A Dark And Quiet Room

He called me names on a messageboard!

“The realist in murder writes of a world in which gangsters can rule nations and almost rule cities, in which hotels and apartment houses and celebrated restaurants are owned by men who made their money out of brothels, in which a screen star can be the fingerman for a mob, and the nice man down the hall is a boss of the numbers racket; a world where a judge with a cellar full of bootleg liquor can send a man to jail for having a pint in his pocket, where the mayor of your town may have condoned murder as an instrument of moneymaking, where no man can walk down a dark street in safety because law and order are things we talk about but refrain from practicing; a world where you may witness a hold-up in broad daylight and see who did it, but you will fade quickly back into the crowd rather than tell anyone, because the hold-up men may have friends with long guns, or the police may not like your testimony, and in any case the shyster for the defense will be allowed to abuse and vilify you in open court, before a jury of selected morons, without any but the most perfunctory interference from a political judge.”— Raymond Chandler, The Simple Art of Murder

“Life hangs together in one piece. Everything is connected with everything else. The problem is to find the connections.”– The Far Side of the Dollar, Ross MacDonald

“[M]urder is an act of infinite cruelty, even if the perpetrators sometimes look like playboys or college professors or nice motherly women with softly graying hair.”—Raymond Chandler, “The Simple Art of Murder”

“[Dashiell] Hammett gave murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons, not just to provide a corpse; and with the means at hand, not with hand-wrought duelling pistols, curare, and tropical fish.”—Raymond Chandler, “The Simple Art of Murder”

“It is not funny that a man should be killed, but it is sometimes funny that he should be killed for so little….”–The Simple Art of Murder, Raymond Chandler

Since I’m working on Dirty Secrets, I’ve been collecting quotes from various detective stories to use in my manuscript. I’m a quote junkie, so why shouldn’t I share with my game audience?

But, if that’s the case, then why not share with you? So, from time to time, I’ll post up a quote that I’m using in Dirty Secrets.

Here’s the quote of the moment:

“That isn’t your real motivation. I know your type. You have a secret passion for justice. Why don’t you admit it?”
“I have a secret passion for mercy,” I said. “But justice is what keeps happening to people.” —The Goodbye Look, Ross MacDonald

From Leithart’s blog:

“Must we castrate our local spiritual creativity and become museums of the ancient treasures of christendom?” he asks. Mbiti’s answer, of course, is a resounding No.

The more prominent you are in Christ’s service, the more certain are you to be the butt of calumny. I have long ago said farewell to my character. I lost it in the earlier days of my ministry by being a little more zealous than suited a slumbering age. And I have never been able to regain it except in the sight of him who judges all the earth, and in the hearts of those who love me for my work’s sake. -Charles Spurgeon

HT: Nancy Wilson

I’m beginning to write the manuscript for Dirty Secrets, and I suddenly realized what I wanted as my opening quote. There are a couple of Scripture passages that seem appropriate, so I’ll put them in.

First there’s this one:

Again I saw all the oppressions that are done under the sun. And behold, the tears of the oppressed, and they had no one to comfort them! On the side of their oppressors there was power, and there was no one to comfort them. And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive. But better than both is he who has not yet been and has not seen the evil deeds that are done under the sun. (Ecclesiastes 4:1-3)

Dirty Secrets draws attention to societal disparities in power relationships, especially in regards to class and race. As such, this seemed like an appropriate verse.

And then there’s the other one:

Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. (Ephesians 5:11-12)

This has actually been the “theme verse” of the project for a while, and I wouldn’t want it to get lost.

Things are coming together quite well. I have some more playtesting to report, which will happen in the near future, and I’m optimistic that I will have this game ready to go by GenCon 2007. That’s going to be a bit of a push, but I think that it is doable. So, here goes!

Raquel says, “If I fall, I want to fall on my face. At least it shows I’m leaning in the right direction.”

Once again, Peter Leithart says something helpful. As an added bonus, he’s funny

From Presbyterian identity crisis:

Broadly speaking, Christian theologians spent the twentieth century with ecclesiology, the ecumenical movement and Vatican II being the most visible results. “Federal Vision” theology is an effort to drag conservative Reformed theology, kicking and screaming, into the twentieth century. (That’s not a typo or mistake; I know it’s the twenty-first century.)

‘Any idiot can face a crisis; it is this day-to-day living that wears you out.’–Anton Chekov

“Do not bury our glorious orthodoxy in the treacherous pit of a spurious conservatism.”?–Abraham Kuyper

Doug Wilson quoting Jeremiah Burroughs:

“Men naturally are wanton in nothing more than in the things of religion; and corrupt spirits are bent upon and pleased with opposition in these things above any other” (Burroughs, Irenicum, p. 29).

I blinked when I read this, because something finally clicked into place. Religious wars are generally acknowledged to be the bloodiest and most destructive. Those pursued for political ends (even corrupt ones) tend to be fairly pragmatic. Realpolitik can be permitted to function, since the goal is equally pragmatic: increasing the power of the conqueror or stopping him. Religious wars are fought because of principle, and there can be no compromise, if some god has spoken.

I hadn’t really considered that this applies on a smaller scale, too…