Philip Pullman

Now I've actually read the Literary Review's interview with Philip Pullman which I mentioned before I find that he is writing a sequel to the His Dark Materials trilogy which will apparently "answer some of the huge theological questions thrown up by his reworking of the Fall". (It will be called "The Book of Dust" and be about Lyra.) So I think I shall wait 'til that's out in paperback before rereading the Trilogy.

In the interview he quotes that annoying saying that there are no atheists in foxholes. This has always irritated me, because it seems to imply that belief is something clutched at in panic and therefore either real and honest or quite the opposite. It would be truer to say that atheists and believers are both less sure of themselves in foxholes. Although the spider-pig is excellent, my favourite bit of the Simpsons film is when the people of Springfield come out into the street to see their doom approaching. All the worshippers run out of the church, and the drinkers out of Moe's Tavern, see the disaster in the sky, and then all the people from the church rush into the tavern and all the people from the tavern rush into the church. It's good to be shaken up and made less certain about things. I could be seduced by the argument that we spend most of our lives sleep-walking anyway. The first time I went to stay at the nunnery at West Malling I found it hard to confront their regime -- every few hours they stop to praise God, because God is to be praised, and there are none of the endless daily chores to hide behind, you have to meet very large things face on. After a few days, though I still found it a hard discipline, I had got very acclimatised. The morning that I left I sat on the platform at West Malling station and felt swamped by what seemed like a heap of utter trivia -- what time would the train get me to London, when would I get home, what laundry needed doing, what did I have in the fridge, whom should I phone -- when a very talkative friend of mine phoned my mobile and I could hardly put sentences together to answer her. It felt like normal life was the most absurd lunacy. To the abbot of Worth, the monastery of the eponymous BBC series, it is clear that much of our busy-ness is stuff we have made up to distract our minds. I could be persuaded of this.

The odd thing is that Philip Pullman seems to be saying that God might exist for some people who need him -- he implies, people with difficult lives. (It sounds like one should call no man an atheist until he is dead, which is as annoying as the foxhole thing I'd have thought.) I await with a mixture of apprehension and interest his resolution of "huge theological questions". Something I will miss about being a fellow is access to people with genuine theological knowledge. In particular, the college chaplain, though I frequently disagreed with his views, has a very large body of theology at his fingertips, not only from the great patristic era, but from the twentieth century and the present. I would be very tempted to do a theology degree if I had the money -- only, it would be too embarrassing if I didn't get a first, and the stress was bad enough last time. So, my good intentions are defeated by worldliness. Ho hum.