There is one story and story only
That will prove worth your telling,
Whether as learned bard or gifted
child
To it all lines or lesser gauds
belong
That startle with their shining
Such common stories as they stray into.
—Robert Graves, “To Juan, at the Winter Solstice”
It all begins with the stories. As a child I soaked up the
stories that surrounded me, a happy sponge in a sea of tales. I was blessed
that master storytellers loved me enough to spout forth narratives whenever I
wanted. And I wanted a lot. The more I heard, the more I yearned to experience
the other side of the process. My desire to tell stories germinated in my
grandmother’s telling of Little Red Riding Hood and my mother’s gift of The
Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. Yet while I rejoiced in the majesty and
power of great fiction, my deepest pleasure came in my family reading me
History.
I do not wish to slight made-up stories — from space opera
to classic mysteries, from comedies of manners to literary novels, all fiction
allows us to imagine the world as it could be. However, History strives to
describe the world as it is — the things that actually happened, in their own
context, with occasional asides into possible meanings for us in the present.
I revel in History; but prior to today I existed as a dry
sponge, ever soaking up without spewing forth. Every would-be historian faces
the trial of faith that transforms the absorbent sponge to the cascading
fountain. This blog, for me, begins the turning of the spigot which will hopefully
water the fields of scholarship.
I think I have picked a good day to start. Lughansa started
earlier today; the Celtic festival that inaugurates harvest, it celebrates the
bounty of the earth and the fruits of prior sowing. I love the imagery of harvest
— the bent laborers, the flashing scythes, the stacked sheaves. Sheaves
traditionally represent the rewards of reaping; in antiquity the high hills and
sacred springs of Lugh received the first stalks shorn from the fields as a
thank-offering and prayer for the harvest to come. Máire MacNeill
notes some of the traditional rituals:
[A] solemn cutting of the first of
the corn of which an offering would be made to the deity by bringing it up to a
high place and burying it; a meal of the new food and of bilberries[1]of
which everyone must partake; a sacrifice of a sacred bull, a feast of its
flesh, with some ceremony involving its hide, and its replacement by a young
bull; a ritual dance-play perhaps telling of a struggle for a goddess and a
ritual fight; an installation of a head on top of the hill and a triumphing
over it by an actor impersonating Lugh; another play representing the
confinement by Lugh of the monster blight or famine; a three-day celebration
presided over by the brilliant young god or his human representative. Finally,
a ceremony indicating that the interregnum was over, and the chief god in his
right place again[2]
Centuries later, Christ replaced Lugh in the devotions. One
of my favorite hymns evokes the joy of starting to harvest:
Sowing in the morning, sowing seeds of kindness,
Sowing in the noontide and the dewy eve;
Waiting for the harvest, and the time of reaping,
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves.
Sowing in the sunshine, sowing in the shadows,
Fearing neither clouds nor winter's chilling breeze;
By and by the harvest, and the labor ended,
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves.
Bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves,
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves
Bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves.[3]
I seek to draw upon that Spirit of favorable augury and
joyous commencement as I embark on my study of Paideia in a public
forum. One possible definition of Paideia is the stories that we tell
each other to form ourselves into better human beings. I hope that all who read
and comment here will be improved by the experience. Lest this all sounds too
high-minded, I write mainly for myself, to strengthen the quality of my prose and
to enhance the clarity of my thoughts. As E.M. Forester said, “How can I tell
what I think till I see what I say?”[4]
This will be an adventure. I will undoubtedly make errors of
judgment, mistakes of haste and fallacies of logic, to say nothing of my own
biased, bigoted opinions. I am human. I ask forgiveness in advance for any of
the above that may be found here. But as a human I labor to become something
more than the sum of my fleshy, fallible parts. Seeking after Paideia
means transcending our current state of affairs and journeying towards an
Ideal, Holy existence.
May the Divine Bard Sing in me to that end — the filling of
all souls with the Sound of the Voice and the Wonder of the Story.
Spencer C. Woolley
[2] MacNeill, Máire. The Festival of
Lughnasa: A Study of the Survival of the Celtic Festival of the Beginning of
Harvest. Oxford University Press, 1962. p.426
[3]The dry reading of the words hardly
conveys the actual spirit of the song. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo-Yz5LOET4
A Mormon Tabernacle Choir rendition with somewhat overwrought visuals.
[4] Forster, E. M. 1976. Ed. Stallybrass,
Oliver. Aspects of the Novel. Harmondsworth: Penguin. p.99
