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Published: Aug. 4, 2020, 5 a.m.

Welcome to another episode of The Literary Life with Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks. Both this week and next, our hosts will be discussing J. R. R. Tolkien's short story "Leaf by Niggle". When this episode goes live, Cindy, Angelina and Thomas will be in the thick of the second annual Back to School Online Conference, happening August 3-8, 2020. It's not too late to register at CindyRollins.net for access both this week and later on!

Angelina sets the stage with a little historical background on Tolkien\u2019s writing of this story as well as some thoughts on allegory and how to read a fairy tale. She talks about this story as an exploration of the struggle of the ideals and demands of art against the demands of practical life and the question of whether or not art is useful. Cindy shares her ideas about the importance of the Inklings for Tolkien to get his work out into the world. Angelina shares about the type of journey on which the main character, Niggle, is called to go on in this story. As you read, we encourage you to look for how Tolkien harmonizes the different tensions within the story.

Commonplace Quotes:

Here are some of the points which make a story worth studying to tell to the nestling listeners in many a sweet \u201cChildren\u2019s Hour\u201d;\u2013\u2013graceful and artistic details; moral impulse of a high order, conveyed with a strong and delicate touch; sweet human affection; a tender, fanciful link between the children and the Nature-world; humour, pathos, righteous satire, and last, but not least, the fact that the story does not turn on children, and does not foster that self-consciousness, the dawn of which in the child is, perhaps, the individual \u201cFall of Man.\u201d

Charlotte Mason

The essay began by noting that total war was underway, with fighting not only \u201cin the field and on the sea and in the air,\u201d but also in \u201cthe realm of ideas.\u201d It said: \u201cThe mightiest single weapon this war has yet employed\u201d was \u201cnot a plane, or a bomb or a juggernaut of tanks\u201d\u2013it was Mein Kampf. This single book caused an educated nation to \u201cburn the great books that keep liberty fresh in the hearts of men.\u201d If America\u2019s goal was victory and world peace, \u201call of us will have to know more and think better than our enemies think and know,\u201d the council asserted. \u201cThis was is a war of books. . . Books are our weapons.\u201d

Molly Guptill Manning, quoting from the essay \u201cBooks and the War\u201d

In everything I have sought peace and not found it, save in a corner with a book.

Thomas \xe0 Kempis

Milton

by Edward Muir

Milton, his face set fair for Paradise,
And knowing that he and Paradise were lost
In separate desolation, bravely crossed
Into his second night and paid his price.
There towards the end he to the dark tower came
Set square in the gate, a mass of blackened stone
Crowned with vermilion fiends like streamers blown
From a great funnel filled with roaring flame.
Shut in his darkness, these he could not see,
But heard the steely clamour known too well
On Saturday nights in every street in Hell.
Where, past the devilish din, could Paradise be?
A footstep more, and his unblinded eyes
Saw far and near the fields of Paradise.

Book List:

Formation of Character by Charlotte Mason

When Books Went to War by Molly Guptill Manning

The Imitation of Christ by Thomas \xe0 Kempis

Planet Narnia by Michael Ward

The Company They Keep by Diana Pavlac Glyer

Smith of Wooten Major by J. R. R. Tolkien

Farmer Giles of Ham by J. R. R. Tolkien

Letters from Father Christmas by J. R. R. Tolkien

A Hobbit, a Wardrobe, and a Great War by Joseph Loconte

Spirits in Bondage by C. S. Lewis

Enemies of Promise by Cyril Connolly

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You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford,\xa0and on Facebook at\xa0https://www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/

Find Cindy at\xa0https://cindyrollins.net, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris\xa0and on Facebook at\xa0https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy\u2019s own Patreon page also!

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