Creativity is an engine of Humanistic religion. Harmony is its navigation system.
The domains of creativity may be seen as “artistic originality, scientific discovery, and comic inspiration”. Scientists can learn from and expand their scientific creativity by drawing on the arts.
“Creativity is part and parcel of human history and enables (groups of) individuals to adapt to and shape their natural and social surroundings.” “Having a creative mind is one of the gateways for achieving fabulous success and remarkable progress in professional, personal and social life.” It frees and engages the mind, appears to enhance a sense of meaning in life, and facilitates problem solving.
Creativity is also central to societal well-being. “The ability to creatively solve problems enabled early humans to survive and laid the foundation for the creative imagination that has resulted in our modern society.” Creativity is essential to science and art. It spawns technologies, and “is a vital skill for the future of work”.
People are drawn to creativity because it encourages them to be free. Yet many people stifle their creativity. For that reason, creativity is an ideal as well as a daily practice.
This week, we will explore the elements of creativity in each of the domains of Being in our relations to the world: enthusiasm in the emotions, imagination in the intellect and innovation in practice. Over the next three weeks, we will explore the elements of creativity as it relates to our sacred relations with living beings, including ourselves: the Truth force in the intellect, Love in the emotions and Faith as the driving force behind creative action. We have reached harvest time in our calendar year. Great things may happen. The choice is largely our own.
Real
True Narratives
. . . Leonardo observed details that most of us overlook. He drew and described the effect of the column of water hitting the surface, the waves that emanate from the impact, the percussion of the water in the pool, the movement of the air bubbles that are submerged by the falling water, and the way the bubbles pop into floral-like rosettes when the reach the surface. He noticed that eddies containing bubbles are short-lived because they dissipate as the bubbles rise . . . . Try noticing all that when you next fill a sink. [Walter Isaacson, Leonardo da Vinci (Simon & Schuster, 2017), p. 433.]
Book narratives:
- Daniel J. Boorstin, The Creators: A History of Heroes in the Imagination (Random House, 1992).
- Paul Johnson, Creators: From Chaucer and Durer to Picasso and Disney (HarperCollins, 2006).
- Martin Geck, Johann Sebastian Bach: Life and Work (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2006).
- Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg, The Flavor Bible: The Essential Guide to Culinary Creativity (Little, Brown & Company, 2008).
- Oliver Sacks, The River of Consciousness (Alfred A. Knopf, 2017): “contains reflections on the evolution of life and the evolution of ideas, on the workings of memory, the process of consciousness, and the nature of creativity, alongside examinations of his own mishearings and misrememberings and his experience of illness.”
- Michael Sims, Arthur and Sherlock: Conan Doyle and the Creation of Holmes (Bloomsbury, 2017). “How Conan Doyle Landed on Sherlock Holmes and Why He’s Stayed With Us”
- Lydia Davis, Essays One (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2019): Davis relates how she prepares her essays.
- Michael Pollan, Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation (The Penguin Press, 2013). “ . . . the richness of his own engagement with cooking refutes his own nostalgia.”
- Stacey Erasmo, The Long Run: A Creative Inquiry (Graywolf Press, 2024) is about how people sustain creativity over time.
Biographies of Isaac Newton:
- Richard S. Westfall, Never at Rest: A Biography of Isaac Newton (Cambridge University Press, 1981).
- James Gleick, Isaac Newton (Pantheon, 2003).
- Edward Dolnick, The Clockwork Universe: Isaac Newton, the Royal Society & the Birth of the Modern World (Harper, 2011).
Technical and Analytical Readings
- James C. Kaufman and Robert J. Sternberg, eds., The Cambridge Handbook of Creativity (Cambridge University Press, 2010).
- Robert J. Sternberg, ed., Handbook of Creativity (Cambridge University Press, 1998).
- Robert J. Sternberg, Elena L. Grigorenko and Jerome L. Singer, eds., Creativity: From Potential to Realization (American Psychological Association, 2004).
- James C. Kaufman and Robert J. Sternberg, eds., The International Handbook of Creativity (Cambridge University Press, 2006).
- R. Keith Sawyer, Explaining Creativity: The Science of Human Innovation (Oxford University Press, 2006).
- Mihaly Csikszentmihaly, Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention (Harper-Collins 1996).
- Robert Olen Butler, From Where You Dream: The Process of Writing Fiction (Grove Press, 2005).
- Robert W. Weisberg, Creativity: Understanding Innovation in Problem Solving, Science, Invention, and the Arts (Wiley, 2006).
- Nassir Ghaemi, A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness (The Penguin Press, 2011): "A specialist in bipolar disorder explores whether madness improves political leadership." The author concludes: "The best crisis leaders are either mentally ill or mentally abnormal."The best crisis leaders are either mentally ill or mentally abnormal. The author's conclusion supports the data that show that highly creative people think unconventionally, and that this is a valuable aspect of leadership in crisis.
- Jonah Lehrer, Imagine: How Creativity Works (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012): a popular science of creativity, “a collection of interesting stories and studies to ponder and research further . . . but make your own careful choices about whether to believe what it says about the science of creativity”.
Journals on creativity:
- Creativity Research Journal
- The Journal of Creative Behavior
- Thinking Skills and Creativity
- Journal of Creativity
- The Journal of Creative Behavior
Photographs
Documentary and Educational Films
- Indie Game: The Movie: illustrating that creativity comes in many packages
Imaginary
Fictional Narratives
Novels:
- Tom Lichtenheld, Bridget’s Beret (Henry Holt & Co., 2010).
- Edward Carey, The Swallowed Man: A Novel (Riverhead Books, 2021): “. . . a riff on the entwined themes of fatherhood and creative spark. . .”
- Patricia Lockwood, No One Is Talking About This: A Novel (Riverhead Books, 2021): “Lockwood is a modern word witch, her writing splendid and sordid by turns. Her prose rambles from animal gags to dirty talk to infinitely beautiful meditations on the nature of perception that deflate and turn absurd before they can turn philosophical.”
- Niven Govinden, Diary of a Film: A Novel (Dialogue Books, 2021): “For Maestro, the struggle to reconcile ambition with artistic vision is never-ending. In this regard he differs sharply from Cosima, the author of a novel, long out of print, that Maestro tracks down, reads and decides he must use as the basis for his next film.”
Poetry
Vex not thou the poet’s mind
With thy shallow wit:
Vex not thou the poet’s mind;
For thou canst not fathom it.
Clear and bright it should be ever,
Flowing like a crystal river;
Bright as light, and clear as wind.
[from Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “The Poet’s Mind”]
Other poems:
- Valery Yaklovich Bryusov, “Creative Work”
Music: Composers, artists, and major works
Music is a creative endeavor. Some works of music are derivative, and some performances are mundane; however, every great composer and musician is a creative genius. Therefore, any great work of music, and any great performance, would well illustrate the human value of creativity. Here are some anthologies, as a predicate to some contemporary music that focuses on creativity itself.
- J. Peter Burkholder & Claude V. Palisca, The Norton Anthology of Western Music, Volume 1: Ancient to Baroque (Eighth Edition, W.W. Norton & Company 2019).
- J. Peter Burkholder & Claude V. Palisca, The Norton Anthology of Western Music, Volume 2: Classic to Romantic (Eighth Edition, W.W. Norton & Company 2019).
- J. Peter Burkholder & Claude V. Palisca, The Norton Anthology of Western Music, Volume 3: The Twentieth Century and After (Eighth Edition, W.W. Norton & Company 2019).
- Carl Parrish, ed., A Treasury of Early Music: Masterpieces of the Middle Ages, the Renaissance and the Baroque Era (Dover Publications, 2012).
- Carl Parrish & John F. Ohl, Masterpieces of Music Before 1750: An Anthology of Musical Examples from Gregorian Chant to J.S. Bach (W.W. Norton, 1974).
- Bill Kirchner, ed., The Oxford Companion to Jazz (Oxford University Press, 2000).
- Terry E. Miller & Andrew Shahriari, World Music: A Global Journey (Fifth Edition, Routledge, 2020).
A jazz label, Creative Improvised Music Projects, focuses on the creative aspect of improvised (free) jazz. Each of the discs they have released serves as an example of creativity in music. Here are a few of the artists in their stable (not all releases are on the CIMP label):
- Adam Lane, with his playlists;
- Andrew Lamb, with his playlists;
- Burton Greene, with his playlists;
- Chris Kelsey, with his playlists;
- David Haney, with his playlists;
- Dominic Duval, with his playlists, his playlists with Joe McPhee, and his playlists with the C.T. String Quartet;
- Elliott Levin, with his playlists;
- Ernie Krivda, with his playlists;
- Frank Lowe, with his playlists;
- Jay Rosen, with his playlists;
- Jimmy Bennington, with his playlists;
- Joe McPhee, with his playlists;
- Kahil El’Zabar, with his playlists;
- Lou Grassi, with his playlists;
- Mark Whitecage, with his playlists;
- Michael Bisio, with his playlists;
- Odean Pope, with his playlists; and
- Steve Swell, with his playlists.
Ornette Coleman stands out as a champion of free jazz and musical experimentation. “Coleman's work ranged from dissonance and atonality to liberal use of electronic accompaniment in his ensembles, as well as the engagement of various ethnic influences and elements from around the globe.” Here are links to his releases; a documentary film; and live in Montreal in 1988.
Conductor Václav Talich once remarked: “In art there is no such thing as a goal definitively achieved. Artistic growth is a series of errors, and a search that lasts as long as the artist’s life.” This willingness to experiment opens a door to creativity. Here are links to Talich’s playlists, a documentary film, and a video of his conducting.
In legend, the Hindustani late night classical raag, Raga Megh is capable of producing rain. “Megh” means “cloud”. Usually the raag is performed during the Monsoon season. Performances are by Mohi Baha'ud'din Dagan, Kaushiki Chakraborty, Kushal Das and Amir Khan.
Creative tension:
- Livia Teodorescu-Ciocănea composed her ballet “Le Rouge et la Noire” (The Red the Black) (2000) (approx. 76-137’) to evoke a collision between Neoclassical ballet and contemporary dance. The ballet is drawn from Stendahl’s novel of the same name.
Albums:
- Steven Halpern, “Enhancing Creativity” (1987) (56’)
- Michael Wollny, Émilie Parisien, Tim Lefebvre & Christian Lillinger, "XXXX" (2021) (45’): this is as creative a musical endeavor as we are likely to hear.
- Joni Mitchell, “Court and Spark” (1973) (37’): “Perhaps the most important break for Mitchell, with the development of Court And Spark, was her embrace of jazz musicians: in this instance, Tom Scott and LA Express.”
- Elton John, “Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy” (1975) (63’): “The album not only showcases Elton John's unparalleled musicality and storytelling capabilities but also offers a personal journey that will resonate deeply with listeners who appreciate concept albums and literal lyrical meaning.”
Music: songs and other short pieces
- David Bowie, "Andy Warhol" (lyrics)
- The Rolling Stones, "She's a Rainbow" (lyrics)
- Elton John, "Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters" (lyrics)
- Lana Del Rey, "Salvatore" (lyrics)
Visual Arts
- Editors of Phaidon, 30,000 Years of Art: The Story of Human Creativity Across Time and Space (Phaidon Press, 2007).
Film and Stage
- The Last Metro: the creativity is in the film making, not in its characters
- A Little Princess: the young heroine’s individuality wins out over calamity and a muggle-headmistress’ attempts to quash it.