Sire say

by Connie Ericson
Contending that “a glimpse
of life is captured by every
piece of literature," James
Sire proceeded in a lecture
series entitled "Literature As
Vision", to discuss the vise
ions in a variety of literary
works.

Editor 8t P rof

Mr. Sire, who is presently
editor of InterVarsity Press,
a religious publishing house,
and Associate Professor of
English at Northern Illinois
University, further defined
literature as "a View of real-
ity in concrete terms come
municated by an appropriate
linguistic structure, and cre-
ating an apropriate experir
ence in the skilled reader."
During the course of the lee-
tures, held Sept. 30— Oct. 2,
Mr, Sire especially concen»
trated on the view of reality
in literature.

Thursday evening he ex-
plained and contrasted Chris-
tian theism and naturalism.
The Christian concept of a
Creator who is both transcen-
dent and immanent, separated
from yet personally related to
the cosmos, is thephilosophic
vision in the poetry of Gerard
Manley Hopkins, and C. S.
Lewis, among Others, In
”God's Grandeur", for exams
pie, Hopkins sees the worldas
it is- it “wears man's smudge
and shares man's smell"'~but
nevertheless recognizesGod's
continuing control ofthe crea-
tion and the comingofthe Holy
Ghost with the dawn.

Autonomous

The contrasting naturalist
world view, illustrated inpart
by some ofFranz Kafka'sparr
ables and Stephen Crane's
short poems, envisionfs the
cosmos as the impersonalplus
time plus chance, stated Mr.
Sire, Man is not only auton-
omous, but without signifit
dance, for he himself is only
matter. In this universe de-
void of meaning, “men look
beyond themselves trying to
latch onto something, but noth-
ing is there," Mr. Sire ex-
plained in analyzing Kafka’s
parable “The Watchman."
Autonomous man cannot stand
to be alone, but when he rea-
ches out,askinghis impersonr
al universefor confirmationt ,
or even condemnation-the re~
ceives no answer: “The wat-
chman gazed ahead of himand
said nothing."

Visions of hope do exist in
literature, as Mr. Sire demon-
strated Friday witha compar»
ison and contrast of Hermann
Hesse's ”Siddhartha" and J.
R. R. Tolkien's fairy tale
“Leaf by Niggle”. As with
all journeys, Mr. Sire said,

 

 

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the journeys of Siddhartha and
Niggle begin with restlessness
and desire for the completion
of the self in some unknown
way. For Siddhartha, this is
wandering from the way of
negation to, finally, unity with
Brahma, or the oneness ofthe
universe.

However, though Siddhartha
does achieve illumination, his
concluding philosophic view
will not allow him the (EtE’
gories of truth and falsity, the
distinction of reality and ilr
lusion, or the reality of pass-
ing time. Mr. Sire thus con—
cluded that Siddhartha's sys
tem will not allow him, for
example, to say as he does
that “love is the most impor‘
tant thing in the world." The
journey to the east ends in
emptiness, with man still
lacking in significance

Inﬁrmary

Niggle’s journey, on the other
hand, brings him intoa right
relationship withhlmself, oth
er men, and the world around
him. Though he is outwardly
a good man he istaken away to
a purgatoryr like infirmary
Where he is remade and fin-
ally found fit to be taken to
the world he had previously
been able to paint only in his
mind.

In this world, aworldand life
that can be accepted only as a
gift, Niggle is satisfied, signs
ificant, and of worth to his
neighbor. Tolkien, like Hop~
kins and Lewis, conceives of
a world in which God is in
search for imperfect man,
morality has meaning, and
man has personality.

Saul Bellow

In his final lecture, Mr.
Sire focused primarily on Saul
Eellow's latest novel, “Mr.
Sammler's Planet", a novel
in which man is understoodas
both a material and spiritual
being, significant, and related
to a personal God for his
being and moral system. Mr.
Sire found Mr. Sammlerlackt
ing, however, in a full Chris
tian system, for Mr. Sam-
mler fails to see the Chris*

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tian assertion ofa resurrec-
ted body as well as soul, and
In an earlier discussion on
the value of literature, Mr.
Sire amplified his views on
the “propagmndistic“nature
of literature and of the re»
lated experience the reader
may have. Like any otherpro-
paganda, Mr. Sire said, liter
rature may win the reader to
its view ofreality, "butthough
we believe things for lots of
different reasons, if some
thing is in fact true, then we
should believe it.".
refuses to accept the denota-
tion as well as connotation of
the ”Bible".

literature] View Of Reality 1'

photo by Don Henry :

Frozen in time, this race car collision is one of the john
Balsley sculptures on display until Oct. 21 in Schaeffer Colliery.

Johnson Zeroes In On Population Problem

Willard Johnson, executive
vice-president of Zero Popu-
lation Growth, lectured to Bier
logy 101 students Monday,
October 4. Students and guests
attending the lecture received
a dose of alarming statistics
that they are not likely to for

get.
Forecast Disaster

We have reached a point of
crisis, Johnson claimed: if
the present population growth
rate continues , by the year
2050 the population will be
increasing by one billion a
year. Today, in most of the
world’s developing nations,
50% of the population is int
volved in the production pro-
cess while the other 50%, the
elderly and those not old 6,
nough to work, is supported
by the rest.

This kind of ratio, Johnson
claims, is a foremost of dis-
aster.

Some ofthe critimlproblems
arising out of over-population
are:

1. The under»15 age group
requires so much tome and
money to rear that a family
with many children cannot
save any money. This pre
sents a strain on a country's
economy because the lack of

personal investment by clii’
zens limits the growth ofbusi—
HESS.

2. Malnutrition and protein
deficiency have caused differ-
irig degrees ofmental retarda‘
tion in [WO’thirdS of the
world’s children.

3. Over half of the world’s
adults do not get sufficient
calories from their diets to
give them the energy to get
through a working day.

4. Natural resources are
being used so fast that suc-
ceeding generations will
simply not have enough.

5. Sometimes as many as
50% of the babies born in
African nations die in the
first year because of hunger
and disease.

Temporary Respite

Recently a declining birth
rate and the “Green Revos
lution" have given false hopes
to those who aim for a solue
tion to the populationproblem.
Johnson noted, however, that
the 11% drop in the birth rate
from 1960-70 must not be
mistaken for a drop in the
population growth. The latter
figure depends as well on the
death rate, which has dropped
even faster than the birth rate.
The Green Revolution, though

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it has delayed the hungerpro-
blem, is onlya temporary res~
pile from a worldwide famine
which is imminent unless the
population explosion itself is
controlled.

Johnson suggested thatin or-
der to reach zero population
growth, families must limit
the number of children to two,
immigration should be re
stricted to political refugees,
and welfare programs should
improve nutrition standards
in order to reduce mental de-
ficiency in the young.

In an interview after the lecs
ture, Johnson described the
economics effects ofzeropop-
ulation grown-i as being a re
duction in demand for many
personal items as fewer and
fewer people are born.

Johnson predicted that the
papal birth control ban Willbe
lifted by the next Pope, and
contended that Catholics even
now use birth controlmethods
widely.

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October 8, 1971

 

