Marginalia — The Faith and Literature Debate (cont.'d) …

… Everything That Rises - Criticism, Not Committee Work. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

… Greg is having an argument with himself, not with me, or Dana Gioia, or anybody else. He wonders why certain kinds of literature, and certain books, have been ruled out of the discussion; identifies the sense of absence as part of the postmodern condition; calls what’s left of the argument “declinism” and “nostalgia,” and nostalgia for greats like Flannery O’Connor and C.S. Lewis in particular; confesses that he has heard “the siren song of declinism” himself, felt “the temptation to believe that we live in an era of exhaustion”; and against it affirms the value of an “incarnational” art as represented by artists who “struggle with faith,” such as Cormac McCarthy and Bruce Springsteen.

Cormac McCarthy? Bruce Springsteen?

Well, that caught y attention. So I went and checked out Wolfe's essay and yes, lo and behold, he does say:

… any cultured person’s “Top Ten” lists of greatest living artists would contain world-class artists of faith or those who grapple with faith: Marilynne Robinson and Cormac McCarthy in fiction, Sir Geoffrey Hill and Nobel Laureate Tomas Tranströmer in poetry, Richard Rodriguez and Annie Dillard in nonfiction, Arvo Paert in classical music, Bruce Springsteen and U2 and others in popular music, and so forth.

That's a mixed bag, for sure. But mostly a good one, actually. I think Marilynne Robinson is spottier than her admirers do. And if McCarthy is grappling with faith, it's in a mud pit of overwriting. As for Springsteen, he is to rock what Meryl Streep is to acting: a master impersonator. Even the faith is an impression.

… the very basis for that “incarnational” view is questioned from moment to moment in people’s lives, and that there is real, fiction-ready drama in this: in people asking themselves and each other, from moment to moment, whether the Christian scheme is true or false, salvific or the big lie.

I think this is a point of seismic magnitude in this debate. These are the things St. Paul said we should think on, and that thinking has to be as honest as one can make it. What exactly does what I profess faith in imply?  The metaphors need to be examined and considered, not in terms of what we've been told about them, but on their own terms. Metaphor is an algebra. It's equations need to be solved also.  And all this must be done in light of a question pertinent to oneself: Who exactly am I?