The Review Show
So last night was my first viewing of The Review Show since the new year. It didn't get off to a good start when I realised it was being presented by Martha Kearney who I always find a bit too... something. I'm not sure if that something is nice, or insipid. I certainly don't think she's an idiot, however, or lacking in taste.
Which I wish I could also say about the Hitchens brother who sat as one of the reviewers. Now, Peter Hitchens was not surprising in the least - he always was one of the most objectionable presenters on Question Time (Question Tim's smarter sibling) - and by the end I felt rather sorry for him as I realised what he needed was someone as rude and opinionated as his brother to make it any fun. I've never had much patience for the pseudo-American styled exaggeration of social trends as revolutions, crusades or some such hyperbolic alarmism and - whilst undoubtably sharp - I have to admit Mr Hitchens wearied me. But like I said, maybe if they'd given him a bit longer to stir up Robert Ince, I wouldn't have found him so irritating and maybe more worthwhile(!).
One thing I genuinely enjoyed was the interview with Philip Pullman. Of course I've read his interviews and found him intelligent and interesting, but hearing him speak was something else: he's very careful with his words and speaks so softly, almost cautiously, that it makes the strong sentiments he might occasionally dare to speak all the more provocative. The only thing that struck me about the review of his book was something that the Canon said which chimed with something I've been thinking more about lately. He was saying that the only bad thing about 'The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ' is how it makes the all too common - rather blithe - assumption that the 'Christ', the 'magic' Jesus, was just something tacked onto the original by a perhaps disingenuous Church. However, he said, right from the earliest Gospels we see that both the 'magic' and the 'mundane' Jesuses are deeply entwined: if the 'magic' Jesus is an invention then the 'mundane' is as much an invention of the Church as is the 'magical'.
The reason I found that more interesting was because I get rather fatigued by the secular chorus a la 'Atheists for Christ' where we get a universal agreement that 'Jesus was nice*' but... and along comes some boring caveat eg '...I don't think he was anything special' or '...I don't believe any of the miracle stuff' etc etc, not just because of my latent contrarianism but because it's just so boring, so unthinking. Of course mundanity is very difficult to emulate, as even the meanest writer of fiction can tell you, so an accurate portrayal demands respect. Still, regardless of personal belief, I think it's pretty clear that for the Gospel writers, what we now consider mundane they also considered magical. The fact that a lowly man from an uncultured background could get up and speak as if he knew what he was talking about, even arguing with and occasionally showing up the educated with a few insights of the sort of clarity you'd call genius if it was in the field of mathematics of physics, that was magical. The only reason it isn't to us is because it's what has informed our culture, upbringing. Even me whose family was a bunch of thoroughly traditional pagan upper-class landowners up until two generations ago.
[*And of course, the reason I get fatigue from that particular argument is because, having read the actual books, he wasn't really that nice. Nobody who challenges anything or changes anything does so by being nice. At least, not all the time. Though maybe to cats and babies (we don't know his attitude to the former, but assuming he was of even moderate intelligence, he probably pretended to be at least).]
Anyway, the rest of the show was quite good and not nearly as explosive as these things tend to be promised or as much as Peter Hitchens tried. The only other bit that seemed promising was the review for '39 Arguments for the Existence of God' but that was killed as quickly as it arose: it started from the contention with the assumption that, or the labelling of, the culture war as one between 'faith and reason' or 'religion vs science'. It almost threatened to develop into a discussion about the simplification of the issue, the way it's been polarised either by a few disingenuous persons or the media or whatever (and that whatever would've have been an even more interesting discussion). Ince of course brought up Galileo (*sighs*) and made a blithe reference to a couple of (one and oddly irrelevant) burnings as they began to talk about the development/encouragement/suppression of the sciences by the Church. The Canon ended up on a mini-rant about the social works that are the foremost efforts of the CofE... it was a flash of glory, my friends, that was all too brief.
Perhaps Martha was doing us a favour, though. Perhaps she realised what was needed was a Historian of Science, some sort of specialist in the field, before she could let the debate rage onwards...
Ha! If only.
Which I wish I could also say about the Hitchens brother who sat as one of the reviewers. Now, Peter Hitchens was not surprising in the least - he always was one of the most objectionable presenters on Question Time (Question Tim's smarter sibling) - and by the end I felt rather sorry for him as I realised what he needed was someone as rude and opinionated as his brother to make it any fun. I've never had much patience for the pseudo-American styled exaggeration of social trends as revolutions, crusades or some such hyperbolic alarmism and - whilst undoubtably sharp - I have to admit Mr Hitchens wearied me. But like I said, maybe if they'd given him a bit longer to stir up Robert Ince, I wouldn't have found him so irritating and maybe more worthwhile(!).
One thing I genuinely enjoyed was the interview with Philip Pullman. Of course I've read his interviews and found him intelligent and interesting, but hearing him speak was something else: he's very careful with his words and speaks so softly, almost cautiously, that it makes the strong sentiments he might occasionally dare to speak all the more provocative. The only thing that struck me about the review of his book was something that the Canon said which chimed with something I've been thinking more about lately. He was saying that the only bad thing about 'The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ' is how it makes the all too common - rather blithe - assumption that the 'Christ', the 'magic' Jesus, was just something tacked onto the original by a perhaps disingenuous Church. However, he said, right from the earliest Gospels we see that both the 'magic' and the 'mundane' Jesuses are deeply entwined: if the 'magic' Jesus is an invention then the 'mundane' is as much an invention of the Church as is the 'magical'.
The reason I found that more interesting was because I get rather fatigued by the secular chorus a la 'Atheists for Christ' where we get a universal agreement that 'Jesus was nice*' but... and along comes some boring caveat eg '...I don't think he was anything special' or '...I don't believe any of the miracle stuff' etc etc, not just because of my latent contrarianism but because it's just so boring, so unthinking. Of course mundanity is very difficult to emulate, as even the meanest writer of fiction can tell you, so an accurate portrayal demands respect. Still, regardless of personal belief, I think it's pretty clear that for the Gospel writers, what we now consider mundane they also considered magical. The fact that a lowly man from an uncultured background could get up and speak as if he knew what he was talking about, even arguing with and occasionally showing up the educated with a few insights of the sort of clarity you'd call genius if it was in the field of mathematics of physics, that was magical. The only reason it isn't to us is because it's what has informed our culture, upbringing. Even me whose family was a bunch of thoroughly traditional pagan upper-class landowners up until two generations ago.
[*And of course, the reason I get fatigue from that particular argument is because, having read the actual books, he wasn't really that nice. Nobody who challenges anything or changes anything does so by being nice. At least, not all the time. Though maybe to cats and babies (we don't know his attitude to the former, but assuming he was of even moderate intelligence, he probably pretended to be at least).]
Anyway, the rest of the show was quite good and not nearly as explosive as these things tend to be promised or as much as Peter Hitchens tried. The only other bit that seemed promising was the review for '39 Arguments for the Existence of God' but that was killed as quickly as it arose: it started from the contention with the assumption that, or the labelling of, the culture war as one between 'faith and reason' or 'religion vs science'. It almost threatened to develop into a discussion about the simplification of the issue, the way it's been polarised either by a few disingenuous persons or the media or whatever (and that whatever would've have been an even more interesting discussion). Ince of course brought up Galileo (*sighs*) and made a blithe reference to a couple of (one and oddly irrelevant) burnings as they began to talk about the development/encouragement/suppression of the sciences by the Church. The Canon ended up on a mini-rant about the social works that are the foremost efforts of the CofE... it was a flash of glory, my friends, that was all too brief.
Perhaps Martha was doing us a favour, though. Perhaps she realised what was needed was a Historian of Science, some sort of specialist in the field, before she could let the debate rage onwards...
Ha! If only.