Yearly Archives: 2010

Books

Authors

Note: This was one of those social media lists that people do. It’s a great list, but I’m somewhat disconcerted to realize that eleven years later, my list is still largely the same. That the shape of my intellectual life has changed so little since my early 30s feels like it should be a red flag of some kind. (DL, Sept. 7, 20201)

The Rules: Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen authors (poets included) who’ve influenced you and that will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than fifteen minutes. Briefly describe the nature of their influence.  

We’re looking for voices that have led you to consider new thoughts or significantly shaped your perspective on something.

I’m excluding biblical authors (like Paul), but there’s little doubt that the influence of the Bible on my life and thinking, both directly and filtered through other authors, has far surpassed all other influences combined.

In the order I thought of them, which probably means something.

  • J. R. R. Tolkien (the shape of my imagination and the products it produces)
  • C. S. Lewis (ditto)
  • Richard Halliburton (fostered a culturally outward focus rooted in world travel and history)
  • Andrew Sullivan (my disillusionment with all things Republican. Moving from Malkin to Sullivan as daily blog-reading has had significant influence)
  • Michael Behe (demonstrating to me Darwin’s failure to explain the origins of life)
  • Alan Keyes (shaped my perspective on politics and the trouble with the American republic)
  • Frederick Wheelock (taught me Latin and how to teach Latin)
  • David Macaulay (helped me visualize the past and present)
  • Edmund Spenser (profound professional influence. The existence of Edmund Spenser’s writings have literally changed my course in life, for good and ill. Very strong influence on my conception of good poetry.)
  • Tom Clancy (helped me understand what modern war and nuclear terrorism look like)
  • John Bunyan (how I conceptualize the Christian life)
  • Hannah Whitall Smith (Wow. Still trying to wrap my head around what happened there. Pretty sure it wasn’t good.)
  • Harry Berger (definitively showed me that all those godless pagan literary critics I heard about at Bob Jones can be godless pagan stinking geniuses. Helped me understand what being a Ph.D. in English lit is all about.)
  • Fanny Crosby, Isaac Watts, and Charles Wesley. (different authors, same book. 🙂 My conception of what Christian music can be.)
  • Epic poets, especially Milton, the aforementioned Spenser, and the Beowulf author. (I cheated, I know. Sue me. My conception of what poetry is, or used to be, capable of) 
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Faith

Aiming Low

Note: I can trace the first unraveling of my lifelong faith in the reliability of the Bible to a specific date—September 27, 2010. On that day, at 1:35 pm Andrew Sullivan (of whom by then I was an avid reader) posted a short post entitled “Aiming Low” which ended with a single question, asked rhetorically: “How do you rebut a Senatorial candidate who believes that the earth was made 6,000 years ago?” The implied answer which Andrew seemed to assume all his readers would undoubtedly recognize and agree with was, ‘You can’t. They’re past reason.’ I, a convinced and passionate Young Earth Creationist (YEC), was provoked by what I perceived as both slight mockery from a writer I respected and admired and sad ignorance of the obvious scientific basis for the Biblical account of origins. I determined to write to Andrew to set the record straight. I began an email which I intended to be a clear, succinct and persuasive argument for a young earth–a clear demonstration that the YEC position was not nearly as irrational as he assumed. I never finished it. The research and reading I began as I wrote the email spiraled completely out of my control, and by the following Spring I had developed serious doubts about the historicity of the Flood narrative in Genesis. (DJL, July 16, 2023)

It’s hard to write an e-mail like this: the venue is wrong for the content and what you are able to communicate despite the formal limitations is going to be misread.

Nevertheless, here goes.

  1. I) The standard evolutionary mantra is patently, egregiously, and demonstrable inadequate as an explanatory tool–despite what the experts, Wikipedia, and Dawkins all say (and believe me, I’ve read my share of all of the above).
    1. A) Darwinian natural selection can function only if 

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Academic Writing

Job Application Cover Letter

Note: I only ever applied for one tenure-track position before I left academia for a career in IT. This is the cover letter I attached to my application. Looking back, it is a neat encapsulation of many activities and ideas that were significant in the first decade of my post-college life. (DL Sept. 8, 2021)

I am writing to apply for the position of Professor of Literature at Houston Baptist University. I believe that my professional training and research potential, my breadth of teaching experience, my personal commitment to a classical focus in education, and my missions-oriented cross-cultural experience make me an excellent candidate for the position.

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Movies & TV

Why You Should go See Avatar as Soon as Possible

Note: I wrote this Facebook Note in the first flush of excitement and awe after having seen James Cameron’s Avatar, which I still regard as one of my top two or three favorite movies ever. It quite effectively captures the passionate certainty that used to define my Christian worldview and the way I read the world through that lens. I think the analysis of the various kinds of fiction and why they’re written is still accurate, but I myself have much less certainty about my own worldview. I’m still as opinionated though. (DL, Sept. 7, 2021)

*This note is unfinished, but I’m posting it now because you can see where my thoughts trend. I may or may not get to finish it.*

Avatar is the best movie I’ve ever seen.
As far as I’m concerned, it’s the best movie that’s ever been made.

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