More on memorising

I’ve started getting to grips with memorising Psalm 119 again – verses 65-72 are mostly under my belt, though they need regular revision to make sure things stick.  Only another 100 verses or so to go - and strictly speaking I've memorised the last stanza in the past, so hopefully I'll be able to dredge up some of what I learned again when I come to it. 

I’m starting to feel I’m getting to grips with the meaning as well.  I’m not sure why it should be that when you learn lines in a play you pretty much get the meaning from early on, but with learning Psalms or other Scriptures, it’s an altogether slower process.  I guess there’s a kind of distance at first, as with any reading of Scripture, and it takes the work of the Holy Spirit to put that meaning into it so that you gain an understanding.  The words themselves are clear enough, usually; it’s the feeling that it relates to me particularly, as opposed to being general stuff on a page, that takes time. As well as this, the peculiar tricks and techniques that are required (at my age, anyway) to learn the stuff in the first place means that it’s quite a time before you get hold of what you’ve actually learned as having meaning; for quite a while you’re still struggling to hold the mnemonics in place, and often they’re distracting as far as the meaning is concerned.   

And of course Psalm 119 is particularly difficult because initially, and for quite some time after, it seems as though there isn’t much connection between one verse and another – even between one line and another in many cases.

In relation to memorising a play script, I came across this in a book called Acting Skills by Hugh Morrison, on page 116. 

Older actors in particular should make an early start on learning, as age makes memorising lines harder, and all actors should find time in rehearsal to take notes of any useful and important points that arise.  Some find it useful to write out a paraphrase of a scene's content, the character's intention, situation and progression of emotion.  Learning lines is an actor's basic chore and it's sensible to learn moves at the same time, to gain physical freedom as soon as possible.  Difficult business with props, dancing, fights must be worked at from an early stage of rehearsal.  Don't lay down your script till you are reasonably sure of the lines, as someone being prompted every other line is tiresome for the entire company.  Long speeches in particular need early examination; how much do they advance the action of the play?  How do they deepen our understanding of the character?  What reaction does the speech produce in other characters?  What is the climactic point of the speech or the most important thing said?  This mini-drama is the actor's equivalent of an aria, and must be examined for its variety of tempo and tnoe, after some discussion with the director.  

Actors rehearsing, courtesy of thirdage.com

I'd agree with all of this, in principle, although trying to learn complicated moves and hold a script at the same time can be very frustrating.  For me, I think, it's better to have the lines firmly in your head - as least as far as you can - before the director starts getting into too much detail.  It's just as annoying for other actors to have someone constantly referring to their script when they're trying to work from learnt lines as it is to have someone constantly being prompted because they haven't learnt their lines thoroughly enough to get through more than a few lines at once. 

But I'd agree most of all in this paragraph with the opening statement: '...age makes memorising lines harder..'  There's no doubt about this, and what's worse, you lose fluency with age.  You can say the lines at home when there's no pressure, but trying to put them across fluently in rehearsal can become a real trial.  In the last two plays I've been involved with, I've managed to put the script down much earlier than in the past, basically by saying to myself that the sooner I free myself from the script the more relaxed I'll be about speaking the lines without it.  And it's worked.  Certainly there are times when everything suddenly goes in rehearsal, or lines get themselves thoroughly tangled.  But these situations are normal enough.  Having the confidence to say to yourself that you can do without the script improves your concentration on the other actors' work, and on the director's instructions, and gives you a sense of freedom that's lacking when you have the supposed security of the script in hand. It's the way I'd work again, if anyone ever asks me to act in another play!

Advantages of walking a dog

One of the advantages of a dog is that you rediscover your neighbourhood while taking him out of a walk. When my children were small we used to spend a lot of time walking up and down the hilly streets where we live, and finding all sorts of interesting stuff on the way.

Things haven't changed all that much in the intervening twenty-five years; most of the house that were there when the kids were young are still there, most of the cracks in walls, most of the stony driveways that have never been paved over, some of the houses that have never been painted, and much more. Only the people have come and gone.

And that's another interesting thing: I met a man last Saturday whom I hadn't seen for several years. Turns out he's been living down the road for at least five of those years, has married and is just about to have his second child. This evening, while out walking before the evening meal, we met two children (they were cousins, they told me) who asked if my dog was friendly. Someone on Facebook called him a furball the other day, and that's pretty much what he is - badly in need of having his first haircut, in fact. So the last thing he looks is unfriendly. But I assured the kids he was perfectly friendly, and they patted him and chatted in a way that you hardly come across in the neighbourhood these days.

And further up the road I came across a man wearing a t-shirt with 'Speaking in tongues,' 'Holy Spirit' and the like on the back. You'd think someone willing to wear that would be a pretty ardent Christian, but he told me he hadn't been to church for quite a few years. The t-shirt (and several others in different colours that he still owned) were made when he was attending a Revival church in Australia.

Dogs are great conversation starters - it wasn't until my dog stopped outside this man's house (he was unloading his van) that I noticed the t-shirt.

These sort of things have never happened with any of the cats we've owned....!

People of the Spirit

Our church has been running a series on the subject, People of the Spirit, in which each Sunday sermon relates to the Holy Spirit, and there are also various other evenings and such where that's also the focus during this period. Along with the sermons, we've been doing a series of short 'dramas' - mostly about 8 to 10 minutes long. These have related to the topic, but unusually for us, have used the same set of characters played by the same actors each time. They've appeared about once a fortnight, and the characters have developed in each episode.

The first drama was written prior to the series starting, but from then on they've been written on the fly, as it were - being prepared partly in relation to the sermons and partly in relation to how people have responded to them, and partly in relation to how the actors feel their characters are moving forward. Or how the other actors feel someone else's character is moving forward, as happened this time around.

This particular drama has had the shortest turn-around time of them all, being conceived, for the most part the Thursday before last, written by the Saturday, and first rehearsed last Wednesday, when everyone pretty much knew their lines. Scary for me, but in fact I discovered a new kind of confidence in regard to learning my lines that quickly - must be because of the role I played in When We Are Married a few weeks ago, when I had to get a larger number of lines under my belt than usual, and managed without undue stress.

Each of the actors plays someone fairly similar to their real life selves, and there's a kind of understanding from the audience that the character has some of the attributes of the actor as well as not being the actor. The first play consisted of four soliloquies from each of the four main actors (two more have been added in subsequently), and I thought I would come across as a serious character; in fact the audience/congregation laughed at my first line, and continued to do so regularly throughout my speech.

Consequently we've taken that sort of thing on board, and my character, though he remains the person he was at the beginning, has been given lines that are intended to get laughs, and this has worked effectively. On the other hand, the actor playing the kind of even-tempered character (who's a fairly equable fellow himself) got the opportunity to turn around this time, and is angry for most of the play; something he rarely is in real life, and something his character seemed unlikely to be at the beginning.

It's been an interesting experiment doing things on the run, as it were, but a good experience - and it's nice to be able to spend time with a group of actors that's extended over a much longer period than usual.

Christian Thought

For some time I’ve been reading a book called The History of Christian Thought, by Jonathan Hill. To get the negatives out of the way first: sometimes the tone is just a bit too facetious for the subject matter, and the humour occasionally undermines the seriousness. And it uses two type-faces. There’s a reason for this: when it’s talking about the person, or their thought, it uses one type-face. When it’s talking about general history surrounding that person, it uses another, smaller type-face. The smaller one is just a bit too small for my taste.
But besides these quibbles (I always have quibbles about non-fiction books) the breadth of understanding of the various theologians and philosophers – and the history about them – is enormous, and it’s given me a much better view of the Church’s history than any of the more widely regarded books, such as Chadwick on The Early Church, which was dull, dull, dull.
You have to wonder, as you read about all the arguments, the heresies that weren’t always heresies, the battles, the murders and assassinations, the plain stupidity and the huge range of characters, just where the Holy Spirit fits into it all. Didn’t Jesus promise that He would lead us into all truth? Man, He leads us on very circuitous routes, if that’s the case!
Can anyone really state clearly why Jesus died on the cross? ‘For our sins,’ you might say, but how did His death deal with our sins? There’s a large number of views on this subject alone, several of which I’ve encountered and several of which I’ve thought were the last word on the issue.
I just talked about the Holy Spirit, but the views on Him and the Trinity are again very diverse. Of course we can’t have any full understanding as finite humans of such a complexity, something that’s more complex than our minds can grasp, but the attempts to do so have ranged over vast plains and distant mountains.
And how come, as Christians, we can’t seem to agree on enough of the basics to stand together? The Church is still greatly split between Eastern Orthodoxy (in its various guises) and Protestants and Catholics – and all their guises. Does God like diversity so much? Is this His Church that stands as One? You wouldn’t think so, looking at it from our point of view.