Considering that the use of words is dangerous and their abuse perilous, it should come as no surprise that “paganism” is a particularly dangerous word. The danger lies in the dangerous lies that arise when the word is employed thoughtlessly. It is, for instance, employed thoughtlessly by Christians when they describe any hedonist or heathen [...]
J.R.R. Tolkien’s love of the Anglo-Saxon language and culture is legendary among both Tolkien scholars and aficionados, as is his hatred of all things French. His biographer, Humphrey Carpenter, wrote that he suffered from “Gallophobia.”[1] His student and friend, George Sayer, commented that when Tolkien stayed with him and his wife, he very politely ate [...]
The day of the printed journal of imagination—dealing with ideas, literature, and poetry—seems to be fading. To be sure, it has been fading rather dramatically ever since the Second World War. Political and ideologically-oriented magazines, specialized academic journals packed full of discipline-specific jargon, and even the so-called best sellers have replaced the journals of imagination. [...]
In a recent post, English priest-blogger Fr. Ed Tomlinson likened the threat of secular modernism in the church to Tolkien’s Balrog. You may remember the great demon pursues the members of the Fellowship as they are fleeing the mines of Moria. The final confrontation is at the Bridge of Khazad-dum. Gandalf defies the Balrog crying, [...]
Today’s offering in our Timeless Essay series affords our readers the opportunity to explore the Middle Ages as they were, rather than through the muddled lens of the moderns. —W. Winston Elliott III, Publisher There is very little in our modern life that is more muddle-headed than the view that most moderns have of the [...]
One of the mysteries of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings is the character of Tom Bombadil. Who is this odd, hill-leaping, silly-song-singing, farmer in the dell? Is this cavorting, yellow-booted bumpkin a darling that Tolkien could not kill, a rustic mechanical who simply had to have a part in the great saga? Was Bombadil [...]
“I should like to record my own love and my children’s love of E.A. Wyke-Smith’s Marvellous Land of Snergs,” reads an endorsement on the cover of that book. The endorser is J.R.R. Tolkien, and it was very kind of him to offer the guidance. Without him, it is likely we would only have visited a [...]
Ever since I arrived at Cambridge as a student in 1964 and encountered a tribe of full-grown women wearing puffed sleeves, clutching teddies, and babbling excitedly about the doings of hobbits, it has been my nightmare that J.R.R. Tolkien would turn out to be the most influential writer of the twentieth century. The bad dream [...]
The past few years have shown some waning in the exceptional popularity of J.J.R. Tolkien’s fantasy writings, but the “Tolkien phenomenon” is a clearly established fact of modern literary history. I am certain that his works will be read and studied for many decades and even more certain that they are deserving of such reading and study. [...]
The leaves were long, the grass was green, The hemlock-umbels tall and fair, And in the glade a light was seen Of stars in shadow shimmering. Tinuviel was dancing there To music of a pipe unseen, And light of stars was in her hair, And in her raiment glimmering. There Beren came from mountains cold, [...]
Is it possible that the popular Indiana Jones trilogy is a cleverly-structured, well-thought-out, theologically-astute analogy of the Christian spiritual quest? I do not suggest that it is an allegory, and I realize it is always possible to read too much into popular film and fiction, but might there be more meaning there than meets the [...]
Even J.R.R. Tolkien, interestingly enough, could not pinpoint exactly when the mythology began. One can most certainly date the mythology if only in its barest, least recognizable form sometime prior to his participation in the Great War, when the young man wrote his poem, “The Voyage of Eärendil the Evening Star.”[1] In a letter written [...]
If we reconstruct J.R.R. Tolkien’s reading of Genesis from the opening pages of The Silmarillion, then, on Tolkien’s interpretation, only days four through six involve the actualization of material existence, whereas the first three days concern creation in an immaterial realm. Stratford Caldecott notes three correspondences between Genesis and Tolkien’s myth: between heaven and the [...]
Hoping to prove successful in combining a love of things old with mythology and with a desire to uphold the dignity of the human person in a world rent asunder by warring ideologies, J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis challenged each other to create deep works of the imagination. After a “toss up,” the two men [...]