Why Study J.R.R. Tolkien with Alison Milbank

In this video Dr Alison Milbank explores how approaching Tolkien's work, like The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings, from the perspective of a theologian can show new depths in his work as a creative writer, and how exploring literary worlds can be a way of doing theology.
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[@jamesmcneil3454]

amazing!

[@gabriellebaalke6704]

I love this.

[@pwmiles56]

First thought: Realism is the most misleading description (of a philosophical theory) ever conceived.
Second thought: Tolkien in 'On Fairy-Stories' engages in deep dissimulation. The Platonic substrate is there, but disguised. "Involve myself with the philosophers", forsooth.
Third thought: the "inner consistency of reality" which is referred to (1:30) is a phrase he found in the OED. More detail is in the Flieger and Anderson edition of OFS. I once tried to find out who wrote the phrase but the trail ran cold.
Fourth thought: I read somewhere that religion and psychoanalysis engage with the same subject matter. I suggest that "strangeness and wonder" (part of OFS's prescription for fantasy) can be seen as psychological states, necessary (for JRRT) to the knowledge of God, arriving as it might from St Augustine's "signs" ('Of Christian Doctrine'). An illustration is Merry riding into Harrrowdale:
"Merry looked out in wonder upon this strange country, of which he had heard
many tales upon their long road. It was a skyless world, in which his eye, through dim gulfs of shadowy air, saw only ever-mounting slopes, great walls of stone behind great walls, and frowning precipices wreathed with mist. He sat for a moment half dreaming, listening to the noise of water, the whisper of dark trees, the crack of stone, and the vast waiting silence that brooded behind all sound."

[@arthurofalbion]

MrPwmiles: I'm curious. Why is 'Realism' a misleading description of a philosophical theory?

[@peterbrown7688]

The Mundus Imaginalis.

[@hamishryan3507]

"Tol-kean"

[@brooksboy78]

That's... how you pronounce his name (TOL-KEEN).

[@DrWhom]

@@brooksboy78 tolky-yen? tolk-eye-yun? talkin?