Rape, Revenge, and Gender Inequality

Last night, Cap made me aware of some trivia from the recent horror film Midsommar that I did not care for. Here’s the same fact, from IMDb: “After the coerced coitus scene, Christian was supposed to run away in the robe that he had entered in. Jack Reynor [the actor] himself suggested that Christian run out […]

Myth: The Secret Ingredient to Modernity

One morning on my patio, I turned to one of our potted plants and beheld an audacious fuzzy caterpillar energetically exploring the leaves. He stepped so lively that he won my heart, and I thought, “Why not take him inside and let him pupate and become a moth, and we’ll have some opportunity for Nature […]

When You Feel Small

In his very excellent and moving book C. S. Lewis: Man of Letters, Thomas Howard writes of Lord of the Rings: “We find at work in that world such notions as majesty and mystery and purity and nobility and taboo and heroism and so forth—all of which we tend to attach to ‘antiquity’” (46). Nobility. […]

Tolkien’s Fruitless Labor and Our Hope

I had the distinct privilege last week to visit the Morgan Museum and Library in New York City to catch the Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth exhibit, a display of his original papers and artworks. I knew Tolkien had a gift for prose, language creation, and world building—but I never knew how talented he was as […]

Top 10 Books of 2018

When I posted my Top 10 Children’s Books before last Christmas, one of my friends asked if I had a Top 10 Books of 2018 list in the works. Of COURSE I did! Well, not at that very moment—but I thought it would be fun to develop one after the new year. Then I got […]

My Solution to Resolutions

New Year’s Resolutions have come under fire lately. My whole adult life, I’ve heard the (perhaps deserved) cynicism. While I’m generally skeptical of what culture says we should do, I do like New Year’s Resolutions. The new year is a guaranteed fresh start, an official milestone to look forward to as the beginning of something good. […]

Hope Misunderstood

“The hope of the righteous brings joy, but the expectation of the wicked will perish.” Proverbs 10:28 There are lots of reasons to think about hope and expectation in the days leading up to Christmas. We are looking forward to certain gifts, hoping that what we ourselves give will meet with thankful excitement, praying that […]

Tolkien Blog Party 2018!

This year, to top off my celebration of Tolkien Week, I’m participating in Hamlette’s Tolkien Blog Party! (Many thanks to her for organizing!) 1. What’s your favorite Middle-earth story/book? It may be cliché, but since Lord of the Rings is one of my top three books of all time, it’s that one. I count LOTR […]

Tolkien’s Three Satans and Why They Matter

Happy Tolkien Week to one and all! One of the aspects of Tolkien’s work that fascinates me is its depiction of Evil. Not only can this mild-mannered, somewhat niggling professor write some truly terrifying scenes, but I also appreciate the thematic truths that inform his portrayal of Evil. I love a good subtle villain as […]

The Purposeful Parallelism of The Hobbit

In a blog with a Tolkien reference in the subtitle, and with a list of at least ten Tolkien-related blog posts in my head, I find it shameful that I have yet to write specifically about Tolkien. My undergraduate thesis was on Tolkien, and I teach a class on him and Lewis every other year, […]