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The Secret Garden: Chapters 19, 20 and 21

#59: Dec. - Jan. 2009 (Fiction)
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GentleReader9

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Oh goody! I get to "correct" you some more. :laugh2:

Tom said, and I paste:
I misread the passage you quoted, because I was focused on Burnett's interest in spiritualism, which isn't relevant here.
Are you sure you didn't just have an alternate reading which might have been equally valid? The cool thing about literary passages, dreams and poetry is that there are multiple correct readings. I think spiritualism is probably relevant throughout the book and I would like to know what you read, on a less personal, more symbolic level?
"Where can I find a man who has forgotten the words so that I can talk with him?"
-- Chuang-Tzu (c. 200 B.C.E.)
as quoted by Robert A. Burton
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Thomas Hood
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GentleReader9 wrote:Are you sure you didn't just have an alternate reading which might have been equally valid? The cool thing about literary passages, dreams and poetry is that there are multiple correct readings. I think spiritualism is probably relevant throughout the book and I would like to know what you read, on a less personal, more symbolic level?
Yes, I think I made a mistake in supposing the "One of the strange things about living in the world . . ." passage was spiritualistic, because nature is speaking to her and not the dead, even in memory. It's her assurance of personal immortality. There's no seance nor clear sight.
"Archie! Archie! Archie!" it said, and

again, sweeter and clearer than before, "Archie! Archie!"

He thought he sprang to his feet not even startled. It was such a real voice and it seemed so natural that he should hear it.

"Lilias! Lilias!" he answered. "Lilias! where are you?"

"In the garden," it came back like a sound from a golden flute. "In the garden!"
Although it occurs in a dream, I did consider this purple passage to be spiritualistic, because it implies that we are visited by the dead more than just in memory.
The cool thing about literary passages, dreams and poetry is that there are multiple correct readings.
Well, a teacher might say so who wants to get a response from students, and everybody has to start somewhere. I'd prefer to say that there are multiple tolerable readings, because some readings are more insightful than others, are more aware of the psychology and cultural background of the author and more sensitive to use of language. I read Walden through three times and didn't detect a single pun. But now that I have been corrected by others, my reading has improved :)
So correct me all you can.

Tom
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giselle

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I think there might be a blurry line here between what is personal experience in a straightforward sense, that is, what our senses tell us is happening around us and, on the other hand, spiritual experience. What Burnett describes of Colin's experience is personal experience but could it not be his spirit prompting him to experience an eternal moment, giving him access to forever lived in that moment, a moment that would otherwise be just an average moment in time like any other?

Whether this is Burnett's meaning or not, I think spirituality is threaded throughout this book and that she intends the characters to be moved by and to experience spirituality in many different ways. The hovering presence of Mrs. Craven, for example, the way her "spirit" binds the story and the characters together is an indication of this. The characters go about their personal experiences within this spiritual context.
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I would like to think of Mrs. Craven in a "guardian angel" type of sense. She knows that her family is suffering and she is nudging them back to life. I guess you could say that it is spiritual. It was still pretty much a magical book in my opinion.
If you obey all of the rules, you miss all of the fun.
--Katherine Hepburn
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giselle wrote: What Burnett describes of Colin's experience is personal experience but could it not be his spirit prompting him to experience an eternal moment, giving him access to forever lived in that moment, a moment that would otherwise be just an average moment in time like any other?
This one I had to think about, but yes, I think everyone, religious or not, has a natural hunger for spiritual life.

Tom
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Thomas wrote:
I think I made a mistake in supposing the "One of the strange things about living in the world . . ." passage was spiritualistic, because nature is speaking to her and not the dead, even in memory. It's her assurance of personal immortality. There's no seance nor clear sight.
Then a discussion of spirituality (personal spiritual experience) and also of spiritualism (a belief in immortality through contact with the deceased) ensues for the next several posts.

I think both of these are themes in the text, although I would argue that it's possible to take the "ghostly presence" of Mrs. Craven, especially in dreams, to be an expression of the individual's psyche where it connects to universal consciousness; it uses the dream character of a loved one no longer living as a "bridge" or metaphor about the permeable, connected nature of the human Self among selves, the collective Mind among minds. I guess this is a kind of neo-Jungian reading and admittedly brings something of an outside "lens" to the text.

If it is possible to make an eternal contribution to thought, to understanding, to humanity's civility and wisdom -- or to a family's love and interdepent nurturance, within a lifetime that spills over the brim of a single personality to touch and fill others with its love and power, then we do live forever through one another -- the truest, best parts of ourselves do. This can be experienced in dreams, in fleeting impressions, messages felt to be from "beyond the grave" -- or in more mundane forms, like diaries or other writings, or the passing down of an ancient lullabye. Whatever is still held in the living mind and heart is not dead, not lost. It sings in new throats and looks out of new eyes; its whispered tales give new skin the gooseflesh. Like a constant, seasonal wind breathing through new lungs and into every cell, spirit has a tangible referent. Is this magical thinking? Maybe. But it seems to be quite literally and clearly true.

Personal spirituality, a belief in spiritualism -- different, but possibly connected and referring to a concrete social and personal phenomena.
"Where can I find a man who has forgotten the words so that I can talk with him?"
-- Chuang-Tzu (c. 200 B.C.E.)
as quoted by Robert A. Burton
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Storytime: an Interlude.

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Just wanted to share a personal "ghost story" tangent. I hope no one minds.

My grandfather, the one from Alabama who marched for civil rights and preached liberal theology from his pulpit -- we'll call him, "Lilburn," used to play a game with me and my siblings. He would put on a strange, wide-eyed facial expression and wave his arthritic hands "spookily" and make a sound like, "woooo-woooo," tiptoe-ing around after us or popping out suddenly with it in dark hallways, intoning, "It's the ghost of your old, dead Granddaddy, a-comin' after you....wooo!" Of course we would scream and run away and it was really fun.

I didn't realize it until years after he had died and I was quite grown up, but the point of this came to me suddenly when I was starting to slip into despair about what my parents and grandparents and ancestors would think if they could see what a mess I had made.... All of a sudden, "Wooo," my old, dead Granddaddy was there, making fun of the idea that there was anything I could do, ever, that would make his ghost come after me in judgment. There was no way I need ever fear his ghost. I felt his promise of eternal, constant, unconditional love instead, and I knew he would laugh at the idea that he might "come after me if I was bad to take me away." The man was a genius.
"Where can I find a man who has forgotten the words so that I can talk with him?"
-- Chuang-Tzu (c. 200 B.C.E.)
as quoted by Robert A. Burton
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GentleReader9 wrote:If it is possible to make an eternal contribution to thought, to understanding, to humanity's civility and wisdom -- or to a family's love and interdepent nurturance, within a lifetime that spills over the brim of a single personality to touch and fill others with its love and power, then we do live forever through one another -- the truest, best parts of ourselves do.
But when you've done the right thing, you have done right eternally, even if know only to you and God.

Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Tom
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Thomas Hood
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Re: Storytime: an Interlude.

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GentleReader9 wrote:. . . I was starting to slip into despair about what my parents and grandparents and ancestors would think if they could see what a mess I had made. . .
An expert is one who has made all the mistakes. Yesterday I became an expert in Moen single-handle faucets. I made about every mistake with such a faucet I am likely to make in the rest of my life, including the gushing experience of forgetting to drain the pipes before pulling the faucet. So now you're an expert in life, and they would be proud.

And not only do you have to clean up your mistakes, probably you (like me and Mary and Colin) inherited a few:

Six at the beginning means:
Setting right what has been spoiled by the father.
If there is a son,
No blame rests upon the departed father.
Danger. In the end good fortune.

Nine in the second place means:
Setting right what has been spoiled by the mother.
One must not be too persevering.

Tom
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Quoth Thomas fair and true (may he not this day rue):
But when you've done the right thing, you have done right eternally, even if know only to you and God.

Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
Aha! Now you're inviting us to talk mystically. And you're telling us something that's literally and absolutely true, too, just in a different way. I try to keep it simple for the people who don't feel safe with "ghosts" walking in their world. May I add you're either very brave or very foolhardy to go this route on this site? You even used the filthy "G" word, may you not come to wish you could just wash your mouth out with soap and have done with it. :laugh:

I believe the type of act you describe has real, felt effects for others, even if they don't consciously know it and it's "known only to you and God." Minds are connected not just by words, but in thought; hearts are connected not just by expressed feelings, but by passion itself; spirits are connected by the quality of deeds, sung and unsung. There is a part of all of us more whole than the sum, a still place of identity with one another's inmost nature in which we know each other deeply and always have. How else could we get such a clear, vivid consensus reality which is so utterly far off-base? :D
"Where can I find a man who has forgotten the words so that I can talk with him?"
-- Chuang-Tzu (c. 200 B.C.E.)
as quoted by Robert A. Burton
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