Ruinous reductions and brash bowdlerizations
Ken Myers reads an article by Vigen Guroian, “The Fairy Tale Wars: Lewis, Chesterton, at al. against the Frauds, Experts, and Revisionists.” In the article, Guroian critiques the common practice of retelling traditional stories in ways that eliminate the meaning of the originals. (31 minutes)
Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 158
FEATURED GUESTS:
David Setran, Vigen Guroian, Michael Dominic Taylor, Thomas Pfau, Jason Paone, and Matthew Levering
From myth to sacramentality
Craig Bernthal: Tolkien asserts that reading fairy stories is a way to ‘recover’ the world”
Virtue and myth in Middle-earth
Ralph C. Wood and Bradley Birzer discuss Christian wisdom, virtues, and the strength of myth in J. R. R. Tolkien’s created world of Middle-earth. (33 minutes)
Man, myth, and Middle-earth
Tom Shippey and Joseph Pearce discuss the “author of the century,” J. R. R. Tolkien, and assert the power of myth to convey deep truth. (26 minutes)
On children’s literature and gardening
Vigen Guroian discusses profound fairy tales and the pleasures of gardening. (20 minutes)
Further up and further in: understanding Narnia
Joseph Pearce explains how fairy stories can open our eyes to the depths of reality if we read them with the virtue of humility. (15 minutes)
Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 142
FEATURED GUESTS:
Stanley Hauerwas, Perry L. Glanzer, Nathan F. Alleman, Jeffrey Bishop, Alan Jacobs, D. C. Schindler, and Marianne Wright
Chesterton and Tolkien as theologians
Alison Milbank discusses how both Chesterton and Tolkien restore reason to fantasy and help us to see things as we were meant to see them. (20 minutes)
Fairy tales and what’s really real
Anna Maria Mendell describes how fairy stories can use the device of magic to call attention to the real nature of things. (13 minutes)
Vigen Guroian: “Awakening the Moral Imagination: Teaching Virtues through Fairy Tales”
Vigen Guroian contrasts the features of character and virtue with those of what is more modernly called “values,” and examines how these different approaches to moral consideration reflect conflicting ways of understanding self-formation. (48 minutes)