Episode 59: "Leaf by Niggle" by J. R. R. Tolkien, Part 2
08/11/20 • 83 min
1 Listener
On this week’s episode of The Literary Life with Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks continue their discussion of J. R. R. Tolkien’s short story “Leaf by Niggle“. If you missed the Back to School 2020 Conference when it was live, you can still purchase access to the recordings at CindyRollins.net. Angelina opens the book chat highlighting Tolkien’s mirroring of Dante’s Divine Comedy with Niggle’s journey, and our hosts move through a recap of the story. The questions we should be asking as we read are whether this story deals with the recovery of our vision and whether it ends with a eucatastrophe.
Cindy brings out more of the autobiographical nature of this story for Tolkien. Angelina tosses around the idea that Parish and Niggle may be doubles and be a picture of Tolkien’s two selves. Thomas talks about what Niggle has to do in the “purgatory” section of the story. They also talk about the themes of art and the artist, sub-creation, and redemption. Come back next week to hear a discussion about why we ought to read myths.
Commonplace Quotes:It is when a writer first begins to make enemies that he begins to matter.
Hilton BrownKill that whence spring the crude fancies and wild day-dreams of the young, and you will never lead them beyond dull facts—dull because their relations to each other, and the one life that works in them all, must remain undiscovered. Whoever would have his children avoid this arid region will do well to allow no teacher to approach them—not even of mathematics—who has no imagination.
George MacDonaldThere were people who cared for him and people didn’t, and those who didn’t hate him were out to get him. . . But they couldn’t touch him. . . because he was Tarzan, Mandrake, Flash Gordon. He was Bill Shakespeare. He was Cain, Ulysses, the Flying Dutchman; he was Lot in Sodom, Deidre of the Sorrows, Sweeney in the nightingales among trees.
Joseph Heller On the Death of Dr. Robert Levetby Samuel Johnson
Condemned to Hope’s delusive mine, As on we toil from day to day, By sudden blasts, or slow decline, Our social comforts drop away.
Well tried through many a varying year, See Levet to the grave descend; Officious, innocent, sincere, Of every friendless name the friend.
Yet still he fills Affection’s eye, Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind; Nor, lettered Arrogance, deny Thy praise to merit unrefined.
When fainting Nature called for aid, And hovering Death prepared the blow, His vigorous remedy displayed The power of art without the show.
In Misery’s darkest cavern known, His useful care was ever nigh, Where hopeless Anguish poured his groan, And lonely Want retired to die.
No summons mocked by chill delay, No petty gain disdained by pride, The modest wants of every day The toil of every day supplied.
His virtues walked their narrow round, Nor made a pause, nor left a void; And sure the Eternal Master found The single talent well employed.
The busy day, the peaceful night, Unfelt, uncounted, glided by; His frame was firm, his powers were bright, Though now his eightieth year was nigh.
Then with no throbbing fiery pain, No cold gradations of decay, Death broke at once the vital chain, And freed his soul the nearest way.
Book List:(Amazon affiliate links are used in this content.)
Rudyard Kipling by Hilton Brown
A Dish of Orts by George MacDonald
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
When Books Went to War by Molly Guptill Manning
The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
The Great Divorce by C. S. Lewis
Paradise Lost by John Milton
Letters from Father Christmas by J. R. R. Tolkien
Support The Literary Life:Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!
Connect with Us:You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/
Find Cindy at https://cindyrollins.net, on Instagram
On this week’s episode of The Literary Life with Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks continue their discussion of J. R. R. Tolkien’s short story “Leaf by Niggle“. If you missed the Back to School 2020 Conference when it was live, you can still purchase access to the recordings at CindyRollins.net. Angelina opens the book chat highlighting Tolkien’s mirroring of Dante’s Divine Comedy with Niggle’s journey, and our hosts move through a recap of the story. The questions we should be asking as we read are whether this story deals with the recovery of our vision and whether it ends with a eucatastrophe.
Cindy brings out more of the autobiographical nature of this story for Tolkien. Angelina tosses around the idea that Parish and Niggle may be doubles and be a picture of Tolkien’s two selves. Thomas talks about what Niggle has to do in the “purgatory” section of the story. They also talk about the themes of art and the artist, sub-creation, and redemption. Come back next week to hear a discussion about why we ought to read myths.
Commonplace Quotes:It is when a writer first begins to make enemies that he begins to matter.
Hilton BrownKill that whence spring the crude fancies and wild day-dreams of the young, and you will never lead them beyond dull facts—dull because their relations to each other, and the one life that works in them all, must remain undiscovered. Whoever would have his children avoid this arid region will do well to allow no teacher to approach them—not even of mathematics—who has no imagination.
George MacDonaldThere were people who cared for him and people didn’t, and those who didn’t hate him were out to get him. . . But they couldn’t touch him. . . because he was Tarzan, Mandrake, Flash Gordon. He was Bill Shakespeare. He was Cain, Ulysses, the Flying Dutchman; he was Lot in Sodom, Deidre of the Sorrows, Sweeney in the nightingales among trees.
Joseph Heller On the Death of Dr. Robert Levetby Samuel Johnson
Condemned to Hope’s delusive mine, As on we toil from day to day, By sudden blasts, or slow decline, Our social comforts drop away.
Well tried through many a varying year, See Levet to the grave descend; Officious, innocent, sincere, Of every friendless name the friend.
Yet still he fills Affection’s eye, Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind; Nor, lettered Arrogance, deny Thy praise to merit unrefined.
When fainting Nature called for aid, And hovering Death prepared the blow, His vigorous remedy displayed The power of art without the show.
In Misery’s darkest cavern known, His useful care was ever nigh, Where hopeless Anguish poured his groan, And lonely Want retired to die.
No summons mocked by chill delay, No petty gain disdained by pride, The modest wants of every day The toil of every day supplied.
His virtues walked their narrow round, Nor made a pause, nor left a void; And sure the Eternal Master found The single talent well employed.
The busy day, the peaceful night, Unfelt, uncounted, glided by; His frame was firm, his powers were bright, Though now his eightieth year was nigh.
Then with no throbbing fiery pain, No cold gradations of decay, Death broke at once the vital chain, And freed his soul the nearest way.
Book List:(Amazon affiliate links are used in this content.)
Rudyard Kipling by Hilton Brown
A Dish of Orts by George MacDonald
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
When Books Went to War by Molly Guptill Manning
The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
The Great Divorce by C. S. Lewis
Paradise Lost by John Milton
Letters from Father Christmas by J. R. R. Tolkien
Support The Literary Life:Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!
Connect with Us:You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/
Find Cindy at https://cindyrollins.net, on Instagram
Previous Episode
Episode 58: "Leaf by Niggle" by J. R. R. Tolkien, Part 1
Welcome to another episode of The Literary Life with Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks. Both this week and next, our hosts will be discussing J. R. R. Tolkien's short story "Leaf by Niggle". When this episode goes live, Cindy, Angelina and Thomas will be in the thick of the second annual Back to School Online Conference, happening August 3-8, 2020. It's not too late to register at CindyRollins.net for access both this week and later on!
Angelina sets the stage with a little historical background on Tolkien’s writing of this story as well as some thoughts on allegory and how to read a fairy tale. She talks about this story as an exploration of the struggle of the ideals and demands of art against the demands of practical life and the question of whether or not art is useful. Cindy shares her ideas about the importance of the Inklings for Tolkien to get his work out into the world. Angelina shares about the type of journey on which the main character, Niggle, is called to go on in this story. As you read, we encourage you to look for how Tolkien harmonizes the different tensions within the story.
Commonplace Quotes:Here are some of the points which make a story worth studying to tell to the nestling listeners in many a sweet “Children’s Hour”;––graceful and artistic details; moral impulse of a high order, conveyed with a strong and delicate touch; sweet human affection; a tender, fanciful link between the children and the Nature-world; humour, pathos, righteous satire, and last, but not least, the fact that the story does not turn on children, and does not foster that self-consciousness, the dawn of which in the child is, perhaps, the individual “Fall of Man.”
Charlotte MasonThe essay began by noting that total war was underway, with fighting not only “in the field and on the sea and in the air,” but also in “the realm of ideas.” It said: “The mightiest single weapon this war has yet employed” was “not a plane, or a bomb or a juggernaut of tanks”–it was Mein Kampf. This single book caused an educated nation to “burn the great books that keep liberty fresh in the hearts of men.” If America’s goal was victory and world peace, “all of us will have to know more and think better than our enemies think and know,” the council asserted. “This was is a war of books. . . Books are our weapons.”
Molly Guptill Manning, quoting from the essay “Books and the War”In everything I have sought peace and not found it, save in a corner with a book.
Thomas à Kempis Miltonby Edward Muir
Milton, his face set fair for Paradise, And knowing that he and Paradise were lost In separate desolation, bravely crossed Into his second night and paid his price. There towards the end he to the dark tower came Set square in the gate, a mass of blackened stone Crowned with vermilion fiends like streamers blown From a great funnel filled with roaring flame. Shut in his darkness, these he could not see, But heard the steely clamour known too well On Saturday nights in every street in Hell. Where, past the devilish din, could Paradise be? A footstep more, and his unblinded eyes Saw far and near the fields of Paradise.
Book List:Formation of Character by Charlotte Mason
When Books Went to War by Molly Guptill Manning
The Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis
Planet Narnia by Michael Ward
The Company They Keep by Diana Pavlac Glyer
Smith of Wooten Major by J. R. R. Tolkien
Farmer Giles of Ham by J. R. R. Tolkien
Letters from Father Christmas by J. R. R. Tolkien
A Hobbit, a Wardrobe, and a Great War by Joseph Loconte
Spirits in Bondage by C. S. Lewis
Enemies of Promise by Cyril Connolly
Support The Literary Life:Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!
Connect with Us:You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at
Next Episode
Episode 60: Why Read Pagan Myths
Today on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Cindy Rollins are having a conversation about why everyone ought to read myths. Angelina begins by explaining what a myth is in terms of literary genre. She talks about the characteristics that run through myths, such as explanations of origins and natural phenomena, common characters, and a universe that hangs together. Cindy poses a question about why we have come to interpret the word myth to mean something untrue since the time of the Enlightenment.
Angelina helps parents feel more confident about their children’s ability to know the difference between reality and fantasy. Cindy talks about how knowing mythology is a key to understanding other stories and literature. Unfolding a portion of church history, Angelina explains how early Christians wrestled with pagan stories and Old Testament stories at the same time. When we go looking only for morality tales in the Bible, Cindy points out, then we miss the main idea. Getting a bit more practical, Angelina gives some examples of the role of pre-Christian storytellers who pointed to the Truth.
Be sure to be back next week for the beginning of our series on Til We Have Faces by C. S. Lewis, in which we will be covering chapters 1 and 2. (Amazon affiliate links are used in this content.)
Commonplace Quotes:The imagination of man is made in the image of the imagination of God. Everything of man must have been of God first; and it will help much towards our understanding of the imagination and its functions in man if we first succeed in regarding aright the imagination of God, in which the imagination of man lives and moves and has its being.
George MacDonaldThose who do not know that this great myth became fact when the Virgin conceived are, indeed, to be pitied. But Christians also need to be reminded–we may thank Corineus for reminding us–that what became fact was a myth, that it carries with it into the world of fact all the properties of a myth. God is more than a god, not less; Christ is more than Balder, not less. We must not be ashamed of the mythical radiance resting on our theology. We must not be nervous about “parallels” and “pagan Christs”: they ought to be there–it would be a stumbling block if they weren’t. We must not, in false spirituality, withhold our imaginative welcome. If God chooses to be mythopoeic–and is not the sky itself a myth–shall we refuse to be mythopathic? For this is the marriage of heaven and earth: perfect myth and perfect fact: claiming not only our love and our obedience, but also our wonder and delight, addressed to the savage, the child, and the poet in each one of us no less than to the moralist, the scholar, and the philosopher.
C. S. Lewis from “Mythopoeia”by J. R. R. Tolkien
The heart of Man is not compound of lies, but draws some wisdom from the only Wise, and still recalls him. Though now long estranged, Man is not wholly lost nor wholly changed. Dis-graced he may be, yet is not dethroned, and keeps the rags of lordship once he owned, his world-dominion by creative act: not his to worship the great Artefact, Man, Sub-creator, the refracted light through whom is splintered from a single White to many hues, and endlessly combined in living shapes that move from mind to mind. Though all the crannies of the world we filled with Elves and Goblins, though we dared to build Gods and their houses out of dark and light, and sowed the seed of dragons, ’twas our right (used or misused). The right has not decayed. We make still by the law in which we’re made.
Book List:A Dish of Orts by George MacDonald
“Myth Became Fact” by C. S. Lewis
The Faerie Queene by Edmund Spenser
The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis
Wings and the Child by Edith Nesbit
Paradise Lost by John Milton
The Aeneid by Virgil
The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
50 Famous Stories by James Baldwin
English Literature for Boys and Girls by H. E. Marshall
D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths
D’Aulaires’ Book of Norse Myths
Tanglewood Tales and A Wonder Book by Nathaniel Hawthorn
Til We Have Faces by C. S. Lewis...
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