Book Description
The movie took years to be filmed and edited, and was the subject of endless stories, rumors, and speculation. At a screening at Cannes in May 1979, Francis Ford Coppola said simply, "There wasn't a truthful thing written about [the film] in four years." That year at Cannes, Apocalypse Now won the Palme d'Or, going on from there to worldwide acclaim and etching itself in the memories of audiences with unforgettable sequences like the dawn helicopter attack scored to Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries" or Lt. Colonel Kilgore's chilling "I love the smell of napalm in the morning." Here, generously illustrated with evocative stills from the film and revealing photographs from the set, is the story behind the movie where Vietnam met Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. It is the extraordinary saga of Coppola and his crew and actors-who included Marlon Brando, Robert Duvall, Harvey Keitel, Martin Sheen, Dennis Hopper, and Harrison Ford-battling hurricanes in the jungles of the Philippines, the calamity of a lead actor's heart attack, and crises both psychological and financial . . . in the end giving rise to a modern film classic.
Customer Reviews:
A wealth of information, with some glaring omissions.......2003-05-10
Talk about bad timing. After years waiting for a good Apocalypse Now book, Peter Cowie's comes out, right around the same time as "Apocalypse Now Redux." The irony being that Cowie wrote the book in 2000, a full year before Coppola unveiled his reworked masterpiece. This means that, due to how long the publishing process takes, the book has hardly any information about Redux, which is a shame. As Cowie's interview with Coppola took place in 1999, there are no quotes or thoughts from the director about what lead him to create Redux.
That being said, the rest of the book is very informative, in some cases too informative. The background, pre-production detail is nearly staggering. I would have liked to have learned more about screenwriter John Milius' original script idea, "The Psychedelic Soldier," which, after he was inspired by the idea to do a modern tribute to Conrad's "Heart of Darkness," became Apocalypse Now. Cowie, however, does do a great job of mentioning many of the early drafts of the script, even quoting from the rarely-seen first draft, in which the VC speak in goofy subtitles, and Colonel Kilgore is known as Colonel Kharnage.
The level of research Cowie has performed leaves me wondering over many glaring omissions. For example, the highlight of the book is a chapter titled "Buried Treasure," in which Cowie goes over the 5 ½ hour work print. Though he gives detailed descriptions of the major scenes that are in the work print, but were not included in the original version (or the Redux), there's no mention of the Photojournalist's death scene, which is a major revelation of the work print. Likewise, Cowie doesn't mention how deadly Martin Sheen's Willard is in the work print; for example, in it he kills a child in the climax.
Cowie also fails to cover little bits and pieces that are interesting in the film. For example, he doesn't mention that Lee Ermey, who would later make film history as the drill instructor in "Full Metal Jacket," plays one of Kilgore's helicopter pilots, during the beach raid sequence. And there is no detail about what scenes, exactly, Harvey Keitel filmed during the few weeks he spent on the set. But these little matters are trivial. The fact is, the book is a pretty good compendium of information about my favorite movie. There are no color photos, but there are some nice behind-the-scenes shots and stills, including a very nice one of Willard's head coming out of the swamp, enshrouded in fog.
The main thing I found interesting in the book was that cinematographer Storaro advised Coppola to end the movie on a pessimistic note. Watching one of the early edits, Storaro urged Coppola to integrate the scenes of Willard hacking at Kurtz with the caribou sacrifice, as well as the shots of Kurtz's compound exploding. The way Storaro envisioned it, Willard would kill Kurtz at the exact same time as the air strike, which would obliterate all of them. A very dark ending, but Coppola obviously didn't like it. The footage of Kurtz's compound being destroyed, by the way, is included as an extra on the Apocalypse Now (original version) DVD.
IN-DEPTH.......2001-08-23
If you loved the movie (either version), you'll love this book. I got it in time to read before Apocalypse Now Redux came to the big screen. I'd previously read Eleanor Coppola's notes and Karl French's Bloomsbury Movie Guide (BMG #1). Notes concerns itself mainly wth the family stuff that the Coppolas were dealing with at the time the movie was being made. BMG #1 is more of an encyclopedic a-z that deals more with subjects. Cowie gets it right by going beyond this by delving into Francis Coppola's private archives to focus on the movie itself. Part one of the book is broken down into such topics as birth of the project, assembling the team, pre-production, the screenplay, shooting (phases 1-3), the perils of post-production, and at last - a movie! Part two of the book deals with the 5 ½-hour rough cut, the characters themselves, the contrasts of the film set in asia as opposed to Conrad's novel set in Africa, and conclusions. While the other 2 books did what they intended to do, the Apocalypse Now Book is more in-depth which will give you a better understanding as to what it took to get this awesome film made and to the big screen. The horror indeed.
Book Description
"It may be the most lucid account of the strain of epic moviemaking that we'll ever get. At its center there's a great artist-hero caught in a trap - struggling to find the theme of the picture he's already shooting." -Pauline Kael
Customer Reviews:
i enjoyed the book...but i'm a big fan of the movie.......2001-01-07
to balance the reviews i have to add that i really enjoyed the book. i loved the film, the follow up documentry was as impressive (oscar winning i think), and this is a very interesting addition. i must add that one needs to be 'in' with the film making history already (i.e its no introduction to the most infamous 'touch-and-go' film productions) before one could appreciate this. its a well told tale.
A look at film from an interesting angle.......2000-03-24
I found the book to be very compelling and insightful. It takes a look at what went on behind the scenes of "Apocalypse Now" from the point of view of someone not involved in filmmaking in a direct way.
Don't waste your time with this book!.......1998-07-21
Perhaps a better title for this book would have been Meaningless Notes on the Making of Apocalypse Now. The author, who was charged with making a behind the scenes documentary of how the film was made, wastes the reader's time on disjointed anecdotes about her family life during the three plus years it took to complete this film. While the book jacket teases the reader with suggestions of her invaluable insights, the actual text is much more heavily devoted to Ms. Coppola's observations of her children, her husband's (in)fidelity, and what various dinner guests were served while visiting with the Coppola family. We learn much more about how four year old Sofia Coppola spent her days than how Martin Sheen's heart attack impacted the production. Why was Sheen hired to replace Harvey Keitel?...... What about those rumors of animosity between Marlon Brando and Dennis Hopper?...... Why did director Francis Ford Coppola choose to ignore weather experts and watch as the sets were des! troyed by a typhoon? Unfortunately you won't get any answers to those questions in this book. You will however learn in great detail how each of the Copppla clan spend their individual birthdays and how the Phillipines can't compare to California when it comes to health food shops and clothing boutiques. Duh!!! If you are truly interested in learning more about this historic film, I suggest you use your browser in a search of magazine and newspaper archives for appropriate material. Your time will be better spent surfing the net than waiting for Ms. Coppola to tell you why Robert Duvall's character was so hung up on having his Air Cav troopers surf "Charlie's Point."
Book Description
The Bloomsbury Movie Guides feature scores of entries on all aspects of the making and meaning of movies and include historic, cinematic, and literary references; profiles of the actors and directors; and interviews.
Apocalypse Now, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, received eight Academy Award nominations in 1980. In this book, film critic Karl French provides a critical analysis of a movie that has established itself as one of the greatest films of all time. He provides the reader with insightful behind-the-scenes stories about daily workings on the set. He examines the importance of every character and their contributions to the movie. Also included in this edition are interviews with William Hokanson, a Vietnam veteran, Stephen Bach, a United Artists executive, Richard Marks, Walter Murch, and John Milius.
Customer Reviews:
Vietnam War Clasic.......2006-11-04
This is my favorite all time Vietnam war movie - so naturally I would have to read something like this on the background of the movie. This is of course, a cult favorite even for us Vietnam veterans. The orginal film left out some important elements in the telling of the story - so it was great to see the later version come out in DVD and video.
I still love the smell of naplam in the morning and I love this book as well. It works. Although there is a mis-quote in the book (or two) - over-all, I rate this as good and entertaining information. It is not enlightening or profound nor does it deliver some words of wisdom - but it is what it is and that is very much okay!
An important mistake.......2005-06-12
On page 7 French quotes Kilgore as saying `I've been trying to forget about you' to Willard, but I am sure he actually says `Na Trang forget all about you?' He is implying that Willard's superiors have forgotten about him and his mission. I think this misquoting is important - French implies that Kilgore doesn't care about Willard or his mission but in fact Kilgore is trying to emphasise that their military superiors don't care about them, or anyone in the field really. This is why he cares more for surfing than war.
Excellent choice, novel approach.......2001-08-20
Apocalypse now (BMG #1) is an excellent choice for Bloomsbury to kick off their line of movie guides. It's also good in that it'll tide us over and give us a glimpse into Apocalypse Now Redux (I'm refering to the restored scenes). While the encyclopedic method employed here may turn off some, i find it a novel approach to tackling one of my favorite movies. If nothing else, it'll be easier to look something up at a later date. The 8 pages of color and b&w pictures here were nice but i'm glad to see that Bloomsbury doubled that number by the time Blue Velvet (bmg #3) came out. All in all, this book is a good companion to Peter Cowie's the Apocalypse Now book and Eleanor Coppola's Notes.
The essential a-z of the essential Vietnam war movie.......2001-03-14
I strongly disagree with one reviewer who said this is hardly worth buying. My advice is: buy it - you'll love it.
OK, I'm probably biased in that I tend to enjoy the 'encyclopaedia' format of books like this. I read one entry, then follow the links to another, and another until I'm totally immersed in the arcane and amazing information on offer. Linear readers might find it a bit annoying, I guess. However, even for them, this book is well worth reading. It's an essential companion to Apocalypse Now, and has certainly enhanced my viewing of the film. I love Karl French's terse, opinionated style.
My only complaint is that with a tiny bit more effort the references could have been complete enough to make this a useful academic work as well as the popular paperback it already is. For example, I would have loved to follow up Nguyen Khac Vien's essay 'Apocalypse Now Viewed by a Vietnamese', quoted on p. 230, but couldn't since it doesn't appear in the bibliography. Having said that, there are plenty of leads here that I *am* going to follow up.
Great entry in the Bloomsbury Series.......2000-07-08
This first book in Bloomsbury's movie guide series is, so far, the best of the lot. Full of interesting and often hilarious insights and observations, this A to Z guide to the film actually works fairly well as a straight-through read. I particularly enjoyed the references to the place of water buffalo in classical dramatic structure.
Customer Reviews:
How does Hollywood do history?.......2007-02-14
In "The Hollywood History of the World", George MacDonald Fraser provides an enjoyable survey of Hollywood's treatment of historical subjects. This is no scholarly dissertation, enumerating all of the factual errors in each film and grading them on accuracy. Indeed, there's very little scholarship at all. Although there is some judgement on historical matters, most of Mr. MacDonald Fraser's commentary is made up observations about actors, sets, dialogue and drama. This book is really the reminiscences of a movie lover who happens to be a history buff. The author adeptly conveys the wonder one must have felt watching movies during Hollywood's Golden Age, and makes one realize how incredible it is that we are able to actually see history resurrected before our eyes, while all previous generations before the early 20th century had to resort to dusty manuscripts and pictures. The movies are the closest process we have to time travel and George MacDonald Fraser concludes that Hollywood has done a pretty job of it.
A Must for Lovers of Costume Drama.......2005-10-22
I bought this book when it first came out in the '80s, and it has gained that most honored spot for a book -- the bookcase right next to my bed. It's an old friend; I've read it over and over. It's hugely entertaining, and remarkably informative as well. I joined Netflix largely to get access to many of the wonderful old movies I'd read about in Fraser's book, and I've learned all sorts of tidbits of history.
Also fascinating are the many illustrations showing contemporary portraits of the historical characters portrayed and the actors who played them. Much of the casting and costuming has been remarkably good -- in particular, in The Private Life of Henry VIII, Merle Oberon's costume as Anne Boleyn is a dead-on copy of the clothes Anne wore in a portrait. Read this book and you'll have a new respect for how much history Hollywood has gotten right.
One of the best & drollest history books I have read.......2005-06-20
A brillantly conceived foundation with combines GMF love of history and Films. It also allows him to poniticated on all of the issues and ideas that claim his fancy. It was a very fun read for me!
a joyous and witty book........2000-03-03
This is not a dry scholarly study but a witty, droll, and entertaining book in its own right. Fraser has apparently seen every historical film ever made; it goes without saying that films set in Regency England and Mary Stuart's reign in Scotland are throughly scrutinized by Mr. Fraser, along with "One Million Years B.C." and "Ben Hur." Fraser peppers the book throughout with his own knowledge of history without ever getting pedantic. A real treat for movie buffs and fans of Fraser's novels.
Book Description
These essays by eminent European intellectual and cultural historian Anson Rabinbach address the writings of key figures in twentieth-century German philosophy. Rabinbach explores their ideas in relation to the two world wars and the horrors facing Europe at that time.
Analyzing the work of Benjamin and Bloch, he suggests their indebtedness to the traditions of Jewish messianism. In a discussion of Hugo Ball's little-known Critique of the German Intelligentsia, Rabinbach reveals the curious intellectual career of the Dadaist and antiwar activist turned-nationalist and anti-Semite. His examination of Heidegger's "Letter on Humanism" and Jaspers's The Question of German Guilt illuminates the complex and often obscure political referents of these texts. Turning to Horkheimer and Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment, Rabinbach offers an arresting new interpretation of this central text of the critical theory of the Frankfurt School. Subtly and persuasively argued, his book will become an indispensable reference point for all concerned with twentieth-century German history and thought.
Book Description
Madness and murder, history and colonialism, drugs and war ‹ these are the major themes of Francis Ford Coppola¹s landmark film. The making of Apocalypse Now was almost as dramatic as the film itself, nearly costing Coppola his sanity and actor Martin Sheen his life. A fascinating guide to this Vietnam epic.
Book Description
The companion screenplay to the recently updated version of Coppola's groundbreaking masterpiece. The book features an introduction by Francis Ford Coppola, the entire screenplay, and 8 pages of color photos.
Apocalypse Now is a retelling of Joseph Conrad's classic novella, Heart of Darkness--set in the Vietnam War. This is the definitive vision of madness and folly of war in our times.
Customer Reviews:
Basically just a transcription of the movie.......2003-05-03
I was disappointed to see that this book doesn't contain the original version of the Apocalypse Now script, by John Milius. It could have at least contained one of the later Milius/Coppola rewrites, such as the final revised 1975 version, which is easily found online. The simple fact is, those scripts provide a better reading experience; you're better off just watching the movie than reading this one. And, if you're a fledgling screenwriter, you're certainly not going to learn anything about the craft of scriptwriting from this book.
The reason being, as any viewer of the excellent documentary "Hearts of Darkness" knows, is that Coppola basically gave his actors free reign in expanding and ad-libbing their dialog on the set. Having read the earlier Milius/Coppola rewrites, I know that a lot of the lines in Apocalypse Now were in fact from the script. But many more of them (particularly Brando and Hopper's dialog) were in fact made up by the actors themselves. So to publish this book and say that it's a pure creation of Milius and Coppola is a bit misleading (something which Coppola himself vaguely asserts in his introduction).
A straight-up publication of an earlier version would have been preferable, if for the simple fact that it would give amazing insight into the twisted path this film took, from script to celluloid. For example, the '75 version mentioned above (the script Coppola started with on the set, but eventually rewrote day by day) not only opened with a psychedelic action scene, it also ended with one: a surreal, apocalyptic (of course) set-piece that involved untold VC, rampant destruction, and drugged-out GI's, with "Light My Fire" blaring over humongous stereos. It's interesting to imagine what the movie would've been like, had Coppola stuck with this ending, though from the beginning he claimed he had a problem with it; he found it too much like a comic book. Still, many have complained that the ending of Coppola's actual film is a bit underwhelming; there are many who would have in fact preferred the climactic sequence Milius envisioned. As for myself, I like both.
There are other interesting differences in the early Milius/Coppola drafts. For example, Willard is more of a devil-may-care super-soldier; he shares his joints with the PBR crew, and takes easily to murder: in one well-written sequence, Willard, realizing the French Plantation owners are attempting to trick him out of crucial fuel and ammo supplies, fools them by murdering some Vietnamese guards and planting their bodies in empty supply crates - crates which the French believe contain fuel and ammo. Kurtz as well is different, a blond-haired he-man who kills hundreds of VC single-handedly. Hardly the character Marlon Brando played in the film!
Actually, it's unfair of me to review these earlier incarnations of the script. The fact is, the version published here is far removed from them. But even though I'm unimpressed with this book, I still can't give it a poor review; even though it's mostly just a transcription, still, it's a transcription of my favorite movie, so that means it can't be ALL bad.
Apocalypse and history.......2002-06-23
"Apocalypse Now! Redux" is celebrated as one of the most powerful anti-war manifestos. One of the reasons for its long-term success is, without a doubt, its precocious post-modernism. The Air Cavalry scene, in particular, conveys a message that will become part of the post-modern intellectual credo. Most core Western cultural symbols, old and new, are intrinsically violent, "barbaric." "Apocalypse Now!" is not only a harbinger of this vision, it takes it to the extreme. In it, even the counterculture, in other contexts celebrated as a "liberating force," is intertwined with the lethal vines of death. In the new release of the movie the Playboy culture and the untrammeled eroticism of the sixties become central driving forces of the Vietnam war. In Coppola's own words "This is an L.A. war." His synopsis of the movie sums it up: "The American War `to bring civilization to the ignorant millions' is merely the extension of mercantile colonialism[;] the horror and savagery lie not in the jungle, but in the American culture itself, with its powerless [sic] technology and pop culture."
Although not very original-the idea goes all the way back to Marx-this vision, combined with a daring cinematography and paranoid atmosphere, made the movie into a landmark cinematic event. At the time (1979) it sent shivers down, for different reasons, obviously, many liberal and conservative spines.
When I first saw "Apocalypse Now!, behind the Iron Curtain, I found it an exhilarating visual experience. It gave me a glimpse into, I thought, a new world of meanings. Particularly intriguing was the idea that one can talk about war, usually associated with the "shoot `em up" clichés of the "Dirty Dozen"-kind, without using grandiloquent musical scores and images. War can be "modern." Soldiers can smoke weed and listen to rock-and-roll. The Rolling Stones and the Doors had to shape a war that took place in the middle of the Aquarian era. This could be accurate and honest in its intents, if not in details, I told myself until recently, since we are talking about an expressive work of art. I never gave a lot of thought to how much this really fit the ways of the American military or its war in Vietnam. Up to a point it sounded quite realistic to me that crazy American colonels could be surfing aficionados and that their use of technology would be as reckless as their military machinery would allow them. Why, I could not precisely tell, probably ignorance about the ways of American military would be the best explanation.
But, then, I had yet to hear about the Ia Drang battle. The eye openers were the movie "We were solidiers," released in March, 2002 and the book with the same title. They recount the 3-day battle of November 16-19, 1965 between units of the same 1st Air Cavalry Division that appears in Coppola's movie and the 33rd, 66th and 302nd North Vietnamese Army regiments, infiltrated in South Vietnam from Cambodia. The movie, far less esthetically ambitious than "Apocalypse Now!," is however painstakingly accurate. It helps you understand not only the Vietnam War but where Coppola's "Apocalypse Now!" fails the test of a truly great work of art.
Coppola fails to penetrate to the raw reality of the Vietnam war. This is because he utilizes and refines in his movie derivative material. His characters and icons-human, intellectual and historical-come from a large repository of artistically already transfigured-with a political-radial agenda-materials.
The movie draws on journalistic work directly influenced by the counter-culture. Some of them seem lifted directly from the famous, for its partisanship, photo-essay "Vietnam, Inc" by Philip Jones Griffith and prefaced by Noam Chomsky. The scene in which Kilgore offers water from his canteen to a Viet Cong fighter wounded in the gut, saying "Any man brave enough to fight with his guts strapped on him can drink from my canteen any day," it's obviously inspired from a similar episode depicted in Griffith's book. There, a young Vietcong, although wounded in the abdomen and keeping his intestines inside with a wash bowl, was taken prisoner only after three days of fight, winning the respect of the American soldiers, who offered him water with approximately the same words used by Kilgore.
In another scene, Kilgore is shown flicking "death cards" atop of Vietcong corpses. This is a "creative" reinterpretation of a war folklore theme. Peter Cowie, the author of the companion book launched with the new version of "Apocalypse Now!," explains that this is "a slight [sic] perversion of what occurred during the toughest phase of the war." The sic refers to the fact that in the real incident, presented in Michael Herr's "Dispatches," the Americans are the victims. "Once after an ambush that killed a lot of Americans," cites Cowie the "Dispatches" passage that inspired Coppola, "the NVA covered the field with copies of a photograph showing yet another young, dead American, and on its flipside a mimeographed message: `Your x-ray have just come back from the lab and we think we know what your problem is.'" This is a quite surprising act of "artistic license" since Herr was directly involved in the movie.
In consequence, the themes and people presented in "Apocalypse Now!" spring not from reality but from the meta-reality of the anti-war movement. Nothing betrays more the fundamental shortcoming of "Apocalypse Now!" than Coppola's inability to put in perspective the fact that the officers who lead the American troops in Vietnam were, by and large, the same people who saved America and the world from the Nazi and Japanese totalitarianisms. They had little in common with the sixties and with the counterculture. Their personal cultural style was influenced much more by Gregory Peck, Henry Fonda and Humphrey Bogard than by Elvis or the Rolling Stones.
Everything I read in "We Were Soldiers" convinced me that, for example, Lt.-Col. William Kilgore is a very distorted representation of reality. He has very little to do with history and everything to do with the "post-colonial" caricature of the Vietnam War. The average battalion commander in the 1st Air Cavalry Division is much more like the author of "We were soldiers" himself, lieutenant general (ret.) Harold (Hal) Moore.
In 1965 a Lieutenant Colonel himself, commander of the 1st battalion, 7th Cavalry, 1 Air Cav. Division, his career and lifestyle do not betray any shadow of frivolity. Originally from Kentucky, father of 5 children in 1965, a West Point graduate, he commanded two companies in the Korean War and had spent many years abroad, in Europe and Asia, before returning to Fort Benning, in Georgia, to join the 1st Air Cav. An accomplished aviator and master parachutist he was a "straight and narrow" soldier, remembered for shaving, and demanding his troops and the occasional war correspondent attached to his unit to shave, too, every day, even when on the frontlines.
Moore's 1st Air Cav. commanding officers were made of the same stuff. Some of them were recruited from the heroes of the "greatest generation:" the battalion and company commanders of Salerno, Normandy and Bastogne. As Moore describes him in his book, the division commander of 1st Air Cav., "Major General Harry W.O. Kinnard, a native Texan [...] was West Point, class of 1939, and Airborne qualified in 1942. Kinnard was one of the shooting starts of the 101st Airborne in World War II. He was Brigadier General's Tony McAuliffe's operations officer, G-3, at the Battle of Bastogne in the Bulge, and the man who suggested that General McAuliffe specifically respond to German surrender demand with one historic word: "Nuts!"
FOR YOUR EYES ONLY.......2002-01-27
Alright Apocalypse Now (AN) fans, here it is, the complete screenplay of the recently released Apocalypse Now Redux (ANR). If you are looking for insight into this classic film, I suggest that you check out the appropriate books by Eleanor Coppola, Peter Cowie, and Karl French. If you want to enjoy this movie in a literary fashion, then look no further and pick up this book. Written by John Milius and Francis Ford Coppola, this screenplay covers everything that you saw in AN and ANR. It's a great way to enjoy your favorite bits of dialog as well as to explore the restored scenes. It's a shame that there are only 8 pages of color and b&w photos (with only one shot from ANR) though. With the release of the expanded film, I would have expected a few more extras here. Anyway, this is a must have for all AN/ANR fans. And remember, Charlie don't surf!!!
Customer Reviews:
Hard read, but has value........2006-12-05
Reading Catherine Keller's Apocalypse Now and Then often reminded me of what it is like to read something in a language in which I am not proficient. What was different about this experience is that the book is written in English, my native language. Despite the convenience of reading a text in a language in which I am familiar, I was unable to understand much of what Keller was talking about. There seemed to be no concrete topic in her paragraphs, and the section breaks made no sense. Often the information in the beginning of one section was a direct continuation of the content of the previous section, despite a large printed number and several line spaces separating the sections. There was more continuity between sentences from one section to the next than there was within the sections themselves. I was left repeatedly with the same question, "What are you talking about?"
When I first prepared to read Apocalypse Now and Then, I was excited to get into the material. I anticipated work similar to other feminist writers I have enjoyed such as, Elizabeth Johnson, Carol Christ, Nancy Howell and Penelope Washbourn. I have no way to compare Keller's work to these or any other scholars because of my inability to break thorough the barrier I encountered when reading the text.
I will admit that the very phrase "end times" associated with apocalyptic literature is a good place to start when discussing what I did appreciate about "Apocalypse Now and Then." Despite my feeling moderately illiterate as a result of reading Keller, I feel the experience was worth the attempt I made because of the content in the preface regarding eschatos. Keller notes that her book, "does take place within such a spiritual boundary... a horizon that always recedes again into a `not yet' that `already is,' or is nothing at all (xiii)." Though I am not sure what Keller means to say by this, I came to think of eschatology or apocalypse as a continuous cycle similar to her use of metaphor of the horizon. I had thought that it was her intention to depict apocalypse in this way, but when I came back to it I was unable to find her statement how I remembered it. Regardless, I know see that we are always a part of the end times as well as the rebirth. Whether temporally, or physiologically, we are in a constant state of change. As one moment in time, or one arrangement of physical structure, the world as it was dies for a moment, as a new world is born. This new world is quite like the old, and similar to the next, but unique to itself, never to be repeated.
This is somewhat illustrated in Keller's description of how the Spirit works to reveal truth through texts from the Bible. As one reads, in this case the book of Revelation, one is moved only in the way or to the degree that one can see the meaning of the text in that moment in time. "The pneumatic reading I have undertaken of Revelation's text and of its extrabiblical effects assumes, however, that the Bible never has been and never can be insulated from its surrounding lifeworlds (287)." One cannot take oneself out of the interpretation of the text, especially if one recognizes any aspect of a spiritual component to life. Understanding can only be understood from that exact temporal and physical location from which one experiences the text. It is through this experience that the Spirit enters into the formula. It is through the relational experience of engaging the text that we know the Spirit (285).
Despite the limitations to my ability to read Apocalypse Now and Then with confidence, there are a few other points in the book that caught my attention. I found it curious that Keller's description of the literary form of the apocalyptic did not discuss the context of the genera. Much of apocalyptic literature was a form of political writing in which an author would criticize the current context in a future fictional setting. This allowed the author to write harsh criticisms of a political system or society, while maintaining a distance from the true subject as a result of the fictionalization of events in a future context. This provided protection from authorities, who would have ample justification for retaliation should the criticisms be literal or unhidden. This has hardly anything to do with the end things as described by Keller. Instead Keller associates the apocalyptic as a literary genre with the eschatological mythology of Zoroastranism (21). Keller implies that those seeking social justice and political change have at times used apocalyptic literature as inspiration or justification, but the possibility that the book of Revelation was intended to be an immediate tool for such action is not explored (as far as I understood Keller's intentions).
One aspect of Apocalypse Now and Then that I appreciated was Keller's description of an ebb and flow in the willingness of individuals to participate in actions geared towards social change. With our tendency to want that victory over evil that we associate with our underlying understanding of the end, we desire for all of our actions to result in the final cessation of all that causes pain and suffering in our world. When faced with the reality that despite our efforts, there is always going to be pain and suffering, social, political, and religious participation may seem pointless (14). The mode of change is beyond us, why try?
The resolution to this dilemma is illustrated in Keller's story of her second trip to El Salvador. Marta Benevides is said to be a woman who works with the people of El Salvador, trying to make life better. She approaches her work not as a movement towards a time when the work is done, but as a way of life. She says she is being rather than struggling, and instead of fighting for change, she lives the way (280). If we think back to the horizon that always recedes again, we see how Marta Benevides maintains her way of life. Only when we recognize that this is the apocalypse, the process that is the end of the old and the beginning of the new, will we be able to fully participate in the moment. We will be able to live the way, as Marta Benevides puts it. When we stop preparing for what is to come, and live what is, we will shed the burden of waiting for a judgment. Whether we see the judgment as an event that will justify us or liberate us, it keeps us from fully participating in what is in this moment.
Opening the Male Box.......2005-12-10
This is the book that changed my life forever. I read it many years ago, and it continues to reverberate in my theological practice. Apocalypse means "unveiling." As Keller says, this was the verb of the groom unveiling his bride. The next thing we know, that same groom is tearing open the earth for weatlth and pleasure. Thus economic development is revealed in the dark light of pillage. I have never read such an eloquent plea for the earth and her creatures, the earth itself as the Body of Christ. The book reads like a dream, revelatory, deconstructing the strictures of linear thinking to show its underlying chaos and self-interest. As a result of reading this, I began to do theology as dreamwork, an idea that Keller herself takes up in more recent writings, notably God and Power.
Virtually inaccessible.......2003-10-22
I'm certain that, buried somewhere deep in her convoluted prose, Keller has important and profound understandings to share about the nature of apocalypse. Unfortunately, this text is written in the language of a person so immersed in academia that she has forgotten how to communicate clearly and concisely to those outside of the world of research journals and symposiums. Keller's approach is to say in a paragraph what could be said in a sentence and to write with such a vocabulary that most readers will need to keep a dictionary close at hand just to decipher what she is trying to say.
Apocalyptic Brilliance.......2000-07-15
If you'll only ever buy one book on apocalypse and apocalyptic phenomena, this is the one. A brilliant theological investigation in how the Western world, and especially the U.S. has been shaped, molded and thought through the storylines of John of Patmos' 'revolting revelations'. Keller's reading employs (among other) feminist and poststructuaralist perspectives to a biblical text that can neither be completely dismissed nor entirely embraced. Instead she argues for a 'counterapocalyptic' approach that avoids the closures of either a 'straightforward apocalypse' or an 'anti-apocalypse.' This is a powerful, exciting, astonishingly honest, thoughtful and brilliant text well worth the work it takes to grapple with its poetic cadences.
A text from a most powerful contemporary theological voice, who is also a singularly inventive, smart and witty writer.
Oh, and lest you think there is no need to read a book on apocalypse after we made it into 2000, this book will convince you that the influence and impact of apocalyptic thinking is far stronger, deeper and more subtle than much of the hullabaloo about 'the end is near' might make you think. This book lays bare some of the foundational ideas of the Western world without which our world would not be what it is. At times a tough read, but worth every effort.
Apocalyptic Brilliance.......2000-07-15
If you'll only ever buy one book on apocalypse and apocalyptic phenomena, this is the one. A brilliant theological investigation in how the Western world, and especially the U.S. has been shaped, molded and thought through the storylines of John of Patmos' 'revolting revelations'. Keller's reading employs (among other) feminist and poststructuaralist perspectives to a biblical text that can neither be completely dismissed nor entirely embraced. Instead she argues for a 'counterapocalyptic' approach that avoids the closures of either a 'straightforward apocalypse' or an 'anti-apocalypse.' This is a powerful, exciting, astonishingly honest, thoughtful and brilliant text well worth the work it takes to grapple with its poetic cadences.
A text from a most powerful contemporary theological voice, who is also a singularly inventive, smart and witty writer.
Oh, and lest you think there is no need to read a book on apocalypse after we made it into 2000, this book will convince you that the influence and impact of apocalyptic thinking is far stronger, deeper and more subtle than much of the hullabaloo about 'the end is near' might make you think. This book lays bare some of the foundational ideas of the Western world without which our world would not be what it is. At times a tough read, but worth every effort.
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Apocalypse Now?: Reflections on Faith in a Time of Terror
Duncan B. Forrester
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ASIN: 0754652734 |
Books:
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- The Journey of the Lost Boys: A Story of Courage, Faith and the Sheer Determination to Survive by a Group of Young Boys Called "The Lost Boys of Sudan"
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