from the couch

Tonight, I have been really bored. I am compiling a binder with poems written by Chesterton and Lewis. I want to memorize them. They are very beautiful and very much different from what we read in my Honors British Lit class. I'm watching National Treasure again. I love this movie, and I don't know why. I was talking to my mom about that last night. I pulled a Chesterton quote off TheShadowoftheBear.com yesterday, so I was relatively prepared to explain why I like the movie so much, inspired by the idea from Chesterton.

"To the insane man his insanity is quite prosaic, because it is quite true. A man who thinks himself a chicken is to himself as ordinary as a chicken. A man who thinks he is a bit of glass is to himself as dull as a bit of glass. It is the homogeneity of his mind which makes him dull, and which makes him mad. It is only because we see the irony of his idea that we think him even amusing; it is only because he does not see the irony of his idea that he is put in Hanwell at all. In short, oddities only strike ordinary people. Oddities do not strike odd people. This is why ordinary people have a much more exciting time; while odd people are always complaining of the dullness of life. This is also why the new novels die so quickly, and why the old fairy tales endure for ever. The old fairy tale makes the hero a normal human boy; it is his adventures that are startling; they startle him because he is normal. But in the modern psychological novel the hero is abnormal; the centre is not central. Hence the fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, and the book is monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among dragons; but not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses what a sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of to-day discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world."
~Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Orthodoxy, Chapter 2, "The Maniac"


Wordy? yes
Worth reading a few times or until the meaning is comprehended? I think so

I wish people would talk and write the way they used to. If this were to be on the inside cover of a "modern-day" book, the reader would more than likely not even buy the book because it would require too much effort to read, and apparently thinking is uncool.

Speaking of uncool, my school's prom is tomorrow night, and all the teachers and SADD are making sure everyone understands that it is wrong to put someone else's or your own life in danger by driving while drunk or high. SADD made a big deal out of it by having the grim reaper come in to "kill" someone every half hour or so - about how often someone is killed the night of prom across the nation because someone was driving under the influence. Teachers lecured or told stories of prom past.

I like stories. I think that people who actually hear stories and learn from them have a notable advantage in understanding people and how to live. I also think there is a binding force behind oral tradition between the storyteller and the listener.

“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.“ ~Albert Einstein