Thursday 27 September 2007

Brecht and Shaw - Christian atheists?

Rehearsing Brecht's "The Chalk Circle" and recently seeing the excellent Saint Joan production at the National, I've been struck by how these 2 atheists keep coming back to Christian themes, and perhaps even values.

To take one example from each. The epilogue of Saint Joan consists of all the major characters coming back, facing Joan (now a saint), and giving their various excuses for why they can canonise her but not follow her example - worldly power, could not cope with her example, etc, a bit like the parables (eg the wedding feast guests' excuses) and temptations from the New Testament. One states that her sufferings have made it so much easier for him to visualise Christ's sufferings - she replies with "Must a Christ suffer in every age, for those who have no imagination?" She then sums up her responses with the last line of the play - "O God who made this beautiful earth, when will it be ready to receive your saints? How long, o Lord? How long?" Now of course one can't ascribe Christianity to a man who also came up with "The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one" and "I'm an atheist and I thank God for it". Yet, to me, both those quotes from "St Joan" feel deeply Christian statements, or at least ones that a Christian can get as much out as an atheist, or maybe even more.

As for Brecht, he portrays a judge legalising a theft to compensate a victim of war. Again, though this derives from his Communism not from Christianity, its 'bias to the poor' and counter-cultural-ness (if that's a word?!) is - in mine numble opinion - very Christian, parablesque, and akin to Jesus's teachings. (And as for how I relate to his mockery of miracles, the decadent but omnipowerful church, and corrupt priests and monks - heck, that true son-of-the-church Chaucer was doing the same 500 years ago!)

Entirely pretentious, subjective and knock-down-able thoughts, I know, but I hope they'll provide some food for thought.

Dipping my toe in the blogging ocean...

Well, I've had this set up for so long I figured I might as well start using it! What I'll be putting on it I've not the foggiest notion, but here goes...