My semi-regular round-up of articles, essays, and opinions of note for discerning Pagans and Heathens.
We are saddened to report that Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge, the musical and spiritual partner of Psychic TV founder Genesis P-Orridge, passed away on October 9th due to a previously undiagnosed heart condition.
"Genesis Breyer P-Orridge and her reactivated Psychic TV aka PTV3 are terribly sad to announce the cancellation of their November North American tour dates. This decision is entirely due to the unexpected passing of band member Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge. Lady Jaye died suddenly on Tuesday 9th October 2007 at home in Brooklyn, New York from a previously undiagnosed heart condition which is thought to have been connected with her long-term battle with stomach cancer. Lady Jaye collapsed and died in the arms of her heartbroken "other half" Genesis Breyer P-Orridge."
A visual and conceptual artist, Lady Jaye spent more than a decade exploring the concepts of "pandrogeny" in which she and Genesis strove to become one being incorporating all sexes and sexualities. The P-Orridges and Psychic TV were instrumental in the development of music that explored occult concepts and imagery.
Several interesting stories have emerged that touch on environmental issues. In England, there is a plan developing to save Sherwood Forest, which is in increasing danger due to storms, forest fires, and vandals which are killing the ancient oak trees at an alarming rate.
"For the people who care for Sherwood Forest it is like a death in the family when one of the ancient oaks falls, a tragedy that is now becoming depressingly frequent. They used to lose an average of one a year, now it is usually five, and the rate is accelerating. The appalling calculation, which almost breaks the foresters' hearts, is that in 50 years' time the greatest collection of ancient oaks in Europe, many 1,000 years old and more, may be no more."
The foresters hope to plant 250,000 oaks on 350 acres, in order to help preserve and protect the ancient oaks. The article also discusses the folkloric history of the forest, including tales of Robin Hood and Druidic rites.
Why are environmentalists like Al Gore and Wangari Maathai winning a prize dedicated to peace? According to Slate.com, sudden environmental shifts may be one of the biggest contributors to war and strife.
"I asked Maathai what reforestation had to do with ending conflict. "What the Nobel committee is doing is going beyond war and looking at what humanity can do to prevent war," she answered. "Sustainable management of our natural resources will promote peace." ... The idea of a connection between conflict and climate change is fairly new, and one that had been mostly relegated to academic journals until earlier this year. Then, in June, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon went on record to suggest global warming as a cause for the fighting in the Darfur region of Sudan."
More proof that everything is interconnected. A rise in temperature doesn't only mean running your air conditioner more in the summer, it can mean drastically changing whole cultures and peoples, a point that is further explored in a column by Jodi Rave. Rave reports on how climate change is affecting the way indigenous populations struggle to live and interact with a quickly changing landscape.
"I was in Alta, Norway, as an invited speaker at an international indigenous journalists' conference. Indigenous people - communities whose homelands have been invaded by colonizers yet still maintain distinct languages, cultures and customs - share common concerns, including a right to live off the land ... But global warming is changing their landscape ... In Alaska, sea ice is melting and the permafrost is thawing. Native Inuit villages are being destroyed ... What will happen in Scandinavia and other parts of the Arctic when snow disappears little by little?"
Some indigenous groups are now working with scientists in order to understand and adapt to the changes, hoping to meld science with traditional wisdom.
As Samhain approaches, those hoping to save the Hill of Tara in Ireland from highway development are planning magical and symbolic actions to help raise awareness and stop the planned M3 expansion. The TaraWatch organization is raising funds to create a "protective light shield" around the historic spiritual and political center.
"Tara Light will consist of an elaborate light show with beams of white light illuminating Tara valley the home and source of the Celtic Halloween festival (the Celtic New Year), while a live radio broadcast will provide an audio backdrop to those viewing the event from Tara and others tuning in around the valley, surrounding area, Ireland and beyond ... The objective of the lighting event is to show the positioning and significant quantity of sacred sites throughout the complex, in relation to the motorway route proximity and to show the importance of immediately halting the destruction to maintain the integrity, balance and beauty that has existed here for over 5000 years of history."
Meanwhile, Celtic Reconstructionists from around the globe are planning rituals to help protect the site. A web site for the "I Stand With Tara" ritual is now up, and details are going to be posted soon.
Since I brought up Al Gore earlier in this post, I thought I would mention that Pagan author and pundit Isaac Bonewits is calling for magical action to urge Al Gore to run for President.
"As a Druid and as a priest of the Earth Mother I know how important it is to use both magical and mundane methods to draft Al Gore, kicking and screaming if necessary, to run. There is no other position from which he could have the power and influence he will need to push major American corporations, our national and state governments, and other nations of the world to take the drastic action that will be needed to avert the worst of the already tipped-over climate."
Finally, the blog Tropaion links to a BBC documentary concerning "Togas on TV", a look at how ancient Rome is viewed in popular culture.
"The question that the narrator asks is what is Rome for us today and how we conceive it, and whether or not that is right or wrong. Enjoy it, as I must confess I enjoy it, especially with the marvelous points by our Mary Beard."
That is all I have for now, have a good day.
Labels: Celts, enviornmentalism, Hill of Tara, indigenous, Isaac Bonewits, Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge, Pagan News of Note, Paganism, Robin Hood, Rome
8.12.2007
Review: Stardust and Rome
My schedule allowed me to see the film adaptation of Neil Gaiman's "Stardust" during its opening weekend (a rare occurrence in my household), and since I plugged the movie on my blog earlier this week I thought I would provide a review. But let me preface by quoting a small bit from Roger Ebert's review that mirrored many of my own feelings concerning "Stardust".
"There are lots of other good things in the movie, but they play more like vaudeville acts than part of a coherent plot. It's a film you enjoy in pieces, but the jigsaw never gets solved. I liked it, but "The Princess Bride" it's not."
There are many good small things in the film. Michelle Pfeiffer is charming as the witch Lamia, and the Greek chorus of dead brothers are entertaining throughout, but the film itself is something of a mess and the romance lays the syrup on so thick diabetics should be warned. Though it has been some time since I read Gaiman's original work, I don't believe it was so openly mushy and sentimental. That more than anything else separates this film from the modern classic of swashbuckling fantasies "The Princess Bride" (which it has been compared to several times), a film that wasn't afraid to add a generous dose of cynicism, sarcasm, and doubt (not to mention a script as tight as a steel drum).
Perhaps the greatest sin of "Stardust" is that it doesn't trust the audience to make connections for themselves, everything is explained and narrated to a point where the characters don't have a chance to expand and breathe. We all know that fairy tales involving dashing heroes will (generally) end up with a happy ending, but most of us don't watch for the pay-off happy ending, we watch to see how well the storyteller convinces us that it might NOT work. In "Princess Bride" we are shown an array of characters with their own fully-formed motivations helping, hindering, or confusing the main quest for true love, in "Stardust" every plot point seems like just another tick on a check-list to "happily ever after". "Stardust" isn't a bad film per-say, like I said before there some bright moments that can charm you, but I was hoping for a classic and ended up with a trifle.
On a completely different note, I started watching the second (and last) season of the HBO television drama "Rome", which recently came out on DVD. I don't have cable, so it has been quite awhile since I visited these characters, and I must say that I had forgotten how fresh "Rome" is in its ambition and scope. The aftermath of Ceasar's death (which happened at the end of the first season) is handled very well (though history is always fudged a bit in this show), and as always religion is everywhere in the series.
"If the past is a foreign country, then ancient religion may be its most exotic locale. The HBO series "Rome," which returns for its second season on Sunday, is hardly "Fodor's Guide to Paganism," but by venturing off some well-worn cinematic paths, the show has given the worship of the gods a generous treatment in a genre dominated by stories of gladiators and the advent of Christ. The creators of the serial drama, which focuses on the power struggles during the last days of the Roman Republic in the first century B.C.E., wanted to portray Roman religion not as a doomed prologue to Christianity but as a vibrant and meaningful part of everyday life."
Religion is taken so seriously that when a character commits a major act of blasphemy in the second episode, you feel truly shocked by the action. It is a shame that "Rome" will not see a third season (due to the staggeringly large budget), but we can at least enjoy the two soap-operatic seasons of the Roman Empire's rise.
Labels: film, HBO, Neil Gaiman, Paganism, review, Rome, Stardust
7.11.2007
Pagan Fashions For Peace
Lately it seems that everything old is new again in the world of high fashion. Earlier this year you had the witch-themed fashion line by British designer Alexander McQueen, then last month their was reporting on "antler chic", now one of the world's most famous fashion designers is making an explicitly pagan statement ... for peace.
High fashion and high ideals merge for Valentino's 45th anniversary.
"As bombs fell during the first Gulf War, Valentino designed a simple, white column dress with the word 'Peace' embroidered on it in 14 languages. That 'Peace' dress is now the centerpiece of Valentino's 45th anniversary fashion exhibition, surrounded by 300 more of his most glamorous evening gowns at Rome's Ara Pacis monument commissioned by Emperor Augustus. 'This monument is so amazing that we decided if you can't beat it, join it,' Giancarlo Giammetti, Valentino's business partner, said to reporters before the opening. 'We decided to create a pagan procession of women honoring the Ara Pacis.'"
The Ara Pacis Augustae (altar of majestic peace) personifies peace as a Roman goddess, and celebrated the Pax Romana, an era of relative tranquility after a number of wars (both civil and foreign). According to the organizers of the event, the show is mean to be a "spiritual journey" with the gowns embodying "floating ideas", and unlike the hostilities to pagan displays in Greece, Italy seems to have no compunction at such an "unChristian" display of extravagance.
"Among the visitors to the exhibit was Italian Premier Romano Prodi. On hand to congratulate the designer at the opening was Rome's Mayor Walter Veltroni, who announced the opening of a museum dedicated to Valentino and his fashion in a former city garage near the Roman Forums. 'Rome is making an effort to keep up with the beauty of Valentino's work,' he said."
Also attending the gala event were Sienna Miller, Sarah Jessica Parker, Joan Collins, Mick Jagger and Annie Lennox. Proving that while the UK and America may have jump-started the modern Paganism movement, the Italians remember that ancient paganism walked hand-in-hand with pomp, glitz, and high ideals, just like in the (very) old days.
Labels: Ara Pacis Augustae, fashion, Italy, Paganism, Rome, Valentino
3.08.2007
The Golden Rule
Philip Harland, Assistant Professor in the Humanities Division at York University, offers a corrective to those who still think ancient pagans were amoral hedonistic party-goers concerned solely with gladiator battles and orgies.
"Despite what you may have heard about the "pagan" Greeks or Romans (a friend of mine - perhaps representative - thought they were all about wild orgies), "pagans" too were very concerned with proper behaviour as they defined it, and sometimes they defined it in similar ways. Educated philosophers, in particular, focussed their attention on questions of what behaviors were most fitting, desirable, or appropriate in particular circumstances. Such philosophers were often very concerned with "family values", and so they spent considerable time thinking about what were the appropriate relationships among members of the household..."
As an example, Harland focuses on the ethic of reciprocity (aka "the golden rule") and quotes the work of 2nd century Stoic philosopher Hierocles.
"The first bit of advice, therefore, is very clear, easily obtained, and common to all people. For it is a sound word which everyone will recognize as clear: Treat anybody whatsoever as though you supposed that he were you and you he."
Hierocles the Stoic wasn't the only pagan philosopher to endorse the ethic of reciprocity, similar statements have been made by Seneca, Aristotle, Epictetus (also a Stoic), Socrates, and his student Plato.
"May I do to others as I would that they should do unto me." - Plato
In fact the earliest known written version of the golden rule is from an ancient Egyptian piece of literature entitled "The Tale of Sinuhe", written nearly two thousand years before the birth of Jesus.
"This is an ordinance: Act for the man who acts, to cause him to act. This is thanking him for what he does."
This is a far cry from some evangelical commentators who have claimed that ancient pagans existed in a fatalistic world view devoid of morality. In fact, Christianity would have had a very hard time taking root in such societies. The truth is that our modern world (and its advanced "ethics" and "morals") is more in debt to ancient paganism than many people realize. Something to remember the next time someone tells you how lost we would all be without the dominant monotheisms.
Labels: ethics, Greece, morals, Paganism, philosophy, Rome, The Golden Rule
2.15.2007
A Fertile Lupercalia To You!
Today is the festival of Lupercalia, the ancient Roman observance of fertility and the coming spring. Not to be confused with the commercialized martyr's celebration held yesterday, Lupercalia is a holiday sacred to the god Faunus, and the mythical she-wolf who reared Romulus and Remus the semi-mythical founders of Rome. It was considered an important holiday of religious observance and purification.
"Lupercalia " by Domenico Beccafumi
There are many lurid accounts of what goes on during Lupercalia, some make it seem like an excuse for copulation and frivolity. One of the best descriptions I have found on the web comes from W. J. Kowalski's excellent Roman Calendar page.
"The rites of this day included the sacrifice of a goat or a dog at the cave-grotto known as the Lupercal. With the sacrificial blood wiped across their foreheads, the youth partaking in this ceremony would then run the circumference of the Palatine hill, perhaps about 5K, tracing the traditional route of the city boundary traced by Romulus the day he founded Rome. In the process, girls who approached the runners would be brushed or splattered with the februa, thongs of sacrificial goatskin, presumably bloody, symbolically blessing them with fertility. Red is the color of the day as it is with Valentine's Day, the day invented to replace the Lupercalia. Fertility and sexuality were likewise replaced with the puritanical pipedream of sexless Love."
Most (non-Pagan) people wouldn't even know about Lupercalia if it were not for the constant stream of Valentine's Day articles in the press. The favorite trend amongst bored newswriters and editorial columnists seems to be talking about the ancient pagan influences of a particular holiday. This has done more to further an awareness of ancient (and modern) paganism than any Pagan advocacy group could hope to attain. So as more people grow sick and tired of the Valentine's Day expectations, perhaps I'll be hearing more "blessed Lupercalias" in the future.
A very blessed and fertile Lupercalia to you all!
Labels: Lupercalia, Paganism, Rome
2.13.2007
Greco-Roman Fantasy
Salon.com reviewer Gary Kamiya analyzes (and praises) the sweeping historical cable television drama "Rome". The show, now in its second (and last) season, is playing out the rise of Octavian (Augustus) the first Emperor of Rome. Kamiya seems especially impressed with the boldly un-Christian woldview of the show.
"'Rome' is based on solid historical research. But what makes it draw imaginative blood is the fact that it's uncensored scholarship, audacious history. "Rome" is incredibly entertaining, while also being incredibly shocking. It's history porn. It dares to depict an alien worldview, one untouched by Christianity and the moral ethos introduced by that strange little sect. Perhaps those Catholic watchdog groups should stop worrying about heretical fluff like "The Da Vinci Code" and pay more attention to 'Rome.'"
Kamiya also favorably compares "Rome" to the BBC series "I, Claudius" and declares it the better work of the two.
"The key here is "graphic." This is where "Rome" separates itself from such earlier efforts as the superb BBC series "I, Claudius." A highly intelligent work, "I, Claudius" might in certain ways be superior to "Rome" -- its intrigues are more exquisitely intricate, and it avoids certain melodramatic narrative clichés. But it cannot match the way the new series violently immerses the viewer in history. Based on Robert Graves' novels, "I, Claudius" is essentially a work of theater, not film; it uses language, not action or setting, to pull in the viewer. It is a subtler approach to history, brilliant in its own way, but it does not succeed like "Rome" in truly evoking the past in all its radical and banal otherness."
But while "Rome" is winning accolades on cable television, according to some, the "swords and sandals" epic films in theaters are in trouble and the upcoming film "300" is the last chance to save the genre from slipping back into obscurity.
"Hollywood is pinning hopes on 300 to rediscover the kind of success enjoyed by Ridley Scott's Oscar-winning Gladiator in 2000. Since then the ancient epic has suffered setbacks with Troy, starring Brad Pitt and Orlando Bloom, which was derided by critics as a travesty of Homer, and Alexander, with a bleached-blond Colin Farrell, which flopped at the box office and earned director Oliver Stone some of his worst reviews. Both films were made by Warner Brothers, as is 300. Another turkey could destroy studios' willingness to invest in the genre, just as in 1963 when the Richard Burton-Elizabeth Taylor version of Cleopatra killed such productions for decades."
300's ultra-stylized version of the Battle of Thermopylae seems to be winning over advance test audiences, so it looks like this won't be the last film to venture into our ancient Greco-Roman (pagan) past.
1.13.2007
The Gods of Rome
Beliefnet takes a look at the portrayal of religion in the critically acclaimed HBO series "Rome" (just in time for the beginning of the second season). Though the series tends to play fast and loose with history at times, they do try to portray just how important (and ever-present) religion was in that culture.
"If the past is a foreign country, then ancient religion may be its most exotic locale. The HBO series "Rome," which returns for its second season on Sunday, is hardly "Fodor's Guide to Paganism," but by venturing off some well-worn cinematic paths, the show has given the worship of the gods a generous treatment in a genre dominated by stories of gladiators and the advent of Christ. The creators of the serial drama, which focuses on the power struggles during the last days of the Roman Republic in the first century B.C.E., wanted to portray Roman religion not as a doomed prologue to Christianity but as a vibrant and meaningful part of everyday life."
The articles references the now-infamous Taurobolium scene, and hints at what might have been if the budget had allowed.
"The show's creators also had to bow to the pragmatics of TV production in the 21st century. One important and well-known festival was not included in "Rome" largely because it was too costly: The Lupercalia, which traditionally fell on February 15, was a fertility ritual the show scripted and then scrapped. 'We had Mark Antony rushing through the streets in a wolf skin whipping fertile young women, but it was not to be," Heller says. "If you're going to get those rituals right, you need to do them grandly, because that would have been an amazing spectacle and we didn't want to do it half-assed with a couple of guys running around in circles.'"
Ah, the opportunities lost. While some of the nuance of Religio Romana is lost to the soap-operatic story-lines, "Rome" is still one of the best attempts to portray the "pagan" past. Better by far than the endless films and television specials where Romans are played as decadent agnostics or foils to Christians. I can't wait to rent these once they come out on DVD.
12.14.2006
Aeneas: Patsy For Imperialism?
Was Aeneas, the mythical survivor of the Trojan War and founder of Rome, a hero of civilization or an apologist for imperialism? Edward Rothstein of the New York Times examines the question on the occasion of Robert Fagles new translation of the Aeneid.
"But in recent decades, when even the notion of civilization has come under challenge for its claims of ethical and social superiority, Aeneas has sometimes been portrayed as a kind of patsy for imperialism, mouthing higher goals while succumbing to reckless fury as he spills the bowels of his enemies on the earth. The argument has been made that Virgil's project was actually ironic, anti-Augustan: he showed how civilization itself is drenched in blood, with self-celebratory history being written by the victors."
In the end, after weighing the case, Rothstein agrees with translator Robert Fagles's assessment. That the story of the Aeneid (in the hands of Virgil) is something of a cautionary tale.
"The Aeneid, he has suggested (thinking, he had said, of contemporary events), exhorts empires to behave. But it does not dismiss the ideal of civilization or the labors demanded or the persistent dangers faced; it offers a realist prophecy of war and peace, heralding civilization along with its discontents."
Was Virgil trying to flatter Rome (and Augustus) while at the same time trying to warn of the excesses of empire? It seems a likely scenario, Virgil, though a supporter of Augustus, was reluctant to take on the writing of a "national epic" and was pressed into the service by Augustus. One thing is certain, the influence and relevance of Virgil and his Aeneid remain vital to our present day understandings of power and civilization.
