As we enter the third month of our national lockdown, many of our friends and supporters are struggling due to the Coronavirus pandemic and our country’s efforts to mitigate its deadly effects. Indeed, the crisis has brought much destruction and distress. But it has also caused many to turn again to the Divine manifestations of Truth, Beauty, and Goodness in this world.

The preservation and celebration of these “Permanent Things” are at the heart of The Imaginative Conservative’s mission. For nearly a decade, The Imaginative Conservative has been an important forum for civil dialogue about what it means to be conservative… to be human… to be God’s creatures. For the last ten years, we have provided essays by great minds that reflect the best of conservative and humane thought, past and present, free of charge and paid advertising.

To continue to do so, however, in this unexpected and unwelcome era of medical, economic, and social crisis, we need your help now. 
— Read on theimaginativeconservative.org/2020/05/giving-tuesday-now-making-world-better-place-support-the-imaginative-conservative.html

From Grand Rapids’ Vintage Parlor Orchestra (the brainchild of impresario/conductor/artistic director/mastermind Thomas Pike), a completely apropos cover of the Beach Boys’ “In My Room”.  Featuring the delightful vocal talents of soprano Emily Smith — and a vintage Hammond L-100 organ:

Since 2018, the VPO has been bringing the masterpieces of classical music to nightclubs, art galleries, brewpubs and other non-traditional venues in West Michigan.  Learn more at vpogr.com.  (Full disclosure: I’m a regular VPO patron and donor.)

— Rick Krueger

 

Not surprisingly, the sub-genre of post-apocalyptic literature boomed after the dropping of the two American atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Suddenly, megadeath seemed a possible reality. Even mainstream books—such as Nevil Shute’s On the Beach—dealt with apocalyptic horrors. Some, such as R.H. Benson’s The Lord of the World (1907) and Walter Miller’s Canticle for Leibowitz (1959), relied on the mass destruction of nuclear weaponry. Amazingly enough, Benson’s 1907 novel hypothesized the weaponry as “city crackers.”

But, there were a myriad of other ways to kill off the earth and human beings, too. In Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End (1953), humans evolve into something new. Jack Finney feared the arrival of communist, parasitic aliens in his serialized Invasion of the Bodysnatchers (1955). J.G. Ballard entertained the idea of twin killer, solar radiation and the greenhouse effect, in his The Drowned World (1962). In Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle’s Lucifer’s Hammer (1977), a comet hits the earth. Douglas Adams has the interstellar public works commission bulldoze the earth as a barrier to good trade and good highways in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1979). S.M. Stirling blames a hiccup in the temporal order in Dies the Fire (2004). Gordon Dickson offered simple economic collapse for Wolf and Iron (1993). Stephen King, of course, wrote his tale of “Dark Christianity,” The Stand (1978), employing the plague as the method of death. Justin Cronin unleashed vampires upon us all in The Passage (2010), and Richard Matheson let loose the zombie-vampires in I am Legend (1954). 
— Read on www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/pandemics-and-our-love-for-post-apocalyptic-drama/

Timely and provocative assessment of various cultural, moral, and political problems in “post-constitutional” America.

America is increasingly defined not only by routine disregard for its fundamental laws, but also by the decadent character of its political leaders and citizens—widespread consumerism and self-indulgent behavior, cultural hedonism and anarchy, the coarsening of moral and political discourse, and a reckless interventionism in international relations. In The Historical Mind, various scholars argue that America’s problems are rooted in its people’s refusal to heed the lessons of historical experience and to adopt “constitutional” checks or self-imposed restraints on their cultural, moral, and political lives. Drawing inspiration from the humanism of Irving Babbitt and Claes G. Ryn, the contributors offer a timely and provocative assessment of the American present and contend that only a humanistic order guided by the wisdom of historical consciousness has genuine promise for facilitating fresh thinking about the renewal of American culture, morality, and politics.

“By exploring what humanistic renewal might entail, this book offers judicious and insightful perspectives about what the past teaches us about the limits of human beings in society and how to be prudent within the context of universal morality given these limitations.” — James A. Todd, Palm Beach Atlantic University

“‘What communism, Nazism, and progressivism share in common is a rejection of the moral realism that inspired and justified the development of limited government.’ That lapidary statement typifies the depth and clarity of this remarkable collaborative effort. Its diverse authors reacquaint readers with the moral imaginations of such giants as Edmund Burke, John Quincy Adams, Russell Kirk, Robert Penn Warren, Eric Voegelin, Irving Babbitt, and Claes Ryn. How refreshing it is in today’s academy to hear ‘Let things be called by their right names!’” — Walter A. McDougall, Pulitzer Prize–winning historian, University of Pennsylvania

Justin D. Garrison is Associate Professor of Political Science at Roanoke College and the author of “An Empire of Ideals”: The Chimeric Imagination of Ronald Reagan. Ryan R. Holston is Professor and Jonathan Myrick Daniels ’61 Chair for Academic Excellence at Virginia Military Institute.
— Read on www.sunypress.edu/p-6877-the-historical-mind.aspx

Anderson (Stake) assembles a fun, nostalgia-filled anthology of 23 original, lighthearted horror tales riffing on the movie monsters of both modern cinema and B-movie favorites. The majority of tales are short and snappy, like Jonathan Maberry’s fresh, surprising zombie story “Gavin Funke’s Monster Movie Marathon” and Karina Fabian’s playful “Josie’s Last Straw,” both of which hit the ground running and pack a quick punch.
— Read on www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-68057-107-3

Shop – Nick D’Virgilio
— Read on www.nickdvirgilio.com/shop/

Pre-order NDV’s forthcoming album!

Cold Warriors

In this brilliant account of the literary war within the Cold War, novelists and poets become embroiled in a dangerous game of betrayal, espionage, and conspiracy at the heart of the vicious conflict fought between the Soviet Union and the West

During the Cold War, literature was both sword and noose. Novels, essays, and poems could win the hearts and minds of those caught between the competing creeds of capitalism and communism. They could also lead to blacklisting, exile, imprisonment, or execution for their authors if they offended those in power. The clandestine intelligence services of the United States, Britain, and the Soviet Union recruited secret agents and established vast propaganda networks devoted to literary warfare. But the battles were personal, too: friends turned on one another, lovers were split by political fissures, artists were undermined by inadvertent complicities. And while literary battles were fought in print, sometimes the pen was exchanged for a gun, the bookstore for the battlefield.

In Cold Warriors, Duncan White vividly chronicles how this ferocious intellectual struggle was waged on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Among those involved were George Orwell, Stephen Spender, Mary McCarthy, Graham Greene, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, John le Carré, Anna Akhmatova, Richard Wright, Ernest Hemingway, Boris Pasternak, Gioconda Belli, and Václav Havel. Here, too, are the spies, government officials, military officers, publishers, politicians, and critics who helped turn words into weapons at a time when the stakes could not have been higher.

Drawing upon years of archival research and the latest declassified intelligence, Cold Warriors is both a gripping saga of prose and politics, and a welcome reminder that–at a moment when ignorance is all too frequently celebrated and reading is seen as increasingly irrelevant–writers and books can change the world.

To put this more positively: The future of the Church, once again as always, will be reshaped by saints, by men, that is, whose minds probe deeper than the slogans of the day, who see more than others see, because their lives embrace a wider reality. Unselfishness, which makes men free, is attained only through the patience of small daily acts of self-denial. By this daily passion, which alone reveals to a man in how many ways he is enslaved by his own ego, by this daily passion and by it alone, a man’s eyes are slowly opened. He sees only to the extent that he has lived and suffered.

If today we are scarcely able any longer to become aware of God, that is because we find it so easy to evade ourselves, to flee from the depths of our being by means of the narcotic of some pleasure or other. Thus our own interior depths remain closed to us. If it is true that a man can see only with his heart, then how blind we are!
— Read on ucatholic.com/blog/the-lost-prophecy-of-father-joseph-ratzinger-on-the-future-of-the-church/

We have nothing for always. We all know you can’t take it with you.

In Gaelic there is no word for permanent possession. Tha airgead agam nam phòcaid means I have money (temporarily) at me in my pocket. Tha bean agam aig an taigh; I have a wife (temporarily)at me at the house. Tha agus foghlam agam; I have learning at me (an education). Tha glòir agus buaidh agam. There is glory and victory at me (temporarily) Tha ìmpireachd agam. There is an empire at me (temporarily)

Similarly, the Greek philosophers taught us that nothing in life is ours to keep PERMANENTLY—not our children, not our family, not our beloved mothers, not our wives and husbands not our loyal dogs and cats. not piano, not our books, our material possessions, not our youth and vitality, not our beauty, not our pains, sorrow and losses or minor triumphs, not our brain nor our memory. You are lucky if you keep your wits late in life as your hair goes gray and limbs grow old.

My father often quoted from memory Sophocles:

OEDIPUS AT COLONUS:

Dear son of Aegeus, to the gods alone

Is given immunity from eld and death;

But nothing else escapes all-ruinous time.

Earth’s might decays, the might of men decays,

Honor grows cold, dishonor flourishes,

There is no constancy ‘twixt friend and friend,

Or city and city; be it soon or late,

Sweet turns to bitter, hate once more to love.

If now ’tis sunshine betwixt Thebes and thee

And not a cloud, Time in his endless course

Gives birth to endless days and nights, wherein

The merest nothing shall suffice to cut

With serried spears your bonds of amity.

My mother used to say, life and love are just brief moments in time so we should love each other today and be kind to each other today so as to have no regrets.

The door is locked forever and beyond it I cannot go or even knock. I still know my mother’s phone number 201 992 4871 but it has been disconnected for over 20 years now.

But I have only a few regrets. I called her at least once a week. She used to say, “this is costing money!” and I answered, “it’s cheaper than cocaine, whiskey and beer. I will cut back on them.” She laughed. She never once hung up on me.

I was was not the worst son in the world though not the best. I could have done more and been less selfish. I showed gratitude however. And we sang songs together and had a few laughs. We went to ballgames and picnics and hikes and museums. And my parents lived to know their grandchildren and they them. That was a great blessing. And soon I will see my grandchildren again. They are far away now -hundreds of miles. But I am happy they are safe.

God willing, they may get to know and remember me.

RICHARD K. MUNRO