Alone. Welcome to Mythic Mind. We pursue wisdom of the past between primary
secondary worlds. I'm your host, Andrew Snyder, and as always I am
truly grateful for your company. All Right, So it took a little bit
longer than I had originally planned, but today we're wrapping up our series on
Tolkien's Tales from the Perilous Realm as I discussed Smith of Wutten Major with today's
guests Aaron Irber. But first I want to thank all of my patrons and
my super patrons and hire by name, and so many thanks to Mark,
Paul, Aaron, Aaron, Andrew Brandon, Emmy Harrison, Ian Jamie,
Jeremiah, Joscelyn, Joshua, Matthew, and William. Your support helps me
to keep this going and to expand into new directions. And speaking of new
directions, I recently mentioned that I'm going to be leading a couple of public
studies this summer. The first study, which we'll begin in mid May,
is on the fiction and philosophy of C. S. Lewis, as we
read and discuss his Ransom or Space trilogy Screwtape Letters till we have phases the
Great Divorce and Narnia. Each week will include videos on the reading with philosophical
and theological analysis, connections to other course texts, connections to his related nonfiction
books and essays, additional recommended reading, and more. And while I intend
for there to be a great deal of substance here, you do not have
to have any prior experience in philosophy, theology, or Lewis. As with
Lewis himself, I tend to take some heavy material and present it in a
way that is accessible to nearly everyone. In addition to these videos, we're
going to have some live discussions that will be recorded and made available, and
we're going to have ongoing conversations into an exclusive discord chat. And I'm also
going to provide prompts for reflection and production related to the reading. Your level
of engagement is entirely up to you, as I know that everyone's going to
have different interests and schedule allotments. But I want for this to be as
immersive as you want it to be. And most of all, I'm really
looking forward to the community that is already building around these incredibly potentially life changing
stories. If you are interested in doing this, I encourage you to go
ahead and sign up now. If you sign up for the Lewis Course in
November, you will have free access to the other course, which is going
to be Life, Death and Meaning with Beowulf and Boethius. If you're interested
in joining this community, I encourage you to go ahead and sign up now.
If you sign up for the Lewis Course in November, you'll have free
access to the other course, Life, Death and Meaning with Beowulf and Boethius
when it becomes available. Also, if you sign up between now and the
end of twenty twenty three, you can use the code first in the wardrobe
for twenty five percent off. I'll put the link to the course and that
promo code in the show notes. And now let's get to the main feature
of today's show, as I discuss Smith and Wooten Major with Aaron Irber.
I randomly came across Aaron on Twitter one day and how to check out his
podcast when I saw the title I Might Believe in Fairies. Aaron discusses topics
of faith and culture, and especially literary culture, folklore and the sort,
with a range of interesting guests. It's generally in my rotation and it should
be in yours. As well, and so be sure to look up I
might believe in fairies. So now we're going to move into our conversation on
Smith of Wouten Major, although I do want to say something kind of about
the outset, and I probably should have led with this at the beginning of
this whole series, is that when we're discussing stories, and probably especially when
we're discussing Tolkien stories, and I talk about what things mean, I don't
mean to do so as like a straight one to one relationship, as in
a strict allegory. Really, what I mean is that when we read good
stories, when we read Tolkien stories, we see echoes of primary world realities
playing out in the secondary worlds that he created. And so that's just worth
keeping in mind that I'm not trying to tell you here's what it means,
but I'm trying to tell you here's something of what I think it means.
And I hope that that makes sense. Well anyways, I'll sot off rambling
and jump right to it. Oh and one more thing, I had to
record this when I was outside of my studio, so the audio quality isn't
quite what I would like, and so I do apologize about that. Anyways,
here we go, Aeron Urbero. Welcome to the mythic of my podcast.
Hey, thanks for having me. Absolutely Now, pretty soon after when
I first started really engaging with Tolkien beyond Wesendarium, and I got to this
story, which is Smith and Wuton Major, which is about the idea of
fairy that's more or less when I first doubled across your podcast I Might Believe
in Fairies. Naturally, I kind of made a connection there, But why
don't you go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself kind of what
you're into and what you do. Yeah, So, as you mentioned,
I have a podcast that it's called I Might Believe in Fairies and I discuss
it started kind of as like, I was really frustrated with the lack of
content, like interesting content. And I'm a Roman Catholic, so the lack
of interesting content being produced by Catholic people. Most of it is political,
most of it is apologetic and scope, which means, you know, explaining
the faith, and that's fine, but I was just kind of fed up
with all that stuff. So I wanted to do something else. So the
main kind of the goal of the show is to discuss not just like Catholic
authors, but Christian authors that have especially ones that have like an apostolic sort
of and sacramental sort of view of the cosmos and then just promote their work.
You know. I wanted to do that, and then it turned into
like, well, I talk about folklore and I talk about some weird stuff
in scripture, and yeah, just it's it's been a lot of fun.
So that's what I do in my spare time. I'm an entomologist by training.
I got a graduate degree at the University of Minnesota. Entomology was just
a sort of insects, so that's kind of kind of related to what I
do for my day job kind of. So yeah, that's that's pretty much
me. Check out my show, I guess. Yeah, I would definitely
recommend that. Over the past a couple of years or so, I would
say it is when I first started to really become enchanted, started to really
deal with the idea of fairy It's when I first really discovered Tolkien and left
modernity behind, so to speak. And it's a you know, when I
saw the title of your podcast something on Twitter, I just naturally drew me
in and so I mean, let me ask you this. I mean,
I think you said you're not really focused on the apologetics and that side of
thing, although it might be potentially tygentally related. Yeah, what what is
your interest in very fantasy folklore that sort of thing. Well, I my
interest in it. It's really fun Primarily, Like you know, I guess
I don't really know how I really got started into it. I kind of
grew up on comic books, so it's they're kind of related to fairy stories
and fantasy kind of, you know, they're they're a bit different, like
they're kind of different genres, but they're they're tangentially related. But I like,
I'm interested in fantasy because I think it expresses how we actually live in
the world, you know, and how we actually interact with the world.
And what I mean by that is, you know, as as a Christian,
you know, we believe in some things that give secular people, you
know, give my heart attack, you know, or make them make them
think twice about taking it seriously, like angels and Dan's and for me,
Catholic saints, and and with fairy stories. Actually, I just attended a
Christian science fiction fantasy convention called Doxicon, and one of the keynote speakers was
Tim Powers, and he was a really amazing author. Uh. He said
that while the actual character of Sauron is make believe something like Sauron exists,
you know, and that's what fairy stories, that's what fantasy, good fantasy
can do, is to remind us that these things actually exist and the world
is stranger than we we really think. He also gave the example of with
materialists, with secular modern secular people, you know, we have kind of
these like sense, these like sense images in our minds. And he gave
an example of like the chickens being reared in an enclosed space no sunlight entered
in for generations, you know, and big barn with no windows, no
exposure to the outside world, and after like three or four generations, kind
of you know, without the sun, without any sort of external you know,
factors like predators and things like that, they would they wheeld a cardboard
cutout of a hawk across and so the shadow would pass over the chicks and
they all freaked out, you know, they all the chicks freaked out and
ran for cover. And and so even without like the the real experience,
real knowledge and experience with with a hawk with like you know, maybe they
learned that from their their chick parents, their chicken parents, you know.
Well, no, it's in it this innate thing in us where we were
we have this like sense of the other right. And so that's what fairy
tales can kind of do is remind us of that. People still get even
if you're not a believer, you're a materialist, you're an atheist, you
still get creeped up. I think, you know, when you have no
right to be you know, ghosts and wear wolves and whatnot. So yeah,
I think fantasy is really good for that. And besides that it is
really fun. So that's how it should be. Yeah, fair enough.
I mean even Carl Jung said something I give the quotic not quite right,
but basically said, even the most hard boiled rationalists is not free from terrors
and nightmares. Like whether you believe as we do, that, I mean,
there are actual others, other realities that play here than the material or
even that it's a projection of the human consciousness. Like there's something that we
aren't able to tangibly or even necessarily rationally deal with, that we need to
deal with in some way, shape or form. You know, my academic
background is in turke Guard. My doctoral dissertation was on Careguard's sense of anxiety,
despair, fulfillment, that sort of thing. And as I kind of
at the same time as wrapping that up really sorted dive into Tolkien and fairy
fantasy more broadly, I really saw a pretty profound overlap between the concerns of
the existentialists, especially the Christian existentialists, and then you have fairy as the
perilous realm where we either find or lose ourselves, right, right, And
so I've passed this of all my guests as I go through the series on
Telton perils realm, what exactly you kind of already address this, but what
is the perilous realm? What is landa fairy? Oh boy? And I
just kind of breeze through Tolkien's on fairy stories, and even Tolkien like can't
really give a definition. He actually kind of purposely doesn't give a definition,
and he talks about what fairy is not, well, it's it's from what
I understand, it's fairy is like it's it's a land, it's a but
it's also like a state of being. And in a book I recently read.
It's on the shelf over there. I'll just grab it real quick.
Remember the author, he's just on my show. What his name is,
Junius Johnson. So he wrote a book called On Teaching Fairy Stories. I
really recommend it, especially if you are homeschooling and stuff. It's how to
how to apply on fairy stories to an educational teaching teaching students basically, and
he talks about by being a state of being as well. He kind of
expands on what Tolkien was saying. It's like there's a something it's kind of
like sacred almost. It's like this, you're kind of set apart to be.
To be sacred is to set something apart and for special use you related
to worship. But bey is kind of like that, where but it's instead
of a sacred use, it's kind of like you're doomed, you know,
and there's this kind of doom hanging over you, and you are no longer
are tethered to the rhythms of the natural world, or I guess I should
say the primary world, because fairies, accorded to Tolkien, are not supernatural.
They are more natural. We we're supernatural and they're hypernatural or something.
Like that natural we are, and so it's basically the state of being.
And it's a land too that exists kind of parallel to ours in a way,
you know, and you can enter into it, but the the boundaries
are dubious, you know, you don't know where the entrances are, and
you might find yourself there, you know. But I think it has more
to do with the state of being, like kind of untethered from from the
primary world in a way. It's not I don't know if it's bad or
good, you know it's but it is dangerous, right right, Hence the
parallels realm. Yeah. I like Tolkien's take on that that it's not even
so much that the elements of spirit are themselves the transcendent, you know,
they are the hypernatural that calls forth or highlights the transcendent human spirit. And
along several lines what you slaid out, he makes the point that fairy is
neither heaven nor hell. It's something like the road in between, where you
find your bearings and end up one place with the other. And so it's
something like where you most fundamentally come to terms with yourself and either are found
or lost. Yeah, exactly, yep, And that's something that the Genius
Jacks attacks about in his book too, is it's I don't want to say
self discovery. It's not like a journey of self discovery, but it's it's
something like that where you enter into fairy and you don't come out until you
learn what you're supposed to learn, you know, and and then by the
end, if you survive, you're usually you've learned something at least, you
know. It might have not all your pieces, you know, with you
at the end, but you'll have learned something and you'll be So it's something
like that, you know. Yeah, and whatever, whatever it is that
you learn and take with you, that's the only treasure of fairry you're allowed
to bring back into the primary world. Right, it's whatever you've internalize,
so to speak. Right, unless you're a smith, and then you get
a flower. Okay, fair enough, fair enough. So yeah, there's
a lot of fol floor where you know, you go into the fairy burrow
or barrow, you know, or whatever, and they have all this food
and gold and stuff. While you're there. It's sumptuous and delicious, but
you try to bring it back into the primary world, it turns into you
know, dung dead leaves. Basically it's death. You know, you can't
use it. It doesn't it doesn't work, so you can't. Yeah,
the only thing you can really bring out is what you learned from the experience,
and in that something of fairy does enter into the primary world in you,
right, And that gets the Tolkien's idea of escape and recovery right.
You go into fairy to step away from the primary world in a way that
you can return to it better very quick to deal with that, right and
you, Yeah, that's in his unfairy stories. I always there's actually four
things that the fairy stories do, and I don't understand completely the first one
and the fantasy, you know, the idea do you have a resting strangeness
where you're kind of almost dazzled by the the difference the other you know,
And then there's your recovery escaping consolation and recovery is like regaining a clear view
of things and looking at reality in a more cleaning the windows I think Tolkien
described it. And you you, fairy helps you to regain a clear view
of reality where instead of look it gets rid of the familiarity and you start
looking at trees as enchanted trees, you know, not just boring old trees
and horses as enchanted horses and whatnot. So yeah, yeah, And Lewis
makes a similar point when when Kyle enters in a chanted forest, that doesn't
make him lose the original force. It just makes all for us a little
more enchanted. Exactly. Yep, yep. So now moving on to the
main topic, Smith the Wuten Major. To my understand, this is the
last story that he wrote, at least that was published. What is Smith
Woten Major? Like, how do you class this? What do you think
is happening? It puts on a metal level. Yeah, So, as
you mentioned, so, Smith of Wooten Major is the last thing Tolkien wrote
as far as fiction goes, and he wrote it when he was older.
He was fifty seven when he wrote it, which is the same year that
he completed The Lord of the Ranks. So Vernon Fleeger and I think it
was there's a two thousand and five extended edition. I was trying to find
that Tolkien wrote it. He was a unpublished essay written by Tolkien about this,
which I really want to read, but I couldn't find it. So
it's in the extended edition, but the two thousand and five versions like three
hundred dollars, so I can't swing that. But Vernond s Flieger, Tolkien
scholar. Her essay about it is on the Tolkien Estate website. So it's
basically it's Tolkien's what he's doing, as far as I understand it is,
he's taking the ideas that he wrote about uh and un fairy stories. And
the unfairy stories was actually a lecture that he gave at the Andrew Lang a
society. I think that it was Andrew Lang. I think it was called
the Angeline Society, but ange Lang was a he he and his wife collected
folk tales and fairy tales that coumdpile them into the volumes the fairy book series
of the Blue Pink you know, red fairy books. And so they asked
Tolkien to talk about what fairy stories you know are, and he came and
gave a lecture at the University of Saint Andrews, Scotland, and basically within
on fairy stories, he lays out, he tries to lay out what fairy
land is, what you know, what the fay are kind of indirect,
you know, he says, he can't really define it directly, it's kind
of impossible, but he can he can kind of talk about it indirectly.
And so this Smith story, Smith and Whoten Major is his attempt to put
those ideas into practice in his true, a true fairy tale. And because
I don't think he considered one of the rings to be a true fairy tale.
It's more like myth and myth and fairy stories are related, but they're
not the same thing. And so yeah, that's that's what Smith is supposed
to be. You know, he's he's taking ideas un fairy stories and he's
giving them a body and putting them in a story. And it also is
Toldkien described it as an old man's story, so he's older when he writes
it. His big accomplishment has already done. And as it says in the
story, which we'll get to, there's a there's a there's a title called
the Great Cook that in the town where they in every twenty four years in
make a great cake. It's called the Great Cake for the feast of the
good Children, and twenty four children are invited and they're supposed to be all
the best children. They are the most virtuous and stuff, but only you
know, the great cooks, since it's every twenty four years. Great cooks
only really get to make a cake once, you know, are a great
cake once in their career. And I think Tolkien felt that the Lord of
the Rings and the whole Legendarium was his great cake, you know, and
that he was done. And this is kind of his sort of bereavement but
peaceful sort of acknowledgment that he had he needs to move on and pass the
torch. So that's that's I think what the story if I could summarize it
like it is, but it's more. It is more than that. It's
more than just Tolkien being sad and writing a sad story about losing Fairyland more
than stand on its own, you know. But yeah, yeah, yeah,
And I think it's good broad framing. And also I think it's worth
noting the original context that it out in that you know, originally he was
tasked with writing the preface to the McDonald's Golden Key, and then you know,
as he's seeking to tell this you know, little story as a point
of proving the power of fairy essentially, you know, it develops into a
full story in its own right, and of course he never finishes the original
preface that he started out on Typical Tulkien as recently going through I don't know
what some book on the Inklings and brought up the fact that he and C.
S. Lewis had initially set out to do a work together on language
and meaning, but after Lewis wrote a few pages, he gave it up
because he realized Pulkien can't do collaborations because he can't stick with a method long
enough. I thought this is a good anecdote to that point. But anyway,
so obviously he's trying to say something in many ways, I would class
it in the same way as Niggle and that it's about as close to allegory
as Tolkien gets in that things mean things right, right, And I think
with the allegory bit, Tolkien did say, you know, he always resists
strict allegory, which which is like, you know, the famous example is
Aslan is actually Jesus, you know, it's like and while Lewis did use
that his books, Lewis's books are more complicated than than just that. But
for Tolkien he resisted the strict allegory. But he he said that his works
can be allegorized, you know, like they can be you can you can
see the bits that kind of made up the cake, you know, the
pot of soup or whatever you want to describe it. But it's not just
that you know it can stand it. Basically, I think what the different
I was just thinking about this today, Like the difference between strict allegory and
something you can allegorize is the thing you can allegoriz should be able to stand
on its own, whereas something that is a strict allegory you need something external
to the story in order to understand it, or in order to not just
understand it, but just to actually have the story itself. Like so I
think that might be wrong, but it may be too simplistic. But so
you can allegorize the bits like I did you know about and I didn't make
that stuff up. That was an article I read about him, it being
like him being bereaved, that his masterpiece is done and he's got to move
on. And that's I think that is there in the story. But it's
not, like I said, it's not just that. It is about fairyland
too, you know, and that's not something you can I think Tolkien said
that the human elements of the story can be allegorized, but the fairy elements
much harder. It's much harder to figure out what he's doing there, because
the point he makes it un fairy stories is like you can't really figure out
fairy, you know, It's like it's it's it's well, not impenetrable,
it's indescribable. So yeah, and I think that's a common theme we're going
to see throughout the story, the idea that fairy is beyond our control.
We can't manage it, we can't even really articulate what it is. We
can't even are always articulated to ourselves, let alone to others. But the
fact that, you know, he begins his story with there was a village
once, not very long ago for those with long memories, not very far
away for those with long legs, And so he starts off by making the
point that the story he's about to tell is not far away from any of
us. Yeah, So that's how he starts off. He's telling this story
about something that happened not long ago, not far away, and we're told,
as you said, that we're looking forward to this great feast the Feasts
of good Children in which the Master Coke is going to make this great cake
for these twenty four children who are invited to attend. But one of the
persons that really stood out to me is when it describes the great Hall of
the town and it says that it was built of good stone and good oak
and was well tended, though it was no longer painted or gilded as it
had been once upon a time, And so we get this idea that the
guilding, that the painting had worn thin, and essentially they became fragmatist of
sorts. Yeah, in that it says it was maintained, but it lost
its luster. It is beauty that that itself was not maintained because it didn't
serve a pragmatic purpose. And so I think that really points to the disenchantment
of the modern Arab And in fact, later on, when alf who's going
to be revealed as the Elf King, sorry for the spoilers, I guess
you know, it's a very short story, right, he makes sure that
the hall is actually repainted back to his former glory, and at the time
some of them are actually accusing him of being imaginative and innovative and fantastical when
you're really what he's doing is he's re enchanting the Great Hall, bringing it
back to what it used to be. Yeah, I think I think there
was a line. No, I think there was a line that said the
townsfolks said they were some of them complained that they thought the renovations were too
modern or too new fangled, when really Alpha was restoring them to something even
older than what they knew, you know, like what they they looked at
as new fangled and like oh, it's just modern nonsense, you know,
and then like Alpha is like, actually, no, this is much older
than you say, I thought those There's a lot of humor, you know,
a lot of like subtle humor in the story too, which is which
is good? Yeah, And I appreciate that because so on one hand,
it gets a Tokien's idea of enchantment, which fundamentally real enchantment is kind of
like the magic, so to speak, of the elves, and that it
brings out the qualities that are inherent in something, the good qualities, and
that's I think what the guilding here kind of represents. And then it also
gets to the classical idea that what is good in the capital C conservative sense
is actually something eternal and transcendent that we should form ourselves too, not necessarily
something we progress toward in time. And so to reenact the good you have
to go back, right, Yeah, And there's a lot of restoration being
done in the town too, like the children. When Elf is the great
Cook and he's about to leave Smith, the main the main character Smith,
he notices that the children at the new at this great feast looked even more
beautiful than he remembered in the past, you know, and just there's there's
there seems to be this just rejuvenation of the town of Ooton Major that happens
after Elf has been working there. So do you want to like go through
just the basic plot. I think they might be helpful be kind of talked
about the main framework of it. But basically, there's this you know,
great cake. There's a great cook and the first one we hear of he
he leaves and it comes back and he brings home this apprentice who which is
unheard of because usually apprentice comes from the village itself, but he's this apprentice
comes from outside and his name is Elf. And when when the first great
cook in the story comes back. His name is his name is Ryder,
and he is more joyful and Mary singing songs and which is not like him.
You know. It wasn't like a grump before, but he just didn't.
He wasn't the singing type, you know. And now he's Mary and
and full of he's dancing and singing. And then he leaves, you know,
for good, and he doesn't come back. And then Alf becomes well
he's the apprentice still and that everybody thinks he's too young to take over the
job of great cook. So they get this guy, Noakes, who I
can't remember why they pick him. Basically, he's like he's competent enough.
He's competent enough to do it. He's not very good at it, but
he can he can do it, and he's he doesn't really he's kind of
a pragmatic guy. Noakes is kind of I think I found that Noakes.
The name Noaks is like an old English term for fool that's from a website
of like British slang or something. I don't quote me on that, but
I go correct, so we'll go with it. Well, he you know,
it's time for him to make the great cake and Alf is his apprentice
and help. You know. Basically, Alf is doing all the all the
hard work, and Noaks has taking credit for it. And Noakes wants to
make a cake that has a fairy queen hunt and because you know, children,
children like two things, sweets and fairies, and nobody grows out of
sweets, but everybody grows out of liking fairies. So he wants to basically
just like to condescend to the children and give them a nice fairy cake and
stuff and Elf Alf isn't too happy about that, but he goes along with
it. And then they find this star in this old spice bot. Because
he's trying, he's freaking out. Noaks is freaking out. He doesn't know
what he's doing, you know, so he's looking back in recipes and stuff.
He doesn't understand half of it. And he finds this old spice box
and get some get some spices out of the cake, and he finds this
little tarnished star and Alf says that that star comes from fairy and Noakes.
Noakes says, that's ridiculous. You know, we wouldn't be funny. It
wouldn't be funny if it wouldn't it be funny if we put in the cake
and then the you know, the children got a surprized and they would be
very, very funny. And Elf said, well, no, it's not
very funny. I don't think they'd be funny at all. Which Tolkien actually
mentions this, so again to go back to on fairy stories. And now
this is like a like a incarnation of his ideas is you can have humor
and satire in a fairy story, but the one thing you can't make fun
of, Tolkien says, is the magic. And that's what Noaks is doing.
Noaks is making fun of the magic. And Alf says, no,
that's not not We'll do what you want. We'll put it in the cake.
We'll put all little trinkets in the cake. The kids can get whatever,
and they can have a fairy queen on top of the cake. This
is not my idea, is you're right, notes, and but you can't
make fun of it, and it's not a laughing matter. And so you
know, the cake is distributed and people get prizes, some get to others
get none. And one boy Smith, he's Smith's son, and that later
becomes called Smith. He eats the star. He doesn't know it. He
doesn't think he got a prize, but he eats the star, and then
on his tenth birthday, he starts singing kind of he notices the beauty of
the natural world, and he starts singing, coughs the star up, and
before it could float away, he slaps on his head and that star gives
basically is a passport to let him go to and from Fairyland whenever he wants.
And so then the story kind of progresses from there. But that's that's
the basic that's the kind of the basic story is his sort of adventures in
Fairyland and and yeah, everything after that, and he gets older and has
to pass it on to the next person. So yeah, that's that's a
bi I just wanted to lay that out because if people haven't, you know,
yeah, fair enough. Yeah, that's helpful. So obviously there all
kinds of places we can jump around the conversation, and I don't have a
particular agenda in mind. One thing I was thinking about is when the cake
gets divided up, and you know, all these coins in it, and
twenty four coins, right, one for each child theoretically, even though some
get more. Yeah, they were like, I don't know if it says
like little trinkets, you know, it's the King cake, you know.
Uh, you have little prizes kind of hidden in there with the main prize
in the center, and so you divide up the cake, and theoretically every
kid should get one. But the Noake says, all the fairy treat is
very quickly. Fairy Queen is very tricky. She might give two to Billy
and might give zero Susie, you know. And and Elf is not happy
about that at all. He's very He's just very serious about the whole thing.
Because reality, like these these creek these reality does exist, and Noakes
is kind of making fun of it. Right, So Noaks does not have
the right sort of piety, I guess, the right approach to it.
And so there is a kind of doom or providence at play here in that
there's a certain sense in which, okay, yes, it looks very random
the way the treasure are getting distributed, but at the same time Smith was
destined to get this star, and so there's a purpose at play here.
It reminds me of in my medieval philosophy class that recently led a study on
boetheis the constellation of Philosophy, which is something that I've read once a year
for the last like five years or so. And yeah, he talks about
the relationship between fate and providence. And so what we describe as fate is
something like the chain of the web rather of cause and effect around us as
we can perceive it through our finite little perspectives. And it looks it looks
chaotic, It looks like things just kind of happen. But at the same
time, ultimately there is a providence that stands above the wheel of fortune that
actually leads to real purpose, even though most of the time we can't hope
to perceive exactly what that is. And so I kind of see something similar
at play here, and that, you know what looks chaotic, the fact
that some get to some get zero. Ultimately, the star is going to
end up exactly where it's meant to be, just as it will when it
gets passed on to the next child. That even though you know at the
end the star gets baked into the next cake for the next child, it's
decided ahead of time who's going to go to right through a seemingly random process,
right, yep, yep. The the providence of the elves, you
know, and you can allegorize that. And I don't know if I would
do that necessarily to be like, well, we have the king and the
queen, you know, it could be marry and you know Christ yeah,
you know, I mean, and I don't know if that works that well,
but it's but yes, that there's definitely a level of providence there.
And actually I think in the later on the story is revealed that from the
Queen when she's talking to Smith, and she says, I, you got
the star because you desired to see me because of your desire. Because he
saw the the little fairy queen on the cake, and he had this intense
desire to see the fairy queen and that's why he got the star, right,
because of that intense desire, And she's he was ashamed that, Well,
the star is a gift too. It's a gift from providence, right,
It's not just something he deserved. But he was ashamed because of the
fairy little trinket on top of the cake because it was such a poor represent
representation of the fairy queen and her grandeur, you know, and in her
stature as as this magnificent creature and she says something along the lines of,
don't worry about that. We're not a I'm not a d by that.
For some people, that's the only glimpse of fairy that they'll ever get,
you know, and that's sometimes it's enough to awaken something in them. And
and so like even the little like, you know, the little caricatures of
grand and great things can be enough sometimes to awaken something deep inside you.
So yeah, and so he got the star as a gift, you know,
is this and it wasn't his, you know, he didn't get to
keep it. But it is kind of mysterious as too, like what the
purpose of all this was? What was the purpose of him getting the star?
Why? Why do that? Why allow him access to Fairyland? But
then he's wandering around Fairyland and he thinks he can go wherever he want,
you know, and he really can't. And and so he's kind of presumptuous
in that, and the Queen kind of rebukes him initially and says, well,
you're you've grown bold to starbrow, you know, And he's like,
oh, crap, I actually can't go everywhere I want to with this,
even though I thought I could. So yeah, I'm kind of rambling now,
probably stop talking. Well, it's more rambling is more or less his
encounters with Fairy, when he has all these disconnected encounters, and really back
to the Starbrough idea. And so I think it's interesting that he eats the
star did the cake. That's originally how he comes to attain it, but
then sometime later he basically regurgitates it and the slaps it on his forehead.
Right, yeah, it's just a weird thing. It's weird. I mean,
I have some ideas. I mean, you have any thoughts on what's
happening there, you know, I don't. I mean, that is an
odd way to go about it. And there's something about communion there in some
way, you know, because when you're sharing, you're sharing a meal with
someone, you're communting with them. And take two is kind of like this.
I'm not this isn't I can't remember where I heard this from, but
this is not original my original idea. But cake cake is kind of this
superfluous thing. Right, it's not the meal, it's the thing that comes
after the meal, and it's it's not something you need, right, it's
but this is something that's delightful and very very nice and can be very beautiful,
and that it that kind of is fairy in in a way. You
know, you don't need fairy, you know. And Tolkien says that,
I think in on fairy stories you don't. You don't need it. The
the thing you need is humility, you know. That's what it's a humility
is enough, you know. So it is maybe something to do with that.
And it's when he's he's he turns ten and he notices he sees the
beauty and the birds, you know, the natural world, and he starts
singing, and I think that's when he coughs it up, and before it
looks like it's about to float away, and in a panic, he slaps
it on his forehead to keep it from I don't know why he thought that
would work, you know, you just to hold his hand there forever,
you know, But it stuck to his head and then it kind of like,
I don't know, meld it in with his forehead and became not quite
invisible. But if you weren't looking for it, you couldn't see it,
you know, which is probably something to do with you know, have those
who advised to see, you know, let them see yeah, it's still
like the regurgitation bit. I don't know why. I mean almost wonder and
I mean obviously whenever I'm saying this might mean this. I'm talking in terms
of echoes, not necessarily direct relation. But yeah, yeah, I mean,
I wonder if the point is that fairy, like many of the most
important parts of meaning in life, is something that you consume, is something
you encounter on a level of ontology, right, a level of a being
before it ascends the level of knowing. And so I want to he has
to consume it and then at some point future works through a system. I
suppose it's being rises to the top. That's when it then gets imprinted on
his mind, right, I think I think that's I think that's right.
So Tolkien actually taught or maybe it was Vernon Flieger in that essay I recommended
people read from the Tolkien estate. Let's see. Basically, the idea is
you don't have to understand the enchantment for it not for it to have an
effect on you. Yeah. I don't remember where I wrote that but or
where she wrote that, but basically that's the idea. So he doesn't know
he's eating it, right, He doesn't know it's in there. He thought
he didn't get a prize, but then he he consumed it. And then
later on, after he regurgitates and slaps on his forehead, he comes to
understand. Like you said, he comes to understand the meaning behind it.
But it was having an effect on him either way. He didn't have to
understand the He doesn't have to understand the magic for it to have an effect.
There seems to be I almost said sacramental element there. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, being is more foundational than knowing, right, yep, Yes,
you need to basically you need to live out so in the in the
Christian life. And now I'm not very good at this and not a theologian,
so if I'm wrong, you know, don't don't attack me, send
all your anger emails to. But you need to basically live it out before
you can understand it better. Right, So, I mean that's just true
of life. You know, there are passages in scripture that there are just
words in a page. You know, until you start that phase of your
life you're actually living like through you know the death of a loved one or
or you know, persecution or or whatever you know, and you start,
you live it and then you understand. You understand things better right when you're
living it out. And so that's kind of how it works. Now,
understanding is important and and reason is very important too, and we can't lose
our reason. But things like faith is prior to reason. I believe that's
correct. So faith is a gift right and it's something that we need to
ask for to increase to. So so God increases our faith, you know.
That's why in like the so I attend the traditional form of the Roman
right in the in the missile, it's when you're about to receive the Eucharist.
It says basically, it says, I don't believe enough in this,
Lord, please help me believe more in this, you know, because because
it's it's something that we don't understand completely. You know. It's like God's
being, like the incarnation to God is made man like what does that mean?
Like he's the beyond infinity, you know, becoming like us and elevating
us higher, you know, and that that should break our minds, you
know. It's that's there's almost something like I don't know if you're fans of
the show or fans with like love Craft and HP love Craft. There's almost
something like love crafting about Christianity and that it is it should it should inspired
Like Lovecraft was all about, you know, the monstrous other, you know,
and nihilism. You know, there's the the at the center of the
universe is just you know, insane, massive, you know whatever, unrationality.
But that's not what we believe, right, but it is kind of
useful to have that, Like, you know, God and the sacraments and
all this stuff are so far beyond us that we can understand them to a
degree, but like there's this mystery there that like should would break our brains
if God actually like revealed That's like in in Job, you know, God,
job is like why did all this happened? God? Why why did
my you know, we're right his wife didn't die, but why did all
my kids die? When I lose my house? Why am I covered in
scabs? And God's like I could show you, but you wouldn't understand it
even if I did, you know, which is not a satisfying answer,
but it's it's like it's just beyond us, you know, and we need
to have that trust that these sacrament these sacraments and like these images and symbols
they haven't do something right, and they do do things. We have miracles
to kind of attest to it. But it's, yeah, the faith proceeds
understanding. I think that with Smith consuming the star without knowing it, that
is manifested later with him kind of understanding more of what it's all about.
Now, he doesn't get to a complete understanding of everything, obviously, but
he has more of an understanding. He's able to live that out more so,
right, And it does, you know, with the star on his
forehead, it turns into something of a limited passport in that it seems like
he can interferry now more or less that will at least it seems that way,
even though he doesn't have complete control once he gets there, right,
And so, I mean, I think that has something to do with the
real internalization of fairy from heart to mind. You can in a sense enter
into it willingly, although you're still entering something perilous right where it says that
there are great evils, but mortal weapons can't really do anything there, right,
Yeah, they wouldn't. It's be of noe of small consequence, you
know, And yeah, the star protects him from the lesser evils. And
he's guarded from the greater evils by probably the queen and the king. You
know. It doesn't say it's not he's not. I don't know if he's
aware of the fact that he's guarded from these things, you know. And
so he's kind of wandering around and he gets into trouble sometimes when he goes
he goes to the lake. It's like this lake with the like fire weeds,
you know, and like this the fire creatures below the water, and
he wants to go down in there and explore because he's like, well,
hey, I'm I'm Smith the explorer. I can kind of do whatever around
And he steps foot on this like water, which turns out to be almost
like a glass like he can't penetrate the water because it's it's more real than
he is, and he's blown away by this wind and this birch tree saves
him while also being very injured in the process. And basically the birch tree
says, you shouldn't be here, like it's you shouldn't be here. This
is not for you. And so he is learning this as he is going
that, you know, the star gives him permission to be certain places,
but it's a limited passport. It's like you have a guest pass at like
you know, some secure facility. You can only go in certain rooms.
You know, you can't go in the top secret, you know, a
control room. Everything happens like you don't have that right, you know.
And then the elf Queen is very forgiving because he's then stumbles upon you know,
her dancing with all of her maidens, you know, and he wants
to dance. He wants to go in there too. When he wants to
dance with them, and she calls him presumptuous, you know, not in
a mean way, but she's like you're or something like that, you're getting
over bold, you know, you know, like this is not you.
You should not be here. But then they dance with him anyway, you
know. And Corey Elson, the Tolkien professor of podcast, he's got a
two part series on this story, which is really good. Basically, in
folklore, you know, the the wanderer comes across the the dancing fairies,
and as soon as he's discovered, they leave, or so he disappears or
something. You know, usually it's not good, like something bad happens,
but in this case, they do let him dance with them, but he's
only allowed to dance with them when they share their swiftness and power and joy
with him. Otherwise he probably would have been unmade dancing, so right,
Yeah, when I first came across the story and it gets to this point
where he's now invited into the fairy ring, you know, as he can
help. It's probably not going to go up for because typically doesn't. But
yeah, he's almost made very like for the purposes of joining in the dance
only for a short time, and Tolkien's very clear only for a time.
For for a short while he's able to share in their nature to a degree,
and then after that he then she actually tells him to Neil right,
to take his rightful position. That's something that initially he wasn't sure he was
even worthy to do. But now that they're dance together, order is put
into place and she says, Okay, Neil, take your place. And
then we're told that basically very in the primary world almost overlap for a time,
and it's almost like he's not quite sure where he is, right right,
Yeah, So for a brief so I have a quote here, for
a brief moment, the two worlds are actually in union. So this is
from an essay. Oh, what's who wrote this? Oh? Here it
is Margaret Salmon's from a mislare. So he seemed to be both in the
world and in fairy and also outside them and surveying them, so that he
was at once in bereavement and in ownership and in peace, which she's putting
her hands on him. Like you said, he was reluctant to even kneel
because he's so far beneath her that it would be, like I think Cory
Elson said, it would be like a worm kneeling to a god. You
know, it just wouldn't that God wouldn't even notice. But she elevates him
to the level of a servant right and puts her hands on him, and
then he has his experience of being in both worlds, kind of like uniting
the two worlds together. And part of what Tolkien talks about in unfairy stories
is this idea of restoration and recovery and constellation. And when I understand consolation,
the Fairland is about restoring, or is about fulfilling ancient desires that we'll
have, desires that stem primarily from the fall, and this idea of like
trying to restore a prelapse areaan sort of the pre fall sort of integrity where
if you ever read you, You've read Perilandra I. C. S.
Lewis's where he talks about how when he goes to Parallel, when he goes
to Venus. Basically, Ransom in that story is a realization that you know,
in this world and on Mars myth in fact and history are one and
the same. They're not separate like they are for us. And with that
with fairy fairy Land, that sort of like consolation. It's like a fulfillment
of our deep desires of like reunification of all all those things you know with
with each other. So when the two worlds, he's in haapbitening both worlds
at the same time. To me, that seems like he's Tolkien what he's
using this kind of bridge the gap between Fairyland and the primary world. That's
another instance of unfairy stories being that like the primary inspiration for this for this
Smith story, right, and so we get the idea that fairy and the
primary world are both real worlds that belong together. Right, But of course
the modern spirit is to hold the one and dismiss the other, and so
doing becomes a fractured reality exactly. Yep. I love this theme of bereavement
and peace going together, and it's it's something like the ownership that brings them
together into the whole person. And this is a common theme we see throughout
Tolkien, the unification of joy and sorrow. One of my one of my
favorite lines from Tolkien altogether comes from The Silmarillion. In talking about Almo,
he makes the point, I remember the exact wording, if joyful is the
fountain that rises in the sun, its roots are in sorrows unfathomed are the
foundations of the earth. Yeah, and that is I think a profoundly true
idea, is profoundly Christian idea for sure, the idea that ultimately it is
the Cross of Christ that is the true world tree, you know, holding
together reality. And that's one of the first things that really brought me into
Tolkien. You know. It's we've already talked about the sum but fantasy is
often seen as escape in a negative sense, like you're somehow fleeing reality.
But no, what talking shows us again and again is that fantasy in its
best form brings you to engage with reality. More profoundly than you're inclined to
here primary world existence, right, Yeah, and he mentions, you know
who's primarily concerned with escape, you know, as jailer's right concerned with that.
Yeah. And this idea of joy coming out of sorrow, uh is
basically the Christian idea. You know, with the resurrection of Christ, the
incarnation leading to the resurrection, it looked like, you know, on the
cross, it's like Christ was defeated, right, he like this enemies one.
But through the resurrection he you know, oh death, where is thy
sting? You know, he defeats death and he but nobody expected that except
for maybe our blessed mother, But everybody was like, well, he's dead,
he's gone, you know, and then he comes back. And so
that's the idea that in fairy stories too, And Tolkien said, it's not
really a complete fairy story until you have that sort of happy ending that you
could task through the sudden joyful turn of the story where where everything, I
don't say everything works out, but like, you know, the darkness is
defeated and there's there's light and and he says that the Christian story is like
the fairy story, you know, and so that's why you see these,
that's why there's a genre of storytelling is the fairy tale. You know.
He distinguishes it from tragedy. It's like the it's like the opposite of tragedy,
you know. And so it is a comedy in the original sense of
the word. Is like the happy ending, right, things start off bad
and they get better, whereas tragedy is the other way, and start off
good and get worse, you know. And so I think there's a happy
ending with Smith, but it is it is kind of bittersweet ending where he
needs to give up the star. You know, he's an old man now,
he's had his his time with it. And he actually when when Elf,
you know who does turn out to be the the fairy King, the
Elf King. He and Elf obviously you know there's like Elf Elf Alf Elf.
You know it's told he's not subtle in that one. But you got
angry, you know at Alf's like this is mine. You can't It's like
this, this came to me, it's mine, you know, the bio
moment, Yeah, exactly, exactly. Yep. He had that Billbo moment
where he's like, no, no, this is this is fine. You
can't have this, but he does give it up on his own free will.
He does, and that, from what I read, allows him to
then choose the successor. You know, we actually the queen. The queen
gives the message to Smith to let the king know, to let to say,
let him choose, you know, that's what he's supposed to say to
the king, so that he says that to Elf, not knowing he was
actually the king. And then Alf reveals himself to be the king, and
and he was Smith, you know, so like the he and that let
him choose? Was let let Smith choose? And again kind of mysterious,
like as why why was Smith chosen? You know, well, he desired
to see the fairy. Well, I mean why did he you know,
he was allowed in the faerry? What was the point of that? You
know, it's it's I think it has to do with restoration or restoring the
town, restoring the magic of everyday things, you know. Uh. And
Smith was you know he when this are we hit the star in his forehead?
You know, he would his his craft, his smith and craft got
more beautiful. You know. He surpassed the skills of his father. And
not only were his items useful. They were also intricately beautiful and and wonderful
of the behold. And he was saying, you know, he was singing,
people would come to listen to him things. So he wrote, like
music and joy into the town. And so this the town is slowly kind
of being restored to something more complete, right, And that, I mean
is the ultimate defense of the fairy story rights. You get that kind of
enchantment that allows you to live more authentically human lives in the here and now.
And even if you're doing a lot of the thing things everything everyone else
is doing, you're bringing a different quality to it. You're bringing that transcendence
to it of the true, the good, and the beautiful. KidGuard talks
about something very similar in Fear and Trembling, which is primarily about the life
of faith drawing on for him and Isaac, and you know, he makes
the point that the Knight of Faith, the true Christian essentially on the surface,
might look very much like everyone else in that you know, he's going
about his life, he's raising a family, he has a job, he's
doing mundane things, but it's all done with a kind of purpose that makes
mundane things more than mundane things. Right. I mean, I think we
see something similar to that in that now Smith without the star, he starts
to do mundane things. He starts to teach his kid, for example,
you know, how to be a good smith. And he's doing these practical
things though with the enchantment of where he's been, which in turn gets passed
on in seemingly mundane ways. Right. Well, it's you know, with
when you're a Christian and you know, I think when you're doing your you're
living your life. You know, you have Okay, I have four kids,
you know, and it's it's really easy to let the details kind of
take over, you know, and just focused on like, okay, and
I gotta do this, I do that, I gotta do changing diaper,
I gotta feed this one who won't stop screaming. I got you know.
You know, you gotta not lose your patience with your kids when they are
being little turds, you know, which happens. But in that and I'm
not good at this, by the way, Like I'm not a good I
talk a big game, but basically you can view that as this annoying thing
that I have to deal with, or you can view it as you know,
what This is like a step on my journey to destroying the demon that
is my pride, you know, like to be too, like taking a
sword and like you know and fighting off the demons attempt me to whatever sins,
you know, like humility. I think Moses is the Black one of
my favorite saints, his early early saint. He basically was this barbarian warlord
who was about to get captured by the local you know, authorities, and
he hides in a monastery and the monks at first, well he kind of
hides among them. They wont let him in the monastery right away until he
repents of his sins basically, and so he's this huge dude, huge like
Ethiopian guy, and I think he's Ethiopian, and he basically converts and becomes
a monk. And then another time when the bandits break into the monastery,
he's like the abbot and he you know, he subdues them single handedly and
then they all convert to you know, which is really funny. So he
beats them all up and then they become MUCKs. But he says that the
devil, like, you think you can fast, but the devil does not
eat. You think you can stay awake, but the devil does not sleep.
But the only thing we can outbeat the devil is in his humility,
since he has none, you know. So humility, you know, do
the mundane things that we find annoying teaches humility and that's how we defeat ourselves,
you know, and defeat the demonic powers. And so if you view
it like that, and again, I'm not good at this. I don't
I talk a big game, but like you, that's how I think.
That's kind of how re enchantment works. You know. On the on the
day to day level, it's like this thing, I have to change a
dirty diaper, you know, and poop is everywhere. It's just everywhere,
you know, and now I have it's on me. I got to clean
up this. And instead of like just moaning about that, and sometimes you
need help, you know, sometimes I have to call it my wife,
like okay, hold hold the baby's arms down so they don't get in the
poop, you know, like that, but that those moments are like okay,
I have to do this, and she can't just sit in poop all
day. You know, I have to change a diaper and it has to
be me. You know, there's nobody else here. It's got to be
me, and I can use this opportunity to increase my own humility, you
know, because it's not a fun job to do, you know, but
somebody's going to do it, and it might as well be the mom or
the dad, you know. So it's that like the re enchantment allows us
to take those moments and and like kind of offer them back to God in
a way that there's actually meaning behind them. You know. It's a lot
of people, I think, go through life and they just think I'm a
dad. So most of my references are kids that having kids and like having
a family is this kind of you know, crippling burden. You can't travel
very easily, you can't do whatever you want, you know. But really
it's like they're kind of the the hammer kongs on the iron that forges,
that forges, the sword or whatever it is you're doing that you're just being
shaped into something beautiful, you know, if you like, if you let
it. And I think C. S. Lewis kind of talks about that
in the Problem of Pain too, So yeah, now I'll be done talking.
No, I think it's terribly important that there is no mundane human activity,
especially, you know, especially if you do have kids, right,
It's it's so easy to get lost in the gross things that you have to
do on a daily basis. I mean, I've I've got twin two year
olds, so I'm not the same thing in directions. Yeah, yeah,
you got it. You have a little differently than me. But yeah,
it's a if you do lose focus, lucy enchantment, then it becomes something
like work, like grudgery, and then you look back one day and you
recognize that you let pass before you the task you had to raise immortals.
Were really thinking about it, Yeah, exactly, Like we're raising little immortals,
you know, like that's that's a crazy thing to think about, you
know, and like we're like responsible for their souls, like where they end
up, or at least to a degree. You know, obviously when they're
a dollars, they make their own bad choices, but hopefully they don't,
you know, and there's a level of trust there too. But yeah,
it's like we're we're raising we're raising these like immortal creatures that can't do anything
for themselves. Yeah yeah, I mean, how can we possibly see that
as a mundane thing? We have to do. You know, it's this
glorious purpose that we've been given that we have to be a best terribly arrogant
to ignore. And so it should lead us to be crushed down and then
to rise up with the call the fairy queen to take our proper place,
you know. And so with Smith, he's not elevated to kingship, you
know, he's basically elevated to a servant. He was like almost nothing before
and then he was elevated to a servant. And and so we have to
have this in mind. Like you know, we are sons and daughters of
God, right, that is a thing that we are. But we're not
like the most important person in the world in the universe, you know,
that is that is Christ. And we have our place, you know,
we have our place in the tapestry. You know, we have our place
in the story. But we're not the main character. But we we do
cooperate if we try to cooperate with what God wants us to do, you
know. But we're basically servance, you know. I mean, we are
like in a way, you know, we are sons and daughters, but
we we're like we're adopted, but we're We're not the centers of the universe,
so we have a role to play. And there's some humility in that,
like I'm not going to be you know, bel prize winning, you
know, physicists and hearing or the doctor hearing all these diseases. Now I'm
just the guy who likes insects and fairy stories and has four kids, and
and I'm pretty small in the grand scheme of things. In fact, then
it's like most people will forget them here when I'm gone, you know.
So it's like, but knowing that God does not forget, and you have
a place, you have a purpose, you have, you have a task
before you a quest. You know, you have an adventure. There's an
adventure while waiting. You knowing that is a is a great consolation. You
know that everything happens for a reason, nothing is wasted, and everything is
a purpose. So and I think again that's what fairy stories help us to
realize. It's like they're like with because in the Habit, you know,
with Bilbo, like I think at the end, Gandalf says like there are
the world is very big and you are very small, and but you have
a role to play or something like that. You know, so, yeah,
just these stories can help. It's something that's really just not what modern
people want to hear, like all this type of kings and queens and you
know, servants, and you know, it's all very foreign to most people,
you know, but that's kind of how reality lays itself out. So
these help us kind of re regain that view, right that be gaining a
proper sense of hierarchy is actually essential to having a place in the world.
Right. I think we covered a lot of what I considered be useful material
here. I mean, do you have any other thoughts before we wrap it
up? Well, I think it's interesting I had mentioned that I don't think
that the King and Queen are allegories of Christ and our Lady. I don't
think they are. I think primarily because of how the elf king Elf interacts
with Noakes. By the end of his life, so Noakes is he's fat,
doesn't do much anymore, but he's still obsessed with like what happened to
the star or the star go? You know, it had to be something
happened to it. And Alf who was his apprentice, you know, for
many years he appears to him and all of his glory of the Elf King
and calls him fat and stupid and you know, proud and like everything.
I did everything and you did nothing, really, and Noakes freaks out and
says, I'm just an old man, and Alf's like, yeah, you
are. You're just an old man. So that's that's that's fine. I'm
not gonna beat you over the head anymore. And so but then like Noaks
like he's like, well, I want to lose weight, and Elf kind
of grants him that request. He loses all this weight, but he still
maintains the fact that there's no fairies, nothing happened, you know, he
doesn't heart isn't changed, right, because I don't think Elf the fairy King
is a christ figure in that way. I don't think he is there to
change people's hearts who don't well I guess Christ. He doesn't change peoples hearts
who don't want to be changed. Right if if, if Noakes doesn't want
it, right, will be taken away, right. Yeah, Like maybe
my whole theory is is bunk. But but that's to me, I'm like,
that's too easy to allegorize the King and Queen is you know, certainly
there's elements of Christ in him, the restorative nature of what he's set out
to do, his providential sort of hand, and in all of the things
that happened in Wooten Major. So there's there's definitely like elements of it,
but I don't think it's supposed to be like an Asla Christ sort of you
know, one to what relationship. So well, yeah, there's something of
an echo. And I find interesting that in that final encounter between alf and
and Noakes, when Alf reveals his glory and then goes away, Noakes frame
data. So there's just a dream, there's something all away, you know.
He's like, oh, it's just something I ate, And so that's
why he like doesn't eat anything anymore. He does he hardly. He's afraid
he's gonna have bad dreams. Right. He takes the you know, there's
more gravy than grave about you approach. Yeah. I was just thinking,
yeah, yeah, Carol. Yeah, he basically just writes it all off.
He's like, no, none that actually happened. It was just a
dream I had, and that the the star must have dissolved or Elf must
have taken it before they mixed the batter, you know. So he still
maintains all that stuff, even though he just witnessed this like really crazy reveal,
you know. Yeah, but Noakes has not changed. He doesn't change.
At the end, he looted the weight and he lives longer and he's
able to spend a time with his family and going to walks again, so
that's good, but he doesn't like his heart doesn't changed, so right he
he even rationalizes it as, of course I lost weight, I didn't eat
as much, right exactly. Yeah, one one loses weight when one doesn't
eat, you know. Yeah, it's really funny. Yeah, so that's
pretty much it. I just wanted to kind of touch on that a little
bit too. And then the fact that the one thing that Smith gets to
take and pass down to his children is not the star. It's the flower
that the elf queen gives him, which does not deteriorate, it does not
wilt, and it's a bell and also it smells to it too, So
it's this like sort of almost like I think Smith describes it as like a
baby toy. You know, babies can play with it. It won't break,
you know, so you're not going to break it. But it's passed
down through the generations. But even then, it's not completely there is because
they keep it. He made a little casket for it, and they can
open it up, but it closes when it wants to close. You don't.
They don't get to, you know, close it on their own.
It's kind of still out of their control. They don't. Really, it's
not something they have like complete dominion over. So right, it's even fair
that's own is still out of your control. Yeah yeah, yeah, but
that too was a gift. It wasn't something he earned, you know.
Authored I really like gene Wolf in Book of the New Son, he says
something like, if a gift is deserved, then it would be called that's
that's called a payment. You know, it's a gift is undeserved. That's
why it's a gift and not a payment. So yeah, yeah, that's
all I have. Very good. I think it's a good way to bend
it off. And so I certainly appreciate you coming on. I feel like
it's a good talk. Yeah, it was a lot of fun. Thank
you. You know, anytime you want me on again, i'd talk about
anything Tolkien related. So I don't don't talk Tolkien that much on my show.
It's actually kind of I kind of go away from Tolkien because there are
so many shows like yours that do a much better job talking about Tolkien and
so, but I haven't talked about Tolkien occasionally, so, but it's always
fun to kind of dive back into, especially something as kind of obscure as
Smith of Wooten Major. Yeah, that's why I'm trying to stick to it,
and I try to stay away from Leschendarium for some reasons. But okay,
well, good, we will do it again sometime. That's good.
Thank you for listening to Mythic Mind, And as a reminder, be sure
to look up Aaron's podcast I might believed in Fairies, and I also know
that he's doing some interesting things with Grimm's Fairy Tales on his Patreon. And
as a reminder, if you are interested in my summer studies, be sure
to sign up for the Lewis course this month if you're listening to it in
November to get both for the discounted price of one. And if you'd like
to support my ongoing work, you can join the Mythic Mindfellowship at patreon dot
com slash Mythic Mind. Oh, and next time we're going to be starting
a short series, or at least what I think will be a short series,
on Tolkien's translation of Beowulf, and so I'm not doing a rush job.
It may be a few weeks before you see the first episode roll out,
but I do intend to get it out in December. If you would
like to join the Mythic Mind conversations, until then, be sure to join
our Patreon, and until next time, I wish you many meaningful roads ahead.