On Intertextuality: Emerson, Meet Mumford

Ralph Waldo Emerson, founder of Transcendentalism and philosopher extraordinaire, occasionally amuses me. Take, for instance, this passage from Nature:

Nature is made to conspire with spirit to emancipate us. Certain mechanical changes, a small alteration in our local position, apprizes us of a dualism. We are strangely affected by seeing the shore from a moving ship, from a balloon, or through tints of an unusual sky. The least change in our point of view gives the whole world a pictorial air.

Okay, that’s not actually the amusing part yet. Be patient. I really love this concept that a change in perspective makes the world seem new. The amusing part comes at the end of the paragraph. Imagine, if you will, our austere and brilliant Emerson in this position:

Turn the eyes upside down, by looking at the landscape through your legs, and how agreeable is the picture, though you have seen it any time these twenty years!

Oh, my, gosh, can you imagine Emerson bending over to look over Walden Pond though his legs? Hilarious!

So, now that we’ve laughed at Emerson a bit, let’s move on to something even greater. I was listening to Mumford & Sons this week (as I do pretty much every day), and I thought about these lyrics from their song “The Cave”:

So come out of your cave walking on your hands
And see the world hanging upside down
You can understand dependence when you know the maker’s land

Okay, so Mumford & Sons’ version involves a little bit of gymnastics rather than just bending at the waist, but I love that the idea of looking at the world in a different way appears in both of these texts.

I also appreciate the ideas presented about nature in the two: Emerson talks about freedom (emancipation) while Mumford talks about dependence. [Side note: after reading SPIN's June cover story on Mumford & Sons in which Marcus Mumford talks about the importance of faith, I'm even more convinced that the biblical references throughout this album are very intentional.] At any rate, I think both Emerson and Mumford might agree that nature points to the existence of a Creator.

Now, for fun, watch this video of Mumford & Sons playing “The Cave” in a bookstore. Go on, you know you want to.

I struggle to find any truth in your lies.

My favorite song, “Awake My Soul,” by Mumford & Sons begins this way:

“How fickle my heart and how woozy my eyes / I struggle to find any truth in your lies / And now my heart stumbles on things I don’t know / My weakness I feel I must finally show”

Sometimes, I look at the people around me and wonder what kind of lies they’re believing. I think about the depth of my inner thoughts, and I recognize that, at any given moment, one of my beloved friends could be fighting an inner battle about which I know nothing. I wonder if their battles are like my own. Are those battles also buried so deeply, entrenched in years of self-doubt, that escape seems improbable–or impossible?

I’ve found that, even in all the end-of-semester busyness, I’ve been experiencing a bit of dissatisfaction lately, and I can see throughout patterns in my life that this dissatisfaction lies in years of self-doubt. What truly amazes me, however, is how absolutely pervasive this self-doubt can be.

One bad class period in which my students don’t respond to any of my instruction. One plagiarized essay. One student who turns in a late assignment. Any one of these incidents brings up questions that I hate to realize I’m asking myself: Do I really want to teach? Is this actually my calling? Am I making any difference? Why am I working so blasted hard for students who clearly don’t care?

This self-doubt leaks over into my own academic life. The grading scale at Gardner-Webb is strict; if I make anything below a 97 in a class, I lose my (pridefully-held) 4.0 average. A 96–a very honorable grade–will earn me a 3.66 in a class, which is bordering on unacceptable, at least to my perfectionist nature. After taking a midterm exam a few weeks ago, I walked out of my professor’s office thinking I had just blown my GPA. I didn’t feel as though I answered the questions thoroughly, and I did not feel as if I adequately expressed my knowledge of American Renaissance literature. Two weeks later, when my midterm was returned to me, I was astounded by my grade–a 99–and my teacher’s comments that the test was clearly too easy for me. I was also a little ashamed of the flood of relief that passed over me as I realized that I still, in fact, have an excellent chance of making above a 97 in the class as a whole. Just days before, I had followed the slippery slope of self-doubt down to questioning my entire future. If I don’t make an A in this class, I’ll lose my 4.0, and I won’t get accepted into grad school at Baylor (where I’m seriously considering entering a Ph.D. program). My pride as an exceptional student is constantly at war with my perceived identity: though I rarely voice the idea, I often feel that if I’m not a perfect student, then I have completely failed at life. I don’t feel as though I’ve ever been good at anything other than academia, and making less than an A clearly means that I’m not even good at that. See? Lies.

The worst part, however, is the lies of my perception of relationships:

The reason you’re approaching 26 and still single is because no guy could ever be interested in you.

That guy you’re interested in? He doesn’t care about you at all. Other girls are so much better.

That girl? She’s only talking to you because she needs something from you.

Your best friends? They think you’re annoying and you talk too much when you drink too much coffee. You should stop that. Don’t do that anymore. You’re always wrong.

Lies. Lies. Lies.

But so comfortable, too. The lure of lies is that they appeal to my selfish nature. When I believe these lies, I’m in control. Yes, berating myself is difficult, but it’s also very powerful. When I blame myself, I’m buying into the lie that I’m actually important (in some negative regard). It’s easier to believe that I’m single because I’m not good enough than because God has some greater plan. Because when I recognize God’s purpose, I have to let go of my own mindset. And letting God love me can be even more difficult than hating myself.

The truth is that I far too often believe the lies. I do not often enough grasp the Truth. This dissatisfaction serves a purpose, however. I recognize the self-doubt, and I begin to actively fight against it. I read Psalm 139 and remind myself that, even in the trenches of self-doubt, I cannot flee from my Father’s presence. I remind myself that truth is found in the cross on which my Savior died, not in my job or my academic career or my relationships with others. I write on my blog because that’s a little easier than saying the words face-to-face. And I listen to Mumford & Sons’ song and I hear the hope at the end: “Awake my soul / For you were made to meet your maker.”

I’m not sure of Mumford & Sons’ intention in those lyrics, but I know Who my Maker is, and I know that He doesn’t want me believing the lies. And I finally find the courage to fight against them and turn to the Truth once more.

Mumford and Sons

A few weeks ago, I downloaded a Bonnaroo mixtape created by SPIN magazine. I was super excited about it because it contained the Gaslight Anthem’s new single “American Slang” several weeks before the album was released. And while I certainly love The Gaslight Anthem, I found on that album a treasure: a live version of the song “White Blank Page” by London folk rock band Mumford and Sons.

I bought the full album on Monday, and it’s one of the best musical purchases I’ve made in a long time. The entire album–12 tracks long–is brilliant. Marcus Mumford’s voice is strong and deep, the instruments (including a mandolin and banjo) rock, and the songwriting is absolutely brilliant!

There are times when I listen to the album, and the music sounds like it should be played on the porch of a mountain cabin in Appalachia. And then there’s the song “Dust Bowl Dance,” and I imagine some film of violence and poverty in 1930s Oklahoma. These are definitely not the kind of voices I imagine coming out of London, but then again, what do I know about the London folk scene?

I’ve been listening to the album all week. And hoping that eventually, they add tour dates in the US.

Here’s a video of “White Blank Page,” filmed in a bookstore in London. Excellent music + books everywhere = a beautiful video:

And one of my favorites, especially lyrically, is track 4, “Roll Away Your Stone”:

“It seems that all my bridges have been burned / But you say that’s exactly how this grace thing works / It’s not the long walk home that will change this heart / But the welcome I receive with every start”