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Workshops
Classes and Seminars
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Truth:
Beyond Mere Facts
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Truth:
Beyond Mere Facts
Led by Geoff Wood
Wednesdays 7-8:30 pm
October 18, 25; November 1, 8.
Cost: $60 |
It
is commonly assumed that literature is fiction, given to metaphor
instead of hard facts. As such one could say it tells lies. If
you really want to know the truth about things - they say - you've
got to read "history" based on an objective observation
of what "actually" happened at this event or in that
person's life. But literature, be it sacred or secular, does deal
with facts; it does tell the truth better than objective writing.
Was the opening shot of the Battle of Concord heard beyond the
town limits of Concord? Factually, objectively speaking it was
not. But was it the shot heard round the world? The poet Emerson
says it was and in so doing states a "fact" of transcendent
importance. He sees Concord from a vantage point not available
to eyewitnesses. In other words you have to go to Emerson to know
the truth about Concord.
These
sessions will demonstrate how literature does this - working with
Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath
and other stories and poems, some biblical. In so doing, we hope
the literature dealt with may emerge reflective even of the truth
about yourself.
Dr.
Geoff Wood has a Ph.D. in Sacred Theology from Catholic University,
Washington, D.C. and a Licentiate in Sacred Scripture from Rome's
Pontifical Bible University. He has taught at Catholic University,
Swarthmore and Bucknell University.
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