Everything I write is Christian Allegory, even my Laundry List. Get Used To It.
It just happened again! I just got a letter from an editor who said “I was pondering what to do with this story for quite a while. It’s a message story, i.e., a story that exists primarily to give a message rather than for the sake of the story itself; I don’t normally publish message stories, but I like this one after you graciously wrote it at my request, I wanted to find a suitable place for it.”
The story is an ultra-short one, exactly 1000 words long, about a girl trying to get herself abducted by UFO aliens. I cannot describe it without giving away the surprise ending: but I managed to cram into that short space three different story ideas that had been floating around in my imagination hopper, and do it in an almost Gene-Wolfean way. Darn proud of that story, and darn happy to make the sale, I must say.
But to my knowledge, it is not a message story. The only message in the story is “If this story amuses you, O gracious Reader, then Pay Me! PAY ME!”
I cannot even tell what message the editor thinks is in the story.
I confess my pride is a little deflated when an editor says my story is not a story told for its own sake. I want you to imagine my doggy ears drooping, my tail and head hanging, and a little whine escaping my teeth. But if I have to swallow my pride to make the sale, so be it. Beside, my pride is a swollen and disgusting thing, and needs a little deflating.
And after all, he bought the story. Fifty bucks for three hours work. That is good money, and I cannot complain. It is not like honest labor, digging ditches or making shoes. I am getting paid for doing make-believe.
But there is something weird going on when things I write that don’t mention Christianity at all, not even to make fun of it, are regarded as Christian allegory. It is getting so bad that I cannot even write a simple story about a girl trying to get herself abducted by UFO aliens without it being read allegorically.
On second thought, no. There is nothing weird going on. The supernatural world has laws just as the natural world does. I was warned this would happen when I signed up. I was told.
If I were a bimetallist or a Ghibelline, no one would think everything I wrote was an apologetic for bimetallism or Holy Roman Imperialism. But Christianity is something different from and greater than mere economic or political theory: it is something unworldly and otherworldly, larger than life, and you cannot be marked with the chrism unremarkably. The winged powers and crowned principalities of Hell recoil in fear and loathing at the unseen torch of double flame that burns above the believer’s head, and they cannot tolerate that light.
Even normal humans, (or “muggles” as we Catholics call them) if they do not recoil, cannot help but notice that light. If it does not affect everything you do, O Christian, you are doing something wrong. If the world does not look at you sidelong, puzzled or disapproving, you are doing something wrong.
On the third hand, if the editor here thought the message in the story was on some other topic, and not a Christian message, the mere fact that I would leap to that conclusion first tells you something.
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
