Revd Dr Maggi Dawn (Robinson College,
University of Cambridge, UK)
Perfection or Paralysis? A Study of Pain as Necessity or Hindrance to
the Creative Process
This presentation will consider different kinds and causes of pain, their effect on human creativity. It will challenge some theological assumptions that pain is necessary to human perfection, drawing on passages from the Book of Psalms, the prophet Isaiah, Shakespeare and Coleridge. It will also include a short musical performance.
Maggi Dawn began her career as a
musician and singer-songwriter, releasing five albums of her own, and working
as a freelance composer, arranger and performer for the BBC and for various
bands and recording studios. In the 1990's she changed career to study theology
at the University of Cambridge. Her PhD was on the relationship between
literary form and theological meaning in the work of Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Maggi is currently Chaplain and Fellow at Robinson College. Her most recent publicatons
are Giving It Up [BRF, 2009], a foreword to Augustine's Confessions [Hodder &
Stoughton, 2009], and The Writing on the Wall: high art, popular culture and
the Bible [Hodder & Stoughton, 2010].
