Dear Friend,
Reading Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet last month was a delight, indeed. I mentioned in the introductory post that it’s a book I’ve always wanted to read and pretty much always assumed I’d enjoy; but we readers know that the reading life is full of surprises and there are never any guarantees. The first three-quarters of the book were especially provocative to me, and I enjoyed thinking about the book’s structure as much as its wisdom. While I felt the last quarter of the book was a bit redundant, essentially a “make life of it what you will, and therein lies your happiness,” nevertheless, it’s a reasonable message and perhaps one that does deserve to be restated in so many ways.
This month, we turn our attention to our first young adult novel of the project, and my second re-read so far. Every other book for the project aside from Dickens’s A Christmas Carol has been new-to-me. I chose James Brandon’s Ziggy, Stardust & Me as our introduction to young adult literature because I still think about it almost every day, years after I first read it.
In a time when anti-LGBTQ sentiment is on the rise in the United States and when schools and teachers are under attack for teaching the truth about history and about people, it seems a wise and necessary moment to engage with a book that shares some of these truths about us–where we’ve been and how far we’ve come. The book also deals with issues of racism, trauma, domestic abuse, and institutional homophobia (the “treatment” of homosexuality as a disease to be cured.) Despite its serious and sometimes heavy subject matter, it is also remarkably tender and strikingly inventive.
I’m excited to revisit this one, and I hope you’ll join me.
Publisher’s description: The year is 1973. The Watergate hearings are in full swing. The Vietnam War is still raging. And homosexuality is still officially considered a mental illness. In the midst of these trying times is sixteen-year-old Jonathan Collins, a bullied, anxious, asthmatic kid, who aside from an alcoholic father and his sympathetic neighbor and friend Starla, is completely alone. To cope, Jonathan escapes to the safe haven of his imagination, where his hero David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust and dead relatives, including his mother, guide him through the rough terrain of his life. In his alternate reality, Jonathan can be anything: a superhero, an astronaut, Ziggy Stardust, himself, or completely “normal” and not a boy who likes other boys. When he completes his treatments, he will be normal—at least he hopes. But before that can happen, Web stumbles into his life. Web is everything Jonathan wishes he could be: fearless, fearsome and, most importantly, not ashamed of being gay.
About the author: James Brandon produced and played the central role of Joshua in the internationally acclaimed tour of Terrence McNally’s Corpus Christi for a decade, and is co-director of the documentary film based on their journey, Corpus Christi: Playing with Redemption. He’s the co-founder of the I AM Love Campaign, an arts-based initiative bridging the faith-based and 2SLGBTQ+ communities, and serves on the board of the Bay Area American Indian Two-Spirits (BAAITS) in San Francisco. Brandon has been a contributing writer for HuffPost, Believe Out Loud, and Spirituality & Health magazine. (JustBeJB)
Why Contemplative Reading?
Contemplative reading asks us not just what we’re learning about the book in our hands (or ears), but what we’re learning about ourselves through the experience of reading it. The aim is to create deeper awareness of ourselves and understanding of others. It is often described as “holistic,” but also as “heart-knowing.”
Heart-knowing. Doesn’t that sound nice?
The Plan
This book is the longest we’ve read for the project so far; however, I’m hoping that because it’s a young adult work and because it’s, in my opinion, a page-turner, that we’ll still manage to read it well and thoughtfully in a single month, by breaking it down into equivalent segments Specifically, my posting schedule will look like this:
- July 8: Response to pages 1-87 (chapters 1-13)
- July 15: Response to pages 88-177 (chapters 14-26)
- July 22: Response to pages 178-261 (chapters 27-43)
- July 29: Response to pages 262-347 (chapters 44-end)
Reading & Responding
Each set of reading will guide my responses here on the blog and on social media. I might sometimes share the most provocative line or passage, and what it makes me think about. Other times, I might ask questions about the reading, things I’m wondering about or confused about. And still further, I might compare what I’m reading to what it reminds me of from other readings or experiences. I don’t want to give too much guidance about how to read, except to say, read attentively, read slowly, and listen to yourself. What thoughts and feelings arise as you’re reading? Write them down and give yourself some moments to reflect on why you’re thinking what you’re thinking, or why you’re feeling what you’re feeling.
I encourage you to join these conversations and leave your thoughts in the blog comments or on your socials. On social media, please use #theCRPblog.
Meditation
“The truth is, of course, that there is no journey. We are arriving and departing all at the same time.” -David Bowie
Let the music play, with love,
~Adam
Contemplative Reading Project 
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