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Children's and Young Adult Literature Commons™
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Full-Text Articles in Children's and Young Adult Literature
Tolkien Dogmatics: Theology Through Mythology With The Maker Of Middle-Earth By Austin M. Freeman, Alex (Oleksiy) Ostaltsev
Tolkien Dogmatics: Theology Through Mythology With The Maker Of Middle-Earth By Austin M. Freeman, Alex (Oleksiy) Ostaltsev
Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature
The powerful and highly informative definitions that Freeman applies to Tolkien’s Middle-earth phenomenon in the title of his book create a productive interpretational framework. Myth and mythology in Inklings’ writing were always understood, in an almost Jungian way, as a cultural paradigm flexible enough to embrace the free creativity of the playful human mind and a philosophical postulate, or credo, of the humanistic religious intuition of Christianity. In Freeman’s interpretation, Tolkien’s literary myth in some ways requires a theological background, which, in its turn, leads to inevitable dogma, a statement that reveals the sensitive mechanics of literary myth as it …
The Felix Culpa In Tolkien's Legendarium: A Catalyst For Character And Reader Transformation, Nathan C J Hood
The Felix Culpa In Tolkien's Legendarium: A Catalyst For Character And Reader Transformation, Nathan C J Hood
Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature
Examines the role of the felix culpa, or ‘happy fault’, in J.R.R. Tolkien’s legendarium. The article argues that this motif, originating within the Christian theological tradition, was adapted by Tolkien into the guiding structure of Middle-earth’s grand narrative. It shows the importance of the felix culpa in Tolkien’s secondary world by analysing the trope’s role in the Ainulindale and The Silmarillion. It then moves to consider the ways in which the presence of happy faults in The Lord of the Rings has a transformative impact upon the morality and spirituality of its characters and readers.