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Education for Eternity

English Quotes

Cracroft, Richard H.

"Seeking 'the Good, the Pure, the Elevating': A Short History of Mormon Fiction." Part 1: Ensign, June 1981, pp. 56-62. Part 2: Ensign, July 1981, pp. 56-61.

The message of Mormon fiction, while inevitably moral, as is most fiction, need not be painfully blatant. Many of the sweetest messages of life are subtle, and the important messages of truth which LDS fiction will be charged to carry can be aimed at readers schooled in reading well-crafted fiction, at readers who rejoice in the elevating message as subtly suggested through skillful character development, dialogue, setting, symbolism, metaphor, and language. Well-written literature challenges the reader to read to understand--not simply to dismiss--to prove the message, dark or light, and to ponder the implications of his or her new insights. Good fiction thus calls for good readers.

The faith of the Latter-day Saints, regardless of individual literary sophistication, will continue to urge us to seek, in Nephi Anderson's words, "The good, the pure, the elevating." Our faith makes a difference in our vision, for the Latter-day Saint writer and reader works--and reads--on the assumption that man, child of God hard at work on becoming a man or woman of God, is engaged in a serious yet joyful drama, the outcome of which shapes his or her eternal well-being.

The Latter-day Saint, charged to see all things as spiritual, will therefore insist upon a literature which celebrates that drama, a literature which celebrates men and women who learn--through trial and error--the good and great and eternal values. Thus, the Latter-day Saint will continue to believe that literature should celebrate, directly or indirectly, the Creator and Source of such values and wisdom, particularly in a world where those values are increasingly threatened by Satanic forces. (Ensign, July 1981, p. 61)

"Attuning the Authentic Mormon Voice: Stemming the Sophic Tide in LDS Literature." The Association for Mormon Letters, Vol. 1, 1994, pp. 34-43.

If we who are Mormon writers, critics, and publishers wish to speak to the Saints, we must speak to them through LDS metaphors. We cannot dismiss or belittle or patronize them merely because we have supplanted their metaphors or because they refuse to set their familiar metaphors aside. This people deserves a literature grounded in Mormon metaphors, exuding their essences, mirroring their dualistic world, establishing their vision of themselves as pilgrims wandering by faith across a twilit stage, buffeted by the forces of evil, seeking the forces of good, and wondering at the shadows and ambiguities to be found between these bewildering parentheses in eternity. Again, the very stuff of literature. (p. 37)

. . .

As Latter-day Saints read the literature of doubt and dissonance so often applauded by Mormon critics and the Association for Mormon Letters, they register dismay on reading short stories, novels, poetry, and drama which fail to reflect a Mormon worldview with which they can identify. Such a literature of shock, supported by justifying criticism continues to create a gap of distrust between critic and reader. Repeatedly, Latter-day Saints positioned at the center of the Mormon experience must put down the latest Mormon novel or collection of poetry and sigh with J. Alfred Prufrock, "That is not it at all,/That is not what I meant, at all." (p. 38)

. . .

The challenge to the LDS writer who desires to touch the lives of his or her people is to write honestly and well, from within this frame of shared belief in the vision of the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and to probe the lives of faithful men and women confronting a sophic society, a difficult world, and a self which seems ever to fall short of achieving the ideal. How much better does anyone accept direction and challenge from one who understands, empathizes, shares--and believes! (p. 40)

England, G. Eugene.

"The Dawning of a Brighter Day: Mormon Literature After 150 Years." BYU Studies 22(2), Spring 1982, pp. 131-60.

I ask you to consider the following: Mormonism is a genuine religious movement, with persistent and characteristic religious and cultural experiences growing out of a unique and coherent theology and a true and thus powerful mythic vision, and it has already produced and is producing the kinds and quality of literature that such experiences and vision might be expected to produce; it is, in fact, right now enjoying a kind of bright dawning, if not a flowering then certainly a profuse and lovely budding, in its literary history. (p. 131)

. . .

The only way to the universal is through the particular. The only honesty, ultimately, is honesty to that which we know in our own bones and blood and spirit, our own land and faith, our own doubts and battles and victories and defeats. Mormonism cannot be separated from these things because, unlike religions such as Lutheranism or Christian Science, it makes a large number of rather absolute claims about the nature of the universe and God and human beings, about specific historical events, past and future, about language and form and content--and because it is grounded in a sufficiently unusual and cohesive and extended historical and cultural experience growing directly from those claims that it has become like a nation, an ethnic culture as well as a religion. We can speak of a Mormon literature at least as surely as we can of a Jewish or Southern literature. (pp. 133-134)

. . .

The dangers of mixing religion and art are clear and present--from both sides. Literature is not a substitute for religion and making it such is a sure road to hell; and just as surely religious authority is no substitute for honest literary perception and judgment--and didactic, apologetic, or sentimental writing, however "true" in some literal sense, is no substitute for real literature in its power to grasp and change. In the direction of such sentimentalism lies spiritual suicide. We must stop rewarding the "pious trash," as Flannery O'Connor called much Catholic literature--a phrase that well describes much of our own; and we must, on the other hand, also stop awarding prizes to those stories which, for instance, in reaching for unearned maturity, use sexual explicitness or sophomoric skepticism as faddish, but phony, symbols of intellectual and moral sophistication and freedom. (pp. 155-156)

Holland, Jeffrey R.

"Some Humane Thoughts from the Humanities." Address given to the BYU College of Humanities, October 21, 1993.

I submit that part of the blessing of your study in the humanities at BYU is not only to make things clear in your mind but to invite you to some sense of what you are to do, what ideas you are willing to live and die for. Some of the art you enjoy and the poetry you read and the music you listen to, to the extent it is true and beautiful, you must master and, as Kierkegaard said, "take it up into your life" to be part of your trusting devotion. On this campus you have a great standard by which to judge those ideas that really are worth living and dying for, and measured against gospel standards you ought to long for the good and virtuous in your life "as the African desert thirsts for water." (pp. 4-5)

A great poem, a classic novel, a brilliant piece of music, a superb work of art, forces itself upon us. They locate themselves in "the strong places of our consciousness." They work upon our imagination and desires, upon our ambitions, and upon our dreams. Men who burn books know what they're doing. Books are very powerful things.

Those who have read book XXIV of the Iliad--the night meeting of Priam and Achilles--or the chapter in The Brothers K where Alyosha Karamazov kneels before the stars, or who have descended and ascended with Dante and have not altered their views of their own life, have not in some subtle manner looked differently on the room in which they live or on those who knock at the door, have read only with "the blindness of physical sight." Anyone who has read Kafka's "Metamorphosis" and can still look into the mirror unflinchingly may technically be able to read print but is illiterate in the sense that really matters. (p. 5)

Jorgensen, Bruce W.

"To Tell and Hear Stories: Let the Stranger Say." The Association for Mormon Letters, Vol. 1, 1994, pp. 19-33.

As readers, perhaps especially as readers in the formal role of critics, I suggest, we often too quickly judge the stranger by her language--her speech bewrayeth her as "not one of us" (what else?)--before we hear her story. Perhaps especially male guardians or priests, charged as we feel we are with the purity of the city, sniff the odor of contamination so quickly as to reject the gift the stranger may bring, or withhold the gift the stranger may need of us. (p. 24)

. . .

Christian imagination chooses to be the antithesis of Socratic imagination: where the Greek will ascend, will fly every possible contamination in order to keep the city of pure soul well-governed and sterile, the radical Jew dives to the bottom to seize the root of our cruelty and sorrow, to search out the venom that festers our wounds and thus begins to heal us. To do that, Christian imagination risks hearing our voices, the voices of all the others; "alternate voices" if you like, voices speaking by turns. (p. 26)

. . .

Maybe the idea of "criticism" itself, of a crisis in which we have to decide, is the problem; we are to "receive" and "hear" before we judge. Hospitable reading would be slow to shut out. It would be slow to decide whether a literary visitor is "Mormon" or not, especially slow to gauge this by some presumed "doctrinal" criterion or some elusive metaphysical or "essential" notion of "spirituality." (p. 27)

King, Arthur Henry

"The Discipline of the Mother Tongue." Last Lecture Series 1971-1972. Provo, UT: ASBYU Academics, 1972: 61-72.

The whole of our life has to be creative. There is no such thing apart as 'creative literature' from this point of view. Whatever you write, may be creative or not creative, according to your testimony. Either we live creative lives in which we speak creatively, or we live uncreative lives in which we do not speak creatively. And from the whole of the society in which we live there is tremendous pressure on us to live uncreatively, to live without effort, to live passively, to enjoy ourselves at the least expense. These are the major drugs of society. Drugs are to be defined, not fundamentally as things that do you "physical" harm--because it may be possible to invent drugs that do not do you physical harm--but as things that do you mental and moral harm. All of us in this room are taking drugs to some extent. These are the influences in our society which prevent us from living vigilantly, vitally, creatively, and therefore speaking, and writing and reading creatively. There is only one ultimate defense, and that is the gospel. (p. 65)

. . .

There is always a link between how a man lives and how he writes. (p. 65)

. . .

We have to remember that when we consider letter-writing or speech as good, there is a preliminary criterion for their goodness, and that is sincerity; everything else is hypocrisy . . . Out goes preciosity, out goes affectation, out goes all intent to write well, because to attempt consciously to write well means to fail. Writing well comes from living well, working hard and reading good books. That is why I do not believe in classes in creative writing. I do not think that people can be taught other than in a very elementary sense, to write. They can be exposed to good writing, be taught better how to read it, be released into fluent speech, be encouraged to write as they speak. In many respects, good education is the result of learning skills. But in the respect of sincerity, good writing and good reading are the result of good living, not the other way around. (p. 70)

. . .

There is an old traditional idea that there is an intimate link between our quality as a man or a woman and the quality of what we say or of what we write. (p. 71)

"The Child is Father of the Man." BYU Studies 16(4), Summer 1976, pp. 603-625.

I could go on to talk about the greatest of writers and to suggest that that is what we do well to be accompanied by--the greatest of writers. There is no time for inferior writing. There is no time indeed for grumbling about how bad literature is when what we are basing the grumbling on is bad literature. The great thing about great literature is that the greater it is, the greater the scriptures are to us, as a result of reading it. Why? Because the scriptures are even greater. We have a different sense of dimension when we know great literature and its part in our lives. Where Lear ends, Job begins. Where Lear ends, the Prodigal Son begins; and so on. Our testimony of the scriptures, our sensitivity to the scriptures is inordinately assisted by our experience with the greatest literature, and I mean the greatest literature. No one can find that great literature is contrary to the gospel. When I say great literature, I mean Homer, I mean Vergil, I mean Dante, I mean Shakespeare, I mean Goethe, and Goethe was a bit doubtful still when I was a boy. It takes a long time for this to grow. Now I am convinced of Goethe. Eliot, too, spent a lifetime before being convinced of Goethe, and I think his convincement was formal. Mine, I assure you, was genuine. The whole of our literature in Europe and the United States and anywhere else in the West since Goethe is Goethe's aftermath, just as the whole of Greek literature was Homer's aftermath, and the whole of the great period of English literature was Shakespeare's aftermath, and Italian literature is still Dante's aftermath. We can't expect (publishers would like to see it every week) great literature more than once every few hundred years at its greatest height. And what's the good of reading modern trash when we've left Goethe and Shakespeare and Dante and Homer and Vergil unread? And I assure you that even in translation they are greater than the other things. That's all I have time to say--my testimony of the value and place of great literature. Now, don't get me wrong, even the greatest of literature doesn't always tell the truth. Only the scripture always tells the truth. Only the scripture is inspired in that way; but unless you are familiar with great literature, you are missing something--missing something that could help the gospel, can help your own soul and can help you realize: what? What I said just now and will repeat: how great, how ineffably great the scriptures are.

"Finding Ourselves in Our Tradition," "Judgment in Literature and Life," "Moral Significance in Anglo-American Literature," "Total Language," "Rhetoric," "Style in Shakespeare," and "Joseph Smith As A Writer." In The Abundance of the Heart. Salt Lake City, UT: Bookcraft, 1986.

If we are going to be able to live with sufficient vitality and richness in this world, we have to find our way about in that three or four thousand years [of the world's history]. That means knowing dates and places in order to have a frame of reference built in one's brain for the history of civilization. A child should know where most countries and the most important cities in those countries are; and a child should know the most important dates. It is a grind to acquire those things, but one should acquire them. Yet the dates and the places do not count in themselves. They are merely a framework for us to use in order that we may build up our birthright for ourselves. . . . The point is, we have this remarkable birthright to which we have been born: the true documents and art of the past. (p. 92)

. . .

The concept of tradition is one which in our church we should understand well, because it is deeply linked with our genealogical work and our genealogical doctrine: the turning of the hearts of the fathers to the children and the children to the fathers. As we move forward in life, there is not only the whole tradition of our own lives behind us that we should not lose or forget, but also the whole tradition of our ancestors going back to Adam. And one of the major reasons why we need to find out as much as we can about our ancestors is so that we may interpret ourselves through them. Genealogy is important because our families are the extension of ourselves back infinitely and forward infinitely. It is by virtue of them that we are individuals. We do not act alone. The antecedents of our actions go back to our ancestors--what they have done, what they have passed on to us in the way of sin and in the way of virtue. And the consequences of our actions go forward to our descendants. Both the antecedents and the consequences are, in fact, eternal--there is no beginning and there is no end to our actions. That is why we have to thank our ancestors (that is one side of it) and to forgive them (that is the other side of it); and why our children will have to thank us and forgive us. (p. 93)

. . .

Reading good literature makes us more capable of understanding other people, of loving other people, those whom we don't particularly want to love, even our enemies--literature is one of the ways which we can learn to love our enemies, as well as those closest to us. (p. 99)

. . .

I had a Mormon once say to me, "Well, you know, it is a good idea to forget your religion sometimes and just relax." What kind of blasphemous nonsense is that? We must know in our church that to spend our time reading what is called "pure" entertainment when we have the opportunity of reading something of spiritual value is a sin, a plain sin. It always sinful to do less well than we could. But too often we live or lives as if we were ignoring that fact. (p. 101)

. . .

Even the greatest of art, of course, doesn't always tell the truth. Only scripture always tells the truth. Only scripture is inspired in that way. But unless we are familiar with great art, we are missing something that can help our own souls, because in great art, as in the scriptures, we may find power which enables us to live better. This is not a matter of highfalutin culture at all. It is a matter of the whole quality of life we lead, minute by minute. Either we can look at the universe in the way of the greatest of art, or we look at it in a very dull light indeed. The difference is as great as that between a day with sunlight and a day without sunlight. (p. 103)

. . .

All major cultures in the world have seen art as the assistant of religion. This is true wherever you go in the world, and into whatever art you go. The Hebraic tradition, the Greek tradition, the Latin tradition, and the Oriental tradition are all concerned with the use of the spoken and written word as a means of improvement, as a means of education, as a means of teaching. Our own Anglo-American literature is deeply religious and deeply Christian in the sense that it helps us understand what gospel principles mean. (p. 139)

. . .

The language of religion has from the beginning been the language of the total man, the most profound and widespread rhetorical language with the maximum amount of effect. The truths we find in the scriptures are not couched in the prose appropriate to a scientist announcing a discovery to the world for the first time and trying to persuade other people to believe it. The language of the scriptures is the language of and to the whole man; and by that, I mean language which appeals to the whole man--language which is there, not simply to give us plain sense . . . but to back up that plain sense with an appeal, couched in emotive language, that enables us to feel the truth and exhorts us to follow the truth. (p. 164, 165)

. . .

The scriptures ask us to be different, not to think different. That is what conversion is about. We can be intellectually converted without being converted at all. The scriptures are written in the language of the whole man in order that man might liken them unto himself, to feel, to see with the inner eye, to be made whole. (p. 165)

. . .

The scriptures can teach us wisdom . . . if they were merely an abstract set of principles, they would teach us only inoperable rationality. (p. 165)

. . .

My Shakespeare classes sometimes get into trouble because they try to find out what reactions I want them to have. I don't want them to have any particular reactions. I want them to have their own, nobody else's. They expect to be taught how to respond. I can't teach anybody how to respond. I ought not to. A great deal of damage is done by people who say, "You ought to respond to a thing in this or that way." It is a satanic job to do that. What I can teach people, and what anybody else can teach them, is techniques by which they can discipline their own responses: ways for them to find out more about the work before them, so that their experience of it may be a more profound one. (p. 168)

. . .

We, for the most part, have lost the learning of language as a totality; and insofar as we have lost it, we have lost the power not simply to read the great classics, but also to read the scriptures. Learning to read the scriptures and learning to read the classics are much the same kind of activity, because the scriptures and the rhetorical figures are more stressed in Greek literature and others more stressed in Hebrew literature, the fact remains that the use of rhetorical figures is very similar. (p. 171)

. . .

When I talk about a rhetorical approach to the scriptures and great literature, I am always thinking about an approach which is helping us to understand the meaning; and I am using that word meaning in its fullest sense--the full amount of content that we can get from a passage, including that which is revealed by the voice. (p. 172)

Lambert, Neal E., and Richard H. Cracroft, eds.

Twenty-two Young Mormon Writers. (Provo, UT: Communications Workshop, 1975).

The young writer is often torn between what he knows is being published and praised and what he may feel that he wants to write. He is afraid on the one hand of fashionable nihilism and on the other hand of simple-minded optimism. If the end of his narrative shows hopelessness, the writer may feel he has betrayed his faith; if the end overcomes all difficulties, he may feel he has been untrue to his art. Indeed some have suggested that because of his dichotomy no Mormon will produce significant art, that either he will be a good Mormon or a good artist, but not both. Such a view misses the mark. Nothing could be further from the truth.

As we suggested in the beginning, art is the expression of significant human experience. If the divine anthropology of Mormonism could be realized in written words, the product might well be counted among the most significant literary expressions of our time. From Dante to T. S. Eliot, great writers have found their faith the sine qua non of their art. The same is true for the struggling Mormon writer. This is not to suggest that Mormon art should become nothing more than the bearing of one's "testimony." It is to suggest that whatever is written, if it is ultimately to succeed, must be informed by that faith. The writer need not forget that he must sweat for his bread, that he will be afflicted and tormented. But at the same time he must never assume that the sweat and affliction are the ends of his existence. (pp. 12-13)

Owen, Carolyn G.

"The Real Writing Process; Or, What I Will Tell My Writing Students If I'm Being Honest." Proceedings of the Third Annual Laying the Foundations Symposium (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University, 1993), pp. 31-38.

Figs do not grow on thistles, or grapes on berry bushes. So I've persistently made the connection: though not all good people write well--even a saint may need his handbook--good writing is done by good people. (pp. 31-32)

. . .

There are two ways we can read a book for book learning. We can read it for information: for data, facts, instructions, explanations--for knowledge. With the Spirit, we can read it for wisdom; but the wisdom is not in the book, it is in the Spirit; and from the Spirit--through the author of the book--it reaches us. A book is like a cloud chamber; it is like the record of an encounter, where the Spirit has come with creative influence and left its tracks. The Spirit always wishes to return to impress the reader also, spirit speaking to spirit, but sometimes there is no reception: the reader is learning by study; the facts are enough for her. (p. 34)

. . .

We know enough about the old prophets to know that it won't do to covet someone else's mission. Do we hear Lehi saying, "I don't want to be Lehi. I don't want to be a voice from the dust. It's not my genre. I'm an elegiac poet. I want to stay here and be Jeremiah and write laments"? The sharp point is that God will tell us whether we are Lehi or Jeremiah and God knows. What we are, by virtue of our baptisms (by water and by fire) is not writers at all but servants of God, who may serve him best by writing, if our writing reflects the fullness of the gospel and not the familiar partial understanding the world has always had and finds comfortable. The magnificence of our gifts suggests that our mission cannot be simply to rehearse, revise, or replace the masterpieces of the past. Instead of replanting literary seeds already sown by hands commissioned to do it, it may be our part to harvest and gather in "the best fruits of mind and spirit," and prepare a banquet. "Above all things, we must be original," says Orson Whitney. "Our mission is diverse from all others; our literature must be also." (p. 36)

. . .

Supposing that I am teaching writing to Zion students at a Zion school, this is what I will tell them if I am being honest: (1) The real writing process is a process of inspiration, to an open, inquiring, informed, and faithful mind. (2) The inspirator, or muse, of all good and true literature is the Holy Ghost. He is a literal partner. (3) Intellect is a mental faculty; intelligence is a spiritual gift. Cultivate intellect; deserve the gift of intelligence. Never despise either. (4) As a spiritual gift, intelligence is a function of righteousness, not of how many books you have read. (5) The proper use of books is to get knowledge and, through the Spirit, wisdom. Read them intelligently. (6) Heaven has endowed you with gifts. You have unusual literary obligations, but unique tools to meet them. Use them to create a celestial literature. Work to discover what that means. (p. 37)

Tanner, Stephen L.

"Spiritual Problems in the Teaching of Modern Literature." Dialogue 4(4), Winter 1969, pp. 29-38.

The Mormon teacher of modern literature must understand the full implications of the fundamental incompatibility of literary modernism and his theology; and then, without distorting the literature or compromising his theological beliefs, he should be able to abstract from the literature, through a process of sifting and winnowing, what is beautiful, enlightening, true, and significant or enriching to human experience. For despite the basic conflict between our religion and modern literature, the latter still possesses such qualities, sometimes to a rather remarkable degree. (p. 32)

. . .

One justification for a Mormon's studying modern literature is that such a study produces understanding, which in turn, produces the power to influence for good. To ignore or reject modern literature because of regrettably frequent instances of nihilism, atheism, and obscenity is to lose the benefit of the largest body of revealing confessional literature since the Renaissance, a literature which quite accurately reflects the dominant attitudes and values of the people of our world. (p. 33)

"The Moral Measure of Literature." BYU Studies 21(3), Summer 1981, pp. 279-289.

Whatever its causes, the reluctance of modern criticism to take moral evaluation seriously creates tension within the Mormon critic. Becoming skilled in the methods of twentieth-century criticism and at the same time devoutly maintaining one's religious beliefs can be an unsettling process. I have found myself at times feeling a little embarrassed and apologetic about my moral preoccupations when responding to literature as a teacher or critic. I suspect that others of my generation who were trained under the influence of the New Criticism have experience the same ambivalence. (p. 283)

. . .

If there be any conclusion to be drawn from the history of literature, it is that the writer of stories must teach whether he wishes to teach or not; his very denial of the pertinence of the moral law to literature becomes, in practice, inevitably a form of teaching. The fact is that ethics and aesthetics are inseparable in literature. Or, more precisely, just in proportion as the practice or criticism of literary art becomes superficial, ethics and aesthetics tend to fall apart, whereas just in proportion as such practice or criticism strikes deeper, ethics and aesthetics are more and more implicated one in the other until they lose their distinction in a common root. What I wish to assert is summarized in this fundamental syllogism: Literature cannot be separated from life, and life cannot be separated from moral concerns; therefore, moral concerns must have a primary role in the understanding and appreciation of literature. (p. 283)

Williams, Camille S.

"What Shouldn't We Read?" This People 16(2), Summer 1995, pp. 18-25.

Much of English and American literature reflects the Christian tradition. But during the past century, many of our best authors seem to have lost their faith in God and in humankind. Stories once linked human suffering to breaking God's commandments or to the burdens of mortality. That link provided a meaningful way of interpreting our experiences in this world. For many who cannot perceive God in our world, human experience resembles the luck of the draw. Human relationships are reduced to biological and social necessities. Without the loving presence of a common Father, many current stories sever our bonds with others, destroy our obligations to each other. In these stories there are no champions strong and selfless. Most characters are small and selfish and emotionally distant from others. Life just happens. Human relationships are fleeting, deceptive, self-interested. Whatever.

. . . A constant focus on human failure is not an accurate picture of the world in which we live. Worse, it is harmful. It distorts perception. It stunts potential. And above all else, it promotes despair. (p. 18, 20)

. . .

Shortly after finishing my master's degree, a question from my bishop led me to rethink my reading habits. "Is there anything in your life that isn't in accordance with the gospel?" he asked. Well, I explained, as part of a research project on women's issues I was reading a feminist book that included excerpts from novels that most people would consider obscene. I quickly assured him I wasn't enjoying it, but could not intelligently research the topic without reading that book. He signed the temple recommend and gave me some advice: don't use research as an excuse to read things you know you shouldn't.

There is merit in closing a book that makes us feel ashamed to be reading it. Content likely to prick the conscience includes for most of us minute descriptions of sex acts, or extensive passages depicting violence or cruelty. When we ask "Why am I reading this?" we ought to consider not only the incidents that drive the plot, but also the techniques used to elicit reader response. (p. 20)