether it housed rich or poor. This was incomprehensible to the Man, but he simply took advantage of it rather than question it. The ship swept across the sky, borne of the North Wind. Every time a star lit up, it reminded him more and more of the light in the Nursery, the one he saw when he looked out so many years ago on the eve of his child’s birth. Every gift he offered, every child’s face he saw got him closer and closer to his own.

He did not return to his workshop until every child on earth was accounted for—and every child was accounted for—and only then did the moon pass along and make was for the morning. He sat down in his wife’s rocking chair and put his head in his hands and wept. He did not find what he was looking for. In fact, he found something quite different.

There were some things even the North Wind could not change, but at the very least that night he took mercy on the Man, and did what he could. He entreated the help of the other Winds and allowed the Man to be with his wife and child every Christmas Eve. But only on Christmas Eve could he do this; any other time was forbidden. That was all the Wind could do. The only other thing that could explain what happened to the Old Man was Grace. Rather than complain, the Old Man accepted the Wind’s offer, whatever chance he had to have his wish fulfilled. Every child he saw was a gift in itself. Only Christmas Eve was no punishment to him. On the contrary: it was his night, when the Winds held the sky still, and the lone Old Man sailed from star to star to rain gifts on the children of the world. It no longer mattered which one was his.

The next year he would do the same thing. The year leading up to it would be spent in seemingly endless toil. The perpetual labour would be eternal torment to anybody else. But no Sisyphus was he; everything he made of his own hands was born of love, and so he would continue to find joy in his work, a joy he had never known in is idleness as King. The North Wind would never howl in the Valley again. Instead, the Valley would heal and trees would grow again, because of the kindness these two Kings showed to each other. The Wind would even rear up a grove of magic firs that grew to full height just so they might lay low their necks in sacrifice to the Man’s axe. But the Man would not take any more than he needed. The Wind would labour with him in the Valley, and every year he would be guided by his Queen; who some say is the Northern Lights, dancing in the sky at night. And every year he would greet his child in each child he visited, offering his humble gifts. The Man would grew rich again, but it was that special kind of richness, the one that comes from the inside, starting in the heart and reaching all the way to the highest hairs on your head and down to the soles of your feet.

The Old Man started his work over again the next day. There was much work to be done until the next Christmas, and he would only stop when his heart was absolutely empty. The funny thing was it just kept filling up again.

THE END

Merry Christmas, everyone!

-Liam

Myth-crafting

In an attempt to further develop my ideas for my fantasy story, I need to bounce them off of somebody else. Language is a form of loving others, as Alberto Manguel said. I cannot find the story I’m looking for until I share it with others, so here goes.

WARNING: If you have no interest in or detest anything to do with the genre of epic fantasy then I suggest you read no further. It’s a genre fraught with awful clichés unfortunately. I will do everything in my power to do away with them, or renew them, but right here and now is not the time and place that this will happen.

This is the blueprint for the background story of Gondoth and Lalíth, the two Gods who are the cause of the entire story: for siring the Fays, and for their opposing views on the fate of Mortals.


First off, at the very beginning of Time, there is an order of beings born (their origins I haven’t decided quite yet) who are destined to govern the universe, and make sure its laws are upheld. They are the Gods, naturally. The eldest of them is known in the tongues of Man as Albourak. He is the wisest, and is charged with the task of foreseeing the future and advising his brethren accordingly. He receives his visions by consulting a basin filled with a cosmic water, giving him messages only he can interpret. Albourak is recognized as their leader, although no formal hierarchy is (yet) established. The youngest of them is known as Gondoth, the brightest, the most inquisitive, the most cunning and the most ambitious of them all.
Eventually Albourak prophesies that these Gods will be superseded by a younger generation of Gods (These Younger Gods are to the Older ones what the Olympians are to the Titans, and the Aesir to the Giants in Norse myth). The Older Gods must eventually either renounce their power and become servants of the new Gods, or recede back to the cosmic primordial Waters from whence they came. Gondoth objects to this, however. He does not understand why he must bow down to a new generation, especially when the World and their place in it is still so new. And to his credit, Albourak can never quite explain why this is the way things must be, only that they are. The Gods are controlled by a fate, which even they cannot influence. It is one which seems arbitrary when viewed from up close.
When the Younger Gods arrive, the Older ones are permitted for a time to dwell with them. Gondoth rallies many of the Older Gods against this decree, and those allied with Albourak are few. Gondoth meets Lalíth, the youngest and most beautiful of the Young Gods. He woos her and they marry, and in that matrimony is Gondoth preserved, his Godhood intact. The others are not so lucky. The ones whom Gondoth convinced to oppose the decree are stripped of their beautiful bodies and their spirits are mangled and transformed into foul, chthonic monsters. Gondoth detests them, but he vows to protect them and one day return them to their original forms. Of the ones who did not rebel, but accepted their fate, Albourak was preserved, because the Young Gods begged for him to stay and guide them. He consults the water, and it tells him that he must stay. But he renounces his lordship, and may only act as an advisor, having no executive power. He becomes known as the Grandfather God. Because He was preserved, Gondoth comes to resent Albourak, but only harbours these feelings in secret.
Meanwhile, Albourak prophesies the coming of the Mortals. When they are born (I haven’t decided how this happens, whether they are in any way created by the Gods, or separately), of all the races, Gondoth is most intrigued by Man. They are most like him. There is a debate over whether the Gods should dwell among them, or remain hidden from the Mortals. Albourak receives no prophesy about it, so they must decide for themselves. Albourak has misgivings and advises against it, but Gondoth wants to go forward. The Gods would not agree to this, except Lalíth backs Gondoth. She is regarded among her peers for her compassion and wisdom, and because of this, they believe that the Mortals are in good company. That, and there is no explicit rule that they cannot mingle with these new beings. So Gondoth, Lalíth and the Young Gods walk among them, living side by side with them and teaching them. In this time, Lalíth and Gondoth sire a new race called the Fays.

So that’s the beginning of their history, these two. Obviously it’s just a sketch, an extremely brief narrative summary. I’m not completely satisfied with it right now—I haven’t developed Lalíth’s character in any detail for one, but that will come. For now I need to show it to some new eyeballs.

What I need in regards to input are these questions answered:
Is this premise clear? Otherwise, what needs clarification?
What do you think of the names?
Are there any visible loopholes or flimsy bits?

If you, reader, do care to offer your commentary, I appreciate your complete honesty. If there isn't enough material yet to merit any effective critiquing, I understand that as well. If it’s rubbish, please tell me, because at this point it’s hard for me to tell what’s working and what isn’t.