The novel and story of Hannah Coulter begins with a quotation from her second husband to their children: "I picked him up in my arms and I carried him home" (Berry 3). The reader soon learns a few pages in that Nathan Coulter's last story of his childhood is at the age of 16, he picked up his grandpa Dave as they were walking home from the fields. Hannah as narrator says, "Nathan though of that, I am pretty certain , as the last day of his boyhood. past that day de told no more stories about himself" (Berry 4).
A question that I have not thought of before and it took a second reading of Wendell Berry's Hannah Coulter and a four hour discussion among friends to even consider it: When did my childhood end?
The novel and story of Hannah Coulter begins with a quotation from her second husband to their children: "I picked him up in my arms and I carried him home" (Berry 3). The reader soon learns a few pages in that Nathan Coulter's last story of his childhood is at the age of 16, he picked up his grandpa Dave as they were walking home from the fields. Hannah as narrator says, "Nathan though of that, I am pretty certain , as the last day of his boyhood. past that day de told no more stories about himself" (Berry 4).
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An excerpt from a post by Stephen Klugewicz at the Imaginative Conservative concerns the education of young men...worth reading the entire post:
"[Robert E.] Lee’s amazing self-restraint reflected the advice he had given to a young mother about raising her infant son: 'Teach him he must deny himself.' The Christian Lee valued self-control as essential to proper behavior and indeed to personal and public liberty. 'I cannot trust a man to control others who cannot control himself,' he said in evaluating his military subordinates. Lee practiced what he preached. He had the rare distinction of being a cadet who did not earn a single demerit at West Point. He expected the same gentlemanly behavior from the young men in his care at Lexington, Virginia’s Washington College, of which he became president after Appomattox. There he reduced the college’s many rules to one simple rule: 'Every student must be a gentleman.'" Read the post in its entirety. "In modernity, that light might have been considered sufficient for societies of old, but was felt to be of no use for new times, for a humanity come of age, proud of its rationality and anxious to explore the future in novel ways. Faith thus appeared to some as an illusory light, preventing mankind from boldly setting out in quest of knowledge" (Lumen Fidei, 2).
"Faith, received from God as a supernatural gift, becomes a light for our way, guiding our journey through time" (Lumen Fidei, 4). Below are a few quotations from the beginning of Wendell Berry's novel Hannah Coulter. The novel begins at the end, takes you to the story's middle, beginning and end all within its first pages...and by then the reader is enthralled. "Those who have nothing can share nothing; those who are going nowhere can have no fellow travelers." - C.S. Lewis
Why do friendships and marriages last for just a short time in the 21st century...because most people are not on a journey but trying to make the most out of the "here and now" only for themselves. Friendships will not be very deep and marriages will not last very long if this is how we proceed to live. The first time I heard the phrase "homo viator" was in the context of an introduction to Gabriel Marcel. I have not gone beyond that introduction, but the idea of man as a traveler has stuck with me ever since.
I hope to place a few words daily or thereabouts along the journey or travels that we are on...some of us reject or just ignore that our end is somewhere outside of ourselves, back with our Creator. The time spent alive on earth is our only time, so we must make the best of it and keep it going as long as possible...a journey to really nowhere. Man is unfulfilled today and only a few are searching...a key to our travels are fellow pilgrims, travellers... Love and friendship are not possible for those who are autonomous, isolated, in no need of completion with another; all relationships are then temporary, out of necessity, or desire but only until the pleasure is gone or the desire fulfilled. Love and friendship are really unnecessary for the postmodern man. The entries that are to follow are more in the line with those who may not know the Truth or even have faith, but are on a journey toward something beyond man. Travelers searching or those who may know where they are heading, are not alone. My intentions are as "Gabriel Marcel put it, 'Nothing is lost for the man who lives a great love or a true friendship, but all is lost for him who is alone'" (Self-Esteem without Selfishness, p.27) Let us begin our journey together. Comments are welcome, but know that my repsonses may be sparse and concise...those who offend will be ignored or deleted. |