Beauty and Writing

Megan Almon, while discussing the topic of beauty with Wade Mobley, said “The idea is that when we cultivate beauty in the world around us, it’s really an act of defiance against all that is dark and broken and wrong with the world.”

A while back, I talked about the subject of joy. Not extensively, as there are others far more qualified to discuss it. Today I’d like to touch on something in a similar vein: beauty. I may not be the perfect person to touch on this either. I do tend to err on the side of function over fashion, but all the same, I am an artist. I write, play music, and draw, and often, in those cases, there is not necessarily always a function. When I draw, it’s often for myself. I don’t have much skill and my art is rarely seen by anyone but myself, except in the case of a few gifts. When I draw, it’s for the sake of enjoyment and trying to capture beauty. My music is much the same way. I do enjoy giving performances, perhaps making others smile and start bouncing to the beat, but I also take pleasure from playing alone and listening to the sounds of the instrument echo around the house.

However, my writing is meant to be shared. I intend to make a career out of it, and as such, I have all the more motivation to make it enjoyable. Beauty is a good thing — God created it. Can it be warped or misused? Yes. But as it pertains to artists and their work, beauty is something we ought to strive for.

There is a time and a place for beauty. For instance, works meant to shock and awaken, like Wise Blood and Left Behind, don’t require as much beauty as they are works more geared to function. And of course, all books have a function, be it an experience or a theme or an illustration. But just because they have a function doesn’t mean we should forget beauty. No one will read your book again if they didn’t enjoy it.

Sadly, this is something I see happening in Christian writing, especially for children or teens. Too often, the story is predictable and preachy, with a blatant moral. I’ve already discussed overdoing theme and how it can ruin a story, but I want to approach that from another side, the side of beauty. Those stories aren’t just lacking in mechanics, but in craft. Our writing ought to glorify God, but if all we are producing are the simplest of sentences that a third grader would have no trouble with, and if all we can describe are monotonous, cliched details, then we are failing. God can, of course, work with anything, but our appropriate response to Him should be a desire to do our absolute best for Him.

As Andrew Peterson said in Adorning the Dark, “Agenda is bad when it usurps the beauty. Christian art should strive for a marriage of the two, just as Christ is described as being ‘full of grace and truth’ (John 1:14). Truth without beauty can be a weapon; beauty without truth can be spineless. The two together are like lyric and melody. This is not to say that beauty itself isn’t a kind of truth, nor that truth itself isn’t beautiful. It’ll take a better philosopher than me to parse all that out.”

So, what does beauty in writing involve? It can involve many things. It can be beautiful prose — that is, the words you pick to describe a setting or depict a character’s emotion. It can be a beautiful scene or a moment — and this can range from a charming tour of a hobbit hole to a heroic sacrifice that leads to tears.

Indeed, Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics touch on the subject of beauty when describing the types of ‘good.’ It is translated as the ‘beautiful’ good or ‘noble’ good. Good found in virtue, and not just in aesthetics. Good found in deed, that makes the deed beautiful. Friendship is an example of this provided by Hillsdale philosophy professor Nathan W. Schlueter. When someone does something for a friend, sacrifices for a friend, fights for a friend, it is beautiful. Beauty in your writing can be shown through your word choice, through your themes, through the imaginary world you create, through the characters you create to inhabit it, and through what they do.

Now, here’s a question to consider that my friends and I have mulled over — is beauty objective, and if so, how is it defined? We’ve discussed works of art and how they are considered by some to be beautiful, even if their subject matter is not good. For instance, a work of Greco-Roman sculpture we encountered during a history class was quite literally a bust stabbing itself through the chest. Unpleasant, and immoral, but done with great skill. To that end, if a book is written with great skill but depicts the unpleasant and immoral, is it beautiful?

I would say no. Beauty does not consist merely of skill or quality of execution. Evil is never beautiful — not in the true sense of beauty, that sense which existed before the fall or some reflection of that today. Oh, sure, evil can be pretty and alluring, and skillful at what it does, but it’s not perfectly beautiful, because that perfect beauty goes hand-in-hand with goodness. I like to think of Lewis’s passage in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe where Edmund describes the Witch’s beauty as ‘cold.’ A pretty facade can hide evil things, but those evil things, when exposed, are always ugly, and will taint everything they touch. True beauty requires goodness.

As a result, your writing may not always be pretty. If it features both true goodness and true evil, it will have hills and valleys. There will be parts where your character and your reader will both be unable to see any beauty in their situation — and that is as it ought to be. Write that, and write it with excellence. But forgetting beauty altogether would be just as wrong as forgetting joy. Both are parts of life and blessings from our Creator. And, like joy, beauty is, as Megan Almon would say, an ‘act of defiance.’ The Christian has a different view of beauty than the atheist or the nihilist. Beauty has no place or purpose in the darwinian notion, except perhaps to encourage propogation. Beauty is also not based on any objective standard, but is rather whatever someone want it to be, from a urinal on display in an art museum to a canvas with nothing on it to a drag queen.

But we see beauty as one of God’s attributes, clearly reflected in His creation. We believe in a God who created a good world for us, and created true beauty to please and satisfy.

So, like Peterson said, write beauty and truth. Truth may not always be beautiful to your characters. It may not be what they want to hear. Nor may it be what your readers wish to hear. But Truth can also be beautiful. Truth can make your characters — and readers — break down and sob. Truth can fill their hearts with hope and inspire them. And even in the darkest moments of your story, you can still write with beauty. Peterson himself is a brilliant example. One of my favorite passages from his Wingfeather Saga depics Artham struggling with grief and guilt, and yet his prose, his imagery, his ability to reach down and pull at heartstrings is beautiful. Beauty is not skill, but it certainly does involve it. What’s beautiful is the hope he can convey through imagery and allusion.

Strive for excellence. Do your utmost to present yourself and your work as glory and praise to God. I know, it’s intimidating. But honestly? If you’re writing for God, a human’s criticism doesn’t hurt so much.

And remember this: you are also beautiful. You are fearfully and wonderfully made, and whether your writing ‘makes it’ or not, you will always be loved.

“When we manage to make something pretty, it’s only because we are ourselves a flourish on a greater canvas.”

Andrew Peterson, Adorning the Dark

With that in mind, why be afraid? Present truth boldly and without fear. And remind this world that beauty is real too. As Lewis reminds us in the Screwtape letters, we don’t see the ‘real world’ merely when we experience evil or ugliness. Delicious meals, gorgeous sunsets, touching moments — those are also real. Don’t forget that, both in life or in writing.

Alright, all. Have a lovely day. Ciao!