A Brief Exchange

Max:  "Why was Jesus as bright as the sun?"

Me:  "Because he had the glory of God all around him."

Max:  "Eyebrows are made of hair."

The End.

Vintage Furniture and Oddities: The Sketches

I got the go ahead from 'Rex' so I'm going to post the sketches he's worked up for Vintage Furniture and Oddities.  It's good stuff, too.  He captures something about the characters so that, even when they diverge from my mental picture of the character, they work perfectly.

As you can see, the above picture features both Dale Stain and Esther Mayo.  Dale will play a large role in the story, but he is not one of the main characters.  He works with Esther, Lucy, Sam the Rook and others in order to prevent the villain, Big Box, from achieving his goals.

The second picture is Esther Mayo, the character through whom the action is perceived, at least in the regular prose version.  Esther is a bit aimless, but she basically wants to do right by people.  She gets dragged into the conflict of the story through now machinations of her own.

This handsome gentleman is Malcolm Gamble.  Gamble has yet to appear in portions of the story I've written, but he will play a big role.  He is an appraiser of fine furniture, but that means a bit more in the Vintage Furniture and Oddities than it does in our world. 

The last picture 'Rex' has sent me is of my favorite character in the whole story.  

Sam the Rook is a pretty cool character and 'Rex' captured him well in the drawing.  He's leaving the Vintage Furniture and Oddities store, looking alert and ready to throw himself into any challenge that comes his way.  That's Sam.

So you can see why I get excited when 'Rex' sends his sketches.  They're a pleasure to look at.

Me and Rex: Graphic Novel Ahoy!

As you may have seen in the comments of my "Are Comic Books Subversive 'By Nature?'" post, Rex Queems (the Phony) and I are working on a graphic novel together.  This 'Queems' fella is actually one of my brothers.  I'll leave his actual name a mysterious SECRET.  Anyway, this brother of mine took a liking to my short Vintage Furniture and Oddities pieces and wanted to work up a graphic novel for it.  I liked the idea, so we've been talking long distance (St. Louis to Athens, OH) about it.  The concepts have shifted a bit since the early stages, especially since I only had half of an idea as to where I was taking the story.

Lately 'Rex' has been sending me some pictures of the characters I wrote into the story, and one who hasn't shown up yet.  I don't want to post the pictures just yet because I want to have a better idea of what direction we're going to take the story.  Plus I haven't asked 'Rex' if it was alright with him.  Let me assure you, his art is infinitely better than mine.  His characters have a cartoonish quality, but also a depth that keeps them from looking a cheap Saturday morning cartoon.  It's exciting to see the pictures because I can get a richer concept of what the characters are like.  Good stuff.

Alright, Rex?

Get the Fountain Flowing

I'm tellin' ya, it's been a frustrating few weeks.  As you can see, I posted nothing on this blog between August 8 and August 22.  What you might not know is that I wrote just about nothing during that time frame.  No blog posts.  No short stories.  No comic book plotting.  I haven't even written a grocery list, but that's usually Mary Ann's domain anyway.

My life was full of work (15-20 hours/week), class (10-12.5 hours/week), church work (a couple o' three hours/week), and family (all the rest of the hours/week).  Add to this the fact that Mary Ann uses the laptop for her job and that reduced the hours even further.  The thing is, I want to be a writer.  I'm planning on pursuing an MFA after seminary.  I'm going to go out on a limb and say that means I need to have some decent stuff written before I apply.  I would do all these things all day and then after the kids went to bed I could barely stay awake, much less sit in front of a laptop and write.  Classes ended last week, but then I had gotten so far out of the writing 'groove' that for the first few days all I could do was stare at the screen, give up, and play Text Twirl on Facebook.  Not good.

I am pleased to report, however, that as of last night I'm back on the right track.  I took a baby step with some writing on The Familiar Game (nee The Brown Sisters) and today I continued on that story as well as doing some more detailed plotting for the first issue of My Zombie Wife Wants Me Dead.  Not only that, but I had yet another concept for a comic.  Right now I'm calling it The Seven Functions of Robot M, but that title could change.  It's fun because I never thought I'd write a book, comic or otherwise, which involved robots.  And this book has a LOT of robots.  I'll tell you more about that later.

So the fountain is flowing once again at the Duncan house.  The Fall semester starts next Thursday, so hopefully I can get some solid hours in before the time comes for me to focus more on academics.  Time is ticking away, and I've got a lot of writing to do!

Are Comic Books Subversive "By Nature?"

I've been on a comic book kick lately.  No, I haven't been snapping them up left and right.  In fact, the last one I bought for myself was Cerebus 300 in 2004, and that was for nostalgia's sake.  I have no idea what the last one I purchased before that was.  A Madman maybe?  I must've bought it before I got married in 2000, so it's been a while.  No, the kick I've been on has to do with following the conversation around comic books.  I've really been enjoying going to websites like iFanboy, Newsarama, and Comic Book Resources just to see what's new and what's been going on with some of my old faves.  Frankly, I like knowing what's going on without having to buy a bunch of comics.

Lately the most interesting talk has been surrounding writer Robert Kirkman's manifesto encouraging creators to work on books they own and not for Marvel and DC.  It's generated a lot of conversation, and yesterday Ron Richards--one of the iFanboy guys--weighed in.  Ron seems to be a laid back guy.  I like listening to the iFanboy podcast in part because of Ron's personality, so I hate to risk offending him by nit-picking about his post ('cause, y'know, he probably reads my blog all the time).  But, nit-pick I must. 

In his post Ron rejects Robert Kirkman's idea that Marvel and DC should focus on attracting younger readers in part because "comics are a subversive medium by nature and we should continue to embrace that."  That's quite a statement to make.  Comics certainly can be subversive, as in the works of Robert Crumb, but are they subversive by nature?  Let's not forget that Archie is a comic book.  So was Little Lulu.  And Casper and Richie Rich and Donald Duck.  Not only that, but if comics are subversive by nature, then the Franklin Richards comics Ron has been enjoying are by nature not comic books because as far as I can tell they are not subversive, unless we stretch the definition of 'subversive' to the breaking point.

I think that what Ron could have said is something like, "Comics have always had a subversive element, and we should continue to embrace that."  That's a less extravagant claim, and one I agree with.  There usually are things in a culture that need subverting and in ours comic books are well suited for that role.  This less extravagant claim does not provide strong support for Ron's conclusion, though.  Marvel and DC could provide kid-oriented content and still be producing comic books that are by nature comic books.

There's a lesson in all this, boys and girls:  be careful what you say on the internet or some goof who's scraping the bottom of the barrel for blog posts will overanalyze any and every phrase you turn.  Thank you and good night.

Zombie Wife Characters

Turn your computer upside down to see three of the chief characters in My Zombie Wife Wants Me Dead.  I have no idea why this picture ALWAYS loads upside down, because it's not upside down on my computer and none of my other pictures load that way (see below).

Anyway, the upside down man is Burt Flipp, the main character.  He runs a video game review website for a living and is a bit aimless otherwise.  He's good hearted, though, and he tries hard 

to make up for his natural carelessness.  He truly loves Becky and wants to keep her happy.

Becky Flipp is the aforementioned Zombie Wife.  She doesn't start as a zombie, but she ends up that way pretty quickly.  She is a medical assistant to Dr. Andy Perch (see below) when the series begins, but once she comes back as a zombie she has a little trouble at work.  She's the more driven and perfectionistic of the pair, and her perfectionism leads her to continually put off her revenge against Burt (who she blames for her death).  Until then, she sticks around to make sure he doesn't make a mess of the home that she strove so hard to maintain while she was alive.  Like many wives, she alternates between loving her husband deeply and wanting to kill him.

The little monster guy is named Mossy, and I'll leave him a bit of mystery at this point.

This character will show up in issue two or so.  This is the Mighty Fyodor, Gentleman Zombie Hunter.  He starts out as an adversary but eventually makes himself comfortable in the Flipp household.

These are some of the background characters from Zombie Wife.  Shelly is Burt's mom.  I'm not sure how much of a role she'll have past the first issue.  Dr. Andy Perch is Becky's boss before she dies.  Once she comes back, who knows?

So that's it for the characters, except for a couple of incidentals I haven't done sheets on yet.  Comments?

Odd Crap from Blogger

I wanted to put my drawings from My Zombie Wife Wants Me Dead here on my blog, but whenever I try to add my picture it turns upside down.  I even tried to flip it upside down on my own.  No luck.  So you'll have to wait to see it.  Tra la.

Totally New Project!!

One truth about me:  I'm not happy unless I have too many stories churning in my head.  I've got The Brown Sisters (my "serious fiction"), and I have Vintage Furniture and Oddities (my project with my brother), but I needed something else just to do for fun.  I kept wondering and wondering, and it came to me in a flash.  The title to my next great project.  I already have a basic story line, character designs, and material for a few issues (it's probably going to be a webcomic).  I also designed a logo for said project:

Oh yes.  In case you can't read that it says My Zombie Wife Wants Me Dead!  That, my friends, is the sort of title that grabs the attention.  I'm pretty excited about this.  The comic will be black and white, of course, because I'm not doing a whole issue in colored pencil.  I only hope I can do a decent job drawing.  I feel pretty good about my character designs, and I'm using a cleaner style of art than my sketches, but I don't know if I'll be able to convey the sort of action I want in the story.  I'll have fun trying, though!

I'll try to post some of my character designs soon.

Who Watches the Watchmen . . . Act?

The first trailer for The Watchmen is out.  It looks excellent.  Dr. Manhattan is stunning.  Max and Leo have been cracking me up because, since they saw the trailer, they have been playing Watchmen.

"I'm Dr. Manhattan," Leo says.

"I'm Rorschach," Max replies.

Then they run around and battle and fight the bad guys.  It makes me laugh because their perceptions of what Dr. Manhattan and Rorschach are like are, shall we say, a bit off.  I just don't have the heart to tell Max that Rorschach is a mentally unstable far right conspiracy theorist and not a noble hero.  I also don't want to tell Leo that if he wants to be Dr. Manhattan he needs to be naked.  Because, y'know, he'd probably be fine with that.  They'll find all this out anyway when I take them to see the movie next March.

Just kidding.  If you've read Watchmen you'll probably remember that it's less than kid-friendly.  I do plan on seeing myself, though.  The trailer was one of the best parts about going to see PART of The Dark Knight this past weekend.

That's right.  PART of The Dark Knight.  The story goes like this:  A few of us guys who live on campus here at the Seminary got together to go see The Dark Knight Sunday night.  We all rode together and had a good time chatting.  I was a little disappointed that only a couple of us were old comic book junkies so I couldn't talk comics with them, but we had a good time anyway.

We arrived at the theater later than we had wanted so we couldn't all sit together, but I sat with one of the guys and another found a seat directly behind us.  We had been there for about an hour and a half, I think, when it happened.  At one moment Harvey Dent's large, dimpled chin was occupying the screen, the next, darkness.  The emergency lights came on, and a theater employee told us that the power went out and when it came back on the movie would pick up where it left off.  Unfortunately, it was not to be.  They never got the power back on.  10:30 rolled around and they bounced us from the theater.  We got vouchers for a free movie, of course, but here it is Friday and I've still never seen the end of The Dark Knight.  Hopefully I won't have to wait until it comes out on DVD.

Sketches: Faces, etc.

This batch of drawings represent what I typically draw.  I draw faces, often profiles, and I draw monsters.  There are other more complex drawings as well, but no other comics.  The 'elder' picture is actually much larger than the other pictures, and I think the whole thing would look better if I could figure out how to put a border on these pics, but this will do for now.

Buck-Toothed Monster

Elder

 Elegant Woman

Tae Kwon Do Joe

I was trying to use different arm and hand positions here.

So that's all for this round of my sketches.  I have plenty more, so check back often.  If you want to see scribbly, mediocre drawing, that is.

Sketches: All the Good Dragons

I promised I would post some of my drawings, so here's the first.  It's a cartoon I drew yesterday when I should have been studying.  The scanner blurred the upper left corner, but that doesn't affect the cartoon much.  Enjoy.

Graphic Novel Fever

My brother has done something incredibly unfair to me.  My life is hard.  A few weeks ago he casually mentioned that he thought doing a graphic novel of Vintage Furniture and Oddities would be cool.  Since then I had a discussion with Chris Gensheer about our mutual love of comic books.  Those two things combined have sparked an virulent strain of Graphic Novel Fever.  I've been cruising the internet to find out the news about some of my old faves (Madman, for instance).

Since my brother has expressed interest in drawing the above graphic novel, and since he is a better artist than me, I am happily giving him that opportunity. The problem is, I want to get the ball rolling.  And he's entering a doctoral program.  Writing big papers.  Drinking martinis with the President of Ohio University.  One of those sentences might not be true.  Anyway, he doesn't have the time to do a lot of drawing right now.  That means I got the fevah with no hope of a cure unless I can come up with another cool-as-heck idea.  Ugh.

I guess I'll just have to stick to writing "The Brown Sisters" and VFO.  Hopefully that will be enough to scratch the creative itch.

By the way, I will be posting some of my drawings on this blog as soon as I can figure out how to work the scanner.

The Critique Arrives

It's nice when something you've been waiting for finally happens.  Ever since June 17--a long time ago, I know--I have been waiting for Ann McCutchan's final critique of the bit of The Brown Sisters (working title) I read at the Trinity Arts Conference.  For those who don't know, Ann is a professor in the MA in Creative Writing program at the University of North Texas.  She led the workshop in which I read the piece, but there wasn't enough time for a good, thorough critique of the whole chapter.

This morning, however, I get up, make my coffee, and sit at the computer, and what do I find?  Ah!  The critique!  I'm a bit surprised I didn't click on Ann's e-mail with trepidation, but I was just plain excited.  She did not disappoint me.  Well, I was a bit disappointed that she didn't use the phrase "the next Hemingway" with reference to me, but I'll get over that.  What she did was deliver the sort of specific critique I have been longing for.

For instance, I really wanted to know my strengths and weaknesses.  While this is difficult to judge from one piece, she wrote that I have a "fine imagination" and that I should trust my ability to "'nail' a character first time out."  She referenced a specific character and said that the sort of description I applied to her was a strength of mine.

My chief weakness, she thought, was providing too much small detail.  She said I should pare things down, and recommended an exercise to help me with that.  She said I should try to take what I wrote in four paragraphs and, without cutting the scene itself down, rewrite the material in two paragraphs using only my strongest descriptors.  This is just what I needed!  I am looking forward to following her advice.

I definitely agree with her that the story drags a bit because of the detail.  I was just talking to Mary Ann about that yesterday as we were traveling back from a family reunion in Indiana.  She said she has enjoyed reading "Vintage Furniture and Oddities" (parts one and two) much more than The Brown Sisters, and I think she's onto something there.  I've been heavy handed, and I think Ann's recommendations may be just what I need.

On top of all that, she recommended a book to help me.  It's called Self-Editing for Fiction Writers, and it sounds like it will be quite helpful.  Thanks, Ann!

Meeting With Dr. Calhoun

I met with one of my professors today.  Dr. David Calhoun is the freshly retired professor of Church History at Covenant Seminary, but he is continuing to teach.  Last semester I took the elective "Christianity and Imagination" to him, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.  In fact, the class proved pivotal, helping me to decide what I want to do in the future.

I'm also taking Reformation and Modern Church History to Dr. Calhoun this summer, and I met with him after class today.  We'd been planning on that since the end of last semester, but this was the first chance we had to get together.  It was a good meeting.  His comments on my story were encouraging and his advice for me was helpful.  Beyond that, it was just nice to have a conversation with him.  He is one of the kindest men you could meet, and he understands what a writer needs to do in order to do good work.  I must say, I was a bit embarrassed by showing him some of the story's content.  It's not pornographic, nor does it have a Tarantino-like level of language and violence, but there is some cursing and a reference to a sexual situation.  Dr. Calhoun is a Flannery O'Connor fan, though, so he understands what it takes to craft a powerful story.  You have to deal with the warts of reality in a realistic way.

All in all, a good meeting.  He has encouraged me on my way toward pursuing an MFA, and he even said he saw that I had some talent.  Hopefully I can continue to develop said talent and write something that is worthwhile for both Christians and non-Christian.  He also advised me to continue to go to conferences and make contacts with people in the field.  It's nice when you get advised to do exactly what you wanted to do anyway . . .

A 'Creative' Future

As my faithful readers know, I have been fretting over the future here for a long time.  I have bounced between being a pastor and pursuing a PhD, probably in Moral Theology.  Well, I think I've come to a decision.  Mary Ann and I have been discussing this for the last few days, and I think I'm going to pursue an MFA in creative writing.  You'll notice that this is neither the pastoral track nor the PhD track.  There are PhD options in creative writing, but most programs just offer the terminal MFA.

How did I come to this decision, you ask?  By weighing the options, of course!  I looked at PhD work and realized that I could not really get excited about Moral Theology.  I had also come to the conclusion that the pastorate was not the place for me a long time ago.  Then I took a long look at my writing abilities, and I came to the conclusion that I'm a better "creative writer" than I am a theologian.  So the "subjective experience" criterion was definitely in the MFA's favor.

Then I thought about how I feel alive when I'm writing fiction.  I feel like I'm doing something worthwhile.  Like I'm where I'm supposed to be.  It's a spectacular feeling, and one I'm not used to.  I realized then that God designed me to write.  That's how I'm built.  And if I can put in a commercial for Covenant Seminary here, this place has really helped me come to grips with how God made me, and how he can use the arts for his glory.  Coming here for the MDiv was worth it, even if I won't be using the degree in the expected way.

To continue the process I had a conversation with Mary Ann a few days back.  I was still clinging to the idea that I might use the PhD as my primary goal, but keep the MFA as a side option.  During that conversation she helped me realize that practically speaking the PhD was not all that much better than the MFA.  Both the PhD and the MFA will open up teaching jobs, the PhD in theology and religious studies, and the MFA in creative writing.  Neither field has huge demand, but MFA programs are popping up all over.  There is more growth there, I think.  Also, if I get the MFA jobs in the book industry open up a bit for me.  I could get an editing job more easily than before.  Theology doesn't offer a similar non-professorial option.  I know there are think-tanks, but there are certainly more publishers than there are think-tanks.  So there's that.

I also think I stand a better chance of getting into an MFA program with funding than I do a similarly funded PhD program.  As I said before, I'm a better writer than a theologian.  The question is, of course, which program?  I've started trying to figure that out, but that's a post for another day.

Vintage Furniture and Oddities, Part 2

Ages and ages ago I posted the first installment of a little thing I called Vintage Furniture and Oddities.  I intended to post more, but I never did.  Then, earlier today my brother called me.  He is a dang fine artist, and since he liked the little story he wanted to see if we could maybe put into a graphic novel, just for fun.  That was cool with me, and naturally it made me want to write a bit  more.  This installment isn't as dynamic as the first.  It shows how Esther and Lucy met, and also drops the hint of oncoming conflict.

*************************************

The bell over the door chimed as she entered the store behind Sam.  Dust particles floated in the sunbeams that stole through store windows; windows which were mostly obscured by dark, heavy furniture.  Esther rubbed her nose and sniffed away the itch brought on by those tiny particles.  Lucy was nowhere to be seen.  It was just her, Sam the Rook, and some old squatty man with thick glasses.  He ignored Esther and Sam, instead thumbing briskly through what looked like an old library card catalog.  Esther was surprised his stumpy fingers could move so quickly.  It seemed almost unnatural.  She squeezed Oliver's flag in her hand inside her pocket and wondered why she was there.

    "Why should I have ever listened to Lucy?" she thought.  "I knew she was a weirdo from the first time I met her.  But here I am."

   Her thoughts drifted back to Pak-Mart and the job that would probably not be there for her when she returned.  Her shift should have started twenty-minutes ago.  Esther thought of Lucy's grandmother and then of Lucy and, in search of some clue as to what was going on, she rehearsed their first meeting in her head.

*******************

            “So Gemma was your grandmother?” Esther began.

            “Yeah,” Lucy replied.  “I knew her health had been slipping for a while—”

            “But still.”

            “Yeah.”

            Esther remembered leaning on the conveyer belt in front of Lucy’s register and staring into her face, trying to gauge her emotion.  Instead she noticed Lucy’s exotic features; some mix of asian and African and plain ol’ white.  There was a tiny jewel in her nose and a definite sadness around her eyes, but mainly Lucy just looked burdened.

            “Um . . . She was a great greeter.  Your grandma.”

            Esther winced over her absurdly bad eulogy.

            “Thanks.” Lucy smirked.  “She talked about you a lot.”

            “Did she?”

            “Oh yeah.  ‘Esther’s a good kid,” she said, putting on a quavering voice.  “‘Needs some direction, though.’”

            “Sounds about right.  She talked about you, too.”

            “Really?”

            Esther remembered how Lucy’s eyes brightened.  She was embarrassed because Gemma had really not mentioned Lucy much at all.  It was just over the last couple of weeks that Gemma worked at Pak-Mart that she started talking about Lucy.  Nonsense mainly.  Lucy’s face remained expectant though, and Esther, failing to find a lie sputtered the truth.

            “It was a sort of a . . . joke, I guess,” she said, stroking her bone straight hair.  “She would tap her temple and say, ‘That Lucy, she’ll take over the family business.’  I guess she was kind of . . . going.”

            They were both silent.

            “I shouldn’t have mentioned it.” 

            “No, thank you.”

            There seemed to be genuine gratitude in Lucy’s face, which was a shock to Esther.  Emboldened by the reaction, Esther told her the other thing Gemma used to say.

            “There was one more thing, if you want to know it.”

            “Sure! 

            “She told me, ‘Mr. Chalmers had his estate sale.’”

            If the gratitude had been a shock to Esther, it was nothing compared to the waves of emotion that crossed Lucy’s face.  Shock, panic, then terror hardening into determination.  Lucy reached across the conveyer and grabbed Esther by her blue smocked shoulder.  Her fingers dug in slightly.

            “She said ‘Chalmers?’” 

            “Yes, Chalmers,” Esther replied, swatting Lucy’s hand from her shoulder.  “I reckon you missed the big sale, though.  That was a few of weeks ago.  Sorry you missed your china, or whatever you buy at estate sales.”

            Lucy covered her face with her hands.

            “How did I not hear about Chalmers?”  she said.  “Dale.  I’m going to kill Dale Stain.” 

            “Yeah, sorry ‘bout your luck,” Esther said. She had been disturbed by Lucy’s behavior.

    "That's when I should have walked away," she thought.

      Instead she said, “I’ll tell you what though.  I’ll just give you what she gave me.”

            A few aisles away, a cash register chimed a sale.

            “She gave you something?” Lucy asked.  Her voice shook.  She was struggling to maintain control.

            “Yeah, a handkerchief with a bug stitched on it.  But seriously, it’s yours.”

            In a split second Lucy had switched on her ‘calm.’  She waved her hand.

            “No, she gave it to you.  It’s yours.  Just,” here the panic stirred the surface of her face again, “take care of it.  For Grandma.”

            “Deal.”

            A customer entered the line behind Esther.

            “I’m going to go,” she said.

            “Yeah.  Okay.”

             “Do you have any padparadscha?” the man asked.

            Lucy flicked off the light illuminating the bright number ‘12’ over her head.

            “I’m sorry sir, this lane just closed.”

*****************

   "Yep.  Totally weird."

  The sound of a door scraping a warped floor pulled Esther's attention up the stairs.  The upper landing was an exposed walkway, but it was just as crowded with antiques and knick knacks as the downstairs so Esther couldn't see what was going on.  Sam rose to his feet as Lucy rounded the corner and began to descend the stairs.

  "Got the girl and the flag.  Saw a truck."

  "Corundum?"

   Sam nodded.  Lucy hurried to Esther and hugged her.

  "Glad you're safe, girl."

  Esther extricated herself and eyed her friend.

 "Any reason why I shouldn't be?"

Trinity Art Conference: Ruminating on Art and Change

I have now looked at my notes from the Trinity Arts Conference.  As I suspected, they're bad.  In fact, after the second lecture they become non-existent.  I did alright in the first lecture, which is nice because that was given by Greg Wolfe.  Greg is a brilliant guy so he had a lot to say.  The topic of the conference was 'Change.'  One thing that Greg said is that people tend to hate change in art because they want to shoot the messenger.  Society changes, artists respond by expressing that in word, music, paint, etc.  This 'new art' is decried, called non-art, and sometimes anti-Christian (depending on the context).  In reality, the artist is often just holding up a mirror to society.  Understand, I'm saying what Greg said only as I understand it now from my notes.  Don't hold him responsible if I misrepresent his ideas.

The main point of Greg's lecture, I think, was contained in a quote from Walter Brueggemann, which I think I copied down correctly:

"Truthful statements must be continually stated to remain truthful."

This might sound scandalous to ears suspiciously seeking postmodern ideas, but I believe it is true.  To use a silly example:  Many years ago if you called a girl 'cute' she might have sucker-punched you.  Why?  Because 'cute' used to mean 'bow-legged.'  In order for 'that girl is cute' to be true in its original sense, we must restate the proposition:  'that girl is bow-legged.''

On a deeper level we can look at the word 'Gospel.'  One of the speakers at the conference made reference to this.  It was either Greg or one of the guys who did a devotion.  Anyway, the word 'euangellion,' which is Greek for 'gospel,' literally meant 'good news,' but in its context it was good news of a particular type.  One could tell 'the gospel of Caesar,' which would extol his good works and the wonderful things that resulted from his reign.  This affected the way 1st Century people would have understood the phrase 'the Gospel of Jesus Christ.'  It did not mean 'Jesus died for our sins and rose again' to them.  That would be part of it, but not nearly all.  That is how most people understand the word 'Gospel.'  It's either the formula I mentioned or a reference to a genre of music.  In order to help people understand what 'gospel' originally meant, we must restate it.

Greg used an Ezra Pound quote to translate this need for restatement into the realm of art.  Pound said, "the artist's motto is 'make it new'."  The IT, said Greg, is something unchanging.  Great art is still working with the fundamental data of this world.  That statement resonates with me.  I see it in both Rembrandt and Picasso.  Sometimes they might come from vantage points I reject, but even if the images in a painting do not match the world I see in my eyes, I can understand the lens through which it is interpreted and thank God for the truth and beauty contained in the changing form.

Trinity Art Conference: The Aftermath

I've been back from Dallas for a couple of days now, and I'm still trying to sort out what I learned from the conference.  There are some practical things I learned about writing, as well as some specific things about the piece I took with me, but I'm still trying to figure out what I really learned.  What lessons about Christianity and the arts will stick with me?  I suppose I'll have to go over the notes I took for that.  Unfortunately, I take lousy notes.

Anyway, my notes may be lousy, but the conference itself was not.  I enjoyed pretty much everything, from the speakers, to the people, to the workshops, to the art show, to the music, etc.  The speakers were all engaging, covering the theme of change and the arts.  Again, I'll consult my notes and post on that later, but in the mean time you can check out the text of Andy Whitman's lecture at his blog (Razing the Bar) in this post.

Who is Andy Whitman, you ask?  Why, Andy is a music aficionado who writes for Paste Magazine, Christianity Today, and AllMusicGuide.com.  He loves music of nearly every sort, and he gave us a view of change from the critic's perspective, though he hates the term critic.  Andy was one of my favorite people at the conference, not because he spoke so well, but because I had a heckuva time just watching him enjoy the music at the show.  As the band played, Andy sat in his seat wearing a smile and moving to the music.  There was a look of true delight on his face, and he actually whooped a time or two.

What band was it that filled Andy Whitman with rapturous delight, you ask?  Why, Gretel, of course!  Gretel is a three-person band, made up of singer/songwriter/guitar player Reva Williams, bass player Phil DePertuis, and jill of all trades Melissa Myers.  And let me say, Andy was right to be delighted.  I was completely BLOWN AWAY by Gretel this past weekend.  Reva writes great lyrics, and her voice is powerful.  She is angsty and intense, while Melissa's back-up vocals are more gentle . . . angelic, if I may use the term.  Phil's voice is good as well, and he sings the third part in a few songs.  They are musically creative as well, and I will definitely make the effort to see them the next time they're in St. Louis.

The other three speakers were Greg Wolfe, Ann McCutchan, and Bruce Herman.  Winners all.  Hopefully I can write a bit about their lectures later.  I was really excited to get to work with Greg in the writers' workshop, but that didn't happen.  I wasn't able to shoehorn myself in during one of the sessions he attended.  I also tried to strike up a conversation with him, but that proved problematic as well.  No, he wasn't rude, it was just one of those situations where I couldn't come up with anything to say.  All I could do was ask him questions about literature, which exposed my ignorance on the subject.  He was perfectly friendly, but I couldn't get a good conversation going.  Alas, alack, a lump.

The upside to getting in on that last workshop was that we had a smaller group, so Ann McCutchan could spend more time focusing on individuals.  It wasn't a great deal of time, but it was better than it had been in the other workshops.  Ann was a lot of fun and she had plenty of helpful advice.  She writes creative non-fic, but she was perfectly capable of looking over my fiction.  I got the feeling she's read a novel or two.  The people from my workshop decided to give more detailed responses to all the work we brought, and Ann sent out an e-mail today saying that she was going to give a more detailed response as well.  That was exciting to me because for some reason I didn't think she was going to be involved in that.  She's a pro, after all, and a professor.  I figured she would be too busy, but I should have known that she wouldn't just blow us off after the conference.  She was too kind for that sort of thing.

Bruce Herman was the speaker I spent the least time with, though I did get to sit with him and a few others at the end of dinner one day.  I liked him a lot as a person, and I love his paintings.  I can't describe them properly, so just go to his website and check them out.  He's phenomenally talented, and he works hard at his craft.  Again, I can't really remember his lecture, so I'll have to check my terrible notes.

So the conference was well worth the money we paid for it.  Depending on our circumstances next year, I would love to go back.  The speakers will be different (except for maybe Greg Wolfe, as he's been there every year but one), but I know a lot of the same attendees will be, and they were also a part of what made the conference so great.  Friendly, creative people who love the Lord intensely.  How's that for a change?

Dallas Bound!!

Maybe we're fools, but the Duncan family, having just gotten home from West Virginia on Sunday, will be setting out for Dallas, TX on Thursday.  We are a band of strong-willed adventurers, a collection of travelers thirsty for a new challenge . . .

But not really.  We're closer to being homebodies than anything else, to be honest.  But hey, when a fella gets the chance to go to the Trinity Arts Conference  he does what he needs to do to get there.  

Yes, the famed Trinity Arts Conference takes place this very weekend!  I am getting pumped at the chance to get down there and have some people take a look at my work.  It's not like I'm going to come back with a book deal or anything.  I would have to have a novel that's closer to the finish line for that.  Plus, a publisher would have to read it, and that's about as likely as a publisher reading this post.  Anyway, I'm looking to get some good feedback from my fellow-writers at the conference.  Criticism is a good thing, and I haven't gotten enough of that in the past.

I'm taking the same piece of work to the conference that I read in my Christianity and Imagination class (The Brown Sisters).  It got positive comments there, and I really think I've improved it since then.  I've had some other folks take a look at it and gotten positive comments as well, but most of them have been family.  They're certainly willing to be critical, but I think the family connection will always color their views.  If I get good comments at the conference that will be big for me.  I am praying that this weekend will clear up a little bit of my future.  If writing is not to be in my future, hopefully I'll know that this weekend.

Pray for us as we make this trip, and pray for me that I will not be too wounded if my story is demolished or simply passed over without much comment!  If I get the chance I'll try to blog from the conference.

Thinking About the Future . . . Again

Today we'll be traveling from Huntington to Lewisburg to attend Mary Ann's sister's graduation from Med School.  Cari will soon be starting her internship across the river in Ashland, KY (if she hasn't started already--I'm not sure how that works).  This graduation, combined with my brother Aaron's ongoing attempt to get into the PhD program in Communications at Ohio U, has really made me think about my future.  I know, I know.  Posts about 'my future' comprise about two-thirds of the writing I do on here, but bear with me one more time.

Cari's finishing up her DO, Aaron's (hopefully) about to start a PhD.  I'm working on my MDiv, which is a good, comprehensive degree, but I still worry over the possibility of academic work.  Specifically, I worry that I won't get into a decent school.  I know God is in charge of what happens, but I also know that I'm a sinner who can easily mess things up.  God doesn't automatically remove the negative consequences of my sin, after all.  I have to battle that hardened habit of laziness that keeps me from really writing that excellent research paper, or studying hard for that test.

Even if I do conquer my lazy habits, what about the past?  I can no longer control that I did not go to a prestigious school.  I don't think that's a necessarily a killer problem, but if a guy with a degree from Duke and a guy with a degree from Tri-State Bible College are competing, the Duke guy has the edge.  I'm hoping to balance that out a bit with my GRE scores.  Aaron is my model there.  He really busted his butt and got the score he needed for his program and more.  I admire that, and I've already asked his advice on how to go about it.

I'm excited, though, because I'm going to take an independent study with Dr. Anthony Bradley in the spring.  He advised me to do this because he said the papers assigned in typical classes at CTS aren't designed to show doctoral potential.  He said that he took independent study courses to see if he had what it took, so that's what I'm going to do.  That means extra reading and writing, but I, along with Dr. Bradley, basically get to pick the topic.  Pretty cool.  If I can parlay that paper into a sparkling writing sample, I will have done all I can.

Where does this leave the fiction writing I've been harping on lately?  The same place its always been:  one of a few options.  I intend to keep pursuing fiction hard and also pursue PhD studies.  As Dad would say, you always need a back up plan.  But let's just ignore the fact that both of my plans are risky and have a high possibility of falling through.