lory_enterenchanted's Reviews (582)

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

I read the introductory story, Semley's Necklace, years and years ago in The Wind's Twelve Quarters, but I had still never read Le Guin's first published novel -- Chris's #LoveHain event was the perfect opportunity to pick it up. Setting aside the absurdity of the premise, in which a remote planet has evolved a Tolkienesque feudal society, with elf-like, dwarf-like, and human-like life forms, I did quite enjoy it. Rocannon is an explorer and researcher, an anthropologist stand-in who studies planets rather than human societies. He's stranded on the titular world (it's so unimportant it has no other name) when his compatriots are killed by a devious enemy force that wants to use the planet as its base for a rebellion against the League Rocannon serves. He sets out with a few companions, who view this in their medieval manner as a great and noble quest, with a few high-tech tools, but mostly having to come down to human courage, tenacity, and sacrifice. A mysterious encounter at the end gives him the edge he needs over his enemy, but he must pay a terrible price.

The running theme is that one man's life doesn't matter -- but if it doesn't, what does? UKL always presents a beautiful and thoughtful meditation on such themes. Although marred by some silliness (flying cats, and too many forlorn damsels in castles), it still drew me into a richly imagined world.

In this book, Hain is: a planet with humanoid inhabitants, a different species from Earthlings, but in league with Earth, part of an alliance (the League of All Worlds) that is preparing for an expected war with extra-galactic enemies. Thus the visits to technologically backward planets to try to advance them and enlist them as allies--one of whom has rebelled and sought to conquer in its own right. The ansible is in use for instant communication. An unmanned, fater than light death-machine can also strike instantly.

"But Rocannon the hilfer, whose job was learning, not teaching, and who had lived on quite a few backward worlds, doubted the wisdom of staking everything on weapons and the use of machines...What if the weapons of the Enemy were things of the mind? Would it not be well to learn a little of the different shapes minds come in, and their powers?"

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

Short guide to the practice of "knowing oneself by knowing God" - not as a theoretical exercise, but as a relationship. Knowing = deep, intimate communion with a real person. When we truly enter into this relationship, we don't doubt our knowledge of God, any more than we doubt our knowledge of a loved one. This in turn leads to a grounding in our true nature and calling. Our true self is not something we have to create or achieve, but a gift from God.

I always have a hard time paying attention to audiobooks, so I'd rather go over this again on paper, but my library only had this version. There were a lot of nice phrasings that I'd like to remember, but they went by without my capturing them.

I wish that this and all audiobook producers would give attention to marking somehow when direct quotes begin and end. There was lots of quoted or paraphrased material in this book and it was often impossible to tell it from Benner's own ideas and words.

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

When I embarked on my Spiritual Memoir Challenge this year, I did not expect the first book I chose to read for it to be so … challenging. It raised a lot of questions for me, and I’m not sure how to express them. I don’t want to be disrespectful to the legacy of a spiritual teacher whose words have meant a great deal to many people, and who may have done much good in the world. Who am I to argue with that? On the other hand, there were elements in the text that frankly disturbed me. I’ll just try to describe my reservations with honesty, and invite others who may have come away from the book with a different impression to share what they found there. 

It was certainly interesting to read about the path of an Indian Yogi, who became one of the first to carry the Yoga path of self-development to the West. Yogananda (the name this individual chose upon his attaining the rank of Swami) comes across as passionately devoted to the task of opening human hearts to our spiritual kinship, and advancing our inner powers, in service of the goal of peace and universal brotherhood. I can’t quarrel with these noble ideals, nor with his conviction of the basic unity of all religions, which I also share. 

What made me uncomfortable, first of all, was the way people in his narrative most often became convinced of spirit reality, and were inspired to become disciples of the Kriya Yoga path. It seemed contradictory to assert that sense-perception was maya, illusion, and then have such conversions invariably take place following a sense-perceptible miracle — sudden healings, fortuitious giftings of food or train tickets in response to prayer, yogis levitating or materializing in distant places. Yogananda himself is deeply impressed by such miracles, and sees them as confirmation of the validity of his spiritual convictions. 

But, laying aside the question of whether such phenomena are even possible, doesn’t this represent a very materialistic approach to spiritual reality? Why are such materially visible “magic tricks” required to convince people? The constant harping on such events gave an impression of a flashy and crude kind of faith, lacking in inner substance. One also has be to aware that spiritual beings are not always benign, malicious forces could perform such “miracles” just as well as good ones. I could not get any sense of the inner journey required on Yogananda’s path, nor of how one might learn to discern between truth and deception on the way. I’m not saying these elements don’t exist, just that I could not derive an understanding of them from the book.

Yogananda in front of the Mount Washington Hotel in Los Angeles, which he purchased and turned into his yoga center in 1925. From a Los Angeles Times article describing the Yogi’s legacy. 

Another aspect that disturbed me was the assertion that a guru or spiritually advanced person can take on a student’s or less developed person’s karma, even suffering physical illness on his or her behalf. This was presented as a positive thing, and compared with the deed of Christ, with his bearing of the sin of humankind. 

I don’t believe it is commendable to take on someone else’s karma; our karma is ours to work through and to wrest from it the treasures of self-knowledge and moral strength that we alone can gain thereby. It may be necessary to support someone who needs to work through a difficult destiny, and to take on some of the objective effects that a long history of error and wrong choices have produced; that, in my understanding, is what it means that Christ takes on the sin of the world. But he does not take on our individual portion of sin or remove personal responsibility from us; rather he commands us to take up our cross, if we would follow him. It is in relationship with Christ, not as an almighty guru but as a model and guide, that we finally become able to truly work through our destiny. 

There are important gifts to be won out of wrestling with sensory existence, yes, even with its sinfulness. The goal of life on earth is not to escape the earth as fast as possible and return to a pure spiritual existence, as Yogananda suggests, but to bring spirit into the earth through our moral awareness, exercised in freedom. We can’t get out of the troubles of life in the material world by fast-fowarding our evolution through strenuous yogic exercises, or if we do, the results will be unfortunate in the end. Such haste and escapism was also quite dismaying to me. 

A characteristic incident was when Yogananda was on the eve of departing for the West and determined to pray, even to die praying, until he heard the voice of God to confirm him in his decision. He prayed and prayed, without result, until he felt his brain would split. At last he heard a knock at the door. Surprise! The deathless guru Babaji, in yet another one of those miraculous appearances, had transported himself to give Yogananda the message of God: go to America. This gave Yogananda the conviction he needed to make the great journey and all that followed. 

What are we to make of this story? You could see it as an admirable example of persistence in prayer — or a troubling instance of spiritual pushiness and impatience, bringing forth results that may have been merely self-delusion. It’s impossible to tell, from Yogananda’s own account, what is real and what is not, and I was unable to set aside my own skepticism. 

I did learn a lot from this book, which has been important and even life-changing for many, and am very glad I read it. I’d love to talk to students who have taken up the Kriya Yoga path and learn more about what they’ve experienced through it. If you have done so, or if you’ve also read the Autobiography, I hope you’ll share your thoughts in the comments. 

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

An odd little book that circles around themes of forgery, identity, and general avant garde-ness without gelling in any particular way. The first-person narrator, who has ostensibly been researching the life of a notorious painter of forgeries in Buenos Aires, comes to the conclusion that her writing has actually been about herself - but for the reader, she remains an almost complete cipher. Portrait of an Unknown Lady, indeed. Perhaps that's supposed to be the point, but it left me with a dissatisfied feeling. 

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

I really enjoyed this fun adventure with a serious undercurrent. It had great characters, fascinating history, thoughtfulness and a lot of heart. Leslye Penelope is an author to watch!

Just too silly and unbelievable for me. The language was nothing distinctive, and utterly wrong for an actual 12th century account. The author would have done better to omit the framing device of this being a found manuscript -- or else make some attempt to write in a medieval style. The love interest also seemed to come out of nowhere. Even the poppets bugged me - did people actually make and sell such things at the time? Anyway, I wanted to like it, because I'm always up for a fairytale backstory, but it was not for me. 

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

Sort of interesting as a picture of medieval, pre-Christian Norway, but I didn't much enjoy spending time with the characters, or the fact that in their society robbing, killing, and raping everyone in sight was a way of life. The author strained to make her lead characters a bit nobler than that, but that only made them seem too good to be true, and I could not see what was so great about Harald to inspire such devotion. He just seemed like a megalomaniac. 

The battle scenes generally left me confused as to what was going on, but I don't think this was a fault of the author's; I always have a hard time visualizing all the maneuvers and usually end up skimming. The writing style was decent and did not jolt me out of the story, as a lot of historical fiction does. I am somewhat curious to try the sequels and see how things develop, but they're not available from my e-library and I'm not interested enough to seek them out otherwise.

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

In my last Make me read it poll, there was a hot contest between The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian by Sherman Alexie, but the gothic novel set in a darkly atmospheric Barcelona won out by a hair. I was curious to read a book that seemed to generate such strong and differing opinions. Some readers seem to find it absolutely stunning, others are distinctly “meh.” What would I think? 
 

Well, I definitely fall more into the “meh” camp. There were strong elements that had me intrigued, especially at the beginning, with the premise of the “cemetery of forgotten books” and the eponymous novel that seizes the narrator’s imagination when he’s just 10 years old, and sets him off on a quest for the mysterious author. However, the resulting mystery just got more and more absurd and less involving as it went along. The characters acted with stupidity masquerading as passion, reducing one’s sympathy for them, and the over-the-top drama and menace just started to seem ludicrous rather than chilling. 

The fictional author’s books were supposed to be incredibly amazing and yet sold hardly any copies. Aside from this information, and a few vague statements about their contents, we get hardly any sense of these supposed masterpieces. Zafón’s novel, on the other hand, sold zillions of copies yet left me shaking my head, wondering what was the mass appeal. I can think of many other books that would be worthier blockbusters, with more memorable characters, more vividly described settings, and more satisfying plots. However, in the world of blockbuster books some titles seem to take on a life of their own until everybody has to read them, like it or not. 

I am glad I finally read this one, but I will pass on more by this author. I would love to read more Spanish literature, though, so if you have any other recommendations let me know. 

Have you read The Shadow of the Wind? Which camp do you belong to?

Dragons at Crumbling Castle is a collection of stories that Pratchett wrote as a teenager when working for the Bucks Free Press, finally published in book form late in his career (I believe some further volumes were published posthumously). The stories are slight, silly and effervescent, already demonstrating the interest in exploiting the conventions and tropes of fantasy literature that would make the Discworld books such a joy, but with less maturity and incisive humor. But hey, not bad for a 17-year-old! Most interesting for the glimpse they give into Pratchett’s early writing talent, more than for any special merit in the stories themselves.

Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle

Armstrong weaves together the composition of and response to the Bible as a coherent narrative, which makes for an easy read but creates some problems. It is an interpretation, with a certain amount of purely personal opinion thrown in. I think it would be a mistake to take it as a sole source without others to compare it to, for much is presented that is surely speculation without noting it as such (especially in the earlier periods -- there is no way to tell with certainty when, where, and for whom the Gospels were written, for example, but theories are given as facts). 

The overarching thesis is that rather than an immutable object, the Bible has always been a process that reveals much about the soul state of those who engage in interaction with it. The mode has veered from outwardly militant to inward and mystical, with many variations in between. In our time, we've degenerated into a rigid fundamentalism that threatens to destroy the living Word, opposed by a sterile secularism that threatens to destroy the entire world and all that lives upon it. Armstrong pleads for a new hermeneutics that will read the Bible as a gloss on the Golden Rule (an ancient idea), rather than using it as an excuse to perpetuate further inhumanity and cruelty in the world. I agree, but what I think is missing is any sense that there could be actual spiritual experience that is a valid source of insight, and into which the Bible (and other sacred texts) offer a path of knowledge, not just a variety of personal opinions.

I appreciated all the information on the history of Judaism, of which I am woefully ignorant and need to learn more, and the succinct explanation of the origins of Christian fundamentalism. This turned more toxic after it was attacked in the early twentieth century, leading to the current horrible marriage with conservative politics. Also good to have some coverage of the insane, ethically corrupt but popular and dangerous Rapture theology and its literalist interpretations.

Altogether we need to recover from literalism, but a weak pluralism is not the answer. Rather we need to rise to real experience of the true human core, which will be a spiritual experience, because the human being is spirit -- and in which we will find differences overcome, because in our essence we are one, even as we are all different and unique. This is the "reading process" we need to learn and for which sacred texts are meant to prepare us.