Last night I presented a paper to the Newbigin Group on “Writing novels for the kingdom.” Below is the introduction; if you like the sound of it, you can download the PDF file.
It might be much more appropriate to go off and write a novel (and not a ‘Christian’ novel where half the characters are Christians and all the other half become Christians on the last page) but a novel which grips people with the structure of Christian thought, and with Christian motivation set deep into the heart and structure of the narrative, so that people would read that and resonate with it and realize that that story can be my story.
- N.T. Wright, “How can the Bible be authoritative?”
The kingdom novel is an elusive, mythical creature. We’re not even sure if we have any living specimens. We do have some prescriptions for what it should look like, and numerous rumours of sightings. At times, I’ve attempted to create one; in fact sometimes it’s what I’d like to do more than anything. But my story is just as much about my falling short of it, of stillbirths and my retreat from the attempt.
My paper has three sections – firstly, an overview of the idea of a Christian novel. Secondly, an account of my writing career from a faith perspective. Thirdly, an investigation of the framework of building for the kingdom suggested by Tom Wright in Surprised By Hope.
Download the whole paper: Writing novels for the kingdom
8 Comments
July 1, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Hey I was supposed to get an email about when this was on and where. Thanks for posting the PDF will read it tonight.
July 2, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Sorry Chris!
July 2, 2009 at 3:04 pm
[...] Wright trackback This is an extract from a paper I gave this week; you can find the whole paper on my other blog. It might be much more appropriate to go off and write a novel (and not a ‘Christian’ [...]
July 3, 2009 at 3:30 pm
Great post Nathan, I really enjoyed some of your insights, especially around Tim Winton.
July 6, 2009 at 5:24 pm
Thanks Scott.
Stuart said hi from you.
July 7, 2009 at 1:25 pm
Yes, I caught up with Stuart in Melbourne a few weeks ago. I quizzed him a bit about Tim Winton. Was interesting.
So where do you think Tolikin’s Lord of the Rings fits in with writing a novel for the kingdom?
July 7, 2009 at 1:35 pm
Good question. I left Tolkien alone, because it’s been thirteen years (nearly half my life) since I read Lord of the Rings. I think there’s been lots of sermon illustrations taken from the movies, and it certainly resonates with a lot of Christians. I’ll have to leave the question to others; I’ve reacted to Lord of the Rings immense popularity by shunning it in recent years.
September 4, 2009 at 3:19 pm
[...] Jendi Reiter, a Christian writer in the USA, has written an interesting post responding to my paper on Writing novels for the kingdom. You can read it [...]