User:Sherrilledwards/sandbox: Difference between revisions

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First, his central theological motif is that God is an ''artist''—a limited Creator doing the best he can. At the start of ''On God,'' Mailer says, “I see God, rather, as a Creator, as the greatest artist. I see human beings as His most developed artworks."{{sfn|Mailer|2007|p=5}} He draws, therefore, an analogy between the Creator and the creative artist—like Hemingway, James, Joyce, or himself. Second, Mailer recognizes that literary ''plot'' is a synecdoche for the larger search for meaning, religion being only one manifestation of that search. Just as Mailer is suspicious of a ''plot'' that is too contrived in a novel, so he is also wary of a ''faith'' in God that is too dogmatic, not sufficiently aware of the indeterminacy and chaos of existence.{{efn|“The reason I don’t like plots to prevail is that they don’t allow the figures in the book, the characters, to push their own limits to the point where they make the plot unacceptable and so throw the design into chaos."{{sfn|Mailer|2007|p=151}}}} Such fundamentalism misreads the nature of the world, keeping human beings infantile, even dog-like.{{efn|“The worst to be said about Fundamentalism is that it reduces people to the reflexes of a good dog. . . . No great writer ever came out of Fundamentalism, nor any great scientist."{{sfn|Mailer|2007|p=71-72}}}}

Mailer’s ''The Gospel According to the Son''{{sfn|Mailer|1997}} is an intriguing work. Rewriting the gospel in first person, he retells the story of Jesus, ''focalizing'' the inner thoughts of the Son of God. To call this narrative bold is an understatement, but the book is more successful than many critics allow. Here, implicitly comparing gospel and story, Jesus compares his account with the canonical gospels:

<blockquote>While I would not say that Mark’s gospel is false, it has much exaggeration. And I would offer less forMatthew, and for Luke and John, who gave me words I never uttered and described me as gentle when I was pale with rage. Their words were written many years after I was gone and only repeat what old men told them. Very old men. Such tales are to be leaned upon no more than a bush that tears free from its roots and blows about in the wind.{{sfn|Mailer|1997|p=3-4}}</blockquote>

=== Notes ===

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* {{cite book |last=Lucáks |first=George |date=1971 |title=The Theory of the Novel: A Historico-Philosophical Essay on the Forms of Great Literature|location=Trans. Anna Bostock. Cambridge |publisher=MIT Press |pages= |ref=harv }}

* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date=1991 |title=Harlot's Ghost: A Novel |location=New York |publisher=Random House |ref=harv }}

* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date=1997 |title=The Gospel According to the Son |location=New York |publisher=Random House |ref=harv }}

* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |author-mask=1|date=1991 |title=Harlot's Ghost: A Novel |location=New York |publisher=Random House |ref=harv }}

* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |author-mask=1|date=1948 |title=The Naked and the Dead |location=New York |publisher=Rinehart and Co. |ref=harv }}

@@ Line 103: / Line 103: @@
 First, his central theological motif is that God is an ''artist''—a limited Creator doing the best he can. At the start of ''On God,'' Mailer says, “I see God, rather, as a Creator, as the greatest artist. I see human beings as His most developed artworks."{{sfn|Mailer|2007|p=5}} He draws, therefore, an analogy between the Creator and the creative artist—like Hemingway, James, Joyce, or himself. Second, Mailer recognizes that literary ''plot'' is a synecdoche for the larger search for meaning, religion being only one manifestation of that search. Just as Mailer is suspicious of a ''plot'' that is too contrived in a novel, so he is also wary of a ''faith'' in God that is too dogmatic, not sufficiently aware of the indeterminacy and chaos of existence.{{efn|“The reason I don’t like plots to prevail is that they don’t allow the figures in the book, the characters, to push their own limits to the point where they make the plot unacceptable and so throw the design into chaos."{{sfn|Mailer|2007|p=151}}}} Such fundamentalism misreads the nature of the world, keeping human beings infantile, even dog-like.{{efn|“The worst to be said about Fundamentalism is that it reduces people to the reflexes of a good dog. . . . No great writer ever came out of Fundamentalism, nor any great scientist."{{sfn|Mailer|2007|p=71-72}}}}
+Mailer’s ''The Gospel According to the Son''{{sfn|Mailer|1997}} is an intriguing work. Rewriting the gospel in first person, he retells the story of Jesus, ''focalizing'' the inner thoughts of the Son of God. To call this narrative bold is an understatement, but the book is more successful than many critics allow. Here, implicitly comparing gospel and story, Jesus compares his account with the canonical gospels:
+<blockquote>While I would not say that Mark’s gospel is false, it has much exaggeration. And I would offer less forMatthew, and for Luke and John, who gave me words I never uttered and described me as gentle when I was pale with rage. Their words were written many years after I was gone and only repeat what old men told them. Very old men. Such tales are to be leaned upon no more than a bush that tears free from its roots and blows about in the wind.{{sfn|Mailer|1997|p=3-4}}</blockquote>
 === Notes ===
@@ Line 180: / Line 184: @@
 * {{cite book |last=Lucáks |first=George |date=1971 |title=The Theory of the Novel: A Historico-Philosophical Essay on the Forms of Great Literature|location=Trans. Anna Bostock. Cambridge |publisher=MIT Press |pages= |ref=harv }}
-* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date=1991 |title=Harlot's Ghost: A Novel |location=New York |publisher=Random House |ref=harv }}
+* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date=1997 |title=The Gospel According to the Son |location=New York |publisher=Random House |ref=harv }}
+* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |author-mask=1|date=1991 |title=Harlot's Ghost: A Novel |location=New York |publisher=Random House |ref=harv }}
 * {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |author-mask=1|date=1948 |title=The Naked and the Dead |location=New York |publisher=Rinehart and Co. |ref=harv }}