catastrophes

It is true that Nietzsche, instead of driving me further into atheism, initiated me into the questions and doubts of premystical inspiration, which was to reach its glorious culmination in 1951 when I drew up my [Mystical] Manifesto . . . Nietzsche awoke in me the idea of God. Dali 1952

Dali as a surrealist developed his strange method of image portrayal by searching for images from beyond conscious human intellect: paranioac-criticism. This paranoid-critical method of painting was a deliberate detailed reproduction of subconscious images from dreams or spontaneous or self-induced delirium. I am strangely attracted to Dali's work ever since I saw some of his crucifx images and since visiting the Dali Universe exhibition in London. This picture is from a series entitled Catastrophes. For me these are a collision of ideas and Tolkien is very helpful.

... I coined the word 'eucatastrophe': the sudden happy turn in a story which pierces you with a joy that brings tears (which I argued it is the highest function of fairy-stories to produce). And I was there led to the view that it produces its peculiar effect because it is a sudden glimpse of Truth, your whole nature chained in material cause and effect, the chain of death, feels a sudden relief as if a major limb out of joint had suddenly snapped back. It perceives – if the story has literary 'truth' on the second plane (....) – that this is indeed how things really do work in the Great World for which our nature is made. And I concluded by saying that the Resurrection was the greatest 'eucatastrophe' possible in the greatest Fairy Story – and produces that essential emotion: Christian joy which produces tears because it is qualitatively so like sorrow, because it comes from those places where Joy and Sorrow are at one, reconciled, as selfishness and altruism are lost in Love.- The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, # 89 (7-8 November 1944).

The unnamed image is from Dali's series called Catastrophes. There is a certain sharpness and severity which is contained within a sense of being bracketed or put in parenthesis. When things go wrong for us and life is difficult perhaps to the point of almost unbearable what are we to do? Perhaps the secret is the act of putting things in parenthesis that catastrophe can become eucatastrophe. I can't date this image but at some point in time Dali's worldview changed and he found belief, faith, God (read more here). That doesn't mean Dali became a conformist or anything like that, but he was still pulling apart the world around him but with a greater sense of meaning. In his 1942 autobiography he is reported to have written :-

And what is heaven? Where is to be found? Heaven is to be found, neither above nor below, neither to the right nor to the left, heaven is to be found exactly in the centre of the bosom of the man who has faith! At this moment I do not yet have faith, and I fear I shall die without heaven.

By 1951 and the Mystical Manifesto Dali moved from artist depicting the existential angst of the absence of God to painter of signposts grabbing at the edges of perception and sensibility, the place where catastrophe and eucatastrophe meet: The place of Faith, Hope and Love

Sleeping alone

This last month I have been sharing bedrooms because of 1/people staying over at my place, 2/ national staff conference sharing a hotel room, and 3/ International Christmas sharing with four students in a bunk room.

It was this last Saturday night, actually 3 am Sunday morning I asked myself why I do this every year. I couldn't sleep because of snoring and other's noises. At 4 am I was wondering how I could get married so I only had to share with one other person whom I have got used to sleeping beside. I now have a huge envy for those who are married, they only have to share with one other.

I'm an introvert and being around others seems to cost me something, even when they're asleep. Being an organizer as well only accentuates the problem so little sounds become points of worry and due consideration whether action is needed or not. I'm introvert living in an extroverted or extrovert-normalized world, perhaps a quarter of the population. A book I'm reading to write a review, notes that introverts are among the most misunderstood and aggrieved groups... and they are not just misunderstood by extroverts but also by themselves because they've accepted the outgoing lens of society as the correct one.

Of course the grass is greener on the other side of the hill, but a change would be good?

Salvador Dali

Salvador Dali's The Temptation of St Anthony

Years ago I read The Life of Antony by Athanasius. A fascinating story of his struggles with himself and his desire to follow and be faithful to God. Antony/Anthony was the founder of Christian monasticism and asceticism

Dali reused a number of key themes from the history of art. The Temptation of St. Anthony is one used by some of the more fantasy-oriented Renaissance artists (e.g. Matthais Grunewald). In this version, the saint is walking through the desert when he is confronted with a number of temptations. The first a monstrous horse often a symbol of power or strength and them a number of elephants on stilt-like legs. There carry different temptations, including the golden cup of lust and perhaps symbols of greed. There are many Freudian interpretators out there but I find Athansius' biography more helpful. He was being tempted by "memories of his possessions, the guardianship of his sister, the bonds of kinship, love of money and of glory, the manifold pleasure of food, the relaxations of life , and finally, the rigor of virtue and how great the labor is that earns it...".

After two long conferences this month where my sleep patterns have been severely disrupted, I've just returned and slept 3.30pm Wednesday to 10.30 am Thursday. And last night I slept a further 10 hours. We all have our temptations to deal with and their desire to turn us from the path of virtue. They may not be the same but they come at us steadily and we struggle with each of them in turn.