Poetics & Christianity Ongoing Seminar

A la muerte de Paul Ricoeur (1913-2005)

Vicente Balaguer, profesor de Sagrada Escritura en la Universidad de Navarra y experto -entre otras cosas- en teoría narrativa, propone una estupenda síntesis del pensamiento del fenomenólogo francés Paul Ricoeur, que ha fallecido el 20 de mayo pasado en Paris, a los 92 años.

Balaguer, autor de La interpretación de la narración. La teoría de Paul Ricoeur (Eunsa, 2002), ha participado de modo indirecto en este blog, citado en el diálogo sobre "Parábolas y protestas". En el texto que ahora envía dice:

Afirmar que un resumen de la filosofía de Ricœur es una tarea muy difícil, si no imposible, no es un tópico ni una concesión para poner de manifiesto la amplitud de su pensamiento. Un volumen bibliográfico sobre su obra publicado no hace mucho ocupa más de quinientas páginas , y basta con consultar el índice onomástico de cualquiera de las obras mayores del fenomenólogo francés —La metáfora viva, Tiempo y narración, La memoria, la historia, el olvido, etc.— para darse cuenta de que los autores con los que Ricœur dialoga a la hora de proponer sus propias tesis son tantos que hacen casi imposible un estudio crítico entre Ricœur y sus fuentes.

Aún así, el prof. Balaguer logra dar una visión coherente en la aportación que nos propone. Quizá es buen momento para preguntar y comentar algunos aspectos del trabajo de este pensador, de visita imprescindible para los interesados en teoría narrativa y escritura en general.

LA INTERPRETACIÓN DE LOS TEXTOS EN PAUL RICŒUR
Por Vicente Balaguer

Me pide Carmen Sofía que, con motivo de la muerte de Paul Ricœur, proponga algunas tesis de Ricœur para su discusión. También estos días algunos colegas me han preguntado por qué es importante Ricœur. Así las cosas he preparado un documento casi copiando y pegando cosas antiguas. Creo que, quizás con algún error de coherencia, presenta de modo condensado el pensamiento de Ricœur. Creo que a los lectores de P&C les interesa lo que copio en la segunda y en la tercera parte, pero me parece difícil entenderlo sin los puntos que apunto en la primera.

Leer: La interpretación de los textos en Paul Ricœur

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(Actualización 10 de junio 2005)
He visto que V. Balaguer acaba de publicar (el 9 de junio) en Alfa y Omega un artículo breve pero muy claro sobre el carácter "imprescindible" de Paul Ricœur. Vale la pena leerlo: Lecciones de Paul Ricœur

"Tiempo de canciones tristes": retos y esperanzas

Barbara Nicolosi, promotora de “Act One: Writing for Hollywood”, estuvo el miércoles 1 de diciembre en la Pontificia Universidad de la Santa Cruz. Participó en un encuentro con los estudiantes de Comunicación. Tuvimos una sesión en el seminario de Poética y Cristianismo.

Mantuvo también un coloquio con algunos profesores sobre el momento por el que atraviesa la industria americana del cine. Es más fácil resumir aquí lo hablado acerca de esto último que lo tratado en los otros dos encuentros.

Según Nicolosi, el nuestro es el “tiempo de las canciones tristes”. La actual generación de artistas le recuerda a “people sing sad songs by the streams of Babilone” (toma el ejemplo de su amigo el guionista Craig Detweiler, autor del libro “A Matrix of meanings”). Son los jóvenes de la Generación X, quienes no han llegado a conocer Jerusalén, pero identifican la Ciudad Santa como su casa. Son los hijos de la generación que protagonizó la revolución sexual. Han vivido tragedias familiares, son hijos de divorciados o tienen hermanos que han sido abortados, y aunque no juzgan a sus padres, a quienes quieren bien, no pueden evitar la nostalgia de algo que han perdido, que no saben exactamente lo que es, pero que les pertenecía y de lo que han sido privados. Por eso sus canciones son tristes. Por eso, dice Barbara Nicolosi, las buenas comedias de nuestros días, como “Lost in translation” o “Eternal Sunshine” acaban siempre en drama. Hay que ser pacientes y comprensivos con estos artistas tristes y melancólicos, continúa diciendo Nicolosi, quien espera que la siguiente generación recupere, con el arrepentimiento, la alegría.

En cuanto al papel de los católicos en Hollywood, Nicolosi opina que han estado ausentes durante mucho tiempo. Y, en parte, todavía lo están, a veces con una actitud eminentemente negativa hacia la televisión y el cine, sin querer aceptar que en la actualidad éstos cumplen la función que la iglesia ha desarrollado en precedentes centurias. Esta actitud, explica la norteamericana, recuerda a un ratón que, encerrado en la misma habitación que un león, decide ignorarlo, despreciarlo, diciéndose a sí mismo que el león no existe. Si queremos re-cristianizar la sociedad hay que invertir en la formación de los artistas y gente que “hace” la cultura, aunque sea ésta una inversión que no siempre de frutos a corto plazo.

Cuando se le pregunta sobre los valores que identifican una película como cristiana, su respuesta es bastante concreta. No serían, dice, lo valores simplemente “humanos”, aunque todos ellos sean cristianos. Por ejemplo, “In America” es una hermosa película con indudables valores, pero es también culturalmente pagana. Lo que sucede es que se estrenan tantas películas infra-humanas, que en cuanto aparece una con ciertos valores tendemos a etiquetarla como “cristiana”.

Valores específicamente cristianos son, por ejemplo, el sentido de la sacramentalidad, o de que "el bien y el mal no son siempre iguales", o la seguridad de que la Gracia siempre es ofrecida. También se podría hablar de valores específicamente católicos, dice Nicolosi, como el papel de la castidad.

Comentó a continuación que, en el caso de la literatura y el cine o la televisión, la situación en que nos encontramos puede verse con un ejemplo. Una novela cristiana como es “Retorno a Brideshead”, es un poderoso libro. Pero es hoy un libro del que, por desgracia, se prepara una adaptación en la que la limpia amistad entre Charles y Sebastian (uno de los puntos fuertes de la novela) aparecerá como una relación homosexual.

Barbara dice que es un ejemplo de una fuente cristiana pervertida por un artista pagano, justo lo contrario de lo que debería suceder: que los cristianos supiésemos utilizar lo pagano, dándole sentido cristiano. Pero, concluye, sin pesimismo, que ahora mismo no estamos en condiciones de hacerlo, pues ni siquiera formamos parte del juego, estamos aún al margen de la industria de la cultura y del entretenimiento; eso sí, estamos preparándonos para la aventura.

[Texto de E. Fuster]
[Puede descargarse aquí el texto completo de la entrevista hecha por D. Contreras y E. Fuster]

Nicolosi on "isolation and community in the artist's life"

[Barbara Nicolosi has participated as Invited Speaker at the Conference "Epiphanies of Beauty: The Arts in a Post-Christian Culture", November 18-20, 2004, The Notre Dame University Center for Ethics and Culture. This is the text of her notes, taken for this site from the weblog Churchofthemasses. By the way, she will be in Rome, at Santa Croce University, on December 1st. The Poetics & Christianity Seminar members will have an informal seminar with Barbara Nicolosi. Now, the Notre Dame notes on the isolation in the artist's life. JJGN]

ISOLATION AND COMMUNITY IN THE ARTIST'S LIFE

[These are the notes from my talk at the Notre Dame "Epiphanies of Beauty Conference." I gave the talk today and people seemed to like it. Sorry if it's hard to follow in it's spottiness - just imagine me doing the Sicilian hand-waving and filling in all the holes.]

I. Intro….

Thanks for invitng me to be part of this wonderful event. I am not a theologian or a philosopher. I have recently had a short-lived career as a doctoral student. But after just two courses in which we wrangled over earth-shattering topics like “Towards a Practical Theology: Rebuilding a Hermeneutic of Christopraxis” and “Rethinking the Sermon on the Mount as Divine Triadic Transforming Initiatives,” I decided, that I would probably die while scaling the ivory tower, and I should be humbly content to stay in Hollywood and influence the billions of people who make up the ravenous global audience.

I am an artist - a writer and dramatist, and I am the ring-master of a new community of filmmakers in the entertainment industry. We started out in 1999 to try and get better scripts on the desks of Hollywood executives. We created a pedagogical model to address this problem. We find ourselves now, focused on building a nurturing community for our writers, and then standing around the perimeter, rubbing our hands together and hoping that something amazing will happen when we aren’t looking. The classroom phase of the program is basically just the doorway, rite of initiation.

It’s that “when we aren’t looking” that I want to talk about today. The time of isolation that is the prerequisite to every work of art. It is the biggest cross of the artist, even surpassing in weight the cross of their own weirdness.. Mainly because a lot of their weirdness proceeds from the solitude that they have to make their home so often.

I don’t have time today to dwell too much on the necessary relationship between isolation and creativity. You’re just going to have to take my word about it as a practitioner and one who wrangles practitioners.

I will talk about the following:

A) Two Senses of Isolation, one positive and one negative, and how artists tend to experience them backwards.
B) The relationship – I’m going to call it a marriage - between the artist and their art, and the way it ravages them to salvation, and possibly some of us on the outside too.
C) Why Classrooms Will Not Produce The “New Renaissance”
D) What Kind of Community We Need to Create So That We Might See Some Beautiful Art Again At Some Point. (And When I say Beautiful I mean…)

On the subject of literature and faith: is the author's life relevant?

[El pasado dia 8, Barbara Nicolosi publicó un comentario en su weblog acerca de un tema semejante al presentado aquí por Miguel Castellví, y -no deja de ser interesante la coincidencia- con explícita alusión a Greene. Su lectura puede ser enriquecedora en este asunto a veces esquivo. Con el permiso explícito de Barbara para publicar aquí sus escritos, lo incluyo a continuación. Quiza conviene saber que se dirige a escritores. Quien esté interesado en seguir la trama -previa y posterior- de la conexión de este argumento con el de Joan of Arcadia, puede ir a la dirección de Barbara Nicolosi y comenzar desde este post, titulado "ex opere authorato?".]

Someone posted a great question in the comments of the Joan of Arcadia post below, that I wanted to bring out for broader consideration.

The poster (anonymous, otherwise I'd credit you), noted first that Graham Greene lived a degenerate life, and according to the poster, an unrepentant one. My reading of the post is that the charge is Greene was a Clintonian style misogynist. So the poster asks:

What I am wondering is more generally, when thinking about the subject of literature and faith--and teaching it for that matter--is the author's life relevant? Flannery O'Connor wrote quoting St. Thomas, that "art does not require rectitude of the appetite." Can the life of an artist be so depraved as to diminish or even negate the value of his or her art?

A few thoughts...

I am going to go ahead and say, "No, but..."

The Artisthood of the Priest

Barbara Nicolosi is the Executive Director of Act One, Inc., "a comprehensive training and mentorship center created to form the next generation of Christian artists and professionals". Barbara has an MA in Film from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL. She has been a director of development, a reader for the Humanitas Prize, and a consultant on many film and television projects. Her feature screenplay, Select Society, is being developed by Reel Life Women Productions, Bel Air. She is on the executive committee of the City of the Angels Film Festival, the board of CIMA and frequently addresses writer's conferences on screenwriting and the arts. [More on her approach to the film industry: how to transfigure the industry, rather than just criticize it.]

In December 2002, she went from LA to Rome, to participate in a Convegno held at the School of Institutional Communication at the USC.

I had notice that she has done in Chicago, several weeks ago, a specific presentation on the artistic formation to people who work in the formation of seminarians. I asked her about and she gave me her notes of the talk and agree for the publication in this P&C website. Being P&C an interdisciplinary Seminar, with people interested in Theology, Philosophy and Communication, some of us working in a Pontifical University, I found interesting to publish here the Barbara Nicolosi point on the "arts and priests". And discuss it, if someone want to ask or comment something about. [I remember you that the following are just "personal notes for a talk" and that maybe some of us are not the intended public of the address]:

THE ARTISTHOOD OF THE PRIEST

I. Intro –

a) Thank you for having me. I very much appreciate the “vision” required to invite Hollywood screenwriter to speak to your assembly. I feel sure I am the only one of the invited presenters whose last published work was a bold attack on Director Sam Rami for failing to significantly advance the theme of Spiderman II from the franchise precursor.

Armando F. & morale adattamento

Armando Fumagalli ci ha fatto riflettere, lunedì scorso, sugli "Aspetti morali nell'adattamento da letteratura a cinema". Dopo un'introduzione sull'adattamento, ci siamo incentrati, come previsto, su "Sense & Sensibility" (tratto dal romanzo di Jane Austen, scritto da Emma Thompson e diretto da Ang Lee) e "Ritratto di signora" della Campion, che ha attuato strategie di adattamento esattamente opposte.

È vero che non c'è stato tanto tempo per il colloquio come sarebbe stato gradito da tutti. Proprio per questo, vorrei aprire qui un piccolo forum. Mi sembra che gli aspetti morali nell'adattamento letteratura - cinema e in genere nel cinema e la letteratura siano molto interessanti.

Bill Park on "The Passion"

Bill Park is a member of the "P&C" Seminar. He was in Rome last April, participating in the Convegno.

Here is the Bill Park review The Passion of the Christ: Five Questions which will appear in the March Position Paper. As he said to John Wauck it may have some relevance for "Poetics and Christianity". Peter Robinson (Uncommon Knowledge, PBS) put the last question on a National Review Chat site and the response was overwhelmingly negative, in part even abusive.

[JJGN: I have numerate each one of the Five Questions, in order to facilitate the dialogue. By the way, the film soars beyond $200 million in his second weekend]:

The Passion of the Christ: Five Questions

1. Why all the hubbub?

In all my years of film going, I do not recall any movie that has caused such a hubbub. Gone with the Wind (1939) comes to mind, but all the hype about that movie centered on two questions: who would play Scarlet O’Hara; and can a huge best selling novel be successfully translated onto the screen? Needless to say, Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ raises more serious questions. It's curious that earlier Hollywood versions of the Gospels, King of Kings (1927 and 1961) and The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965), caused no such outcries. Admittedly, Gibson's treatment is more graphic and horrifying than anything done previously, but since in the chorus of detractors one hears many secular voices, one suspects the real offence is Christianity itself. In an age in which among the educated elite, tolerance and inclusion stand as the only virtues, in which Christians are regarded as bigots and Christianity oppressive, and in which what religion exists tends toward New Age spirituality, Gibson’s in your face assertion of a Christian perspective can only scandalize. Gibson is not far from St. Paul when he claimed, "We preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and the Greeks foolishness."

Alejandro Llano on René Girard

We had today a very interesting Seminar with Alejandro Llano. He talked to us on "René Girard: ciencia y mitología del deseo, la violencia y el sacrificio" (or on "La antropología de la religión según René Girard", as the actual paper presented by Alejandro is named). Then, we had a enlighting Q&A 30 minutes time.

Here you can find the first version of the text (in .PDF format):Download file . Alejandro is open to answer all the questions or comments coming from us.

News from Manila

I've received a couple of emails from Manila. Paul Dumol, Ph.D. and Professor of Medieval Studies is also the Vice-Rector of the University of Asia & the Pacific. He was here in Rome during the past P&C Convegno: he talk ("Spirituality Onstage: Walking the Tightrope between the Sugary and the Preachy") and show us some videotapes of his recent writing's stage productions. We had a very interesting and enthusiastic conversation on screenwriting projects and now he is telling me that he has started a scriptwriting class at the UA&P. Some excerpts from his emails:

"...We just had the 4th meeting of my scripwriting class. I have 7 students, all from UA&P but one. This is a good number considering (a) the course is not credited for any program and (b) I can really attend to each one. I have a teaching assistant who is himself a beginning scriptwriter. Because the course is not credited in any program, I have only students who are really interested in writing.

The purpose of this first offering is really to help me fix the syllabus. I am gaining much experience. The students are starting from scratch--how to make beginnings, middles, and ends."

He does not forget the P&C past Convegno (the Rafael Jimenez Paper on "Narrative della Redenzione / Narratives of Redemption") and some of the recent topics :

"...I am happy to know that Poetica e Cristianesimo continues to be vibrant. We have to do something similar here. Please tell Rafa Jimenez I have finally seen "Amores Perros" and am sorely tempted to call it a masterpiece --above all the script, the stories. Yes, it was entirely appropriate to cite it in our conference last year. Its "hidden" theme is God, whom we feel all the more present because he is so absent, especially in the first 2 stories.

...Thank you for that beautiful review of "The Passion." (...) What a pleasure! I thought you would quote St. Josemaría and his ideal --that Christ's life should be in our minds "like a film." But the excerpt from "Santo Rosario" is even better."

[Some references on Paul Dumol's dramatic writings and their recent production onstage: "Aguinaldo 1899: Ang Pagpatay Kay Luna", and also on "Aguinaldo" on The Manila Times or in Asia Week.]

News from Austria - Germany

I've received a brief email from Nikolaus Schapfl saying that his Opera "Der Kleine Prinz", from the known work of A. St. Exupéry, will be presented next month in Munich:

Sonntag, 29. Februar 2004 - 15.30 Uhr München, Philharmonie im Gasteig

Nikolaus is a young composer and a not so much loquacious P&C Seminar member: he came to Rome last year in April, to the Convegno, with some of his wonderful musical compositions. I think that he is fortunately "in the mood", in a kind of nonstop working.

As some of you maybe have in mind, the "premiere" of the Nikolaus's Opera "Der Kleine Prinz" take place, very succesfully, last summer in Salzburg, on Sunday 24 july 2003, 8:00pm.

We'll keep in mind his new adventure.

[Find here a Nikolaus's bio and some critics on his works --in German.]