colinjcampbell
The gates of Hell go under
The gospel account was the "eucatastrophe," as Tolkien and Lewis came to call it, the happiest of all tragedies, because it satisfies the human heart’s deepest yearnings, including the desire for an epic mythology. But this myth had the added advantage of being historical fact, interpreted through a literary text and poetic tradition.
This insight unfolded for both Tolkien and Lewis an entire literary philosophy of mythopoeics (mythmaking), inspiring them to create new mythologies for our time. They would spend the rest of their lives arguing privately about how such an understanding of myth, religion, and literature could be applied to the art of writing.
For these two frustrated poets earning a living as Oxford dons, there was one obvious consequence of their theory of mythopoeics: They had to start writing popular fiction. If God used narrative to communicate his revelation to man, and man is called to bear God’s image on earth, then one of the most noble vocations is to create new "secondary worlds" in narrative.
– Jason Boffetti
The gates of Hell go under
The gospel account was the "eucatastrophe," as Tolkien and Lewis came to call it, the happiest of all tragedies, because it satisfies the human heart’s deepest yearnings, including the desire for an epic mythology. But this myth had the added advantage of being historical fact, interpreted through a literary text and poetic tradition.
This insight unfolded for both Tolkien and Lewis an entire literary philosophy of mythopoeics (mythmaking), inspiring them to create new mythologies for our time. They would spend the rest of their lives arguing privately about how such an understanding of myth, religion, and literature could be applied to the art of writing.
For these two frustrated poets earning a living as Oxford dons, there was one obvious consequence of their theory of mythopoeics: They had to start writing popular fiction. If God used narrative to communicate his revelation to man, and man is called to bear God’s image on earth, then one of the most noble vocations is to create new "secondary worlds" in narrative.
– Jason Boffetti