Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Mythic Mind, where we pursue wisdom
Speaker 1: in the past between primary and secondary worlds. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: angrew Sneyder, and I am always grateful for your company. Now,
Speaker 1: first of all, I want to remind you that all
Speaker 1: the content from the Fiction and Philosophy of CS Lewis
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Speaker 1: We're hopefully even closer to that goal by now, But
Speaker 1: for now, I want to go ahead and jump right
Speaker 1: into our conversation today, in which I am joined by
Speaker 1: the Middle Earth Mixer, who runs a fairly high engagement
Speaker 1: account on x that is perhaps best known for ratioing
Speaker 1: large accounts. With the help of the Young Captain of Gondor,
Speaker 1: we recently had a general just a fun chat about
Speaker 1: Tolkien ideology and generally what makes Tolkien great and I
Speaker 1: hope that you enjoy. All Right, So today I'm talking
Speaker 1: with the Middle Earth Mixer. I know a lot of
Speaker 1: people who are listening are probably already kind of familiar
Speaker 1: with your content. I mean, obviously you're I would consider
Speaker 1: fairly high profile on Twitter. Definitely a lot of engagement,
Speaker 1: and you know, I love to talk about a little
Speaker 1: bit regarding what you think you're tapping into, what you
Speaker 1: think you're offering into the Tolkien community and beyond. But
Speaker 1: I mean, before we do that, I mean, just like
Speaker 1: it's going to introduce yourself a little bit, tell us
Speaker 1: a little bit about who you are, and as much
Speaker 1: as you want to share about that and what got
Speaker 1: you connected with Tolkien to begin with.
Speaker 2: Sure, Yeah, I mean I grew up loving The Lord
Speaker 2: of the Rings. It was something that definitely captivated my
Speaker 2: young Christian childhood.
Speaker 3: I wasn't allowed to watch Harry Potter, you know, my
Speaker 3: mom got the gout.
Speaker 2: The memo like a lot of the other moms did
Speaker 2: that that was out of the question.
Speaker 3: So Lord of the Rings was kind of my fantasy.
Speaker 2: And I also really liked Start Wars as well, but
Speaker 2: definitely Lord of the Rings kind of captivated my childhood
Speaker 2: heart in a way that.
Speaker 3: A lot of things just don't.
Speaker 2: And I'm not like a big fantasy person either, if
Speaker 2: you I've said this before on podcasts and on my
Speaker 2: Twitter before.
Speaker 3: I love Tolkien, I love C. S.
Speaker 2: Lewis, I love good literature, but I don't I'm not
Speaker 2: going to read The Witcher just to check it out,
Speaker 2: or you know, I don't care about other stuff. I
Speaker 2: really like what is the philosophical underpinnings of good stories,
Speaker 2: and I like to explore those, But other as far
Speaker 2: as fantasy for fans saying fantasy for fanities the sake,
Speaker 2: I don't care.
Speaker 3: You know, it's not my thing.
Speaker 2: And then as I got older, I kind of let
Speaker 2: go of that a little bit. I started to started
Speaker 2: to be this projection of what I thought was a
Speaker 2: cool person, you know. And I spent a lot of
Speaker 2: my younger years being or trying to be this person
Speaker 2: that I thought was cool but that I was supposed
Speaker 2: to be.
Speaker 3: And then I got married. And then when you get married,
Speaker 3: you kind.
Speaker 2: Of I feel like, when you are constantly having an
Speaker 2: interaction with another person at all times twenty four to seven, it.
Speaker 3: Actually breaks down a lot of that.
Speaker 2: Like those disingenuous parts of yourself, and you actually kind
Speaker 2: of get back in touch with the things a part
Speaker 2: of like the parts of you that are real. So
Speaker 2: I really paired with that, paired with getting married, starting.
Speaker 3: To really think about what I believe in.
Speaker 2: Why getting back into my faith in a different way
Speaker 2: than I wasn't before, it helped me fall in love,
Speaker 2: fall back in love with a lot of these things
Speaker 2: that I love as a child, you know. So I
Speaker 2: got really back in the Lord of the Rings, and
Speaker 2: I really loved how Lord of the Rings and getting
Speaker 2: back into it was walking alongside my faith journey. And
Speaker 2: Tolkien talks a lot about that and on fairy stories
Speaker 2: and how good fantasy done well can aid the religious person,
Speaker 2: and I felt that actually happening in my life and
Speaker 2: it was something that I wanted to share with the world.
Speaker 2: I was very active on Twitter a prior to me
Speaker 2: doing this whole Lord of the Rings podcast thing because
Speaker 2: I worked. I worked in political PR, so it was
Speaker 2: very active on as you can well imagine with it's
Speaker 2: you get that with me, you know, that's that's never
Speaker 2: going to be something that I don't bring to the
Speaker 2: table because it's it's my thing. But I worked in
Speaker 2: political PR and I had this active Twitter page and
Speaker 2: I remember I was on a hype with one of
Speaker 2: my friends one time. It was this place kind of
Speaker 2: on DC. It's a good hyping spot, and I was
Speaker 2: just talking about the Nascolt and the origins and how
Speaker 2: they came into.
Speaker 1: Being right and as one does on a hike, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3: As one does.
Speaker 2: And my friends, he's he's great. He's always like, very
Speaker 2: encouraging with people's dreams and stuff, and he goes, you know, man,
Speaker 2: I would uh, I would totally listen to hours of
Speaker 2: you doing this, And I mean he was he was streight,
Speaker 2: he had no choice, right, And we were on a
Speaker 2: hike roub on a mount and.
Speaker 3: He can't escape me. So I'm just I'm just talking
Speaker 3: about Lord of the Ring stuff, but I can tell
Speaker 3: he meant it. And I was like, man, you know
Speaker 3: what if I did what if I did start something?
Speaker 2: And that's what kind of got the ball rolling. I
Speaker 2: started doing threads and then a couple of my threads kind.
Speaker 3: Of blew up.
Speaker 2: And yeah, and then it encouraged me to buy this
Speaker 2: any mic and get started.
Speaker 1: Yeah. It really is a liberating experience when you just
Speaker 1: recognize that I can just do stuff that I want
Speaker 1: to do.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2: There's actually a great meaning that's like people and using
Speaker 2: it for Trump and running for president president lately.
Speaker 3: But it didn't start with that.
Speaker 2: It's just you can just do things and then it'll
Speaker 2: be a picture of somebody doing something crazy. I'm like, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: that's true. You can just get up in the morning
Speaker 2: and just do things you start.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was really just kind of liberating. And that
Speaker 1: was that idea that really launched a lot of my
Speaker 1: independent stuff. You know, like I just want to teach
Speaker 1: what I want to teach. So I started making some
Speaker 1: independent classes and now I've got a new career.
Speaker 3: It's it's amable it's incredible.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Uh so uh we'll come back around to some
Speaker 1: of the like the Tolkien and politics and you know
Speaker 1: that whole deal. But you said that when you were younger,
Speaker 1: Lord of the Rings really captured your imagination. So were
Speaker 1: you a reader? Was this movies?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: What did that look like?
Speaker 2: It's well, it started off with just the movies, I
Speaker 2: think again, it was like that thing that movie came
Speaker 2: out that I was allowed to watch, and it was
Speaker 2: interesting because I think I was it was nine or ten,
Speaker 2: and I was up late.
Speaker 3: My family was all in bed, and I was watching
Speaker 3: TV and I.
Speaker 2: The Fellowship of the Rings on FX and I was
Speaker 2: just watching it and I remember I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: kids are talking about this at school. I think it's
Speaker 2: like a Harry Potter movie or something. And I turned
Speaker 2: it on and I was immediately just gripped. It was
Speaker 2: like it was like there was an empty socket that
Speaker 2: plugged into my brain. And I remember when they got
Speaker 2: to Ribbondal in the movie, I thought the movie was
Speaker 2: over and I.
Speaker 3: Was sad the background that's happening right now. I thought
Speaker 3: that was the end of the movie, and I was like, man,
Speaker 3: that's a bummer.
Speaker 2: It's about to be over and little did I know,
Speaker 2: it's just a whole new adventure just kind of kicked off.
Speaker 2: So that's what That's what started it. And then I
Speaker 2: became hooked and I started consuming everything, and then I
Speaker 2: would I would sit and make my family, you know,
Speaker 2: sit down and listen to me talk about the lore,
Speaker 2: and bought all the video games.
Speaker 3: So I really got into it. And then.
Speaker 2: When I got more, when I went to college again,
Speaker 2: that's when I started getting back into reading, but not
Speaker 2: still not being quite as into it as I am now. Yes,
Speaker 2: but yeah, it's been a it's been a long journey
Speaker 2: to get to this point.
Speaker 1: See that's fantastic, and I'm always kind of envious when
Speaker 1: I talk to people who had who were really captivated
Speaker 1: by Polking everything he represents early on in life. It's
Speaker 1: not really something I discovered until actually like a few
Speaker 1: years ago. Really, I just wasn't kid well. I mean
Speaker 1: I saw the movies and I enjoyed them, and you know,
Speaker 1: I played some of the games here and there, but
Speaker 1: like it just it didn't hook me up on a
Speaker 1: deep life altering kind of level. It was still in
Speaker 1: the level like entertainment. Not like this is true, this
Speaker 1: is who I am now.
Speaker 3: Uh, you know what it was too, It was it
Speaker 3: wasn't to me.
Speaker 2: It wasn't just a movie because I remember it was spiritual.
Speaker 3: Like I grew up Christian, still Christian and.
Speaker 2: Very much a church going mother, and I would make
Speaker 2: all of my family sit down, and when we get
Speaker 2: to Gandalf and the Power Rog, I would stand up
Speaker 2: and I would pause it, and I'd be.
Speaker 3: Like, Okay, this is like spiritual warfare. He's taking authority
Speaker 3: over like the demon, you know.
Speaker 2: And I'm sitting there and I'm explaining this to like
Speaker 2: my grandfather or my dad who's like doesn't doesn't.
Speaker 3: Care and doesn't understand, you know.
Speaker 2: But even then I would stand up and kind of
Speaker 2: do these grandios, this is the most important movie ever made,
Speaker 2: you know, Like.
Speaker 3: That's that's how I was as a kid. So it
Speaker 3: definitely captured my imagination.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's great. Yeah, it really wasn't even until I
Speaker 1: was in the midst of my doctoral dissertation when I
Speaker 1: finally discovered the literature for the first time. Really, and
Speaker 1: it really did start with Tolkien. And yeah, saying that,
Speaker 1: it really wasn't until I was in the midst of
Speaker 1: my doctoral dissertation, like a few years ago, when suddenly
Speaker 1: I like finally discovered literature for the first time and
Speaker 1: recognize that, yeah, because I mean, growing up, I would
Speaker 1: just kind of felt like, Okay, if I'm going to
Speaker 1: read a book, you know, I want to learn something,
Speaker 1: and so that means nonfiction, right, And so it's like
Speaker 1: I didn't really even understand. I guess I was so
Speaker 1: inundated with sort of this modern understanding of what constitutes
Speaker 1: truth that I kind of miss the real value of
Speaker 1: literature until finally just the right influences came at me
Speaker 1: in the right way, you know, dealing with some personal
Speaker 1: losses philosophically, I'm starting to, you know, get in touch
Speaker 1: with people like you know, Jordan Peterson, who does a
Speaker 1: lot with fairy tales and literature and so like, things
Speaker 1: just starting to open up for me. Finally drawn in
Speaker 1: by largely talking Twitter that community, I finally pick up
Speaker 1: The Fellowship, and just from the first chapter, the whole
Speaker 1: trajectory of my life really changed from that point forward.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Now, if you if you read it right and
Speaker 3: if you read it with like.
Speaker 2: The right mindset, you know, Lord of the Rings were
Speaker 2: really make you into a different person.
Speaker 3: And obviously it's not that might sound silly.
Speaker 2: It's obviously it's not the Gospel, but I really do
Speaker 2: feel like God has blessed Lord of the Rings, the books.
Speaker 3: And the movies.
Speaker 2: It's the themes in it really walk alongside your faith.
Speaker 2: And that's really what gets me so excited about it,
Speaker 2: because I think it actually truly does help people get
Speaker 2: in touch with the simple and the beautiful, but not simple,
Speaker 2: and you know, in a haughty way, like a like
Speaker 2: a high and haughty person might call something simple, just
Speaker 2: the simple things that are right in front of your
Speaker 2: face that we kind of take for granted as simple.
Speaker 3: Right. I find myself looking.
Speaker 2: At trees now and I was never a nature or
Speaker 2: a plant person, and now I totally am like, all,
Speaker 2: look in my wife and be like, with this flower,
Speaker 2: isn't that amazing? And She's like, yeah, I.
Speaker 1: Guess, yeah, yeah, I've had many experiences like that. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, like you're saying, it's simple in the sense
Speaker 1: that you know, when I'm reading Lord of the Rings,
Speaker 1: it's not like I'm like learning something new theologically or
Speaker 1: philosophically that I didn't know before, but I'm encountering it
Speaker 1: in almost more of an incarnate kind of way, more
Speaker 1: of a concrete way, a way that provides not just
Speaker 1: you know, intellectual edification, but it's something like existential consolation,
Speaker 1: which is exactly what Polki talks about, right that escape
Speaker 1: and recovery.
Speaker 2: And I think that there's something what's so great about
Speaker 2: it is that there is something new that you see
Speaker 2: almost every time you read it.
Speaker 3: There's treasure on every page.
Speaker 2: And this is kind of the debate that I like
Speaker 2: to have with with people know about other stories. I
Speaker 2: use Game of Thrones just because I kind of like
Speaker 2: to troll people a little bit. It's it's fun. Camrons
Speaker 2: is fun, you know. But Tolkien really is about less
Speaker 2: about the destruction of the Ring, less about the you know,
Speaker 2: the embarking of the foulship.
Speaker 3: It's all those are all facets of.
Speaker 2: It that make it a great story. But the real
Speaker 2: treasures are these small sentences that you see randomly, just
Speaker 2: sprinkled throughout where it hits you, like a grain of
Speaker 2: transcendent and transit transcendent, transcendent wisdom.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: That you just go wow, Yeah, absolutely. I mean, my
Speaker 1: Lord of the Rings books are all marked up and underlined,
Speaker 1: and you know it's me. It's it's as profound as
Speaker 1: any any classic work of philosophy or theology. Maybe not any,
Speaker 1: but it's definitely up there. There's just so much wisdom
Speaker 1: that comes out, and I think that, Well, let me
Speaker 1: just ask you, why do you think that Tolkien was
Speaker 1: able to make such art where so many Christians just
Speaker 1: come out, you know, writing something so shallow, you know,
Speaker 1: your your pure flix whatever, Like, why do you think
Speaker 1: Tolkien was able to communicate such wisdom so poignantly and
Speaker 1: so authentically.
Speaker 3: I think one of the reasons you just said authentic.
Speaker 2: Truly bearing one soul on a page and not being
Speaker 2: concerned about how it's received.
Speaker 3: From what we know about.
Speaker 2: Tolkien, right, he was very stubborn about what was included
Speaker 2: in there, and he had a lot of people trying
Speaker 2: to tell him to make edits that he didn't want
Speaker 2: to make, and try to take things out that they
Speaker 2: maybe felt was not entertaining or that would kind of
Speaker 2: make the book a little bit of a slog. But
Speaker 2: Tolkien was authentic and really truly felt the things that
Speaker 2: he was writing. And I'm not saying that you have
Speaker 2: to have a tragic life to really produce works of art, but.
Speaker 3: It really.
Speaker 2: It certainly helps, and he really went through a lot
Speaker 2: of pain in his in his life. It's there's that
Speaker 2: famous interview where the guy asks him, well, what is
Speaker 2: the Lord of the Rings about at the end of
Speaker 2: the day, and he says death, And I think that's
Speaker 2: it's less about death for death's sake, It's less about
Speaker 2: death as it is. When he says death, I think
Speaker 2: he means like the human experience. And when you you
Speaker 2: have your.
Speaker 3: Mother die at such a young age you could put
Speaker 3: into a home.
Speaker 2: Your father died when you were so young that you
Speaker 2: have pretty much no memory of him. It's and then
Speaker 2: you you get sent off to World War One and
Speaker 2: you're in the you're in the trenches of World War One.
Speaker 3: It's It can really.
Speaker 2: Give someone who has the mind for it the ability
Speaker 2: to write something so beautiful that we can all relate
Speaker 2: to because it's it's real. And I also do believe
Speaker 2: that it was I believe it was blessed. I do again,
Speaker 2: it's not scripture, but I do believe it was blessed.
Speaker 2: And I think that he was tapped into something. I
Speaker 2: think that he was tapped into the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 3: I think the C. S.
Speaker 2: Lewis was you know, I read those works and I
Speaker 2: moved in ways that other things just don't. So it's
Speaker 2: for a lot of different reasons that I would say
Speaker 2: it's successful, but definitely all the things that I just named.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think that in the midst of that
Speaker 1: authenticity simply writing out of his soul, that he doesn't
Speaker 1: begin with, Okay, here's the ideology that I want to
Speaker 1: put out there, right, He just he writes a story,
Speaker 1: and the story is true because it's coming from somebody
Speaker 1: who's grounded in the truth. And so I think that's
Speaker 1: one thing that makes it so real. And then you
Speaker 1: talked about him writing out of sorrow, and that's really
Speaker 1: the theme that gripped me the most my first reading
Speaker 1: of Tolkien. It probably still does, the way that he
Speaker 1: interweaves sorrow with hope and meaning and joy. You know
Speaker 1: that there's that great line from hall Deer about how
Speaker 1: you know, although you know love is now mingled with sorrow,
Speaker 1: you know, perhaps it grows even the greater because of it.
Speaker 1: Or one of my all time favorite lines from Tolkien
Speaker 1: comes from the Similarillion when he says, you know, if
Speaker 1: joy full is the fountain that rises in the sun,
Speaker 1: it's wells are in sorrow unfathomed or the foundations of
Speaker 1: the earth or something like that. It's this idea that,
Speaker 1: like life, joy and sorrow are not opposing realities, but that,
Speaker 1: especially in the Christian framework, they necessarily go together. Right.
Speaker 1: I mean, the center of our faith is the crucified Messiah.
Speaker 1: And so I think that that ongoing theme, the fact
Speaker 1: that all joy is rooted in sorrow, but also all
Speaker 1: sorrow is transmuted into joy. It's just such a beautiful pig.
Speaker 1: Sure of I think that the way that things are
Speaker 1: of Christian theology, but it's so authentic in the way
Speaker 1: that it comes out from his pen.
Speaker 2: And another thing, another thing about it too, is that
Speaker 2: it's like you said, he never he doesn't start it
Speaker 2: with here's what I believe.
Speaker 4: It was just something that he started writing because he
Speaker 4: had he had these characters, he had he had languages,
Speaker 4: he had frameworks for stories that he wanted to write
Speaker 4: over a long period of time, and he just started
Speaker 4: writing the story and the things that he believed were
Speaker 4: despite anything placed into them.
Speaker 2: Not but not not shoehorn. They're never shoehorn. It was
Speaker 2: just these are the transcendent, these are the truths that
Speaker 2: govern my universe. These are the truths that governed the
Speaker 2: story that I'm writing now I'm gonna start writing, you know,
Speaker 2: And it wasn't like it was never something that had
Speaker 2: to be said, because you read it and it's just
Speaker 2: reflected to you in subtle ways.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I saw a clip going around. You may have
Speaker 1: seen it as well. When you know, interviewers asking him
Speaker 1: you you had worked out this whole world long before
Speaker 1: writing the Hobbit, you know why. The response was mm hmm, just.
Speaker 3: What I did incredible, like the giga Chad had.
Speaker 1: Just why not? I mean, it's just I think it
Speaker 1: really just speaks to Tolkien's I mean the fact that
Speaker 1: he can't be replicated in that, you know, his whole
Speaker 1: world was born out of a desire to make sense
Speaker 1: have this language that he created, which you know you
Speaker 1: usually fantasy after him is going to go the other
Speaker 1: way around, where okay, well, shoehorn some languages in here.
Speaker 1: But no, it's I have this little just obsession something
Speaker 1: that interests me. I'm going to pursue it, and then
Speaker 1: out of that we get the whole world.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, it's it's beautiful. It's a beautiful thing, and
Speaker 3: it's not.
Speaker 2: It's as you said, it can't be replicated because it's
Speaker 2: just not People aren't like that typically.
Speaker 3: You know, that's what makes him so incredible.
Speaker 2: It's like this was his this was his side, hobby,
Speaker 2: his side hustle, and he already was such an amazing
Speaker 2: talented person. And then to just start this and then
Speaker 2: have that either thing that you're known for instead of
Speaker 2: all the work that you were doing at Oxford is
Speaker 2: just truly incredible. But there's people who don't even know
Speaker 2: he's a professor.
Speaker 1: Oh, I know, I know, it's crazy. And you know C. S.
Speaker 1: Lewis kind of talks about this that when you're like
Speaker 1: hyper engage, then fantasy, like writing fantasy even kind of
Speaker 1: becomes a way of escape, and that now you can
Speaker 1: sort of play around with the things that you take
Speaker 1: really seriously during the day. And I think that one
Speaker 1: thing that we tend to forget is that, you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of people who want to go out and
Speaker 1: write their fantasy novel, you know, they end up essentially
Speaker 1: becoming knockoffs, right, chief imitations. Because in order to write
Speaker 1: something like Tolkien did, to write something even like Lewis did,
Speaker 1: like you have to be engaged in the lagoss that
Speaker 1: makes for good stories, right, you have to be doing
Speaker 1: that hard work. You know that if they weren't busy
Speaker 1: reading like the great works of Northern literature or whatever like,
Speaker 1: we would never get these products. And so you know,
Speaker 1: on one hand, you know, they're both geniuses in their
Speaker 1: own rights in that they were able to spin out
Speaker 1: these different stories different worlds, but also there were geniuses
Speaker 1: that were plugged into like the lagosts that goes beneath
Speaker 1: all great stories, the kind of the spirit of truth,
Speaker 1: I guess, and that's something that you can't really just skip.
Speaker 2: And we'll also and this is where actually we're Tolkien
Speaker 2: to Lewis intersect with my part of part of a
Speaker 2: candle be obsession is my.
Speaker 3: Love for history too.
Speaker 2: And I love that the both of them loved history
Speaker 2: and in order to Token particularly set out to write
Speaker 2: a myth, right. He wanted to write a great myth,
Speaker 2: a myth that could sort of have been something that was,
Speaker 2: you know, pre authority in England, you know, like that
Speaker 2: that's what he was going for. And he was able
Speaker 2: to write a great myth because.
Speaker 3: He loved it so much.
Speaker 2: If you don't love myth, you can't really write one,
Speaker 2: you know, you can't write your own.
Speaker 3: But it's because that It's because him and Lewis both had.
Speaker 2: This respect for, you know, not seeing pre Christian myth
Speaker 2: as sort of this thing to not pay attention to
Speaker 2: and not appreciate some of the good some of the
Speaker 2: virtues that you can derive from those stories, because they
Speaker 2: chose to open their minds up to, like, what good
Speaker 2: can I receive from this story that is inherently flawed
Speaker 2: because it's not the truth.
Speaker 3: It's just a reflection the ultimate truth.
Speaker 2: The virtues that are good are just reflections of the
Speaker 2: ultimate truth.
Speaker 3: But it's okay for me to appreciate the good parts
Speaker 3: of them.
Speaker 2: And because they were open to that, which is the
Speaker 2: same kind of person I am, you know, I just
Speaker 2: I think that that really contributed to both of their
Speaker 2: abilities to like well and tell good stories.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I often reference this line from Lewis's Perlandrum when
Speaker 1: he says that, you know, he finally discovered what mythology was.
Speaker 1: It was gleamed of celestial strength, falling on a jungle
Speaker 1: of perversion and imbecility, and it was like, there's good
Speaker 1: stuff there, even if you know it's all mixed up
Speaker 1: in some things that we need to kind of expricate
Speaker 1: it from and you know, bring it back into its
Speaker 1: proper contexts.
Speaker 2: Which yes, I see, I see you post a lot
Speaker 2: about the Space Trilogy. I love I love the Space Trilogy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I mean that's another thing I just like,
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago, I discovered it for the
Speaker 1: first time, and that's another thing that became part of
Speaker 1: who I am moving forward. I can never look up
Speaker 1: at the stars the same way. Again, Well, it's really
Speaker 1: funny to.
Speaker 3: Tell people about it because they're like C. S.
Speaker 2: Lewis wrote a Space trilogy kind of like yeah, but
Speaker 2: it's also kind of a fantasy.
Speaker 3: And you can read the third one as its own book.
Speaker 2: You don't even need to read the first two, but
Speaker 2: you should read the first two.
Speaker 1: Right, and then I mean you try to rise the
Speaker 1: plot and it's just absolutely insane, but it works.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think that there's.
Speaker 2: Like it's funny because there's a hard dividing line between
Speaker 2: people who really really like that hideous strength and people
Speaker 2: who really don't like it and just do not connect
Speaker 2: or understand it at all whatsoever.
Speaker 3: And I think one of the reasons why it resonated
Speaker 3: with me so much is because.
Speaker 2: You know, I worked in PR, so I one, I
Speaker 2: worked in PR, so I have this kind of resentment
Speaker 2: for the drawbacks of journalism and propaganda. And we know,
Speaker 2: like Mark gets used as a propagandist on behalf.
Speaker 3: Of the nice.
Speaker 2: But I also you know, I saw a lot of
Speaker 2: so I was in DC for a while, and I
Speaker 2: saw a lot of the worst parts of myself in
Speaker 2: Mark's character. It's just deep flawed desire to be seen
Speaker 2: as as smart and l liked by the end crowd
Speaker 2: of people that you think are important. So that book
Speaker 2: was a crazy journey for me. But anyway, it went off,
Speaker 2: it went off too too long.
Speaker 1: No, no, Yeah, I will say that that hideous strength
Speaker 1: did instantly click with me, and that you know, it
Speaker 1: begins with sort of you know, he's boring college meetings
Speaker 1: and progressive clicks that eventually you find are rooted in
Speaker 1: the depths of hell, which I mean that's my d
Speaker 1: day life. Yeah, you're right in a you know, humanities department,
Speaker 1: So I definitely know how all that goes. But so,
Speaker 1: so back to to Tolkien. Uh, you know, we we've
Speaker 1: talked a lot about how what makes him so great
Speaker 1: is the fact that he's grinded it grounded in these eternal,
Speaker 1: transcendent realities. Now that being said, it seems pretty obvious
Speaker 1: that he has like a definitely a conservative grounding. And
Speaker 1: I don't just mean like modern American politics, but I
Speaker 1: mean that in the sense that he is latched onto
Speaker 1: enduring realities that are worth conserving with worth holding onto,
Speaker 1: or rather we need to let them hold onto us.
Speaker 3: I guess.
Speaker 1: So, why do you think that mainstream talkien community tends
Speaker 1: to be very left leaning? I mean talking society or wherever.
Speaker 1: What do you think is is?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think I can tell you exactly why.
Speaker 2: I think that that's a phenomenon that we see a
Speaker 2: lot of. I think a lot of these people start
Speaker 2: off really kind of in the same name that we're in.
Speaker 3: I really don't know how you can't, like you don't
Speaker 3: start off that way.
Speaker 2: Not everyone, but most of them, most of these people
Speaker 2: who I won't call them sellouts.
Speaker 3: But.
Speaker 2: Really just kind of fall on the left side of
Speaker 2: interpreting Tolkien, I think they start off in a lane
Speaker 2: of probably a religious person, someone who comes from a
Speaker 2: religious background, someone.
Speaker 3: Who you know, really fell in love with Lord of
Speaker 3: the Rings growing up and then.
Speaker 2: They find themselves in the academic taking the academic route,
Speaker 2: particularly the people who self identify as Tolkien scholars. You know,
Speaker 2: they are in humanities you know, yeah, I don't have
Speaker 2: to tell you. They're in humanity circles, which are which
Speaker 2: skew far left across the board, no offense, because they
Speaker 2: want to be accepted in these circles, and they you know,
Speaker 2: they want they want funding for whatever they're doing, they
Speaker 2: want recognition, they want good jobs.
Speaker 3: I mean, Tolkien.
Speaker 2: Professor, who I don't I don't know Ory. I know
Speaker 2: it's done great work. So like, I'm not going to
Speaker 2: get on here and bash him. But you know, if
Speaker 2: I spent the amount of time in my life doing
Speaker 2: the stuff that Corey was doing, and now finally I'm
Speaker 2: I have, you know, a major corporation that is putting
Speaker 2: me in front of a camera and telling me to
Speaker 2: do interviews and make videos for them and paying me
Speaker 2: to show up at amazing events. You know, I understand
Speaker 2: why you would start kind of bending and breaking your
Speaker 2: views to kind of fit whatever they would want you
Speaker 2: to say.
Speaker 3: So again, I'm.
Speaker 2: Sure he's a great guy, and I'm not trying to
Speaker 2: bash him. I understand the desire. But I think that
Speaker 2: that's kind of the path that a lot of these
Speaker 2: people walk, is they really just want to be accepted
Speaker 2: in the intellectual circles that they're in. They want to
Speaker 2: be taken seriously. Now all of a sudden, you know,
Speaker 2: the rings of powers coming out, they're being taken very seriously.
Speaker 3: Because I think a lot of.
Speaker 2: People who don't really know about fantasy think their fantasy.
Speaker 3: So they've spent a lot of their life, you know,
Speaker 3: feeling like people don't think something is really cool. Now
Speaker 3: of a sudden, it's really cool.
Speaker 2: So I think it's pretty simple, pretty pretty simple human interaction.
Speaker 3: And I don't hate them, but I definitely I go
Speaker 3: a little bit hard on them on Twitter.
Speaker 2: But at the end of the day, you know, it's
Speaker 2: it's just people being people.
Speaker 3: I don't think it's a big mystery.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I guess that, uh, that whole trajector
Speaker 1: usually out brings us right back to that hideous strength.
Speaker 1: I suppoose that's the smart study. Let's take it to
Speaker 1: the nice now with the telphones.
Speaker 3: Sorry, I was just gonna say society. They're like, I
Speaker 3: don't know how you know, whether they're getting their funding.
Speaker 2: From or what the what the donations thing looks like.
Speaker 2: But they're definitely all literature academics who are.
Speaker 3: Trying to.
Speaker 2: Kind of not just not offend anybody. And I actually
Speaker 2: can't even look at their stuff anymore because they.
Speaker 3: Have me blocked.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've never really paid that much attention to them,
Speaker 1: but every once in a while I'll see like the
Speaker 1: lineup of the titles for their conferences, and it's just
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just insane.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's really it really is. Right.
Speaker 1: These people claim to be experts on Tolkien and the
Speaker 1: kinds of things that they come up with. And I
Speaker 1: think that this austog just speaks to academic culture in general,
Speaker 1: that if you're going to be if you're going to
Speaker 1: have a place in academic society, then you're push to
Speaker 1: constantly publish. In order to publish, you have to be innovative, right,
Speaker 1: you have to say something that hasn't been said before,
Speaker 1: And so there's this push of I have to always
Speaker 1: be original. But the putting originality at the forefront of
Speaker 1: your academic drive is not a good way to land
Speaker 1: a good academic. It's not a way to pursue truth, right,
Speaker 1: It's a way to market yourself, which leads to all
Speaker 1: kinds of just absurdities. This obviously isn't relegated just to
Speaker 1: the Tolkien spheres. It's the problem that I have with
Speaker 1: academia in general is that it just pushes you to
Speaker 1: always be original, which is not the same thing as
Speaker 1: pushing you to be wise or to help other people
Speaker 1: be wise.
Speaker 3: Exactly exactly I was I was thinking about that. It's
Speaker 3: like the nobody wants to hear we already know what
Speaker 3: Lord of the Rings is about, right, we know where
Speaker 3: Tolkien stood.
Speaker 2: They don't lie and say that, oh, he would have
Speaker 2: been progressive on this, now he wouldn't know. We know
Speaker 2: what Lord of the Rings is, and we know that
Speaker 2: it's pushing these sort of you know, Christian Western virtue,
Speaker 2: these Christian Western virtues, that's what that's what Lord of
Speaker 2: the Rings is really propping up at the end of
Speaker 2: the day, And no one really wants to hear about
Speaker 2: that anywhere, not in the actually circles want to discuss
Speaker 2: this because to them, even if they're not openly hostile
Speaker 2: towards it, it's like we've heard this.
Speaker 1: Before, right, It's always that desire of I want something new.
Speaker 1: It reminds me that line from Mythopeia where he talks about,
Speaker 1: you know, progressing into the void that you know, we're
Speaker 1: just constantly moving, but into nothingness because you know, a
Speaker 1: lot of times you see the same people who don't
Speaker 1: believe there is such a thing as you know, transcending
Speaker 1: eternal truth. And so at that point, like, what can
Speaker 1: you even progress toward if you don't have an endpoint
Speaker 1: in mind? There's nothing concrete, you know. It's like Lewis
Speaker 1: says that if you're trying to see through everything, then
Speaker 1: eventually you just don't see anything. That the purpose of
Speaker 1: a window to see something concrete on the other side.
Speaker 1: But if you don't think there is anything concrete, then
Speaker 1: what have you been doing?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Or how you know Gandof's line about it being foolish
Speaker 2: to break something just so you can understand it better,
Speaker 2: you know, that's what they're That's what they're doing with
Speaker 2: Tolkien every day, a lot of them, not all of them,
Speaker 2: but you know they're they're doing this dissection of things
Speaker 2: that shouldn't be looked at through through the lens that
Speaker 2: they're trying to see.
Speaker 1: It right, right, And so again Alf says he likes
Speaker 1: White more right because it's this unifying reality. It's pointing
Speaker 1: us upwards, you know, on the other side of the
Speaker 1: prism to what actually is. I mean, you know there's
Speaker 1: that one letter where he says explicitly that the Lord
Speaker 1: of the Rings is not about freedom, it's about God's
Speaker 1: soul right to divine honor. Yes, he says, like that's
Speaker 1: what it's about.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then people like will log on and say
Speaker 2: that it's not it has nothing to do with religion,
Speaker 2: and like.
Speaker 1: Right, there is. But I guess that's when you have
Speaker 1: to follow in like the death of the author idea.
Speaker 1: You know, he doesn't have authority over his own words
Speaker 1: or I don't know, it gets silly.
Speaker 2: No one's allowed to do that to Lord of the Rings.
Speaker 2: I can do it to other people's stuff, but no
Speaker 2: one can do it to the Lord of the Rings.
Speaker 1: That's right now, I guess in line with politics ideology,
Speaker 1: And now I'm sure that one of the big criticis
Speaker 1: that you get is mixing Tolkien with politics right all
Speaker 1: the time. Dude, what's your response to that, whether you
Speaker 1: give it out loud or in your own head, Like,
Speaker 1: how do you respond to that?
Speaker 3: Well? I think it's.
Speaker 2: There are people who would tell you to read Lord
Speaker 2: of the Rings, read the Summarilien, read The Children of Hoorn,
Speaker 2: you know, read every read all of Tolkien's letters them,
Speaker 2: know them, memorize them.
Speaker 3: But don't you dare. Don't you dare.
Speaker 2: Learn anything about how he felt about the world he
Speaker 2: was living in, and about maybe how the themes that
Speaker 2: he reflects in Lord of the Rings might make you
Speaker 2: feel about things that are happening in our world today.
Speaker 3: Absolutely not, don't do that. That's a no no now. I
Speaker 3: think it's.
Speaker 2: To me, it's absolutely ridiculous to take something as substantial
Speaker 2: as Lord of the Rings, where constant themes are being
Speaker 2: reflected at you on every page, beautiful things. I mean,
Speaker 2: I'm just thinking now. One of my favorite lines from
Speaker 2: Tolkien is where he talks about digging up the evil
Speaker 2: out of the fields that you know, so that those
Speaker 2: who come after can have clean earth to pill. Like
Speaker 2: even that statement in and of itself was like, it's
Speaker 2: differentiating between good and evil and telling you that you
Speaker 2: don't have to go out and do anything crazy, go
Speaker 2: out into your community and uproot evil in the fields
Speaker 2: that you know. That in and of itself is a
Speaker 2: problematic statement if you just have sort of this subjective
Speaker 2: approach towards morality in general. So I don't underst stand
Speaker 2: people because I'm just not that person. I don't understand
Speaker 2: people who can consume content and not analyze the morality
Speaker 2: and the themes that are being reflected back at you.
Speaker 3: I can know that something is not good.
Speaker 2: I can know that something doesn't necessarily have a good message,
Speaker 2: and I can turn that part of my brain off
Speaker 2: and still take something in and enjoy it.
Speaker 3: But I still know.
Speaker 2: I still know what values are being projected at me,
Speaker 2: and when I read Go to the Rings, I'm not
Speaker 2: turning that switch off. I know what values are being
Speaker 2: projected at me. I love those values, and I want
Speaker 2: to share them with others because that's the type of
Speaker 2: personality that I am. And if you want to be inauthentic,
Speaker 2: that's fine, that's up to you. But you need to
Speaker 2: admit that you are actually turning a part of your
Speaker 2: brain off when you choose to read things in that way,
Speaker 2: and that's just not the sunthin person I am.
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Speaker 1: has literally changed lives, as it has for mine. And
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Speaker 1: and those who engage with it know exactly what I mean.
Speaker 1: They speak to the way that things are. As Peter
Speaker 1: Crest said in The Philosophy of Tolkien, the Lord of
Speaker 1: the Rings is infused with the same light that illumined
Speaker 1: the man who wrote it. And that light is true,
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Speaker 1: with Tolkien's creation account, the Iwindulay, and then move to
Speaker 1: the beginning of the Fellowship of the Ring. Each week
Speaker 1: will include assigned reading from The Lord of the Rings,
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Speaker 1: there will be a longer video that serves as a
Speaker 1: guide in these forests of wisdom. Also, we will have
Speaker 1: additional recommended readings, an active discord channel, and weekly live
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Speaker 1: hope to see you on this road that goes ever on. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And the reality is that anybody, whether they have high
Speaker 1: profile or not, anybody who's commenting on Tolkien or anything,
Speaker 1: really they're projecting some ideology at play here.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: The question is, you know, is it actually befitting of
Speaker 1: the subject that they're dealing with. But there's no way
Speaker 1: to escape it, and so all of these claims of
Speaker 1: like radical subjectivity or you know, you can't take anything
Speaker 1: from anything and apply to something else, Like it's always
Speaker 1: such an inconsistent critique. You know. It's like at you know,
Speaker 1: my university classes. You know, pretty much all my students
Speaker 1: will tell me there's no such thing as truth, there's
Speaker 1: no such thing as morality. Everything just opinions, all made up.
Speaker 1: And then I ask them, you know, how many of
Speaker 1: you are intending to vote in the next election, and
Speaker 1: most of them raise their hand. It's like, do you
Speaker 1: not see any inconsistency here that you're going to go from?
Speaker 1: Literally like the same day, you can tell me that
Speaker 1: the worst thing you can do is to impose values
Speaker 1: on somebody else, and then you need to go vote
Speaker 1: on which values you can impose in your neighbors, Like
Speaker 1: do you not see the inconsistency there? Or you know,
Speaker 1: even the fact that you're arguing for anything whatsoever, even
Speaker 1: that there is no truth or you know, everything subjective
Speaker 1: you're trying to apply a truth claim to me in
Speaker 1: that very statement, And so pretty much all these critiques
Speaker 1: just sort of fall apart into absurdity.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And.
Speaker 2: I mean I do understand some of the criticism, right,
Speaker 2: because I get very upset when people try to deconstruct
Speaker 2: Tolkien or say that he would have had views that
Speaker 2: he wouldn't have had, or say that.
Speaker 3: You know this this you're doing.
Speaker 2: I mean, just just an example, like the people who
Speaker 2: do queer readings of The Lord of the Rings.
Speaker 3: I mean, like.
Speaker 2: They do that and then they write about it, and
Speaker 2: then they make these arguments for you know what this means,
Speaker 2: and what that means, and what Tolpien really like may
Speaker 2: have meant, you know, about a specific interaction between two characters,
Speaker 2: and it's like that drives me nuts. So if someone
Speaker 2: has sort of a leftist point of view and they
Speaker 2: see me extracting and speaking on behalf of Tolpien in
Speaker 2: ways that they don't think that he would have agreed with.
Speaker 3: I do understand some level of outrage there.
Speaker 2: The difference is, however, is that I'm right now, I'm
Speaker 2: just kidding. I mean, I am, but like I'm not,
Speaker 2: I'm just kidding now. I understand why people would would
Speaker 2: kind of get upset about.
Speaker 3: That, But I just.
Speaker 2: Really, I mean, we know Tolkien, and we know what
Speaker 2: is posicians were, and we know not on policy, but
Speaker 2: we know where he stood, so you can extract some
Speaker 2: level of confidence on how he might have felt on
Speaker 2: certain issues today.
Speaker 3: But you know that's not the point.
Speaker 2: It is like when I say, when I say something
Speaker 2: political on Twitter, that's coming from me. You know, I'm
Speaker 2: not saying Tolkien would have agreed with this. It's just
Speaker 2: because again that was that was my first love politics.
Speaker 2: You know, that's what I used to work in. I
Speaker 2: don't work in it anymore because it's it's not I
Speaker 2: don't recommend anyone work in politics, but that's what you're
Speaker 2: going to get because that's just reflected and who I am.
Speaker 2: And I think you know, you talk about my page
Speaker 2: resonating with people. I appreciate you saying that. I think
Speaker 2: that my page does resonate with people because people are
Speaker 2: looking for more authenticity in their lives. And I'm not
Speaker 2: saying I'm the most authentic person in the world. But
Speaker 2: if you look at a lot of the Tolkien accounts
Speaker 2: or Tolkien channels, a lot of them make great stuff.
Speaker 2: I mean, Nerd of the Rings, he's amazing. So I'm
Speaker 2: not attacking him or like Men of the West or
Speaker 2: anybody like that, but they keep it strictly Lord of
Speaker 2: the Rings, which is good because that's all they're trying
Speaker 2: to do. But sometimes people like to see a little
Speaker 2: bit of the self leak in, you know, and see
Speaker 2: see where you stand on stuff and how you feel
Speaker 2: about things.
Speaker 3: And people like that because everything.
Speaker 2: Now is so man we live in the social media
Speaker 2: age where everything is so manufactured. People have ai that
Speaker 2: are making posts for them now, you know, on a
Speaker 2: regular basis. So when you get someone who is really
Speaker 2: just being kind of vulnerable every day, people like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think that's a good point. That people want
Speaker 1: to connect with people and not just platforms exactly right,
Speaker 1: and people obviously engage in the world into Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think that is something that you definitely bring to the
Speaker 1: table as well as you know, ratioing President of the
Speaker 1: United States or whoever else, which is all good fun.
Speaker 1: We had a good time, Yeah, Yeah, it's and I
Speaker 1: think that speaks to something that it's good just to
Speaker 1: kind of have fun even when you're dealing with serious things.
Speaker 1: I think that speaks a lot of people as well.
Speaker 1: So other than Lord of the Rings, I mean, what
Speaker 1: is your favorite Tolkien story, my favorite token story.
Speaker 3: You know, it's difficult because it kind of changes all
Speaker 3: the time.
Speaker 2: My background favorite, you know that kind of transcends all
Speaker 2: the other favorites, is obviously gand Offs.
Speaker 3: Just the entire exchange between and Off and the Bow Rock.
Speaker 2: Everything that makes it so significant, all of the background
Speaker 2: information and lore that goes into that exchange, the words
Speaker 2: that get Off speaks, the way that the Bower Rock acts,
Speaker 2: the impending battle, the underground fights, the chase up to
Speaker 2: the peak, and Gandalf's you know, death and then coming
Speaker 2: back like it's all. It's all such a significant sequence
Speaker 2: that I think really captures how deep Lord of the
Speaker 2: Rings is in one exchange, and it's really one of
Speaker 2: the pathways that I really like to use to engage
Speaker 2: with other people because everyone knows you shall not pass,
Speaker 2: you know. It's like it's the most iconic scene in
Speaker 2: Lord of the Rings, everyone references in pop culture.
Speaker 3: So it's also a great catalyst for having these more deeper,
Speaker 3: like spiritual and philosophical discussions about Lord of the Rings.
Speaker 2: Because you get to look at something and be like, hey,
Speaker 2: you know, that's a great scene, right, yeah, and Off
Speaker 2: kind of fighting this monster, right, that's cool.
Speaker 3: But also, let me tell.
Speaker 2: You about the spiritual significance about what's happening in this exchange,
Speaker 2: because when you know that, that makes it so much cooler.
Speaker 3: So that's kind of like my background favorite story. However,
Speaker 3: right now, my favorite story is.
Speaker 2: I really love oh I also love when Finn Golden
Speaker 2: fights Morgoth.
Speaker 3: That's another story, but that's everybody loves that.
Speaker 2: I really love when Sam is in Mordor with Frodo,
Speaker 2: when Frodo is passed out and they're at their lowest
Speaker 2: point of despair, and Sam looks up and he sees
Speaker 2: a star punching through and he has this kind of
Speaker 2: inner monologue where he thinks about how this this shadow
Speaker 2: is just a passing thing.
Speaker 3: That's what, That's what.
Speaker 2: One of the quotes that gets loaded into the Two
Speaker 2: Tower speech, there's light that is so far out of
Speaker 2: the bounds and governance of evil, so beyond it that
Speaker 2: it really just dwarfs it in comparison, like evil does
Speaker 2: not have the authority to even to even reach up
Speaker 2: and touch it.
Speaker 3: I love that quote. I love that sequence.
Speaker 2: I love that story, and I really like how it
Speaker 2: actually connects with I don't know if you've heard The.
Speaker 3: Children of Horn, but oh yeah.
Speaker 2: Horn has his exchange with more Goth where he kind
Speaker 2: of essentially says the same thing to him, like, after
Speaker 2: my after my soul exits the bounds of the world,
Speaker 2: you can't touch it, you can't touch me because there's
Speaker 2: goodness beyond that you have no authority or power over.
Speaker 3: And it's a great exchangeau Morgth.
Speaker 2: Essentially, it tries to lie and say that there's nothing
Speaker 2: out there, there's nothing for you to look forward to,
Speaker 2: and Horn rejects this, which is just I mean, only
Speaker 2: a spiritual exchange. I mean, there's we Those are the
Speaker 2: types of inner battles that we have on a regular basis.
Speaker 2: So I really I really like that one, and that's
Speaker 2: that's probably my current besides like the ones with real
Speaker 2: staying power that never go anywhere. That's that's my uh
Speaker 2: my favorite.
Speaker 1: Yeah, those are definitely good ones.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: The Children of Orren definitely is a lasting favorite of mine.
Speaker 1: It's just so so heroic but so tragic, and it's
Speaker 1: the kind of book where you get to the end
Speaker 1: and you just feel empty but also full. I don't know,
Speaker 1: it's he captures the northern tragic spirit so well. Yes,
Speaker 1: but yeah, but you know that's part of the bigger
Speaker 1: story that it is destined for you catastrophe and so
Speaker 1: it's tragedy amidst a story of ultimate hope and it's
Speaker 1: just something so powerful there.
Speaker 2: Yes, I have a love hate relationship with it because
Speaker 2: I like, I like everything to the line up and
Speaker 2: have a good conclusion, right and the Children of Horn
Speaker 2: essentially though it is it's it's a standalone story. You know,
Speaker 2: Torren was going to eventually be redeemed in one of
Speaker 2: the versions of the Last Battle. However that's only one
Speaker 2: of the versions of the Last Battle and it was
Speaker 2: never really thoroughly fleshed out. So it's like you get this,
Speaker 2: you read the Children of Hoorn and it's amazing, but
Speaker 2: then you kind of have this it feels like a
Speaker 2: loose end, you know, when you get done. So it's
Speaker 2: like I love it, and then I also it makes
Speaker 2: me so mad.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's pretty devastating.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, it really.
Speaker 2: It really does capture that Northern spirit and that tragedy,
Speaker 2: that sort of classic.
Speaker 3: Approach to to myth.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely. And there's that great line between more Goth
Speaker 1: and Huron where Huron says, you know, you've wasted your
Speaker 1: strength and your own emptiness or something to that effect,
Speaker 1: and that just cuts really at the central idea to
Speaker 1: Tolkien that all the bad guys more goth Suran, Souramon,
Speaker 1: like all the villains of the story are these people
Speaker 1: who reach out for power, but in so doing they're
Speaker 1: grasped by power, and so they really just fall into
Speaker 1: this emptiness of self worship, and in so doing they
Speaker 1: essentially become nothing. And this gets back to the fact
Speaker 1: that you know, basically the whole story is about God's
Speaker 1: soul right to divine honor. Those who recognize the good
Speaker 1: that stands above and beyond them, those who are able
Speaker 1: to see that star shining forth into the forsaken land. Right,
Speaker 1: those are the people who are able to lash onto
Speaker 1: real enduring meaning enjoy, regardless of their circumstance. And so
Speaker 1: it's all about you know, who are or what are
Speaker 1: you living for?
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I love that. I love that about not
Speaker 3: talk endless.
Speaker 2: I feel like the villains at the end of the
Speaker 2: day are rather pathetic, you know, when you you take
Speaker 2: all things in the consideration, they're.
Speaker 3: Very ugly, and they.
Speaker 2: Sometimes can wield the great power, but at the end
Speaker 2: of the day, they're really there. They've laid themselves low
Speaker 2: and become and they every every day they spend not
Speaker 2: not living in the way that they were originally set
Speaker 2: to live, they become weaker and weaker and weaker, and
Speaker 2: every every evil thing just continues to take them further
Speaker 2: and further away from their original purpose.
Speaker 3: I love that about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. There's this line from Augustine that comes to mind
Speaker 1: in the City of God, when he says that the
Speaker 1: good man, though a slave, is free, whereas the wicked,
Speaker 1: though he may rule, is a slave. And what's worse
Speaker 1: is he's a slave to as many masters as he
Speaker 1: has vices. And so it's in this pursuit of our
Speaker 1: south are self referential good we just become enslaved to
Speaker 1: our passions, and we're no longer free.
Speaker 3: Absolutely it.
Speaker 1: Freedom requires laying down the ring.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's actually one of the things. And
Speaker 2: if you put this on Twitter, we'll stir the pot
Speaker 2: a little bit. One of the things that I actually
Speaker 2: liked about The Rings of Power was slime sorrow. I
Speaker 2: really enjoyed that, not because the book says that sarn
Speaker 2: is slime, but I enjoyed it because it really lined
Speaker 2: up with this theme of one two things. One is,
Speaker 2: at the end of the day, the enemies. The enemies
Speaker 2: is actually pathetic, I mean truly pathetic. And like when
Speaker 2: you see the real true self when everything else is
Speaker 2: stripped away, there's really nothing there, you know. He's this
Speaker 2: sort of this slot and another thing I really liked about.
Speaker 2: And this is going off the spiritual topic a little bit,
Speaker 2: but the structure of power in Tolkien's world is different
Speaker 2: from the structure of power and other fantasy worlds, right,
Speaker 2: where people if you look at Harry Potter, they're.
Speaker 3: Turning things into chocolate bars.
Speaker 2: You know that are and they seemingly can do this
Speaker 2: a never ending amount of times, right, as long as
Speaker 2: they say the right words, something happens, Whereas in Tolkien's world,
Speaker 2: things are they require energy, and beings actually become exhausted,
Speaker 2: right because they are originally created as particularly the de
Speaker 2: Maya and the Valor, They're created as these thoughts and
Speaker 2: reflections of Elluvatar's ultimate power, right, and that's where all
Speaker 2: of their power derives. So if you look at someone
Speaker 2: like Saram, he comes whatever power he has really is
Speaker 2: transitive from a Louvatar.
Speaker 5: And each thing that he does, each evil thing that
Speaker 5: he does, really just further furthering a lessons that that
Speaker 5: original reflection of Alluviatar's thought that he's supposed to be.
Speaker 2: So there's costs for all these things that he does.
Speaker 2: So I liked that that was that was a part
Speaker 2: I went on a tangent there. So well we'll kick
Speaker 2: this up you don't get some people mad and the replies.
Speaker 2: I actually liked that they had him go through this
Speaker 2: whole having to recreate a whole body thing because.
Speaker 3: It takes work, right.
Speaker 2: Uh. And that's that's where Tip baranciates Tolkien, Tolkien's legendarium
Speaker 2: and where the power comes from from other.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so my my promo for this episode is
Speaker 1: not going to be Mixer endorses Rings of Power.
Speaker 3: By the way, please don't please don't. Uh you know
Speaker 3: that's a many that one wondring dot com.
Speaker 1: That's my really.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the boys, I love them. I love those guys
Speaker 3: over there.
Speaker 1: John John Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: He hit me. He roasted me pretty hard and made
Speaker 3: that the thumbnail of his.
Speaker 1: That's great, it's good. Way get some clicks. I mean
Speaker 1: with Rings of Power. I mean, we don't need to
Speaker 1: spend a whole conversation on that now, but I mean
Speaker 1: generally speaking, I actually I don't like it as a Tolkienist.
Speaker 1: I like it relative to what is out there today,
Speaker 1: It's main competitors in the popular media in that I
Speaker 1: think that you know, even an echo of Tolkien or
Speaker 1: an echo of an echo of Tolkien is gonna be
Speaker 1: better than most of what's out there today regarding just
Speaker 1: basic morality.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So this is actually one of the points that I
Speaker 2: like to make is that when you see someone, when
Speaker 2: you see studios that are saying things, because again I
Speaker 2: care about philosophical underpinnings, right, I knew going into the
Speaker 2: show that they were gonna Book of the Lore. It
Speaker 2: was never it was never even a question in my
Speaker 2: mind or like I knew going in, I was like,
Speaker 2: this is not going to add up. So because I
Speaker 2: went in with that expectation, really what I cared about
Speaker 2: at the end of the day is are they going
Speaker 2: to try and deconstruct Tolkien? Are they going to put
Speaker 2: things in here that shouldn't be in here? You know,
Speaker 2: a subjective approaches to morality? Like am I going to
Speaker 2: be seeing that? And I mean it hasn't been perfect,
Speaker 2: but I really I will say that, like I think
Speaker 2: when people make projects where you see actual good.
Speaker 3: Philosophical messaging, good messaging on morality.
Speaker 2: There's a couple of really good speeches in there that
Speaker 2: they particularly I really liked in I think it was
Speaker 2: the last episode or the second to the last episode
Speaker 2: of season two where Cala Marainbore is kind of giving
Speaker 2: the speech to Galadriel, like he admits his mistake.
Speaker 3: There's gold in there.
Speaker 2: And you watch it, you're like, Wow, no other show
Speaker 2: was saying anything like this, So I.
Speaker 3: Would like to give them props for that.
Speaker 2: And I think that when studios come out with stuff
Speaker 2: that actually has good messaging, you should clap for that
Speaker 2: because maybe they'll lean into it more. However, you know,
Speaker 2: Rings Power obviously has some serious more problems that are inexcusable,
Speaker 2: So there's there's a balancing act you have just too, like,
Speaker 2: clap for the philosophical messaging, but also Aron should not
Speaker 2: be kissing Galadrial.
Speaker 3: At any point.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they do some weird stuff for no good reason.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there's no way you can really spin that
Speaker 3: like you can't.
Speaker 2: It was unnecessary to the point where it almost feels
Speaker 2: like you're trying to agitate me.
Speaker 1: I do think it's kind of humorous that some of
Speaker 1: the same people who are trying to defend the show,
Speaker 1: saying that was entirely platonic for the same people that
Speaker 1: can argue that something's going on with Prodo and Sam.
Speaker 1: It's just like something doesn't add up here.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: No, it's all just whatever, it's fitting whatever you want
Speaker 2: it to be to match up with your argument.
Speaker 1: Right. But yeah, I think we're pent on the same
Speaker 1: page with that. Overall, it's pretty good relative to its
Speaker 1: competitors at the very least. Well, you know, we going
Speaker 1: a little over an hour. Is there anything else that
Speaker 1: you think that we should hit on or anything else
Speaker 1: that you want to bring up?
Speaker 2: Probably not anything that we could really unpack. I could
Speaker 2: give a whole review of phrase of Power, but you
Speaker 2: know that would definitely.
Speaker 3: Say that after their time sounds good. Trying to think
Speaker 3: any anything else, any other questions? No, I mean sometimes
Speaker 3: sometimes I go on.
Speaker 2: Donald Trump has this right line where he talks about
Speaker 2: how he leaves. Sometimes occasionally I will leave. So I hope,
Speaker 2: I hope I gave you some good content.
Speaker 1: No, it's a good good weaving, good weaving. I think
Speaker 1: we've weave together something something useful.
Speaker 3: Perfect, sounds good? All right?
Speaker 1: All right, Well, and you know to do this again sometime,
Speaker 1: maybe with some specific topic in mind, but yeah, sounds good.
Speaker 1: All right, well appreciate it. Everyone go follow Middle or
Speaker 1: Mixer if you don't already. Thank you, thanks again for listening,
Speaker 1: and thank you to all of my patrons who make
Speaker 1: this show in my various other endeavors possible. And by name,
Speaker 1: I would like to thank all Tier two patrons and
Speaker 1: higher and so many thanks to Mark Cliff, Aaron D
Speaker 1: Paul William, Aaron s Andrew g Andrew M. Brandon and Christopher,
Speaker 1: emmy E and Jeremiah, Joscelyn, josh T, Joshua B. Matthew,
Speaker 1: Sarah and Steele. And again, I am recording this a
Speaker 1: couple of weeks before the public posting, and so if
Speaker 1: more of you have joined since then, then that's why
Speaker 1: you're left off this time. But you will make it
Speaker 1: next time. I really do love doing this sort of thing.
Speaker 1: I would love to be able to consistently provide you
Speaker 1: with an episode a week in definitely moving forward, and
Speaker 1: maybe even more often than that. But I can't do
Speaker 1: it without your support, and so if you appreciate what
Speaker 1: I do and you want more of it, then please
Speaker 1: go to Patreon dot com slash Mythic Mind and join
Speaker 1: the Fellowship, and you can find that link in the
Speaker 1: show notes, and especially at that second tier and higher
Speaker 1: that there's never been as much available Mythic Mind content
Speaker 1: as there is right now, and so go ahead and
Speaker 1: make that happen. That's it for now, and I hope
Speaker 1: that you tune in next week for our next conversation,
Speaker 1: which will be available even sooner ad free for our patrons.
Speaker 1: But that's it for now, and so until next time,
Speaker 1: godspeed
Speaker 3: And the