Be Right Back

Once again there has been something of a lamentable break in my posting. I have the honor of being asked by Halden over at Inhabitatio Dei to write a review essay for the Other Journal on Donald Miller, spurned on by the earlier "controversy" that arose in relation to my modest response to one of his blog posts. Hence, not being one to want to have my first foray into a theological journal to be half assed, I have set to myself the task of reading (and re-reading) every one of his books, which has been both pleasurable and painful. So far Ive gotten through Blue Like Jazz, Father Fiction, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years,Through Painted Deserts and am starting Searching for God Knows What (which I have heard is his most "technical" book yet).

Having done all this in the last week or two, its been something of an experience of "soaking" in Donald Miller which has both increased my ambiguous relation to his ideas and yet also increased my appreciation for him at the same time. To be perfectly honest after reading these books I am somewhat perplexed about what exactly to think about the corpus of Miller's works, which has made writing a review essay harder than I originally anticipated. On the one hand I really enjoy his writing style, often you run across interesting turns of phrase that grab your attention, and I more than once found myself laughing out loud (for real) at his humorous observations or conversations. He also makes several good points that need to be taken into deep consideration. And to be perfectly frank after reading some other critiques of him over the internet and in print it almost makes me want to like him all the more because most criticisms of his work (especially Blue Like Jazz) are so asinine as to be much worse than simply off the mark. On the other hand he makes certain distinctions (of which I hope to focus on in the essay) and relations, certain categorical statements hidden amongst meandering prose that are somewhat petulant or simply unfounded. I understand the genre of memoir is one of interpretation and opinion, but to be honest I think that despite the truth of many things he says they become framed by his "bigger ideas" in such a way that they either dont actually function the way he wants them to, or they contradict his bigger picture. This is not to say his work is unhelpful or bad, because its not, it can be perspicacious and a fun read, full of poetic ideas and images and very cathartic in its own way. What it does mean is that it makes his work perplexing to me as to what parts I accept of his writing and what, perhaps, i disagree with, and the relation between the two, and perhaps just as important the potential reception of his ideas regarding which strands of thought of his are taken up or, perhaps, cast aside in moments of reader's synthesis.

At any rate I hope to be done with at least an initial draft of my essay by the end of next week (though my posting will commence much sooner than that). Look for my essay in the Other Journal (I have to admit I am excited about my first essay being "published" as it were, albeit digitally). If you have thoughts, opinions, ideas, likes, dislikes about Miller, I would love to hear your opinions and comments here to help me sift through my own ideas.