Fr. Gregory Boyle’s Tattoos on the Heart is about his life working with gang members in Los Angeles. He founded Homeboy Ministries to help people leave gang life. It’s an inspiring book. One chapter, I think just called Successes, is about how Boyle responds when a granting authority wants stats on how many clients he had helped, what his success fraction is, etc. He talks about how uncomfortable he is framing his work in this way. Some “successes” don’t hold--the person goes back to his old life, or is convicted for a crime and goes to prison, or is found and killed by former associates or old rivals. So, are those failures? Can a person be so flawed as to be a failure? The chapter explores those questions thoughtfully and with compassion.
This is an excellent book. I'm currently reading his newest, Forgive Everyone Everything, which has a similar tone in its descriptions of successes that would not be considered typical. A former gang member having his fifth child baptized by Fr. Greg is one of my favorites.
The children’s anthology Frog and Toad include some great stories that end without victory. We love reading these to our toddler. In my favorite story, Toad says he looks silly in his bathing suit and doesn’t want anyone to see him. In the end, many animals see him in his bathing suit, laugh at him, and agree that he looks funny. Toad responds, “Of course I do!” That is the ending. It’s amazing.
*The Road* is like this, along with some other McCarthy novels. As a Christian, I read eschatological tension rather than naive humanism into the father and son "carrying the fire" through a hopeless world.
*The Silmarillion* has some "glimpses of final victory", but the ending of *Quenta Silmarillion* in the War of Wrath is only a temporary reprieve from the "long defeat," and the Akallabêth only a couple millennia later is tragedy all the way through.
Apocalyptic hope allows these magnificent stories to be all the sadder and more horrifying without just feeling desensitizing or nihilistic. I don't think this can work without some metaphysical context -- in theses cases it's Christian eschatology (more or less), or in science fiction this might be a quasi-religious faith in the destiny of the species. I'm trying to think of other examples that set bleak defeat in the context of eschatological tension to make something beautiful.
That’s a great point! Your examples from The Silmarillion are spot-on. More broadly, think about the horror and dismay felt by Tolkien’s Elves about the fact that humans are fated to die and leave the world. They have no eschatology for any eternity outside Middle-Earth. And the Men don’t either, and are stuck wondering why they were created to die, raging against the dying of the light.
"Midge has felt pressure to cast herself as a victim, in order to fit an 'Overcomer' narrative"
No, the pressure is more absurd than that. The pressure is to distance myself as far as possible from the "victim" narrative by casting myself as an "overcomer " (in many people's minds, the *opposite* of a victim) instead. "Look at how much I've overcome. Look how I keep trying to overcome! See what a victim I'm NOT!!!"
That's why I said, "What turns pathetic 'victimhood' narratives into inspiring 'overcoming' narratives is 'enough' success at overcoming. But who decides what enough is? An 'overcomer' whose story of overcoming fails to impress the audience as adequate has 'only' told that audience a 'victimhood' narrative."
That is, the very pressure on people to NOT cast themselves as "victims" but instead as "overcomers" can easily backfire into "just another victimhood narrative" if the audience judges the "overcoming" insufficiently impressive. Characterizing that as "Midge has felt pressure to cast herself as a victim" gets my situation backward. That said, I agree that people *can* feel pressure to amplify the "victim" parts of their story in order to make the "overcoming" part seem all the more impressive by comparison. That's just not the pressure I feel.
Since I don't see myself as an "overcomer" (or a "victim") in the first place, I don't feel the internal pressure to dramatize my victimhood in search of a more-impressive "overcomer" glow up. I just feel both external and internal pressure to distance myself as far from "victimhood" as possible, which is what an "overcomer" narrative is conventionally supposed to do (though it can do the opposite if it fails to impress the audience).
In short, I find the victimhood-overcomer dichotomy self-defeating, and people's judgment of which narrator is which mostly dependent on how much they trust the narrator. Nonetheless, the dichotomy remains very popular.
I think this is a prime example of people projecting their own fears and insecurities onto someone else and losing sight of the other’s humanity in the process. If this person I know to be struggling eventually triumphs, it’s a sign that I’ll be able to win through even though I can’t see how at this moment. If the person doesn’t “win,” it’s a sign that I’m in trouble. Either way, we reframe someone else’s true pain into a story about ourselves.
Fr. Gregory Boyle’s Tattoos on the Heart is about his life working with gang members in Los Angeles. He founded Homeboy Ministries to help people leave gang life. It’s an inspiring book. One chapter, I think just called Successes, is about how Boyle responds when a granting authority wants stats on how many clients he had helped, what his success fraction is, etc. He talks about how uncomfortable he is framing his work in this way. Some “successes” don’t hold--the person goes back to his old life, or is convicted for a crime and goes to prison, or is found and killed by former associates or old rivals. So, are those failures? Can a person be so flawed as to be a failure? The chapter explores those questions thoughtfully and with compassion.
This is an excellent book. I'm currently reading his newest, Forgive Everyone Everything, which has a similar tone in its descriptions of successes that would not be considered typical. A former gang member having his fifth child baptized by Fr. Greg is one of my favorites.
Thanks for the recommendation! I will put Forgive Everyone Everything on my list.
I absolutely loved this book, too.
The children’s anthology Frog and Toad include some great stories that end without victory. We love reading these to our toddler. In my favorite story, Toad says he looks silly in his bathing suit and doesn’t want anyone to see him. In the end, many animals see him in his bathing suit, laugh at him, and agree that he looks funny. Toad responds, “Of course I do!” That is the ending. It’s amazing.
Looking forward to the book club!
Shoulda thought of that one myself... given that I had to read all five stories in the volume every night for bedtime for weeks :)
There's such a big gap between well written children's books and... the rest. I enjoy Frog and Toad every time.
*The Road* is like this, along with some other McCarthy novels. As a Christian, I read eschatological tension rather than naive humanism into the father and son "carrying the fire" through a hopeless world.
*The Silmarillion* has some "glimpses of final victory", but the ending of *Quenta Silmarillion* in the War of Wrath is only a temporary reprieve from the "long defeat," and the Akallabêth only a couple millennia later is tragedy all the way through.
Apocalyptic hope allows these magnificent stories to be all the sadder and more horrifying without just feeling desensitizing or nihilistic. I don't think this can work without some metaphysical context -- in theses cases it's Christian eschatology (more or less), or in science fiction this might be a quasi-religious faith in the destiny of the species. I'm trying to think of other examples that set bleak defeat in the context of eschatological tension to make something beautiful.
That’s a great point! Your examples from The Silmarillion are spot-on. More broadly, think about the horror and dismay felt by Tolkien’s Elves about the fact that humans are fated to die and leave the world. They have no eschatology for any eternity outside Middle-Earth. And the Men don’t either, and are stuck wondering why they were created to die, raging against the dying of the light.
"Midge has felt pressure to cast herself as a victim, in order to fit an 'Overcomer' narrative"
No, the pressure is more absurd than that. The pressure is to distance myself as far as possible from the "victim" narrative by casting myself as an "overcomer " (in many people's minds, the *opposite* of a victim) instead. "Look at how much I've overcome. Look how I keep trying to overcome! See what a victim I'm NOT!!!"
That's why I said, "What turns pathetic 'victimhood' narratives into inspiring 'overcoming' narratives is 'enough' success at overcoming. But who decides what enough is? An 'overcomer' whose story of overcoming fails to impress the audience as adequate has 'only' told that audience a 'victimhood' narrative."
That is, the very pressure on people to NOT cast themselves as "victims" but instead as "overcomers" can easily backfire into "just another victimhood narrative" if the audience judges the "overcoming" insufficiently impressive. Characterizing that as "Midge has felt pressure to cast herself as a victim" gets my situation backward. That said, I agree that people *can* feel pressure to amplify the "victim" parts of their story in order to make the "overcoming" part seem all the more impressive by comparison. That's just not the pressure I feel.
Since I don't see myself as an "overcomer" (or a "victim") in the first place, I don't feel the internal pressure to dramatize my victimhood in search of a more-impressive "overcomer" glow up. I just feel both external and internal pressure to distance myself as far from "victimhood" as possible, which is what an "overcomer" narrative is conventionally supposed to do (though it can do the opposite if it fails to impress the audience).
In short, I find the victimhood-overcomer dichotomy self-defeating, and people's judgment of which narrator is which mostly dependent on how much they trust the narrator. Nonetheless, the dichotomy remains very popular.
I think this is a prime example of people projecting their own fears and insecurities onto someone else and losing sight of the other’s humanity in the process. If this person I know to be struggling eventually triumphs, it’s a sign that I’ll be able to win through even though I can’t see how at this moment. If the person doesn’t “win,” it’s a sign that I’m in trouble. Either way, we reframe someone else’s true pain into a story about ourselves.
Thanks for the mention!
Leah - my daughter and I will be at the ASP Convention, and we'd love to meet you.
Please come up after my talk!
Will do <3