Marilynne Robinson, Gilead

I am sorry to say that I didn't find Gilead to be mindblowingly good; perhaps it had just been too built up by too many people, or perhaps I am just too queasy about Christianity, or ?? I don't know, but I didn't love it. Briefly, the novel purports to be a letter that a dying minister writes to his seven-year-old son reflecting on his life, his thoughts about fatherhood, and his coming to terms with his godson (who is a bit of a rotten apple, but the beloved son of his best friend, so not someone that you can just blow off). It's slow slow slow and meandery and (as you would expect) there's a lot of talking about God, which usually makes me a bit uncomfortable, because you can never be quite sure what other people mean by that.

However, I did have to write down two quotes that stuck with me:

"I began my remarks [he is working on a sermon] by pointing out... that Abraham is in effect called upon to sacrifice both his sons, and that the Lord in both stories sends angels to intervene at the critical moment to save the child. Abraham's extreme old age is an important element... not only because the children of old age are unspeakably precious, but also, I think, because any father, particularly an old father, must finally give his child up to the wilderness and trust to the providence of God. It seems almost a cruelty for one generation to beget another when parents can secure so little for their children, so little safety, even in the best circumstances. Great faith is required to give the child up, trusting God to honor the parents' love for him by assuring that there will indeed be angels in the wilderness."

and also:

"...your mother could not love you more or take greater pride in you. She has watched every moment of your life, almost, and she loves you as God does, to the marrow of your bones... You see how it is godlike to love the being of someone. Your existence is a delight to us. I hope you never have to long for a child as I did, but oh, what a splendid thing it has been that you came finally..."

Mostly I just love the phrase 'to love someone to the marrow of their bones.' I think it gives a good sense of the visceralness of love for a child. I kind of freaked babydaddy out the other day when I read these quotes out to him, and added that if I could, I might actually tunnel inside my baby, roll around inside her hugging and kissing her sweet little internal organs, curling up with her intestines and going to sleep right next to her warm little beating heart. Gross but true.

And on the subject of religion: I wonder how it would change the world if you had to have read, start to finish, the holy book of any religion that you claimed to be a member of. Believing in a higher power is all very well, but I think to actually have to confront the violence/inconsistency/weirdness/downright creepiness of some bits of the Bible (for instance) (which is the only holy-book-of-a-major-religion I have ever read, and I only made it through about half each of the Old and New Testaments if that) might make a lot of people think twice about whether they could endorse it wholeheartedly.

Next up: Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall, and a whole stack of lovely lovely art books on the early Flemish Renaissance...