akuivalainen

Scripture is Strange

Scripture is strange. Its language, its organization, its narrative techniques, are all strange to varying degrees and in different ways, and are rarely straightforward. Source: Scripture is Strange

‘…stories change our behaviors by actually changing our brain chemistry.’

In his 1897 book What is Art? the great Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy defined art as “an infection.” Good art, Tolstoy wrote, infects the audience with the storyteller’s emotion and ideas. The better the art, the stronger the infection—the more stealthily it works around whatever immunities we possess and plants the virus. Tolstoy reached thisContinue reading “‘…stories change our behaviors by actually changing our brain chemistry.’”

Let’s Stop Cannibalising Ourselves and Start Making Art

I can’t be the only one that’s noticed inflammatory shit happening in the world of writing in the last few weeks. There was Lionel Shriver’s smug speech and the subsequent uproar a.k.a. Brisbane finally gets publicity apart from Tom Hiddleston’s visit and there was also Merritt Tierce’s article in Marie Claire a.k.a the Crying StarvingContinue reading “Let’s Stop Cannibalising Ourselves and Start Making Art”

If you read only one Alan Moore Jerusalem interview, make it this one

I recently spent six hours with Alan Moore. We went on a walking tour of his old Northampton neighbourhood, and stood where his childhood home once stood (pictured above). We discussed Anonymous, B… Source: If you read only one Alan Moore Jerusalem interview, make it this one

Weirdness that Happens when writing about Exorcists

Today I sat down to write and do some additional research on a chapter of my new exorcist book only to find the man I was going to mention, the famous Catholic Exorcist Gabriele Amorth had died. I’ve had this chapter planned for weeks but still, it made me take a moments pause. It alsoContinue reading “Weirdness that Happens when writing about Exorcists”

Pokémon Go and the Sanctity of Heritage Landscapes

One of Finland’s best-preserved wooden churches today sits outside Oulu, where the Kiiminki Church was completed in 1760. The modest cruciform frame church in northern Finland was designed by chur… Source: Pokémon Go and the Sanctity of Heritage Landscapes

This book is broken, and other things I tell myself while writing

Theories on the Enduring Power of Myth

Myth is defined as being a traditional or sacred story, the latter essentially distinguishes “myth from other forms of narrative such as folktales, which are ordinarily secular and fictional,”[1] however whether or not these stories are universal or only culturally significant for their intended audience is debatable. Psychoanalytical studies of myth theorise that myths expressContinue reading “Theories on the Enduring Power of Myth”

Viking Jesus

Can’t express how much I love this…

The Melody of The Music of Razors

In nineteenth-century Boston, a young doctor on the run from the law falls in with a British confidence artist. Together, and with dire consequence, they bring back to the light something meant to be forgotten. A world away in London, an absent father, haunted by the voice of a banished angel, presents his daughter withContinue reading “The Melody of The Music of Razors”