Skip to main content

God in Literature


George Steiner
God is always present in a good work of art, literature and music.  George Steiner says that in his book, Real Presences.  That God enters our being and asks us to change ourselves. 

Good literature, art and music have the power to change us.  They touch our souls, in other words.  Psychology tells us that a lot of our attitudes and behaviour are determined by our subconscious mind.  The subconscious mind is the seat of all the suppressed emotions which can take the shape of the devil at times –  when we lose our cool, for example. It is this subconscious mind that good literature touches, that good music soothes or good art cools.  The suppressed feelings undergo transformation under the influence of good art, literature or music.  That transformative power is God, in Steiner’s words. Aristotle gave it a more secular name: catharsis.

The process of writing is also deeply related to the subconscious mind.  Our themes and imagery, our style and diction, they all have their origin in that powerhouse called the subconscious mind.  Let us take three Jewish prophets, for example,  who found their place in the Bible and stayed there for centuries.  Isaiah viewed Yahweh as a King because the prophet came from a royal family.  For Amos, Yahweh was full of empathy for His people.  The fact is that Amos himself possessed that empathy.  Hosea described Yahweh as a jilted husband because his own wife, Gomer, was unfaithful to him.  Each one created Yahweh in his own image.

We will like the God of Isaiah or Amos or Hosea depending on the needs of our own subconscious mind.  

The author of sentences like “There is no love of life without despair about life” (Albert Camus) appealed to me much because that love as well as the despair was part of my subconscious mind.  The twilight of uncertainty in Kafka’s novels, the hopeless hope in them, has been an integral part of my own psyche. 

God can be found not only in the holy books or the dark corners of temples but also in the novels and poems of good writers. Of course, God can be found in the rose in your garden or the pine on the mountain.  In the gurgle of the brook or the murmur of the breeze.  In the pages of a novel or the lines of a poem.  It all depends on the nature and needs of your subconscious mind. 

The ideal would be each person finding his/her own God.  That is the only real God.  The rest are others’ gods and they turn inevitably bloodthirsty.  The other man’s subconscious is not mine.  Its devils are his.  Hence his gods can’t be mine. 

Good literature, art and music and a lot of other things can help us connect with our own subconscious and discover our own god. Steiner is right, after all.


Indian Bloggers




Comments

  1. Like they say, God is within us. Insightful reads, soulful music and other artistic forms only help to discover that peace and contentment within us. Thank you for the post!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. God is the harmony within. Good literature and similar things help us discover or attain or at least move towards that harmony.

      Delete
  2. Lately, God has entered into my conversations with my son who keeps asking me who created God? To be precise, he asks me who gave birth to God. I tell him that humans did. Although he is little and unable to understand the implications of what I say, he wonders. I also tell him that God is in every good thing. I tell him that to be godly means to be good. God is 'goodness' principle. And that good principle is in literature, in art, in aesthetic sensitivities of probing 'hearts'. Can God be 'found'? I think he can only be 'felt' - on the pages, in the breezes, or the fountains, or the gentle touch of loving hearts.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That 'feeling' is also a kind of 'finding', isn't it? Inner harmony is both a feeling and a discovery. Discovery in the sense that we have to make a conscious effort to arrive at it, to get that feeling, to set the house in order.

      Delete
  3. The university will teach you a lot of knowledge from the micro to the macro, from practical to academic, give you an overview and deeper. So you will have the knowledge and the more subtle choices in all areas of mortgage rates, car loan, retirement planning, and investment choices
    baixar musicas , baixar musicas gratis , musicas baixar , download musicas , musicas download

    ReplyDelete
  4. The difference in the opportunities for people with a college degree instead of just a high school diploma is quite remarkable. Add a university diploma, you will expand the limited career and his work
    snapchat , baixar snapchat , snapchat download , download snapchat

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Death as a Sculptor

Book Discussion An Introductory Note : This is not a book review but a reflection on one of the many themes in The Infatuations , novel by Javier Marias. If you have any intention of reading the novel, please be forewarned that this post contains spoilers. For my review of the book, without spoilers, read an earlier post: The Infatuations (2013). D eath can reshape the reality for the survivors of the departed. For example, a man’s death can entirely alter the lives of his surviving family members: his wife and children, particularly. That sounds like a cliché. Javier Marias’ novel, The Infatuations , shows us that death can alter a lot more; it can reshape meanings, relationships, and even morality of the people affected by the death. Miguel Deverne is killed by an abnormal man right in the beginning of the novel. It seems like an accidental killing. But it isn’t. There are more people than the apparently insane killer involved in the crime and there are motives which are di...

When Cricket Becomes War

Illustration by Copilot Designer Why did India agree to play Pakistan at all if the animosity runs so deep that Indian players could not even extend the customary handshake: a simple ritual that embodies the very essence of sportsmanship? Cricket is not war, in the first place. When a nation turns a game into a war, it does not defeat its rival; it only wages war on its own culture, poisoning its acclaimed greatness. India which claims to be Viswaguru , the world’s Guru, is degenerating itself day after day with mounting hatred against everyone who is not Hindu. How can we forget what India did to a young cricket player named Mohammed Siraj , especially in this context? In the recent test series against England, India achieved an unexpected draw because of Siraj. 1113 balls and 23 wickets. He was instrumental in India’s series-levelling victory in the final Test at the Oval and was declared the Player of the Match. But India did not celebrate him. Instead, it mocked him for his o...

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

In this Wonderland

I didn’t write anything in the last few days. Nor did I feel any urge to write. I don’t know if this lack of interest to write is what’s called writer’s block. Or is it simple disenchantment with whatever is happening around me? We’re living in a time that offers much, too much, to writers. The whole world looks like a complex plot for a gigantic epic. The line between truth and fiction has disappeared. Mass murders have become no-news. Animals get more compassion than fellow human beings. Even their excreta are venerated! Folk tales are presented as scientific truths while scientific truths are sacrificed on the altar of political expediency. When the young generation in Nepal set fire to their Parliament and Supreme Court buildings, they were making an unmistakable statement: that they are sick of their political leaders and their systems. Is there any country whose leaders don’t sicken their citizens? I’m just wondering. Maybe, there are good leaders still left in a few coun...

Whose Rama?

Book Review Title: Whose Rama? [Malayalam] Author: T S Syamkumar Publisher: D C Books, Kerala Pages: 352 Rama may be an incarnation of God Vishnu, but is he as noble a man [ Maryada Purushottam ] as he is projected to be by certain sections of Hindus? This is the theme of Dr Syamkumar’s book, written in Malayalam. There is no English translation available yet. Rama is a creation of the Brahmins, asserts the author of this book. The Ramayana upholds the unjust caste system created by Brahmins for their own wellbeing. Everyone else exists for the sake of the Brahmin wellbeing. If the Kshatriyas are given the role of rulers, it is only because the Brahmins need such men to fight and die for them. Valmiki’s Rama too upheld that unjust system merely because that was his Kshatriya-dharma, allotted by the Brahmins. One of the many evils that Valmiki’s Rama perpetrates heartlessly is the killing of Shambuka, a boy who belonged to a low caste but chose to become an ascetic. The...