A Straightjacket of Story

This week I had my first ever direct exposure to Doctor Who. For the record, I thought it was great, but that isn't why I'm writing this time.

My mind seems to work by way of parallels, metaphors, similarities and common threads. And while noting the way a long-running serial works, I realised that the management of the brethren as an organisation is in many ways the same. The Brethren - new series! Where will the twists be this time around? Will the audience still be enthralled, or will they drift away?

No, seriously.

As I understand it, a show like Doctor Who (or, say, Star Trek for something equally long-lived) is big enough that it needs quite a large team to make it work. Also, at least in the case of my prime example, there is one person where the buck stops, and who gets to say what goes. Other people may do a lot of the writing, but it must fit into the top person's structure. It is the Creative Director's personal universe. If that sounds familiar in any way, you may see where I'm going with this.

In a similar way, a new person was recently employed to write a new James Bond novel. Imagine the sense of power, being that person. Finally (assuming the person is a fan), you get to say what goes. If some detail has always annoyed you, then zap! that detail need no longer exist. James Bond is now a chivalrous teetotaller who has a clear understanding of the importance of a clear command structure and proper bureaucracy.

But there's a problem. In any of these types of scenarios, the all-powerful creator of story is not operating in isolation. There is an audience, and that audience has some kind of investment in the history and workings of the narrative universe. They will want something new, if the genre is not completely fossilised, but it must not be at the expense of the structure already in place ... and for any long-running story, that structure will have a lot of detail, many tangles. Some untouchable pillars, but also a whole load of "just stuff" that makes it what it is. As a story-writer in such a situation, complete freedom is not what it sounds like.

Yes, you can make changes. But major changes will need a lot of work within the story: something that happened earlier must be revealed to be a mistake, a dream, presented wrongly for some reason first time round, or some reason must be found for the change that doesn't insult the intelligence of people who value the story. Small things may be glossed over, but people have a deep need for even trivial things to somehow make sense, and contradictions will weaken their hold on the story by making it easy to dismiss. And how many such changes could be made without fatally weakening the story structure by mocking its past?

What I'm saying, which is probably obvious by now, is that while I've often thought of the brethren as a kind of creature, this week it has occurred to me that the system is just as much of a narrative. A long-running serial, handed over from team to team and head writer to head writer, always with the body of the brethren as the long-term audience. The kind of things that finally led me to lose patience with even pretending I could believe in it were just plot twists that were too sudden as the new team let the continuity slip. I give them some credit - they're trying to drag the story into the modern age - but it's a tough task doing that while keeping an audience on board who have certain expectations, and I think they're struggling.

Favourite Book given low marks

I've just been looking for something light to watch while winding down (something has hit me hard in the last few days, I don't know what, and drained me of energy), and happened upon a show where the host finds out things that his guest has never experienced and makes sure they do - always something very popular or well-known that the person has avoided or missed out on. It's called "I've never seen Star Wars", which gives the flavour.

Anyway, the guest in the chair this time was very well read, and was familiar with most of the books on the show's list, and so they ended up discussing one of the two options she hadn't previously read, which happens to be one of my all-time favourites. And neither of them liked it at all, or understood it!

The book in question: The Satanic Verses.

Now, is it my background that makes me love this book so much? After all, I remember when I first read it, in the sixth-form library (probably mostly when I should have been at lessons), and the disappointment then when the teachers and the woman in charge of the library both dismissed it as nowhere near as good as Salman Rushdie's other books. They didn't seem to "get" it, either. I have wondered since whether you need to have experienced both an insistence on religion and an awakening of personal thoughts to appreciate it, and today's discussion kind of confirmed that. Obviously the religious people who read the book and hated it enough to wish the author dead realised what it was all about, yet these intelligent and educated people on the TV had so little clue that they were reduced to finding the book's synopsis on Wikipedia so as to be able to say anything about it. I could hardly believe it.

Very definitely The Satanic Verses is a heretic's book. The aim of it, it seems to me, is to explore the consequences of doubting dogma, how who we are is related to who we try to be, the shape of our souls in response to the mould of our circumstances, and the ridiculousness of the notion that there is any inherent meaning in the world or our lives. I can only conclude that for many people, none of that has much meaning. They have never experienced anything in their lives that lets them even see it within fiction. Certainly to skim through the book looking for some scandalous passage that caused the trouble is missing the point - both tonight's readers concluded that such a passage didn't exist.

And it doesn't. More, there is a steady drip-feeding of absurdity, and the unforgivable sin of treating a serious religion as slightly silly and mildly amusing BUT by someone who is clearly very familiar with its detail. That must have hurt, and clearly did. While modern agnostic Westerners have grown up thinking that religion is slightly silly and mildly amusing and that life is pretty pointless, and so, for them, a book that says so at great length is just deathly dull. Well, I think it's great.

But I am now feeling slightly vulnerable, having seen something I love belittled, and I am seriously wondering if I am in a one-man fan club here.

And, as an afterthought, I am also wondering what the result of a similar book that dealt with the brethren would be ...

Slight Attitude Adjustment

At some point during the second tutorial of my Open University course, I began to see a bit of the other side of education to the one that always annoys me. This is, I think, a good thing if I am to continue.

The second tutorial felt like much better value than the first, and we packed a lot of useful work into it. Almost the most important for me was the chance to talk to someone higher up the tutorial structure, who was sitting in, about where to go from this existing course, and how far my past qualifications will take me without covering the same ground again. I suspect I wasn't the only one who felt that the first tutorial lacked something, as only six people turned up for this one. But we were the winners, in my opinion.

It has always seemed to me that formal education puts a higher premium on conventional thinking than it does on useful knowledge. And I have chafed against that, because I would always want to cover ground that appears "old" as quickly as possible in the hopes that the cutting edge of the subject studied is where the action is. Even after my little flash of enlightenment I can't quite escape the suspicion that most higher education imparts its benefits at the cost of a freshness of view that can be a very valuable asset. Many things, once forced into a container of convention, not only lose their zing but also a percentage of their range of possibilities, put beyond reach by being off the beaten track of established thought patterns.

But what occurred to me while talking about the subject matter I am currently studying was that the few people who manage to acquire the conventions while also preserving their own originality do gain something very precious. And that is the gift of communication. Originality and freshness is undoubtedly valuable, but its utility is limited without the means to share it. Being able to work within an established mode of thought and language puts large amounts of the subject onto a routine basis, so that exchange of thought is efficient - and the new thoughts quickly reveal their worth or faults to the community.

Of course, it all runs the risk of becoming fossilised, just jargon and repetition, but I think I see why it's worth the risk now. I know several people who are naturally gifted musicians and have a suspicion of music theory (including printed music) that is similar to my dislike of formal study. They think that it would stunt something that they have naturally, and aren't sure the benefits are sufficient compensation. Yet I know at least one who was pushed through the process of learning music theory by a teacher who refused to accept that as an excuse, and the combination of natural talent and proper training puts him some way ahead of those who have chosen to hang back. Because something MIGHT curb spontaneity doesn't mean it WILL curb it.

I suppose those who tear themselves free of the rigidities of brethren thought tend to head one of two ways: either continued wariness of any systems of thought at all that might impinge on the hard-won freedom inside the head, or refuge in some kind of replacement, that might or might not be a better system but at least provides external certainties. Neither, as a sole guide, can be healthy, so I am glad to be able to adjust my thinking a little bit.

Lake District Holiday

Last week was an enjoyable one: we spent three and a bit days in the Lake District. We seized on a bargain hotel offer just outside the National Park a little while ago, and the time itself came around remarkably fast. In the end it was beautifully timed, too - between some quite large events and in perfect weather conditions.

Cumbria is renowned for being a little inclement weatherwise at the best of times, and mid-March is not that time. It is a lovely place, however, so we weren't worried. In the event, though, we had glorious sun most of the time, and no crowds and no restrictions. All the restrictions, according to the signs, begin on Good Friday. So it was a good time.

It did make me think, though, about how new and different it was to able to do something like this. We had time, no deadlines, and no obligations. Brethren days out to natural places are not exactly discouraged, although it is generally assumed that people who are really spiritual wouldn't want to spend their time viewing such Earthly pleasures. However, as the requirements to attend meetings daily and stay only with other brethren trump almost all other activities (there are some exceptions to do with life-or-death brethren-management necessities and business trips), the best way for brethren to see natural wonders is to become good friends with someone who lives near some such natural wonder. And hope for an invitation to stay overnight on a convenient public holiday. As such, brethren viewing of such things tends to start at an unfeasibly early hour, and happen at a rapid pace with high efficiency.

This was not like that.

Oddly, some brethren friends (I do still have some), saw my car outside the hotel one evening, and left a "best wishes" note on the windscreen, which was weird. And I just knew that they would be feeling sorry for me, stuck in a hotel room and free to do as I pleased in comfort and privacy, when I could have been making small talk at some brethren host with nothing in common with me, and handing over the obligatory bottle of spirits instead of paying a small fee for my night's accommodation. It's a hard life. Seriously, I don't think they could stretch themselves to imagine that a room with no strings can be enjoyable.

I haven't described any lakes, mountains, quaint towns, wildlife, etc, but I think it's enough to say that holidays are good things, and brethren should try them sometime.

The Invisible Divide

I may have commented on this before, but I find I have two thinking modes: "brethren" and "non-brethren". The former doesn't get as much use as it once did (thankfully), but in certain circumstances it pops up effortlessly.

What is MUCH harder is attempting to use both modes at once, and somehow forcing brethren thoughts into a non-brethren framework - as is necessary to be able to explain them. There really is some kind of barrier which makes it a major challenge. I thought I'd cracked it when I started this blog, which was one reason it was so exhilarating to begin with, but it gets more difficult, if anything, as time goes on.

So how difficult is it for total outsiders? Very, I should think, although I don't agree with the ex-brethren who so stoutly maintain that nobody else can ever understand.

It struck me this week, for instance, how Orwellian brethren language can be. They can use a phrase and understand it, and non-brethren would imagine they understand it too without question ... and yet through brethren use that phrase has acquired a meaning that an outsider doesn't share and doesn't know they don't. It isn't deliberate, so far as I know, but simply that brethren customs change and the terms used to refer to them don't - however, it does please them to be obscure and they like the fact that other people know less than they think they do as a result.

Case in point: "reading", which is modified for outsiders to its old form of "bible reading". In a literal sense this is not misleading, as such meetings start with a passage of scripture. But to anybody versed in Christian customs, the term comes loaded with a set of assumptions such as textural analysis, study, search for meaning and collective focus on a sacred text. A reading among the brethren is simply a discussion around a theme that is on one man's mind with, by convention, one or more passages from the bible loosely attached. Generally speaking, that convention is all that is left of the original meaning of the term "reading".

That's the tip of a fairly sizeable iceberg, too, because you might suppose that religion in general is extremely important to these people. Well, it is and it isn't. Surely, you might say, any system which makes such extreme demands (I'm thinking of the likes of separation) must put a massive premium on the belief system underpinning it? Wouldn't everybody in such a system spend a lot of energy studying those beliefs, delving into the mind of God in whatever way they can? If you ask the brethren, the answer is "yes", and they think so. But for them, religion and practical life are the same thing.

For brethren, theology is done. Finished. They had it all figured out by the nineteen-fifties. Anybody attempting to get any further is wasting their time and probably heretical - and, as all past knowledge is summed up in the top man of the time, the only necessary thing to do is absorb what he says. The duty of the Christian is perfect his or her life on Earth, and the focus of the brethren is to chip away at what they see as the rough edges of that perfection, getting closer all the time. So there is study, reading of the bible etc, naturally, but it is done because of instruction, because they have been told that that is what a perfect life involves. What comes of it is secondary. It is, if anything, more important to dress correctly, because that is as much a part of a perfect life and is visible to others as well.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is that for brethren religion is what you do. Belief is implied by action: if you're doing the right thing, it shows you believe, and if you aren't it shows you don't. And in all cases there is only one right thing to do. In that case, it's no wonder their time, their meetings, their energy, is spent on refining the rules. Outsiders look at what passes for ministry and wonder where the religion is, but brethren honestly don't see it that way. Traditional Christian activities seem to them to be missing the point. Knowledge that makes no difference to the way a life is lived is valueless.

They would also be mystified by accusations that the rules keep changing, for much the same reason. The rules must change, because otherwise there would be no forward movement. If things were perfect, they reason, they would have been called away to glory. So they must pursue that perfection and change things as better ways are revealed to them.

It's a hard viewpoint to convey, as I say, and all the harder because it comes cloaked in familiar terms whose meaning has shifted. I think it's important to keep making the effort to cross the divide in both directions, though. It can never be insignificant for non-brethren to channel what Christianity means into the closed minds of the brethren, because you never know who might be ready for an alternative view. And I find it useful to explain to myself what my assumptions were all those years, even if it doesn't benefit many others!

First Tutorial

A little checkpoint on the university progress. I've had the first of five tutorials now.

Up to this point it's been a "phoney course" in WW2 terminology. I had a pack of books, a website log-in, a few downloads and software installs ... and that was it. The course started on the seventh. Yesterday, the seventeenth, was the first tutorial, and the preparation was only basically getting a computer set up. I looked at the first assignment, and it told me to try the relevant computer-marked exercises first, so I looked online, and the exercises won't be available until the twenty-first. So I wondered exactly what I was supposed to be doing.

Well, it turns out I should be partway through unit two by now. The glossy books, which looked to me like useful things to refer to, turn out to BE the course. I'm actually supposed to DO the little tests that appear every other page - they're not just rhetorical devices. Oops. I suspect I'm not temperamentally suited to formal education. I have become accustomed to absorbing information as required, and actual work looks like hardship ... or maybe I do have student attitudes?

But the tutorial was interesting, not because of the content (it was all about the background aspects of the course, and no mention of the content of the course), but because of the people and so on. The tutor is a nice guy, quite traditional but easy-going, the classroom is in a childcare department and decorated accordingly, and eight of nineteen students turned up. Most of the others live miles away - mind you, the guy next to me had travelled about two hours.

As might be expected on a distance course, the main point in common between us was an attempt to better ourselves. Most people seemed to have a feeling that they had so far settled for something short of their ambitions, and this was a step towards doing something about it. There were delivery-drivers and technicians, and one woman with two jobs (full-time and part-time) and two children as well as the course. One guy was a herdsman (his description) who wanted to learn about computers before robots were installed to do the milking of his cows, another worked in military security and is apparently one of the ones who gets stick whenever a laptop is left on a train as appears in the news with monotonous regularity, and another writes blurb for eBay. All reminded me of the later stages of my education before, once it was optional, in that there was a set of people together who might not be natural at what's on the agenda, but they're going to give it a good try. I felt a bit of a dilettante by comparison, just as I did before.

Two of the eight people also live near me, so just maybe that might be a social link too. We shall see.

Darwin Anniversary

If you follow the news, it's hard to avoid the fact that Charles Darwin's two-hundredth birthday has just been and gone. No doubt my old fellows among the brethren have had a few reminders of the evils he brought into the world, as there are always a few people looking to spice up the regular meeting fare with something topical.

As with so many hard-core religious groups, the theory of evolution is an absolute offence to the brethren. It always seems to me a slightly odd way to think, but the approach is that it MUST be wrong, and therefore any evidence will be interpreted in that light. They're not by any means alone: I saw today that apparently the latest statistics say that fifteen percent of people believe Darwin's theories.

Somebody ( I think Stephen Jay Gould) said that the difference with evolution is not that it's hard to understand, but that people go to such lengths to avoid understanding it. Certainly that's the case with many non-believers (in evolution, that is) I know. I continue to find it hard to accept that such a logical proposition can meet such resistance, but when presented with the theory such people seem able to distort it into something they can then demolish to their own satisfaction in straw-man fashion. Quite why they should go to such mental trouble, I'm not sure. It must surely be quite a hostage to fortune for the future, just as the Catholic church found with the theory of heliocentricity.

Personally, I can't recall a time when I actively disbelieved in evolution. I can remember being surprised to find that my brain was somehow compartmentalised, and I was happy to believe in creation and evolution at the same time, quite literally. I don't know how old I would have been. I still don't see why a Creator God shouldn't have chosen to use a sensible means of creation like Darwinism, but I don't think I even thought that far when I was younger.

Mind you, depending on who you ask among the brethren, they are careful not to be too vigourous in their denunciation of Darwin. There is a line of retreat left in that they carefully accept that creatures adapt and change according to the pressures of their environment, so presumably there will be a face-saving way of changing the doctrine if they ever need to face some hard facts that prove the unpalatable.

In a way, the brethren show the essence of Darwinism in their endless changes. The whole group has come a long way since the eighteen-hundreds, constantly adapting to pressures on their beliefs and way of life. It's often not pretty, but change is there when it's needed for survival.

And my favourite snippet from the anniversary news coverage concerned some eminent Victorian woman, who apparently said after reading The Origin of Species that she didn't see why everybody made such a fuss of Mr Darwin - after all, if she'd had the same facts she'd have come to the same conclusion. That, I think, is the reasonable and honest thought anyone must have if they allow themselves to understand (not to take anything away from the genius of the man, of course).