Pagan Saints in Middle-earth

Cormarë Series No. 38

Is Tolkien's work Christian or pagan? This question has intrigued readers and scholars ever since The Lord of the Rings has been published. Even today this important problem has not been given the full critical attention it deserves, and the present volume is an attempt to provide an answer.

The volume contains a comprehensive bibliography on the subject, detailed indices, a foreword by Verlyn Flieger, and an afterword by Tom Shippey.

Claudio Antonio Testi graduated in Philosophy at the University of Bologna and received a Ph.D. summa cum laude in Philosophy at the Pontifcia Università Lateranense. He is the President of the Philosophical Institute of Thomistic Studies, Vice President of AIST (Italian Association of Tolkien Studies), and at the Dominican Philosophical Study of Bologna he holds courses on Tolkien and on Formal Logic. As a scholar he has written 43 papers (published, among others, in Tolkien Studies and Hither Shore), two books, and edited 15 volumes, two of them in collaboration with Roberto Arduini for Walking Tree Publishers.

Critical voices on the book

"[Testi] has brought his readers the best of both schools. He has shown how they work, and best of all, shown how they can work together." (Verlyn Flieger)

"Both admirers and critics, however, have now been helped to a better and truer understanding of Tolkien's work by this admirable exposition, the deepest appreciation yet written of Tolkien's Catholicity, and one he himself would certainly have welcomed and approved." (Tom Shippey)

 
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Table of contents

Acknowledgements
i

Foreword by Verlyn Flieger
iii

Foreword to the English Edition
vii

Foreword to the Italian Edition
ix

Introduction
3

Part I: Analysis of the Different Perspectives

1 Tolkien's Work is Christian
13

1.1 It Contradicts "Tolkien's Razor"
14

1.2 It Confuses Allegory and Application with Exemplification and Interpretation
15

1.3 It Confuses a Source with a Representation
21

1.4 It Derives a Total Correspondence from a Partial Similarity by Ignoring the Differences
24

1.5 It Diminishes the Vastness of the Tolkienian Perspective
25

2 Tolkien's Work is Pagan
27

2.1 It Diminshes the Importance of those Texts where the Connection between the Legendarium and Christianity is More Evident
27

2.2 It Erroneously Considers Some Elements of the Legendarium to Be in Opposition to Christianity
30

2.3 It Confuses Historical Paganism with "Tolkienian" Paganism
36

2.4 It Applies a Symbolic Reading to Tolkien's Work to the Detriment of its Comprehension
38

2.5 It Diminishes the Scope of Tolkien's Perspective
41

3 Tolkien's Work is Pagan and Christian
43

3.1 Points of View and Contradictions
43

3.2 Dialectics and the Legendarium
57

Part II: The Synthetic Approach

4 Synthesis: Tolkien's Work is Pagan and in Harmony with Christianity
67

4.1 Principles
67

4.2 Definition and Use of the Term "Pagan"
68

4.3 Enunciation of the Proposed Synthesis
71

5 Paganism in Tolkien's World and Its Harmony with Christianity
75

5.1 Poetic and Hermeneutic Principles
75

5.2 Paganism in Harmony with Christianity in Tolkien's Universe
98

6 Catholicism and the Works of Tolkien
127

6.1 Clarification of the Term "Catholic"
127

6.2 Why Tolkien's Work is "Fundamentally Catholic"
133

Conclusion

139

Afterword by Tom Shippey: On Coincidence, and Harmony
141

List of Abbreviations and References
147

Bibliography
155

Analytical Index
181

General Index and Index of Names
185

 
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Cover

Cover illustration 'Rohan' by Ivan Cavini.

(click on cover image to enlarge)

 
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Announcements

Three book reviews in Mythlore (16th April 2022)
Many reviews (17th July 2020)
Three book reviews in Journal of Tolkien Research (10th July 2019)
Three book reviews in Beyond Bree (20th January 2019)
Book review of Pagan Saints in Middle-earth (7th January 2019)
Pagan Saints in Middle-earth is published (22nd March 2018)
Forthcoming and planned publications (21st July 2017)

 
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Pagan Saints in Middle-earth

 
196 pages, Walking Tree Publishers 2018, Cormarë Series No. 38, ISBN: 978-3-905703-38-2.
 

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