Annette Spratte's Blog, page 4

I'm not afraid of sin

Response to a blog post by Natalie Vellacott: Can a Christian Author write for the secular market?
https://www.goodreads.com/author_blog...

Actually, the question was if a Christian author should or should not use profane language and describe sex or violence. I have thought and prayed seriously about this topic in response to the blog post and have come to the following conclusions.
Being an avid reader of the Word of God one thing stood out for me right away: God has never been afraid to name things for what they are. The Bible is full of descriptions – yes, even detailed, graphic descriptions – of all sorts of violent and sexual behavior. There is nothing you will not find in the Bible: murder, rape, incest, beatings, drunkenness, fraud… the list could go on and on. What you will also find is friendship, love and sexual longing for a lover, life-long marriage full of devotion and all the wonderful things that are born under God’s loving care to those who trust in Him.
“There’s sexual longing in the Bible?” I hear you wonder. Let me quote:
“Your lips cover me with kisses; your love is better than wine. There is a fragrance about you; the sound of your name recalls it. No woman could keep from loving you. Take me with you, and we’ll run away; be my king and take me to your room. We will be happy together, drink deep, and lose ourselves in love.” No, I’ve never heard a sermon preached about that passage, either. But it is written in the Bible, Song of Songs, chapter 1, verses 2-4.
So, what I deduct from that is that sexual longing or fantasies are not a sin as such. God created sex, he placed the longing for it in our hearts and minds and that’s perfectly fine – if we abide by the rules. You might also say that drinking is not a sin as such. There are passages in the Bible where God explicitly encourages us to celebrate with strong drink. Does that mean we have to get drunk all the time? No. Of course not. We abide by the rules.
I believe the same goes for creative writing.
If I write a love story about two young people and their yearning and struggle to remain chaste until marriage, why shouldn’t I describe the wedding night when all this yearning is finally fulfilled with love and tenderness? I see nothing wrong in that.
But if I were to write about a married woman willfully deceiving her husband to be with another man and this new couple would then live happily ever after – that would be wrong, because God abhors adultery. It is my responsibility as a Christian author to make that clear.
The same goes for violence. I would never write about violence to glorify it, but I’m not afraid to describe it. And I wonder: if I wrote about a gangster or a street kid and they would only use the cleanest language, how believable would my characters be?
A storyteller must tell the story to the best of his or her abilities. If God has made me a storyteller, I will not do anything less. And to me, a story must have believable characters or the reader cannot relate to them. The people in my story must have real feelings and thoughts; they must go through real situations and then I can show the reader how they deal with these situations following biblical principles. I will achieve nothing if the story feels fake just because I cannot describe everyday occurrences for fear of making other people sin.
Let’s look at it from the reader’s point of view. I read a romance novel and the described sex scenes inspire me to grab my husband and drag him off into the bedroom. Is that a sin? My husband doesn’t think so! (Watch him run to the next book store to supply me with fresh inspiration.) If, however, I feel inspired to run off with the postman, it’s definitely a sin. But I cannot possibly hold the author responsible for that! It is my decision. And I honestly ask: what kind of a person would start taking drugs or committing acts of violence after reading about it in a novel?
For many years I have watched Christians place any number of restrictions on themselves. Some of them make sense while others seem to do more harm than good. I don’t know about your church, but in mine nobody ever talks about sex. Or about problems inside a marriage. It is almost as if sex and marital difficulties cannot possibly exist. And if it is addressed – wonder, oh wonder – it is usually with the tag “Well, we all know how it should be, don’t we?” On the other hand the Christian book market is overflowing with marital guidebooks. Why? Because people don’t know who to turn to!

Christians are afraid of sin. No matter whether it is our own sin or the thought that we might lead someone to sin – the fear of sinning immobilizes us. We are afraid of displeasing God and doing some irrevocable harm.
Well, I’m not. I have written an honest story that includes sex and abuse, violence and heartache, love and friendship, joy and redemption and I deeply trust my Lord and Savior to use it at His will. He is able to point thoughts in the right direction. He is able to meet people in the unlikeliest places.
I should know. I met him in the cinema. And it was a secular movie.

Horses are incredible creatures

When my father died in 2007, the days before and after the funeral were trying times for me. I had terrible nightmares and woke up on the funeral day feeling as if I had battled dragons and demons in the night. Even though the service went well and was not unbearably emotional, I was dead beat by the time I got home. Excusing myself from my husband I went out to the pasture to find a bit of solitude to sort my thoughts and feelings. My horse was dozing peacefully in the company of another and they both were not bothered by my presence. I leaned onto my horse’s back, resting my cheek against the soft coat and closing my eyes. I felt the tension of the past hours drain from me and tears started to flow. My horse waited patiently, never moving an inch or even shifting weight to another leg. I was grateful for the rest that she had given me and when I felt halfway sorted again, I straightened up. I thought that maybe fifteen minutes had passed and was amazed that both horses had kept so still the whole time. But when I looked at my watch my jaw dropped. I had not stood there for fifteen minutes. I had stood there for two full hours.
For two full hours those two horses had comforted me in my misery, had stood by me even though they had not been tethered and could have moved off to start grazing again any minute.
Horses are incredible creatures.

Review

Dracula by Bram Stoker

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


On the second reading I realized that this book contains a lot more than a crafty horror story. While the first half of the story was still in my mind, beautifully underlaid with the images from Francis Ford Coppola's movie, I had completely forgotten the second half and therefore could really enjoy the suspense that was lacking to me in the first half. I like the way the story is a compilation of diary entries written by the various characters, which somehow added to the mystery. Bram Stoker also uses different dialects for different characters, which in itself is a neat idea but unfortunately made the reading rather difficult. I didn't mind so much with side characters, but Dr. Van Helsing was a trial and has cost Stoker a star in my rating (not that he cares...). Being German and having a solid grasp of the Dutch language as well, the accent Stoker invented for Van Helsing completely threw me. It had nothing of German or Dutch sentence structure or grammar. It was just plain, wrong English and often forced me to read a sentence two or three times to get the meaning. Apart from that I wondered deeply how Van Helsing managed repeated Channel crossings within a day or two, but I'm willing to ignore that.
Two things impressed me.
1. The description of Lucy Westenra showed me a highly sensitive person, which surprised me as such. What surprised me even more was the considerate respect Stoker expressed for such a character. In today's society, highly sensitive persons are often regarded as weak performers, or maybe a bit unstable and weird. Many people suffer from their high sensitivity because it is not valued anymore. The strength of sensitive persons seems only to bear sigificance if someone needs to pour his/her heart out. That sensitivity might also be named emotional wisdom and could give guidance to many less sensitive persons is almost unheard of today.
2. Bram Stoker keeps pounding on the honorable, good, pure, noble, loving etc. etc. characters of his heros (and heroine) while at the same time painting a strong role model for both men and women. Being only 46 years old and not over 100 I cannot say if it was his wishful thinking that people should be like that or if people were like that 120 years ago. What appealed to me - again - was the respect expressed in the various descriptions. Stoker obviously had clear ideas about how men and women should act in their respective roles and what benefit the other sex would gain from it. He makes clear that men and women are different and that they need each other in their differences.
This idea blatantly spits in the face of gender mainstreaming and therefore deserves an applause from me. I believe he is absolutely right.
What he is also right about is that there are things you need to do, whether you like them or not and even if they are life-threatening, if God commands you to. The deep faith that carries his heroes through the roughest trials is admirable. And even if the story of this personified evil named Dracula is purely fictional, Christians all over the world face harsh trials every day and need to have their faith strengthened over and over again, just as described in this book.
If it weren't for the tendency to have the characters, especially Dr. van Helsing, go on and on about the same thing I would have given this book 4 stars. But it does have its lengths that keep the story from flowing. Nevertheless, I recommend the read - especially if you don't know the story, yet. (Who doesn't?)



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First Draft Finished

I am very pleased to have finished the first draft of my new book project after a two day writing marathon. I had about half the story written before Easter. Two days may not sound like much, but I had some hard topics to digest. The book is a children's book I'm writing in German for my boys and they gave some very specific wishes to work in. The story is about two boys aged 9 and 12 (just like mine) who find a magic Nintendo game which catapults them into a game set in biblical times. To solve the levels they need to read Bible stories and from those derive the way to solve the level.
My boys requested that a) the story should contain Bible stories they hadn't heard yet - which was no easy feat and I must admit that I partly failed - and b) that the crucifixion and ressurrection of Jesus should be featured. They wanted the children in the story to witness that. I was not a happy camper, I can tell you.
It did help to write these scenes so close to Easter and I hope I have done a decent job with it all. I will know next week when the boys return from Easter camp and I can read the story to them and hear their verdict.

Memoirs of a Geisha Review

Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book is definitely a page-turner. Memoirs of a Geisha takes you into a world that to me is hard to imagine: Children sold into the slavery of social success - or the lack of it. All through the book I struggled with trying to understand the culture behind an institution like geisha, and all through the book I failed - despite the fact that the insights and thoughts given by the author are clear and detailed and deeply touching as well as amusing. I loved the journey, but when it ended I have to admit that the entire idea is still alien to me.
This does not reduce my fascination with the book, though. I read it in only three days because I had time off - luckily - and because I found it next to impossible to put down. At the end of every chapter the story had taken a new twist that made me want to know what would happen next.
What I loved most were the little comparisons Sayuri uses to illustrate her impressions. Example: "Beards were very fashionable at that time, and the Baron wore a number of long, soft hairs on his face that I'm sure were supposed to resemble a beard, but looked to me more like some sort of garnish, or like the thin strips of seaweed that are sometimes sprinkled onto a bowl of rice."
Such and more hilarious things I couldn't find while writing this review made me laugh over and over again, despite the fact that the tenor of the story is more subdued. The girl is struggling and keeps on struggling against the things that fate throws in her path. I would have expected the story to end on that theme as well, but it doesn't. The happy end left me strangely unsatisfied. It felt a bit constructed and unreal. I also realized that I could not identify with Sayuri and therefore did not understand her actions in the end - which is why I do not give 5 stars.
After finishing the book I wondered if such a thing as a Geisha is conceivable in our (western) society today. I think it is, even though the women who live such a life are probably not paid for it by the hour - and they do not enjoy the social standing that a Geisha had. It makes me sad to think that there are people who have no more substance in their lives than moving from one party to the next, always straining to be popular.
One sentence in particular caught me as memorable and worth further thought:
"Nowadays many people seem to believe their lives are entirely a matter of choice; but in my day we viewed ourselves as pieces of clay that forever show the fingerprints of everyone who has touched them."



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Review

Smith of Wootton Major by J.R.R. Tolkien

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Smith of Wootton Major is a raw story that might have been a long and beautiful book. As it is, there are many things hinted at that I'd have liked to know more about, but unfortunately I'll remain disappointed. The story does carry a magic beauty, though.
As for Leaf by Niggles, I can't decide what to think of it. It's odd. Yet it carries a deep truth that we should heed in today's success-oriented society, about the worth and wisdom of those things that seem to serve no immediate purpose. In my current situation as a mother of two highly intelligent and creative boys, it opened my heart for the value of that which is important to them - which is not school-stuff. They need to be acknowledged in what they care about - as we all do. And I hope I'll be better able to do that after reading this little story.



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Storytelling runs in the family

I was walking in the woods with my son the other day and we came across a treestump with a cave underneath. There were three tiny pinesaplings growing atop it and it looked quite magic.
"What kind of an animal would live here?" I asked my son. He shrugged and said "A fox, perhaps?"
I said, "No, I mean a make-believe animal." Suddenly there was a glint in his eyes as if he had only been waiting for a question like that. With a wide grin he informed me that a Pili lived under that treestump.
"It looks a bit like a fox, but it's smaller and yellow, not red. It has round ears and a triangular head and it can open it's mouth really wide." He showed me with his hands how wide and I laughed. "That's more than the size of the entire animal!"
"Maybe, but it's make-believe, right?" He then told me that Pilis can jump really high, as high as the highest trees and they eat birds and can catch them right out of the air or off the boughs of trees. Pilis have enemies, too. Snakes, big big snakes called Ratana. They are as long as the longest anaconda and they can stand upright. They have horny growths behind their heads that they can spread out and if they stand upright with the horns spread out they look like dead trees. The Pilis jumping in the air to catch birds might land on them and then they would be caught.
For the rest of the walk my son told me all about Pilis and Ratanas and the dimensions they usually live in and I thought: Storytelling must run in the family.

Writing runs in the family

Auf dem Uhlenstein. Tagebuch einer deutschen Frau. by Kläre Gerbig

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book was a suprise. When starting out, I thought it was somewhat like the diary of a teenage girl freshly in love. But then the story deepened and took a dramatic turn that suddenly revealed a depth of faith and a ripeness of character that the beginning did not promise.
Personally, the book touched me deeply on several levels because it was written by my maternal grandmother at the age of 18. I have never met her because she died in or shortly after World War II. Until reading the book I'd had no idea that she was a faithful Christian. Perhaps she lost that faith in later years which is why my mother never told me about it. She suffered a stroke when my mother was only 10 years old and thereafter could neither speak nor write, but was bedridden for many years. My mother told me that during the war years she had written a 1000 page novel and had already found a publisher. But due to the war and the lack of paper the publisher asked her to keep the manuscript until the war was over. Sadly, this manuscript was destroyed by bombs in the course of the war.
Being now an author myself my heart aches for the loss. I feel strangely connected to her because I inherited two very important things: A deep faith and a way with words.
So I added this book in memory of Klara Sophia (Kläre) Gerbig.



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