xt7prr1pkj15 https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7prr1pkj15/data/mets.xml  Thomas Merton 1955-12-17 This letter is from collection 75m28 Thomas Merton papers. archival material 75m28 English  Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Thomas Merton correspondence Letter from Thomas Merton to Victor Hammer, December 17, 1955 text Letter from Thomas Merton to Victor Hammer, December 17, 1955 1955 1955-12-17 2023 true xt7prr1pkj15 section xt7prr1pkj15 %=

E

OUR LADY OF GETHSEMANI
TRAPPIST,KENTUCKY

Dec. 17,1955

Dear Hammer-

I have waited for the typescript of the Sermons to
be ready before writing to you. I send it herewith. I
forgot to tell the (new)typist to double—space it, and
inncidentally he did not even make a carbon, so this is
the only copy. I hope it is satisfactory.

About the Eu Tower of Babel my agent has arranged that
this will form part of a volume of poetry which will be
published by New Directions in the winter of next year.

If Anvil Press were to do it, (which would be a fine
thing, I still think) it wnuld have to be as a kind of
special edition in conjunction with New Directions. I

have no doubt Laughlin would like the idea but no doubt it
Complicatesmatters too much.

And new, thank you so much for the Fiedler. It is
intensely interesting and thought provoking. As I had 5355
pected, the arguments I tentatively put forth in my last
letter had little really to do with Eiedler whom I see
to be just as “anti—academic" as I am. However, I do not
think I have mastered his thought well enough to discuss
it, and as you say it would be far more fruitful simply to
live in the light of some concrete embodiment of his
doctrine put into effect. I will ask Father Abbot about
the tryptich. He has just come back from a long trip.
Thank you for offering it to us for a trek. I shall discuss
the whoée project with Bro Giles and we wdll see if it
can be done safely and reverently. Then I will let you
{horn

To return to Fiedler, I am very interesued in all
that he says about words ”creating” our reality for us.

I am not too good on the idealism in which he is rooted,
but I find many of his intuitions very powerful and right.
Actually, modern man uses words as an excuse for not
entering into contact with the real (however you'dgfine
it) and talking is also an excuse for not seeing. Hence
again the vanity of argument about so deep a subject,

 

 x\
>.
0-.
CE
k
m .
7::
r a N
\‘x

,

ungil one is first sure that his eyes are open and that
he is looking at the object. I tliin F edler has evident—
ly hit upon the heart of the whole queStion of artistic
expression. ne clarifies also your characteristic division
that separates artist and patron. The patron has not
expressed anything and is not going to express anything:
he is simply going to look at diet the artist has created.
But the artist, on the other hand, has a problem of expressi
and creationr- not only of a work of art, but in some sense
of reality itself.

As for your notes of l9h6 about the Catholic Artist,
I entirely agree with you. But how on earth are we ever
going to get anyone to see these things? It is enough to
reduce one to deSpair. But the world is being punished for
its sins—— all its sins. The Hepravation of human nature,
even for instance of human techniques of work, is also a
sin against God the Author ofnature. Is it not part of th-
natural law that man should work humanly and taste joy
in creating, and work for something else besides money?

In this season when Christ Com(.s to us, when the Hard

.is ma.de glesh and God takes to h 1 self humanity, we can

lament the last that we have forgotten 0 cc irst of all
h11an in our religion, and we can cry out with tears for a
n"edeemer who is perhaps the only one left Who appreciates
what it is to be Man and to praise God with a Man‘s Heart,
and with a Man‘s tongue. And to open upon the world the
eyes of human intelligence enlightened by divine wisdom.

I return the notes, and with them I send you both
all my best and most fervent Christmas wishes and bless—
ings.l God be with you, and may H s light fill you, and
may His grace guide you and His love possess you.

”evotedly in the Christ Child:
1 I‘ ’14 L/G’M
PS I fully understand what you mean about cities. If I had
seen more of Vienna and less of London and New York, I woul
have less prejudice. In fact, I sent to the Ky U. liorary

a page or two I once wrote about Havana which sl. ows thatN
we agree too about the polis after all.

a

F):

[4-mo- 132;

J'.
.1 . ,, .

/ WWJWVXIWI, ‘t MM W “PW—t; 3Q;}wfiML «40;
@ 614/4497”,

1'
V!

71" .
:15: (11'

5A4? {Wit ,

u yea-43.1 r \

“UR-69‘ z" Frans. a“: .1“
fig." fix 5"

V I
’. 1710/ Am?

(A

, , ~11 ,, " . , u
‘ ' (3 (via/M»: } ~’-: /‘ J ‘ xvi-5" M1” (in. Jr “:0 m’"
. f I