When I hear the word ‘transgressive,’ I cock my Browning*

University Diaries has a great entry (18 April) on a tempest in a creative-writing teapot at San Francisco’s Academy of Art University.

What caught my attention was her reference to Paul Fussell’s book Class. Although he later claimed, perhaps disingenously, that he wrote the book as a joke, it remains one of few accessible studies of a social issue that is more taboo to discuss in America than are fantasies of being a serial killer.

* from a line by the German playwright Hanns Johst, “Wenn ich Kultur h?re … entsichere ich meinen Browning,” often wrongly attributed to Air Marshall Goering of the Third Reich and translated as “When I hear the word Culture, I reach for my revolver.”

(As some of my regular readers know, John Browning [1855-1926] is more known for designing the 1911 Colt .45 automatic pistol.)

When I hear the word ‘transgressive,’ I cock my Browning*

University Diaries has a great entry (18 April) on a tempest in a creative-writing teapot at San Francisco’s Academy of Art University.

What caught my attention was her reference to Paul Fussell’s book Class. Although he later claimed, perhaps disingenously, that he wrote the book as a joke, it remains one of few accessible studies of a social issue that is more taboo to discuss in America than are fantasies of being a serial killer.

* from a line by the German playwright Hanns Johst, “Wenn ich Kultur h?re … entsichere ich meinen Browning,” often wrongly attributed to Air Marshall Goering of the Third Reich and translated as “When I hear the word Culture, I reach for my revolver.”

(As some of my regular readers know, John Browning [1855-1926] is more known for designing the 1911 Colt .45 automatic pistol.)

Dealing with evangelicals

About ten days ago, while I was working at home (revising the book), the notorious M.C. took the dogs for a walk in the woods, leaving me without my first line of defense. As I was pouring a cup of tea in the kitchen, someone knocked at the front door — and it did not sound like her characteristic knock.

I went to the door. There were two of them: men, thirty-ish, dressed “cowboy formal,” each clutching leather-bound Bibles, the King James Version, no doubt. Their shiny, well-muffled sport-utility vehicle had crept up the gravel driveway, and I, back in my study, had not heard it.

I opened the door, polite guy that I am. I forget now what my visitor said, but his purpose was clear. “You’ve come to the wrong house,” I replied. No terribly witty, but it worked; they said goodbye and left.

Encounter number two was by email, from an evangelical Canadian professor whom I know just slightly from the American Academy of Religion’s “new religious movements” group. He wrote to say that he was working on a book on NRMs for Thomas Nelson, a Christian publisher.

I do not question that he is a legitimate scholar, not at all, but his phrasing was unfortunate: “I was wondering if you could send me a list of the 25 most influential witches in modern times.”

In the context, it was a legitimate question, but it hit me all wrong. It was too much like, “Give him another jolt, Boris. He’ll crack and tell us who his associates are.”

The correct response would be, “Witches? That’s a lot of silliness. There are no witches.” (see Gerald Gardner’s Craft Laws, nos. 131-132 in Lady Sheba’s version — but those in the linked document are not numbered).

But, too polite to do that either, I suggested several good reference books, such as the Rabinovitch and Lewis Encyclopedia of Modern Witchcraft and Neo-Paganism.

Pagan Studies marches on

The book series on Pagan Studies that I co-edit with Wendy Griffin has now grown to four titles. If all goes well–if the publisher accepts my ms.–then two books should be ready in time for the American Academy of Religion–Society of Biblical Literature annual meeting in November.

First would be Researching Paganisms: Religious Experiences and Academic Methodologies, an anthology edited by Jenny Blain, Doug Ezzy, and Graham Harvey.

I will have a piece in it called “Drugs, Books, and Witches,” which the editors have put in the section, “Challenging objectivity, theorising subjectivity.”

Second, as I blogged on 12 April, would be my book, Her Hidden Children.

In addition, Wendy is working on a book called Goddessing: Contemporary Women and Ritual Magic, while Barbara Jean Davy is preparing the first undergraduate textbook on Pagan Studies.

I can’t wait to see the book display.

The Man Who Would Be King

The Man Who Would Be King, the 1975 movie (based on Rudyard Kipling’s novel), starring Sean Connery and Michael Caine, is one of my favorites of all time.

Now an English writer, Ben Macintyre, suggests that Kipling’s work was based on the life of an American adventurer in Afghanistan. NPR has the audio report. He also got involved in camel-breeding in the American West.

LEFT: Book cover, The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan.

Book progress & link dump

I am a little drained today, having finished revisions on my book Her Hidden Children: The Rise of Wicca and Contemporary Paganism in America. On Tuesday I will e-mail files to my editor at AltaMira Press, followed by the printouts. Naturally it is not as long as he hoped, and he was already asking me today if I planned to do the indexing myself–or have the cost charged against my royalties. Indexing, what a thought. Maybe after the semester is over I can think about indexing.

Meanwhile, Tarot artist Joanna Powell Colbert comments on a friend’s Goddess rosaries.

Archaeology magazine’s web site offers a collection of articles on the original Olympic Games and some myths about them.

They also have an interview with art historian Kenneth Lapatin, author of a recent monograph, Mysteries of the Snake Goddess, arguing that the famous Minoan “snake goddess” figurine was a late 19th-century fake.

The Passion of the Bunny

After reading this, I wonder what the good people of Glassport Assembly of God have planned for Christmas.

Religion-beat journalist Terry Mattingly has more.

Tropic of Night

If I had to describe Michael Gruber’s new novel Tropic of Night in Hollywoodese, I would say that it’s “(Miami crime writer) Edna Buchanan meets (ethnobotanist) Wade Davis.”

Detectives, sorcerers, preschoolers, santeros, this world, the otherworld, all handled deadpan:

“I read threat in the way they were standing: two Latina women in tan servant’s uniforms, a dark woman with shopping bags, with a little girl and an older boy in tow; a zombie; two thin Oriental guys in cook’s whites speaking Cuban Spanish, and a very fat copper-skinned woman with a cane and a palm fan, all typically what you would find at any such corner in low-rent Miami, except maybe for the zombie.”

Thanks for the tip to Steve Bodio, whose own latest book is Eagle Dreams.

The Masonic conspiracy

The wacko Islamic jihadis are not obssessed only with the so-called worldwide Jewish conspiracy, says New Statesman writer Nick Cohen, they also are keeping alive the fantasy of the evil worldwide Masonic conspiracy! Read more here.

Why do they always take her picture?

Pagans are not the only ones complaining how certain flamboyant figures (example or example) get media attention whether they are “representative of the community” or not.

Religion-beat journalist John Dart (April 1 entry) shows that that complaint is heard in other religions as well, because, he suggests, religion-beat reporters’ input is not heeded.