Years back I wrote an essay called “Of Gods and Waterfalls” that was published in Irreantum, but I also submitted it to a non-Mormon venue. The only Mormon part was one line, toward the end, where I say something about not knowing what it means in Mormon theology to become a god. The original version, the version I submitted to a non-LDS journal, did not contain the line. Did I throw in the line to “Mormonize” the essay sufficiently to meet the requirements of the contest (literature that speaks to the Mormon experience and all that)? I was ready to conclude thus, but, in fact, looking at my freewriting for the piece, I see it did contain references to the LDS theology of deification. So I honestly can’t remember if I de-Mormonized the piece for the non-Mormon venue or if my original intent was to have the reference to Mormonism. In any case, I’ve wondered about my tendency to do this—to have a Mormon and non-Mormon version of things. Either way, the essay doesn’t have much to do with Mormonism.
I also wonder if there is a Mormon and non-Mormon version of myself. If so, the non-Mormon is the better writer of the two. By that I mean I feel like I’m at my best when my writing strives for something that transcends a particular religious worldview. Not that such transcendence requires scrubbing my religion from the narrative, but using one’s own religion as the yardstick to measure all things just seems small. Take C.S. Lewis. Yes, in a way he was a Christian writing to other Christians. But you get the sense he is speaking to something greater than mere Christianity. He didn’t write about Christianity. He wrote about the thing that Christianity was about. Take Brian Doyle, a Catholic writer who not only does not hide his Catholicism but often celebrates it in his work. Yet his work isn’t really Catholic or about Catholicism.
Not sure what I’m getting at here. I just think good Mormon writing isn’t going to be about Mormonism. The less a piece of writing is about Mormonism, the better it will be. It will be less inward, less navel gazing. Even if it’s deeply informed by a Mormon worldview, it will be expansive, looking outward from that view. At most, religion should be a kind of setting or backdrop against which stories play out.
I find I can’t write about Mormonism as a community, or as a theological innovation, or as a quirky religious identity. But what I am interested in writing about in my religiously themed work is the same thing that various religions are interested in–God, meaning, purpose, love.
In a sense, each piece becomes a kind of new religion. Like religion generally, I am using language and narrative to make sense of things. Sometimes the new religion is a close offshoot of Mormonism. Sometimes it’s a strange gnostic heresy out in the desert. I just hope that like any decent piece of writing or decent piece of religion, it’s provisional, imaginative, and reaching beyond itself.
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I have “Gentile versions” of many of my most Mormons works. I’ve never sold one.
But I have done similar things. I added the phrase “since things came out of the box” to make a story fit into a Pandora-themed anthology. That worked.
Ha, love it. It’s funny the things we’ll do to peddle a piece.
I think a lot depends on the particular story you want to write — and on how you define what it means for a story to be “about” something.
Every story, I think, is a mix of the general and the particular. To a greater degree than I think classic literary criticism sometimes realizes, I think that a substantial degree of whether we enjoy or find value in a work of literature has to do not just with its general themes, but also with our sense of connection to or interest in its particulars: the exploration of a particular culture, location, or even topic.
The classic southern writers would not be good writers if the stories they told were not, at some level, distinctively southern, as well as broadly general. I also think I could make the case that for me, the Mormon version of myself is a better writer than the non-Mormon version — because I know the particulars well enough to be able to write them with meaning.
Yes, I certainly don’t want to make a case against regional or culturally specific writing. And I’m definitely not trying to dismiss Mormon writing. I think what I’m getting at is …hmmm…what about this. Good Mormon writing will be more about showing the humanity of our Mormon characters more than showing their Mormon-ness to humanity. But maybe that doesn’t get at it either. I like it when writing strives for something transcendent, something transcending culture or region or religion, even though those things will also play a big role. As you can tell these are only partially formed thoughts floating around.
I think of it as a dialogue (possibly a dialectic?): the general instantiated in the particular, the particular apotheosized to represent the general. Sometimes a story will be about difference. Sometimes it will be about underlying commonality. But commonality has to recognize different, and difference takes its meaning for a recognition of commonality. For different stories and different authors, I think the balance will be different.
Well, honestly, being explicitly Mormon in my writing
a) makes the work better because watered-down art is just blah, and
b) it’s my schtick.
It’s a world most readers (most of MY readers are non-Mormon) are unfamiliar with but clearly defines my characters’ motives that, left undefined, would be incomprehensible and/or unbelievable (e.g., a 35-year-old single woman with a healthy libido who is a virgin by choice) (Because…why?) (There’s only one answer to that. Religion.)
Moriah, thanks for these thoughts. See my comment to Jonathon. I may have overstated my point because I think characters who move within and are motivated by their Mormonism are interesting. I’d wonder what is motivating that 35 year-old virgin beyond complying with a set of inherited norms. She wants God, transcendence, purpose, meaning, or why else go through the trouble? Mormonism speaks to those things, gives them a particular flavor, but they are bigger and more universal.
Yes. Other things motivate her. One is that she really has a battered self-esteem (created and nurtured by a verbally abusive aunt) she hasn’t been able to deal with well, which manifests as not allowing people to touch her, not trusting anyone to care long-term, not trusting men not to play with her heart. Her personal space is huge. You don’t find out why until fairly deep into the book.
The second is a deep-seated, subconscious feeling that she’s saving herself for a certain PERSON. Natch, being subconscious, she doesn’t get this until the Big Reveal at the end. And I might be mixing up my genres but there’s a bit of coincidence in all my books that I imply or state is divine intervention or impression that readers could take as magical realism, if I’m using that term correctly. Theric or Scott (Hales) or Dennis could say better than I could.
So the religion, while totally valid, is a convenient explanation—shorthand, even—for a whole host of reasons that are too deep to infodump. OR … it’s just an excuse. That’s for the reader to decide.
Beyond that, I explore the nature of God everywhere. Religion doesn’t make a difference. I like to explore how God, faith in or lack thereof (or even human connections like loyalty, love, duty, and honor) motivates people. I just do it under the cover of Mormonism because it’s what I know best. At the same time, I bring our culture to readers who don’t know much about it.
Now that I’ve typed all that out, I think that’s what you’re getting at? Mormonism as the vehicle?
Nicely put. Yes, a vehicle, not a destination. (Also, sounds like a compelling character.)
She is the favorite character of my male readership. Women, not so much.