English Language and Literature Commons^™

The Fantasy Of J.R.R. Tolkien: Mythopoeia And The Recovery Of Creation By Robert J. Dobie, Hayden Bilbrey

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

A chapter by chapter review of Robert J. Dobie's 2024 book The Fantasy of J.R.R. Tolkien: Mythopoeia and the Recovery of Creation. The review gives a chapter by chapter breakdown and asserts that though the book is more likely for academics, its approachable coverage of Tolkien's work and philosophical ideas also makes it a great read for anyone who is a fan of Middle-earth.

William Hope Hodgson And The Rise Of The Weird: Possibilities Of The Dark By Timothy S. Murphy, Timothy R. Granger

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

No abstract provided.

Icons Of The Fantastic: Illustrations Of Imaginative Literature, Douglas A. Anderson

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Book review, by Douglas A. Anderson, of Icons of the Fantastic: Illustrations of Imaginative Literature from the Korshak Collection (2025), edited by Amanda T. Zehnder and David M. Brinley

The Mirror Of Desire Unbidden: Retrieving The Imago Dei In Tolkien And Late Medieval English Literature By Giovanni Carmine Costabile, Katherine Cooper Wyma

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

No abstract provided.

Russell Hoban: Faithful To The Strange By Graeme Wend-Walker, Nicholas Birns

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

This is a review of David Wend-Walker's critical book on the fiction of Russell Hoban.

Schools Of Magic: Learning In Children’S And Young Adult Fantasy Fiction By Megan H. Suttie, Sara Landaverde

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

This review examines Schools of Magic: Learning in Children’s and Young Adult Fantasy Fiction, in which Megan H. Suttie argues that fantastic school narrative exists as a distinct subgenre requiring a holistic critical framework. Reading magical school texts simultaneously as school stories, fantasy narratives, and representations of educational institutions, Suttie demonstrates how such works present processes of ideological formation, social reproduction, and readerly critique. Through chapters focusing on J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, Patrick Rothfuss's Kingkiller Chronicle, Lev Grossman's Magicians trilogy, and Terry Pratchett's Tiffany Aching novels, Suttie illustrates the flexibility of her model across various fantasy texts. This …

Urban Fantasy: Exploring Modernity Through Magic, By Stefan Ekman, Phillip Fitzsimmons

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

No abstract provided.

Alice In Wonderland: Norton Critical Edition, Edited By Donald J. Gray, James Hamby

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

No abstract provided.

Imagining The Celtic Past In Modern Fantasy, Edited By Dimitra Fimi And Alistair J.P. Sims, Giovanni Carmine Costabile

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

No abstract provided.

Aubusson Weaves Tolkien: The Woven Adventure, Nancy Martsch

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Aubusson weaves Tolkien. The woven adventure/ Aubusson tisse Tolkien. L’aventure tissée: review of the catalogue of the exhibition held at the Cité Internationale de la Tapisserie in Aubusson, France, June 28 - September 30, 2024. The exhibition showcased 14 tapestries and 2 carpets based on Tolkien's illustrations. This catalogue is available in both French and English editions.

A Real Taste For Fairy-Stories By Verlyn Flieger, Douglas C. Kane

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

No abstract provided.

In Memoriam: Colin Duriez, Justin W. Wiggins

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Noted fantasy scholar Colin Duriez passed away in November 2025. He wrote on Lewis, Tolkien, the Inklings as a group, Dorothy L. Sayers, and other topics, and worked as a publisher and editor with Intervarsity Press, as well as teaching and lecturing.

In Memoriam: James Como, Anne-Frédérique Mochel-Caballero

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Noted Lewis scholar James Como passed away in November 2025; this essay reviews his career and his warm personal interactions with the author.

Piranesi And Neptune: How Susanna Clarke’S Spellbinding Story Orbits Planet Narnia, Jennifer Agee

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

This essay is a critical consideration and celebration of the novel Piranesi by Susanna Clarke. The book makes clear references to the Chronicles of Narnia; these connections have been noted and explored elsewhere. But what hasn’t been noticed is Piranesi’s connection to Dr. Michael Ward’s critical theory as described in Planet Narnia (2008). Ward claims that the Narnia books are secretly organized around a medieval planetary scheme that incorporates the atmosphere, imagery, and influence of the “visible planets,” which C.S. Lewis believed were spiritual symbols of permanent value. This essay briefly explains Dr. Ward’s theory and argues that Susanna Clarke …

Recollections And Reflections On The Book That Created Itself, Verlyn Flieger

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Too long for a fairy tale, too fanciful for a novel, too adult for children, too juvenile for adults. Dearth of sex bars it as romance and its cast of Elves and Dwarves—oh, and Hobbits—bans it as realism. For lack of a better word we call it fantasy, but the fact is that until The Lord of the Rings’ incursion onto the scene in 1954 there existed no such formal category or critical term by which to classify this ground-breaking work. How did The Lord of the Rings create the modern category of fantasy?

Signed, Unknown Friend: Hints Of William Lindsay Gresham’S Associates In A Curious Letter, G. Connor Salter

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

One of the more surprising items in William Lindsay Gresham's archives, a handwritten copy of the poem "Courage, Mon Ami!" with a cryptic note from a friend congratulating Gresham for a unspecified event, led to surprising discoveries about Gresham's circle of acquaintances, including famous writer friends who also knew his understudied brother.

Tolkien’S Thomist Triad: A High Medieval Response To Contemporary Jus Ad Bellum, Jeffrey S. Dixon

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

This paper reviews the development of the component of just war theory dealing with whether it is just to wage a war in the first place (jus ad bellum) from the early medieval to early modern eras and compares its principles to J.R.R. Tolkien’s novels about Middle-Earth. Tolkien’s views on the concept of jus ad bellum can be dated to a specific point in the medieval era, just before a number of modern, consequentialist criteria were added to Catholic thought on just war. I conclude that Tolkien’s fictional works permit broader justifications for war than do most modern just war …

From Maldon To Mordor: Hobbits And The Lord-Retainer Relationship In The Lord Of The Rings, Samuel A. Masters

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Content warning: this paper discusses suicide and suicidal thoughts.

Tolkien’s interest in Old Germanic heroism had a profound impact upon the hobbits of The Lord of the Rings, and the Christianised form of heroism that they represent. In his essays, ‘Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics (1936) and ‘The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm’s Son’ (1953), Tolkien praises the loving, paternalistic relationship between a lord and his retainers in Old English poetry; this aspect of medieval heroism is retained in Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin However, Tolkien also highlights several shortcomings of the Old Germanic ‘Northern Courage’. In …

From Viðkenning To Valarindi: The Enigma Of Goldberry And The River-Woman, Derek Simon

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

THIS IS A TWO-PART ARTICLE. IN ORDER TO READ OR DOWNLOAD THE OTHER PART, FOLLOW THE LINK AT THE END OF THIS ABSTRACT.

Building upon the previous examination of the eddic and skaldic contours of Goldberry’s River kenning names, this reading of Goldberry’s enigma focuses on the mythological referents of her kinship relations and their narrative consistency in the legendarium.  Tending to the intrinsic connection between “[t]he incarnate mind, the tongue, and the tale” (Tolkien, On Fairy Stories, 41), I contend that the poetics of kenning diction sustain if not demand a reading of the River-woman references mythologically through …

The Significance Of Ioreth, Wise Woman Of Gondor, In J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord Of The Rings, Jane Beal Phd

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Using key ideas from the field of Narrative Medicine, this essay considers the significance of Ioreth in her role as a wise-woman (midwife) and healer of Gondor. J.R.R. Tolkien developed the character of Ioreth from the static fairy-tale type of the “Wise Old Woman” to a dynamic minor character in her own right in The Lord of the Rings. He gave her a defining characteristic of talkativeness, and he purposefully attributed to her prophetic utterances of proverb, rhyme, and instruction that positively influenced those around her, including her healthcare colleagues Gandalf, Aragorn, and the herb-master, her unnamed kinswoman from the …

Galadriel: A Source Of Lore For The Silmarillion, Zachary Rhone

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Tolkien provided evidence to suggest that Galadriel, with her extensive experience and knowledge, is a significant source of lore for the Silmarillion. Galadriel represents several characteristics that Tolkien valued in his historians and lore masters; accordingly, the story of the Silmarillion provides information and narrative perspectives unique to Galadriel. Furthermore, throughout Tolkien's writing of the Silmarillion and especially near the end of his life, he continued to develop and further incorporate Galadriel into his legendarium even when concepts for other historians and loremasters faded.

“The Silmaril Was Bound Upon His Brow”: Elwing And Eärendil And The “Living Light” Of Love, Douglas Charles Kane

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

This paper shows the development of the story of Eärendil and Elwing from the time that Tolkien was first inspired by the lines “Hail Earendel, brightest of angels above middle-earth sent unto men” in a medieval Anglo-Saxon poem to Eärendil becoming the Evening Star, most beloved of the Elves, through the agency of Elwing's supportive love and the "Living Light" of the Silmaril recovered by Beren and Lúthien. It provides an example of how "the small gaps, contradictions, and inconsistencies in Tolkien’s work contribute substantially to readers’ experiencing it as somehow different than other pieces of literature, and how the …

Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Gethsemane: Christian Art And Tradition In The Passion Of Albus Dumbledore, John Anthony Dunne

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

This essay contends that Professor Dumbledore drinking a potion from a goblet administered by Harry Potter in the cave from Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince evokes Jesus’s prayer in Gethsemane from the Gospels and his request that "the cup" be removed from him. Even though the Gospels portray Jesus all alone, and Dumbledore has Harry with him, I argue that Harry Potter evokes the expanded Lukan account of Gethsemane, which contains a textually uncertain passage about an angel ministering to him (Luke 22.43–44). I argue further that this Lukan text informs Harry Potter specifically as mediated through visual representations …

The Romantic Imagination Of Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer And J.R.R. Tolkien, Mariana Rios Maldonado, Andoni Cossio

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Studies on the presence of Romantic elements in J.R.R. Tolkien’s literary production have steadily risen to prominence, especially since the publication of Julian Eilmann’s landmark monograph J.R.R. Tolkien: Romanticist and Poet (2017) and, more recently, the edited collection The Romantic Spirit in the Works of J.R.R Tolkien (2024). Our paper seeks to contribute to this scholarly upsurge by presenting a comparative analysis of Tolkien’s works and those penned by one of the most noteworthy authors of Spanish Romanticism, Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (1836–1870). Akin to the Kunstmärchenof German Romanticism and Tolkien’s Fairy-stories, Bécquer’s Leyendas—e. g. “El monte de las …

The Soldier’S Stigmata, Part Ii: Figura, The Four Senses Of Interpretation, And Other Matters In Lois Mcmaster Bujold’S “The Borders Of Infinity”, Andrew Hallam

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

THIS IS A TWO-PART ARTICLE. IN ORDER TO READ OR DOWNLOAD THE OTHER PART, FOLLOW THE LINK AT THE END OF THIS ABSTRACT.

This article will explore the connection between Lois McMaster Bujold’s novella “The Borders of Infinity,” the Aristotelian theory of habitus as developed further in the letters of the Apostle Paul and by the sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, and the four senses of interpretation of scripture first conceived in antiquity and later refined by medieval philosophers. Habitus as a durable disposition, state, or condition (Aristotle) is a structured and structuring social practice or set of social practices (Bourdieu) that …

What Are C.S. Lewis's Eldila And Why Do They Matter?, Joseph Weigel

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

This article explores the eldila from C.S. Lewis’s Ransom Trilogy. Many of the eldila in the trilogy are angelic beings. However, Lewis uses the nine orders of angels in the trilogy and different eldils correspond to different types of angels within the hierarchy. Additionally, eldila, on occasion, can refer to the entirety of the supernatural realm, including the mysterious longaevi. Through the trilogy, Lewis is portraying the rich supernatural worldview presented in the Scriptures that is so often ignored, even by Christians. For Lewis, angels, devils, and the whole realm of spirits, was a reality of the cosmos, …

Pier’S Barn And Aslan’S Stable: Satire And Sublimity In Langland’S Piers Plowman And Lewis’S The Last Battle, Tiffany E. Schubert

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

The stable in The Last Battle is rather mysterious. It seems a random bit of architecture plopped in Narnia, whose primary structures are cozy caves or castles by the sea. Of course, the stable is an important Christian symbol, the humble birthplace of Christ himself. Nevertheless, Lewis’s stable does not function in any straightforward way as the Narnian version of “Away in a Manger.” Rather, it is a place of deception and violence, housing the false Aslan and serving as the focal point of an apocalyptic battle that ends with the destruction of all Narnia. There is medieval precedent for …

Editorial, Janet Croft

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

I do keep saying that this is the biggest Mythlore issue ever, then topping it an issue or two later. With Mythlore #148, I’m afraid I’ve done it again.

We switch up our usual order a bit this time and start with C.S. Lewis. Tiffany E. Schubert explores the parallels between the medieval poem Piers Plowman and The Last Battle, and shows how Lewis used this source. Joseph Weigel systematically examines the angelology of the Space Trilogy, attempting to pin down exactly how we should conceive of the eldils.

“As Though You Could Never Sink”: Gender Euphoria Through Aquatic Embodiment In The Sun Also Rises, Devan Edwards

Honors Theses

Recent scholarship in disability studies and queer theory (2007-2024) reveals that Jake Barnes's war wound in Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises functions as something more complex than tragic loss. This paper argues that Jake's swimming and fishing scenes constitute moments of gender euphoria, a term borrowed from contemporary transgender studies, enabled specifically by aquatic embodiment. In these scenes, water functions as the physical and symbolic medium through which Jake's war-wounded body transcends the performative demands of 1920s heteronormative masculinity. Building on Michael Anesko's provocative reading of Jake as "accidentally transgendered" (Literature and Medicine, 2015) and Martina Kübler's argument that impotence …

The Power Of A Woman’S Charm: Analyzing The Presence Of Onahal In Oroonoko, Kristyn Haney

Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal

Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko is a story that places great emphasis on the importance of the power of beauty, but it isn’t perhaps the strongest force at work in the novel. Onahal is a minor character in the story who contrasts the idea that beauty is the only way to obtain power. As a former wife of the King, it is noted that while she once possessed beauty, she is now older and has therefore lost her beauty to the passage of time. Though her beauty is diminished, she still has her charm, which grants her power within her space. In …