Hello, and welcome to Mythic Mind, where we pursue wisdom on the past between primary secondary worlds. I'm doctor Andrew Snyder, and I'm glad that you're here. Welcome to the one hundredth episode of Mythic Mind. Not too long ago, Aaron Bear reached out to me who he's been on the show before. We've talked with the farmer Giles of ham
Me even on once or twice. Other than that, I possibly in any case and again yeah, yeah, he's the renowned author of Joyful Outposts, a book about the beavers in Narnia, and he recently came to me and came with this idea of us having this conversation about stories that inspired us, especially from our youth, and happened to coincide with the one hundredth episode of Mythic Mind. About time to do that, and so I take you let's
just make it that. I mean, this has increasingly become a group effort, and so I'm more than happy to hand over the reins for the milestone. So Aarin, you can go ahead and friend this conversation with anything else that we need to know and take it wherever you want to go.
Awesome. Well, thanks Andrew and congrats on episode one hundred. You got a really cool thing going on with mythic mind and so may there be you know, one hundreds more and thank you.
I like to think so well cool.
Yeah. To start, I'm going to just share what I put the synopsis of our discussion that I put in the discords kind of just get things rolling. And so I use the term personal enchantment for today's discussion And the question that I asked the group was, what was your fantastis that's a fairy tale by George McDonald? What was your fantastes growing up? We all have stories from our youth that served and enchanting our souls and helping
shape who we are today. What story or stories serve that role for you and in what ways did it shape you? And so I thought it would be a topic worth discussing for a couple of reasons. So reason number one, you know, we're all Christians who are involved on some level in the humanities. So we have an acute awareness then of the bridge between myth and truth, right, and we have a very bested interest in it. Maybe it's even to go farther. We have acute awareness in
myth and reality. Lewis that cotomizes in this famous essay myth becames fact. And so as these stories, these myths, you can take a modern one like or the Rings, or maybe the Rest with the Ancient Mariner, which is one of my favorites by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, or even go farther back in our history and look at the ancients
like Homer and Virgil and Ovid, all those myths. They they really serve in leading us further up and further into goodness, truth and beauty, and oftentimes it it's more potent and it does a better job than a mere you know, propositional claim or argument could do. And bringing it back to Lewis, that's that was definitely the case for him. I guess he had a very logical and rational mind. But what really stirred him towards the Christian
faith was this idea of story a myth. And there's the of course, the famous walk of the Addison's walk with Tolkien and Dyson where he really starts to think seriously about the Christian myth and then eventually accepts it right, and a big story that Lewis read growing up that he then started to realize how significant it was to him later on in life was Fantasties by George MacDonald and later in life, so he read it first as a boy, but later in life he's reflecting on the
book's impact on his life and he ends up calling
it a devotional work for him. And I think that's probably a good way to set up this idea of personal enchantment, is that for us, what are the stories, the myths, the whatever we consumed early in our life that really kind of set us up to accept this Christian myth that for us we have, Like Lewis had a very high reverence for McDonald, and I imagine that the stories that we bring up today, we'll have a high amount of reverence and respect for them, more so
than than other stories. So that's kind of where I'm coming at with the personal enchantment thing. So are there any like questions or clarifications? It's working okay well In reason number two. On more on a practical level, I think this could be a pretty meaningful work of legacy, not just for the Mythic Mind podcast. It is that for sure, but also for us as individuals. So as
uh men, Uh, and as husbands, fathers, as Christians? What are some of the stories uh that we that they affected us so much that we want to impart them to our children and our children's children and and see those stories continue on to shape shape young minds. And so, uh, I know this was formative for me kind of thinking through. Okay, so which stories really impacted me in my youth that I would want to see you know, my my children four of them?
Uh?
Which stories I want them to read? And so that's kind of where I'm coming at with this. And uh, I'd imagine, since this is largely uh everyone in this group has a love for Lewis and Tolkien, I imagine we're going to I'm gonna hear Lord of the Rings or Narnia once or twice in this podcast. Totally fine, Totally fine. But how I want to structure this conversation, That's all right, since we have we have five here, so I have multiple stories that I want to bring in to the conversation.
But maybe I'll probably just start with one and then pass it off to the person next to me, so that'd be Ian, and then we'll each take a story and just kind of circle back around until we hit all the stories that we want to talk about, and feel free to bring in personal experience, feel free to bring in quotes or anything that kind of stuck out to you that really resonated with you. Just kind of showcase you know the importance of that story. Does that
make sense? Everyone's going with that? Okay, awesome, Well how about maybe just set the tone. I'll start and this these stories we read them as reading them later on in life. It's not like the best writing just spoiler alert, but it was really important for me, and it is The Prideing Chronicles by Lloyd Alexander brought brought my classroom copy here, particularly number two, The Black Cauldron. That one
was really uh profound for me. And uh so this is essentially the first besides like the Magic Treehouse books, It's like the first series I ever read and finished. I remember when I was I think I was nine. I was just kind of walking through the library and the book covers just astounded me. I really wanted to read them just based off of the book covers, but the first couple of times I checked them out from
the library, I just could not get through them. It's just I probably was a little bit young in my reading, and so I wasn't that strong of a reader. So that's probably one of the reasons why I kind of just fizzled out after a chapter or two. But then finally I just you know, hunkered down and read them and I loved them. And it's great fantasy. It's it's definitely inspired by by Tolking them the US. Again, not as great as Narnia or Lord of the Rings or
The Hobbit, but a really good story. Uh So, yeah, that's that's my my first book. Has anyone else read it?
The Priday Chronicles I have, although I actually prefer the west Mark books, also by Alexander Whereas Pardine is kind of a mishmash of Narnia and King Arthur for kids, West Mark is Lima's rob for kids.
Okay, well I haven't read them, and but so the Disney movie is loosely based on the first two of those books.
Wow, and they called it the Black Cauldron, I believe, so it's based off as the second books title. But yeah, it's mm.
So, so what about those stories? Looking obviously, as a kid, you don't always know why certain things are enchanting you or inspiring you. Or capturing your imagine nation and looking back, what do you think it is about these stories that gripped you as a child.
Yeah, I think it was besides like watching Star Wars and watching Lord of the Rings films. It was getting a sense of this small, insignificant person, this who's just looking after a pig, which turned out to be a pretty special pig. He gets called on an adventure. You kind of could get this sense of, like the world building is really good, and you see this young man kind of coming of age, gaining courage, and then finally, you know, finding out what his his calling, his destiny is.
And so I just as a young reader, I hadn't really read much of that of that kind, and so that's one reasons why I was pretty for me.
So should I jump in? Yeah, go for it in Yeah, Okay, I actually have a stack of seven books that I tried to think through. I was thinking specifically from when I really started reading, around the time when I was nine to about when I was eleven or twelve. A lot. I hit a lot more serious books when I was thirteen and fourteen. I didn't read Load of the Rings
until I was thirteen. So I view this as like the first Layer, that first enchantment, and I did read George McDonald does, specifically the Princess and the Goblin books as a kid, but they didn't stick with me or really foundationally change who I am in the way that the books I picked dead. So the first one, I'm just going to start with one. The first one is
The Complete Troll Clones by Arthur Conan Doyle. I actually had a slightly different edition of this, but it was the one that happ the original illustrations from the eighteen nineties, and this book did so many things. It introduced me to really the adult short story, that structure of beginning, middle end, and that shorter, compressed time frame, the idea of a narrator who's not the hero. Doctor Watson isn't
the person who resolves the problems. He's there to just record what's happening, So a little more complexity than just your standard first person kid book that a lot of books when you're reading at that age have. But most of all, what I think really enchanted me and still enchants me is the idea of Sherlock Holmes as the modern day Knight. He's a battler for justice, for those who can't help themselves against powerful forces that want to destroy them, and that idea of a huge even though,
of course Holmes is very flawed. You know, he's arrogant, he's not very considerate towards other people. He has a drug addiction, but he still strives for justice. He strives to help people who need help. I think that really enchanted me and continues to enchant me in a lot of the things I love today and the things that are important to me today.
It's a question, fore Ian, who is the best Sherlock Holmes on screen.
Jeremy Brett from the nineteen eighties and early nineties. I appreciate Basil Rathbone and Johnny Lee Miller from Elementary but Jeremy Brett partly because he had pretty much just the original stories. He wasn't working with new material. He was trying to interpret the original character. But also just because of the intensity of his performance. He really gives you a sense of the genius bind with the passion for justice that I think a lot of the other Sherlock Holmes is.
Miss I think that's fair. I'm by no means an expert on Sherlock Holmes, but it definitely seems like some of the more recent takes, which I enjoy watching the you know, cumber Badge or you know, Robert Downey Junior, Like, I think they're fun films, fun show, but it definitely seems like they're almost doing a caricature of a character rather than living out the character or or you know, doing their own portrayal. That's my my amateur opinion, and.
I would argue that both of them are leading heavily into the anti hero interpretation rather than the hero. And I think there's room for an anti hero interpretation for Holmes. But since we're talking about you know, enchantment in a book that kind of brought some goodness into my brain as a you know, eight nine year old boy, I think that Holmes is a here. I think he teaches kids to you know, observe and to do and use their brains, but not just use their brains for anything.
He's not like becoming a super villain. He's using his brains to help people. I think that's it's a message that's not didactic, but it's modeled really well.
Yeah, I think that's a really important point that we've definitely gone through and maybe we're still in a stage of anti heroes where there are very few real, genuine heroes that are firmly on the side of good. You know, you might get a good outcome, but have actually a good heroic figure. It's kind of rare, and I think
people don't recognize how much they want that. You know, some time ago, I've gotten to it spat with some people who are trying to argue that Jackson's Fermuir is somehow improved upon what Tolkien gave us, because he's such a muddled character and you know, you don't know what he's gonna do. It's like, no, like if you are at all in tune with like what it means to be human, what it is you actually want, Like you
want a good guy. You want that at refreshing, wholesome reminder that there is goodness in this world and that's worth fighting for. Yeah, but I don't want to take over here, Aaron. Do you have any any follow up or where do you want to go from there?
No?
I think that's great. If we're going discussing Shirlock, we could go to your book Andrew.
Well, see this is tough. I would like to say that five year old me was reading the Odyssey or even Lord of the Rings. But that's just simply isn't the case. I really wasn't as super active reader as a kid. Now, if we're talking a young child, there are certain things that come to mind. My parents did do a good job of reading to me regularly when I was a young child. You know, I think of this,
see it came up with. It's like a treasury of bedtime stories, which I still have and reach my kids sometimes. It's a collection of fairy tales, but like the more grim versions where you know, not not the kind that typically are provided in children's books today, but you know, the ones where like people die and things go wrong sometimes.
And that was definitely one of my favorite collections. And you know, as I've rediscovered reading and fantasy and fairy tales, I'm continually reminded of that line, that well known line from Lewis about becoming old enough to read fairy tales again, because that is exactly the arc that my life has taken. That as a young child, I love fairy tales. But then as I got a little bit older, especially later elementary school into middle aged, not middle aged, but middle grades,
I just really stopped reading a whole lot. It's really not something I discovered again until adulthood, or at least I stopped reading fiction. And so when I think about what isolated times of reading I did have in my adolescence, I do very fondly remember my parents reading Narnia to me.
So there's the Lewist that was already predicted to come up, and so we read through all of the Narnia books together, and I like, I would like to say that that radically shaped me, but I think that the experience of experiencing those stories with my parents at the time as a young child, I think that was actually the most enriching part of that experience of talking with them, of encountering it and being read to, rather than simply reading
on my own. And so I think having that experiential connection is actually even more important at the time than
the content of what I was reading. And so I guess if nothing else, that's that's a big plug for reading with your kids, not only for what you're reading, even though that is important, but also I think that just having that dynamic of encountering adventure, encountering story, encountering important ideas with somebody who is equipped to lead you through them because young child, I think that is one
of the most formative things about reading in youth. Now beyond that, I can get to more to this in the next round. I mean, honestly, as a child, video games were probably more of where I got my literary fix at the time. So maybe I can circle back to some of that from my next run.
And well just to echo that, you know, I love reading Narnia as a kid. Definitely one of those top stories I've enchanted me. But you know, there's only a first time that you can read this story right and kind of experience it a whole new world for the very first time. But bringing it stories to your kids, like I'm currently reading through the Narnia series with my children.
I'm older two. We're on the silver chair and seeing Narnia through their eyes is it's not the same thing as you know, me reading it personally for the first time, but it's super rewarding and it's it's changed my rankings quite a bit too, Like just seeing the questions that my kids ask about about certain stories. I think I I think it was actually a post that you you made andrew your ranking Narnia books and then I comment, like the language and wardrobe is too it's too low
on your rankings. Read it to your kids and then tell me what the ranking is, because I imagine it's just going to uh to go to the towards the top.
If they don't tell me that the silver Chair is the best, I'm going to tell them they're wrong.
I'm with you. I'm with you on that, but Lion with the Wardrobe is number two. Just maybe set some controversy. Well. Other thoughts on I'm reading two kids, any of your thoughts on that.
I really love the point you make about getting to experience a book for the first time again when reading it to a child. I really like watching people on YouTube react to TV shows or movies that I really like and seeing that experienced the emotions I felt the first time. So I think I think we need to start reading books to kids for the first time. Channel on YouTube.
You know, I will say we have a board book child's version of The Lion of Witch and the Wardrobe, which some people said, don't do that, just wait for the real book. And I get the arguments, but at the same time, I think it's healthy for kids to be familiar with the world. I think that itself is healthy. And even Lewis says that what's good about a book is not the excitement of what's going to happen. What's good about a book is the familiarity that you get
with the ideas and with what's happening. And that's where
it really deepens. And so even when I read this, you know, board book, when I've read this board book with my then two year olds, like they love the story to the point where I get to the page of you know, Aslan coming back to life, which the book doesn't even clearly specify exactly what's happening, but I kind of feel that in form in my reading, and they just just like get so excited, and so, you know, even on their level, you know, I'm able to experience
some of that just enchantment with Narnia and with the story and the hope and excitement that the figure of Asland provides, and so I can. And at this point, like they're capable of very long stories, and so I don't think it will be much longer before we just get into the real thing.
Yeah, I didn't read then.
I read the Language in the Wardrobe when I was probably twelve or thirteen, but I didn't read any of the other ones until my wife was pregnant with our son, and I bought a complete set and read through them in anticipation of them reading them with him.
And I remember.
His reaction, you know, like when Diggery rang the bell, you know, he was petrified. You know, I'd love how real and how much to watch a kid really get into the story like that, and his concerns When he was he was very much a rule follower, so anytime someone was breaking the rules in a story, he was not very excited about it. So it is interesting to see from a child's perspective what story points hit differently than they do as an adult.
Yeah. I think it was towards the end of reading The Lion in Witch and the Wardrobe to my daughter. This is after some people cracks athlun rises again and then ah, my daughter Lucy, so there's a narname that I get there. But she asked me Dad as like Jesus, I'm like, why do you say that? And then she kind of just lifts off some reasons. Well, you know, he he died and he study't for Edmund and now
he's he rose again. Like, that's interesting, but it's just kind of cool to see the experiencing and kind of figure it out on their own. I don't want to the dad that just like explains everything to them. I want them to, you know, to be maybe not as as carefree as like a Dumbledore, where it's like, oh, yeah, this is my school, but you guys just whoever you want and experience it for yourself. But I want to guide them for sure. Yeah. IVE seen them kind of
figure out and put the pieces together. It's really cool, really special. All right, David, what's your first story?
Oh?
All right, well, I yeah, I started thinking about elementary school and our school library. There was a book that I was always checking out and I've got it here. It was The Iron Giant and this is the original printing from nineteen sixty eight, which and looking it up today, I discovered this is worth four hundred bucks, so I'm
going to be careful with it. But yeah, the movie in ninety nine is based on the book, but it's so different that when that movie came out, I didn't even realize it was supposed to be based on the book. There's a metal giant man who eats some farm equipment and can put itself back together, and there's a boy named Hogarth, and other than that, there are not really
any similarities. But yeah, and the original British title was The Iron Man, but even in nineteen sixty eight, that comic already existed here, and so I think they call it The Iron Giant all over the world now because the other Iron Man got much more popular. But yeah, he's like a nuisance when he first shows up and they trap him, but eventually they're welcome him in the community.
But then there's this really weird sudden turn in the story where astronomers see a giant monster coming through space to the Earth and it's they call it the Space Bat Angel Dragon, and it just lands on Australia and demands to be fed, and the Iron Giant challenges it to a contest, and it's it's in five chapters. It's meant to be read to a kid over five nights, and Ted Hughes he's English poet laureate, and so the
writing is very interesting. Sometimes there's a unique rhythm, lots of short sentences and sound effects written out in repetition and things. But I was always just fascinated largely by the illustrations like there, I think they're like etchings, and only this first edition has these illustrations in it. But he looks like he's made out of car parts and stuff basically, like I don't know, you can see like these kinds of strange things like that, like he's got.
A car headlights for.
Eyes in the radiator of a car for a nose, and stuff like that. But I did become an artist, and I think books and the illustrations in them, they had a big impact on me in that way. But just the how far out the story is. I mean, it's only like fifty pages, but like this monster just kind of hanging on the sun.
It really fascinated me.
But in the beginning, he just it starts with this iron man seeing the ocean for the first time and then falling off a cliff and falling apart, and then in great detail, the first chapter describes his parts like a hand finds an eyeball and finds another hand, and they find a leg and they're just describing when all
coming back together. And I remember when I was in third grade, and this would have been like nineteen eighty three or four, all the kids in school had to read for fifteen minutes from whatever book they picked to the principle in his office and I picked book and I read that absurd first chapter to him and he was like, well, that was very interesting, but.
That it stuck with me. I don't know.
I kind of forgot about it for a while, but then it came back and it really stuck with me. And I found a probably twenty years ago, I found this copy of the book.
But you know, it's.
Vaguely environmental and anti Cold War. I think he wrote it to console his children because his wife had committed suicide, if I remember correctly, which is kind of a sad bit of the story. But yeah, I think this book and other books like that really activated my imagination and made me want to be a person who tried to, I don't know, create these kinds of stories and that kind of imagery specifically that was in the book I have.
I have not read The Iron Giant, but I'm putting it on my list to read now. Anyone else read it?
Yeah, like I said, fifty pages, so it's a pretty It seemed huge. I remember when I was a kid getting it in the library, thinking it was about twice this size. You know, but I was I was much smaller compared to it, I guess, but.
You just said it was four hundred dollars.
So yeah, yeah, you know, And you were talking about original illustrations earlier. I don't know why they changed the illustrations, Like, you know, the original Narnia illustrations are the best. I think these originals are the best. There's even like Doctor Seuss books, sometimes they go and try to change the illustrations, and they were there was nothing wrong with them.
They're they're beautiful.
But yeah, So for mine, I was trying to think of stuff that I read as a kid, and the number one series I read was definitely Red Wall. I know that Brian Jake's mentions them not being religious of any kind, but there's definitely a lot of themes throughout it that go well with Christianity and just also just bravery. And I always wanted to be, you know, one of those badgers that's just going through and taking out all
the evil villains, you know. And the good thing about it is like the villains are always I mean, they're like you know when they're you're reading about it, like Okay, this rat's going to be evil or the weasel's going to be evil or the snake, and it's not like they're like super they weren't wrong. They're just evil and they're trying to punish all the like the peaceful animals.
So just seeing like that courage it was great. And it's it's funny because I would always pick them out when I was a kid and I was going to read them from my class because you had to read a certain about before the end of the month, and I'd always procrastinate. So it ended up being my dad reading the book to me, like on a Sunday, just reading like fifteen chapters and I'm just sitting there watching them. So it was always a good talk.
I think my wife really likes those books that I have not read them.
I was first introduced to Redwall actually through the cartoon they did. Do I watch the cartoon chase. It was on PBS, remember, and I think it just detailed the first book with Matthias and Clooney, and I just loved it. It was awesome. And then for some reason the show went away, and this was before TVO. I couldn't really, like, you know, find it ever again until later on. But the first book, especially I love it's fantastic, great world building,
just really excellent world building, tales of courage. And to your point, like there's he's not really playing the game with subjective morals or they trying to make a sympathize with these characters that are clearly villainous or gilling a vice. He's coloring within the lines in that regard instead trying to blur him.
Yeah, I mean, it's really it's it's cool that he I know that he'd mentioned writing about all the food because he was writing for blind kids because he had worked with them or something or had you had a place in his hard for him, and man, I always wanted to eat whatever they were eating, so it was it was well done.
Well, who writes eating scenes better? Tolkien or or Brian Jacks put you on the spot.
Well, I will say that Brian Jakes was on my list. So here's the one I picked A long patrol. I always loved the Hairs because they were such a distinct culture of Later I found out British military officer class. But I loved the sense of brotherhood and community that the Red Bull books hold up as an ideal.
Yeah. I haven't read Law Control but I have read some my kids, like some of the Paw Patrol books. If that qualifies here.
No, No, that's a completely different thing.
Yes, we'll circle back around to me, Chase. I want to hear your answer, though, who writes better eating scenes. I'll give you some time to think about it though, Okay, man, all right, So my next one, and I think there are some other millennials here on this call, so I'm curious to get your thoughts on this, but probably this is actually probably number one besides Narnia, and that's the Harry Potter series. And so what I'm pulling up right now is the seventh book, The Deathly Hallows. This is
actually the Canadian version as well. So the story behind it is I was on vacation in Canada when the book came out, and I'm one of those diehard Harry Potter fans where we went to Barnes and Noble say up till Midnight, got our copy of the book, and then went home. But I couldn't do that on vacation, and so the day after it was released, we found this bookstore in small town, Canada and grab a copy, and then my vacation was Harry Potter. I essentially just read,
ate and slept. That's all I did finishing it, I
think like two or three days. And I just love the Harry Potter series, and it's a series that it kind of speaks to the power of how myth shapes culture because Rowling, you know, for what we know about her, I don't think she's a Christian, but you wouldn't know that if you didn't know anything of it, If you didn't know anything about Rolling, you was going you're judging her off of the books, you might suspect that she's a Christian, especially with that definitely hollow she just goes
full hill and there's so many different Christian elements to it, but they're also present in the previous ones as well, and so yeah, it was definitely a very formative book for me. Is still very profound for me. I love going back through them. They're one of the series I try to get to once a year, once every other year if things are busy. So, the Harry Potter series, what are your guys' thoughts on that? I wonder if it's a little controversial just based off of Rawling herself.
Well, I have a couple of questions. First, of all, how long have you worshiped the devil?
Well, I like witchcraft, man this.
Kidding, Well, that'll be the tiger line.
Oh, come on, if you're going to you know, demonizes rowling. But then at the same time pray Shakespeare, I mean, just stop it, just stop it. There's mh like some other stories that deal in witchcraft, which I mean Narnia is also one of them, guys, and so is Lord of the Rings to an extent, at least dealing with dark magic. She is an nothing that really still colors within the right lines. Uh, there's a sense of a
good and evil objective, good and evil. It's it's not she's not playing a game with it, even though she's writing in the modern age. And so you can see the influence that that Lewis Tolkien in going back farther, she there's a lot of callbacks the Greco Roman mythology. She's influenced by a lot of the right stories this and like the the series succeeds I think in part because of those Christian elements that are present once that she's probably aware of, and also some other ones that
she may even realized. You say, you have a second question for me, Yeah, I'm a devil worship for where I established that.
The second one, yeah, I actually completely forgot that as a kid that i'd read the first four and a half Harry Potter books. I don't really know why, for whatever reason, I dropped off during the Order of the Phoenix, But those were actually.
The first what's that because they got worse?
Well, I haven't read the messin adults, so I can't really give any firm criticism of them, since I really discovered what literature is about. But those were actually the first long books that I read as a kid, so that that should have probably been mentioned my first go around. That I think there is something very enchanting about them, and I think that the firm lines between good and
evil is an important part of that. For me, that's almost required for genuine enchantment, because it's reality, like there is such a thing as the good and there is such a thing as the opposite of that, and for honest, we, even as children, let alone as adults, like we know that's the case. And so when that starts to get blurred and everything just becomes an amorphous gray blob, it doesn't really resonate with us the same way, or at least it requires layers of propaganda for it to resonate,
and then it's not really resonating with us. And so I think to really provide the kind of enchantment that helps us to become more grounded in reality, you need those lines of good and evil. And I agree that's definitely there in Harry Potter. But my follow up, my actual question here is we said that there are a lot of Christian themes in Harry Potter, Like you don't have to give a you know, full analysis, We don't spend the rest of the night doing that. But like,
what do you mean by that? What are some some of the broad Christian connections here?
Yeah, for sure, So let's just take nothing alos for for instance, like there's there's a scene where Harry has to go into the water to grab this a certain item. I think I want to spoil it, but there there's an element of baptism in that that that's that's that's pretty clear, and he's pulled out the water. He saved by by someone else. There's a guy who I was just reading. He called him Ron the Baptist, which I
thought was pretty funny. Harry essentially dying becoming death, to rise again, to conquer the dark Lord h for good. I mean, it's it's kind of all over the place. It's really hard to if you're, you know, reading through it, especially as an adult, you're like, oh wow, there's there's quite a bit here. Touch on that. But Ian has some disagreements. I can sense, So Ian, let's hear it. Man.
Well, So I lived with a family after grad school for about four years where what are my close friends in the face family was a huge Harry Potter fan, and I have never been a Harry Potter fan. I actually didn't read Harry Potter until the last book came out and I was in college. I was about twenty one when I read all seven books. So definitely wouldn't be a candidate for enchantment, even if I liked them. So what I'm about to say I wanted to say.
I think there is certainly an enchanted and Christian appreciation you can have for the Harry Potter books. But when I look at the impact the Harry Potter books, and this is completely divorced from Welling herself. When I look at how people read the books, and I'm kind of influenced here by CEUs Lewis's experiment in criticism criticism, what I see most dominant in the behavior of self proclaimed Harry Potter fans is a tribalism. It's most easily seen
in the the house system. You know, the Gryffindors are clearly the good guys, the Slytherins are clearly the bad guys, the Hufflepuffs are clearly the servant class, and the raven Claus are clearly the nerds. And as the books attempt to tackle more difficult subjects like racism and a clear Nazi analog with Voldemort, I see people applying Voldemort's pretty
much motiveless evil. He's just kind of born evil. He doesn't have an ideology other than might makes right, and he uses racism to kind of motivate some of his followers, but there's no indication that he has any real racial animis outside of everyone who's not Voldemort is less than me.
And I think the way people use Harry Potter to see the world, whether you're on the right and you say, oh, Biden and his people, they're all like, you know, umbrage, like school marms trying to police our speech, or if you're on the left, and you're like, oh, Trump and all his you know, jack booted thugs are like Voldemort
and his death eaters. I think that's an extremely unhealthy and unhelpful way to apply literature to your everyday life, because whether you agree with Biden or Trump, or Republicans or Democrats or whatever your political context is, there's way more complexity in those situations than with Voldemort versus Harry Potter. Voldemort's not a real character. He's a symbol that has
resonance with historical things. So there's a semblance of politics there, but it's not it's not something that helpfully maps onto today's situations. And so I really struggle with Harry Potter having a positive effect on the population because I see so much negative impact in that.
Would you say that as a la and that I'm sorry, I know he cut you off. That's got to this one follow up. Would you say that as a villain, that Voldemort is substantially different than say Suran.
Yes, although if you haven't read you know it so Mellion, you won't have as full understanding of Sauran. But I think Surin makes a lot more sense as a more medieval king whose primary goal is power.
I would disagree with you for most of the points. I think that could be said for like the fandom of pretty much any of the popular things, like I've seen all those like looking through like Jedi and Sith is like you're I mean, everyone uses it, right if you're like a fan on one side, like mant Trump is just Sith board Empire, he just you know, fascist or whatever. You know, you could you can apply that. And in terms of I wouldn't even say like Voldemorre's
really like Saurron or anything. I think in Half Blood Prince, like he's kind of an abandoned kid by his family and that leads him to like turning against it.
I wouldn't.
I know, people make like the you know, like it's a like there's a lot of racism in it, but I would even see it more like kind of like classism if you're going to make that argument, because you know, it's it's somebody that doesn't have, you know, like the wealthier people or like the Weasleys are looked down upon because they're closer to like like Muggles or something like that.
So I mean, I think I say this bias because I did grow up with Harry Potter, and just like Aaron, I remember coming back on a like coming back from a trip and calling my dad and I ended up picking it up in the airports, like I read it on the plane back, you know, and so we were both reading it. But I think there is good there. I think people definitely do misuse it, being fans, for.
Sure, And I do want to emphasize, and this is why I had such a rambling prologue. I lived with someone who I still love very deeply as a friend, who I think does read Harry Potter in a Christian way, in a way that encourages them to be kinder to people and live out the Christian life. So I do think it's very possible to read them like I just look at its impact on the wider world, and I don't see that positive impact in the way I see it for Narnia and for even Star Wars.
Now, for those of you who are the Harry Potter apologists here, you know, I very much segment out my relationship with literature from kind of before and after my relatively recent literary renaissance of like a few years ago. Really it's where just so much my life changes. I just discovered books. Do you would you recommend that, you know, adults, Like if I pick up Harry pot and try to give it a read again, like without having like a life changing experience with it as a kid, Like am
I going to enjoy it? Am I going to read it as great literature? Or is it going to read like a kid's book? Like? How does it read? Do you think for an adult.
The writing does hold up? I would say it definitely isn't on the level of talking. I one a second, the writing is okay, it's it's definitely not on the level of talking the most. But the world building, especially the character building. There's so many good elements to to to Harry Potter. Uh so, yeah, I'm with Chase on that, and also just kind of echo to the misuse of a story of a fandom shouldn't apply to the work itself. How how the phantom treats it. I don't think that's
necessarily fair either. I think my favorite example in the past year was is there are some MSMB what what's your name?
Oh?
Joy read? She had this post where I think it was during the time where like Trump was talking about like how he wants like a third term and they're like always gonna be king or something, and so she like quotes bora mirror. He's like, well, gon Door has no king. Gon Door needs no king. And it's the same character who's just like, moments later in the stories is like my king Eric gone. It's just like this
is this is stupid. So, I mean the point is, like everyone, you can't judge a work based off of how the fandom treats it. And what was the third point? I had a third point, but I think I think I lost it because I was laughing at joy read Sorry. Someone else responds no.
So we don't need to get into this now. But I mean, right now a lot of the Harry Potter fan base is and too keen on Harry Potter anymore. But I guess we don't need to get into the current events.
Well, when I say I do think that saying ex political parties voldemornt would be a misapplication, I think I would still say that it would be fair to say that Harry Potter at the very least falls into an unhealthy tribalism. And it's not just fandom misinterpretation or misapplication. I think that the way the house system is constructed is far too easily good, lesser, lesser evil, and that's not how human organizations work, particularly the way that Rolling
writes to Zen. I understand that Rolling has attempted to say, oh, there's good Slytherins. Being Slytherin isn't necessarily bad. But there is not a single Slytherin who demonstrates real courage and real virtue at the end of the day. Except maybe you can argue system malfoy, but that's a reach in my opinion.
That's the other point. Oh, sorry's chase you gumming.
I was just gonna say I can get what you're saying in terms of like sorting into the different houses is.
Like a hard pill to swallow.
But I also would argue that they're counter to what our society says, like not everyone's going to be president, not everyone could be present. I couldn't be president, you know, like everyone has their certain abilities that are you know, their personality type made line and I think more modern thought it is just anyone could be anything, and I think that's caused some trouble. I think by her making
Slytherin like the evil house. Let's say it's also because they're like people that you would need a slytherin for a certain task, right, you would need someone that's cunning in a different maybe a business deal. Like they're not going to cheat somebody, but but they're looking at like all the ways to do certain things, and so just saying that someone could use that for evil is definitely I mean, like, I don't know, I think those are personality types and stuff like that.
So remember we're talking about books that enchanted us as children, right, so it doesn't matter if Ian wasn't enchanted by it. I you know, I'm tired of always having to point out that I'm the old man here. But I was twenty three when the first Harry Potter book came out, so.
I haven't read them at all.
My wife is a much more avid reader than I am, Like she just she just reads through books at rapid speed. So I bought her a British complete set of the books so that it like didn't have the localizations, you know, it says trainers instead of tennis shoes and stuff like that, just so that she'd have the original text for fun. And she really enjoyed the books. But yeah, my only experience is the movies, most of which I've only seen once.
I really liked the earlier like the first one.
The first story in series like this are always my favorite because I love being brought into this new world with the character who's also being brought into this world, and I always find that fascinating and seeing how they seeing it through their eyes is interesting to me. And then later on, I'm just like, what kind of parent would allow their kids to go to this school where they are in constant peril all the time.
But I do enjoy the stories.
Yeah, I mean, maybe a final thing I'll say on it, then we can move on to your next book. Ina is just trying to truncate it into a historical time period. I think there's a disservice to the text. Sure, you can draw some parallels to World World War two and the Nazi Party, but I think one of the things. I think one of the reasons why we'll still be reading Harry Potter forty fifty years from now is because it has some of those timeless truths in there, and she does a better job of it than a lot
of other stories that you read nowadays. And I think that's because she was influenced by a lot of the right stuff. Feel free to respond to that, but then you can move on to your next next book.
Then, no, I appreciate you've humored me. I hope I didn't come across as too negative. I mean, I do have a negative view of the books, but I hope it was taking in good spirit. I feel like you've heard what I had to say. So my next book
is Star Wars x Wing Work Squadron. And I'm a big science fiction and military fiction fan, and the x Wing books were the first books that I ever read in that genre, and so well, a lot of people might point to a book like Enders Game or Starship Troopers, both of which I love, but I didn't come to those until I was in my teens. And so again, this is the first layer, the first book that really
enchanted my brain with things. And so the things that really enchanted me about the X Wing series is the sort of what I talked about with the long patrol of the band of brothers, the sense of duty and honor. But in Star Wars, these were books that were written for adults, whereas Redwall was written for kids, and so I was exposed to ideas of you know, political machinations
on both the good and the evil side. The idea that not all enemies you face are you know, slavering evil people like Emperor Palpatine, but some of the bad guys actually have motivations and fears and can be sympathetic. And that I think expanded me and enchanted me in ways that I think are really helpful today in our
very tribalized political and religious times. I think being able to look at your opponent's point of view and seeing you might have a point, or even if I disagree with that point, I understand how you came to that. And I think that the X Wing books really force you to look at the world in these different ways, because that's the way most battles are, even in Star Wars,
where it is good versus evil. When a strong writer like Michael Stackpole or Aaron Alston takes on that conflict, they're able to give depth to both sides and give complexity that you can say, I believe I'm fighting for the right side, but there are still rules in combat. Just because I think the other side is fighting for, you know, an evil thing, doesn't mean there are no rules. I should just slaughter everyone on that side. So warfare
with integrity, warriors with honor. Those are the things that enchanted be about the X Wing series.
I would say, now, is this series? Is this canon?
Or is?
Disney said no, I actually I'm not familiar with a lot of the story literature posts.
I read them when I was you know, ten and eleven. This was in the nineties. It's definitely from the old Star Wars the Good Star Wars.
Shall we say, well, I think there are some thoughts on on the X Wing series. By all means, go for it. But if not, then it's you're up. Andrew.
Well, I think for me to be most productive, to jump ahead a few years from say, early childhood. When I think about the books that have most enchanted me, I feel like the first book that really got me, I don't know, I opened me up. I think to just reality on a deeper level, I gotta go shift gears a little bit Augustin's Confessions. First read it in I don't know, ish twenties, early in mid twenties something like that, and it just resonated with me in a
deep way. At that point, I had just finished my bachelor's degree in philosophy, and so I was obviously interested in ideas and asking some of these questions, but I didn't really like I was a Christian, So I had some of the answers, but not early on a deep level. And something about reading Augustine's confessions, reading his philosophical his existential wanderings, his restlessness in pursuit of real substantial wisdom
like that just resonated with me. I never read anything like this, someone who has such a deep understanding of himself and his own motivations as well as a desire for the truth and the way that he had delved into his own psyche. It just helped me to see the world with the kind of wonder that he sees the world. With you, this is kind of a mean level analysis, but you know, Augusta will be going off on, you know, some element of his biography and then just
like ask the question like what is time? And then you know, go off on that tangent, and you know that very much resonates with the way that I kind of think and the way that I feel. And so even though this is very much it's nonfiction, it's the first narrative I think deeply gripped me and caused me to see the world in a different way, which is largely what we mean by enchantment. And so it was from here when I took a class at the beginning of my master's degree where we read just about all
of Augustin's major works. She read The Confession City of God, on Christian Doctrine, on the Trinity, Antiplagian writings, and through both his biographical insights as well as his broader philosophy, so much of it it just built on this idea of wonder and desire, and so I think that really laid the groundwork for all of my reading role that's followed from Carecguard, who became essential to my doctoral work, which continues to lovely scene august Indian themes that drew
me to him to begin with, And then from careke Guard, I was able to enter into fiction in a new kind of way, in a new more existential kind of way. And that's actually what led me back to discovering the significance in fairy tales and entering into myths, and that's what led to Tolkien and then from there basically the entire history of the Western canon. And so for me. When I think of the books that really enchanted me, I have to go to early adult years, specifically with
The Confessions. This copy, this Penguin copy in particular. Although since then some of our listeners will know the Sun guys told me I was reading the wrong edition. So now I read the sheet translation, which is much better, and that's what we're using for our book club on some of the other episodes.
How far are you guys in your book study?
I think we just finished book six, Is that right, Chase?
So yeah, it's been a year since I read The Confessions. I'd love to return to it at some point.
It's so fascinating to me how relevant Augustine remains. Maybe it's because you know, we're kind of in a similar stage of society as late Roman Empire, Late American whatever we are. But you know, things like the obsession with the Gladiators and how people would be really drawn to those things even though they knew it was bad for them. I think there's plenty of spectacles that we in America, not just violence or fictional violence, but you know, political
violence and viewing warfare's entertainment across the globe. I think there's a lot we can learn from Augustine all through his wisdom.
Yeah, I definitely think his deep insights into really desire, Right, this comes down to what you're talking about, Like, all that we do is driven by desire for something, and ultimately we all have this innate desire for the good. But the problem is we watch our on two lesser goods, and so it's as Lewis says, that it's not that our desires are too strong, it's that they're not strong enough.
And I think that Augustine, in the Confessions particular as well as elsewhere, that he does such a good job of capturing that essential human characteristic that you know, while Aristotle would say that we are first and foremost the rational animal, I think that Augustine would say that, I mean, if we're going to frame in those terms that were the desiring animal. He takes a much more platonic kind
of approach. And obviously he has a lot of debt to Plato, and he, just more than anyone else, is such an incredible job of baptizing what's good in Plato and bringing that into a explicitly Christian context. And there are there are a few figures that both sides of the Reformation would vehemently rely upon.
Well, if we're if we're going to go into college years. I was going to talk about how, you know, every time I had to write a book report when I I was in junior high and high school, and they would give us a list of books, you know, that we could pick from. If there was a Robert Heinlein book, I always picked it. So I read like Stranger in a Strange Land and Door into Summer and Starship Troopers and books like that, which I really enjoyed as strange and definitely not Christian, as a.
Lot of his writings were there.
It was an interesting rite and very detailed. It got me into the hard sci fi kind of stuff. But when I was probably about twenty in college, I had a bit of a crisis of faith where I'd been so firm and you know, if anybody could ever tell me that anything in the Bible was not true, then I would I would throw the whole thing out.
You know. I was just so sure like.
In my belief, but my belief was not deep as I thought it was as a late teenager. And then the Internet came around and I started to argue with atheists online and they started bringing up all sorts of objections that I'd never heard of. You know, this was in Usenet groups and whatnot, because it predated social media, and it just was dragging me down in a way I didn't even realize.
And then one day.
I remember I was driving and I just thought, I don't know if I believe this anymore, and it was just suffocating to me, and I.
Was really kind of in despair.
And then I really feel like it was maybe even the next day, a professor of mine who didn't really know the struggles that were going on, but he was a Christian, he gave me a copy of Mere Christianity and told me that I should read it, and it absolutely blew my mind that, hey, I I can ask these questions, I can think and reason about what I believe, So I I know God used that in my life massively, and I just started devouring everything that Lewis wrote from
then on. So I read pretty much all of his nonfiction first and then moved in to all of his fiction.
So that was a pivotal point in my life.
So even though while I wasn't a child, that was a seriously important book for me.
Was Mere Christianity, Pray Scott, that's awesome. I think we probably all a test on some level to the importance of Lewis or you token in there of shaping our worldview and maybe answering some of those those questions that kind of you know, we're wrestling with at the time.
Yeah, I definitely believe that I'm just as much Lewis as you can in a year is going to be better than most apologetics degrees or even most theology degrees, philosophy degrees, whatever. I mean. I know that in my own experience of I'm pretty sure when I was younger I might have read Mere christian anywhey I was younger, I know I read screwtape letters somewhere along the way.
But you know, when I towards the end, or maybe even after, I don't know, at some point in last few years, when I really got into Lewis, like on an extreme level, I definitely became convinced that, like as far as just that this content goes, reading a bunch of Lewis is better than most advanced degrees on not just an academic level, but i'll kind of deeply existential level.
He has such an insight into the faith that he could defend rationally as well as engage with as somebody who actually loves Christ and the wisdom that the Christian faith has to offer. So I mean, and I'm sure that we can all echoes something of that regarding what Lewis has provided.
Yeah, I wish I would have as a teenager or read more Lewis unless of the Left Behind series.
But we all have our regrets.
Yeah, as as a teenager, I Inhaled Lewis's nonfiction and it's it's so good, it's so foundational. Even where I disagree with it, he helps me to learn how to disagree with fellow Christians in a healthy way. And I would absolutely say Mere Christianity is a book that you could read every year and get something new and refreshing and soul constructing every time.
Yeah, Lewis famously thought that Harry Potter books were great.
It's true, He's right.
I think I saw that on an inspirational post going around Facebook recently.
I think it was followed by hashtag rallying did nothing wrong for my next one, I think, which was interesting. I think I got more of it now that I'm an adult than when I was forced to read it in school, but going through the study at Beowulf actually realized deeper meaning some of the Christian themes that were going through it, compared to like pub book school just making you read a bad translation the whole way through.
And that's just led me to definitely, in this time of my life read a lot more.
So.
Obviously I could go off on Beaiwell for a while, which I'm not going to, but I will say that there's so much material that is sometimes taught in schools. All the things like Baywolf are being taught less and less often, as I find speaking with my undergrad students that a lot of them have never read anything from Beywolf. Those who have, I've just read a little bit. I know when I was in school we read I think I basically just helped to the fight with Grendel and
that was it. And the only insights I walked away with is it's an old story about a guy fighting a monster. Like That's about the level of analysis that I got. It's just there's so much in great literature that even if students are exposed to it, it's almost worse that they are exposed to it, because they end up with a twisted understanding of what it is, whereas you know, when I read something like Beaywulf, now it's just it's abounding in deep wisdom. But I'm gonna stop
myself there. Otherwise I'm just gonna talk about Beywolf for the rest of the night. Well, Aaron, is there is there anyhere else you wanted to go?
Yeah? I actually wanted to ask you guys first because I'm on the west coast, so it's it's still fairly early for me. I know some of you are on the East coast. How are we doing on time?
I will probably need to drop off relatively soon, coming up on eleven o'clock here, But I mean, if you guys want to keep partying on feel free.
Okay, Well, what if we did like more rapid fire round of one more book for each of us, and then we can probably call it good for today?
Okay?
All right? Well, I actually only prepared three, so this works out for me. So we talked a lot about Lewis and we Tolkien has been mentioned here and there, and you think I'm gonna choose Lord of the Rings, but I'm actually going to be choosing the Hobbit.
I do it.
That is one of my favorite books of all time. Now, obviously it is as mature and as in depth as Lord of the Rings. No, and it's not meant to be. It's I first read it as as a teenager, and it was written for someone like me at that age. You know, he token wrote it for his children around that age as well, And so I just loved reading The Hobbit. It's one of the best books I read during my teenage years. And then after that I read the Little or the Rings books and they were good.
Obviously they're better now than I'm reading it as an adult, but reading The Hobbit as a teenager was just super formative that they were funny, they were witty. Now i'm teaching it as well to my ninth graders, and just in every single year, I'm just experiencing seeing new things from the text. And so is it as again, is it as sophisticated as as Lord of the Rings are somewhere realian No, but it is pretty dang sophisticated. There's a lot going on with the Hobbit, so pro Hobbit.
Yeah, I'm really glad you said that it's still really sophisticated, because I think there's this sense that you know, it's the kiddie book, and yes, it's completely appropriate for our kids,
but there's sophisticated stuff going on there. And not to mention the just beauty of Tolkien's language, which as always is just phenomenal, the poetry and the songs, and even just some of the narration, like describing the eagles and the flying it still qualifies for Lewis's here are Beauties that pierce the soul.
All right, well, Ian's what's your last book?
So I did do a prioritization, and my last book is going to be the Anna green Gables series by
Ellen Montgomery. One of my favorite three authors as an adult is Jane Austen, and I would trace my love of her character and morality focused writing to falling in love with Ant of green Gables when I was ten and I read all eight of the books the summer I turned ten, and I thought they were just delightful community studies, romance, all the little coming of age things, and they enchanted my little mind with the ideals of what is living the good life in a mundane setting?
Of course, you know, you had Red Wall, you had Tarlock Holmes, you know, a great detective or a mouse with a magic sword. But you know, a normal guy who becomes a doctor and marries his childhood sweetheart, a girl who becomes a teacher and then a mother. How can you live a good life, a life of joy and delight even through great pain and loss and hardship. And the Anaquen Cables books give you a great model
for that, and I recommend them. Obviously they're more typical for boys, sorry for girls to read those, but I read them at ten. I have many of my brothers and my dad have also read them and loved them, So I think they're kind of a thing that can be universal. If you're willing to get over there about a girl.
Well, first one rapid fire, then I'll move on with mine. I think that. I mean, I just gotta pick Lord of the Rings. You know, even though I didn't read the books until a little bit later in life, I mean, I mean, I was taken with the general atmosphere or
general world as permeedi at the culture. You know. I watched the Jackson movies when they came out, you know, played some of the games that are connected to it, you know, Big Battle for Metal Earth fan, but you know when when I discovered the books at the right time, that was personally it was one of the most difficult times in my life. And what I needed was not so much to know some philosophical concept or theological concept. What I needed to do is to experience it. And
that's what Tolkien had to offer. One of the most compelling elements of Talken to me is how he blends sorrow and hope of this Christian idea that joy is found in suffering. One of the best lines in the book. You know, it comes from Haldier. The world is indeed full apparel, and then there are many dark places, but still there's much that is fair. And though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater, And that idea just permeates talk in the world.
And I think that it's again much as Augustin did before. He allowed me to experience the depth of reality and its beauty and its brokenness more profoundly than I was equipped to do so before. So I gotta give my my last vote to Lord of the Rings.
Yeah, I didn't have.
A third book, but these were all good.
Go ahead, David, No, I didn't I didn't have anything else either.
I prepared one. I thought that was the assignment. I spent the rest of my elementary school years playing on my Commodore sixty four.
I'm sorry, And that's why we have a video game podcast.
Yeah, yeah, So, I mean we we have branched off into a couple kind of side gigs here. So in addition to this this main podcast, we also have Mythic Mind Movies and shows, which is where we're continuing our Star Wars, and then we've got Mythic Mind Games where we're doing video game analysis, doing some kind of kind of stuff with that medium. In fact, I thought about mentioned before that if we're talking about stories that grip Us and I should probably throw in through something like
morowined in there. It's something that that you kind of just as a child, like those kinds of things that really captured my attention and brought me into a world of enchantment. But I was trying to keep it literally focused.
Well, I learned something new. I'm glad you gotta plug those those two other podcasts promotion, that's right, that's right, an honorable mention for me. Again, it's not great writing, but it was really formative for me is the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. So Aragon eldest singer and I remember what last one is. I don't know, but I really enjoyed reading. There's actually hanging in my classroom. I can't get to right now because it's buried behind desks.
But you know like those old read posters where it has like a character and then just has the word the word read on it. Well, my one of my ninth grade teachers made a picture of me in ninth grade. I still had a very full beard back in ninth grade. Guy, So it's toy legit, but of me reading eldest the second in the story. And so I brought it in into the class to kind of show that the students use it as a motivation, like, hey, just you know, read read out of high school. I don't think any
extra reading has gotten done. One thing that my students did do and this will never see the light of day. I'll just mention it. Anyways, a student grabbed hold of the photo and made a flag of it, and so there's like a flag of like ten of me, just like plaster all over this.
This.
It's a super loud red flag it's awful, but it's it's really funny at the same time. But again, you guys are never going to see that.
All right, Is there anything else that you wanted to mention?
I don't think so. I really enjoyed this conversation. Thanks for being part of it, guys. I hope those who are listening and watching they maybe have some titles that they want to, you know, put on the short list to read and or maybe putting in their kids' hands. So yeah, I really appreciate you guys jumping on a call and sharing your wisdom.
Cool, and and thank you Erin for facilitating this. Definitely hope to see you in some future conversations. I know you're a busy man, got lots of books to sell, and so everyone go go buy his books. Enjoy flat post. All right, Thanks Aaron, thank you everyone else for showing up, and we'll go ahead and wrap it there, all right. Thank you for listening, and thank you for joining us for the one hundredth episode of the Main Mythic Mind podcast.
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full discord access. And you can find what out with the other tears do if you head over to patreon dot com slash Mythic Mind. But I do want to think all of our patrons. We currently have of seventy active patrons and by name, I would like to thank all Tier three patrons and higher, So thank you to Mark, Aaron, Amanda, Andrew Chase, Chaz, Christopher Clinton, David Don, Aaron Evy, Adam Jack, Jamie, Justin, Justin, Kyle, Paul, Roger,
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from Mythic Mind, see we'll be on Wednesday. We have something coming out from the Mythic Mind movies and Charis podcasts, although I don't quite know what that's going to be yet because we replaced our normal recording time for this episode, so I had something will be coming out over there on Wednesday, the sixteen, that Mythic Mind movies and shows. But that's for now until next time, Godspeeding Plato Stoicism until we have Faces, an eight week course led by
doctor ANDREWS. Snyder beginning August twenty twenty five. I have always, at least ever since I can remember, had a kind of longing for death. It was when I was happiest that I longed most. It was on happy days when we were up in the hills, the three of us, with the wind and the sunshine, where you couldn't see
Gloam or the palace. Do you remember the color and the smell, and looking across at the gray mountain in the distance, And because it was so beautiful, it set me longing, always longing somewhere else, there must be more of it. Everything seemed to be saying, Psyche, come, but I couldn't come, and I didn't know where I was to come to. It almost hurt me. I felt like a bird in a cage when the other birds of
its kind are flying home. And now I will make answer to you, o, my judges, and show that he who has lived as a true philosopher has reason to be of good cheer when he is about to die, that after death he may hope to receive the greatest good in the other world. For I deem that the true disciple of philosophy is likely to be misunderstood by other men. They do not perceive that he is ever
pursuing death and dying. And if this is true, why having had the desire of death all his life long should he regret the arrival of that which he has always been pursuing and desiring. The longing of Plato and the control of the Stoics pervades Louis's retelling of the Cupid and psyche Myth until we have faces with this
incredible novel, which he believed to be his best. Lewis demonstrates the tensions in ancient thought, and even more significantly, the limits of rational philosophy, which can only go as deep as the foxes can dig beyond that, under that and provide the life of that thought, we find the dark and holy places that blind our faculties of reason.
What then, shall we do? This is a topic that we will explore after first surveying some important philosophical contributions in the ancient world that have had some significant bearing on Lewis's great novel. To this end, we will begin with Plato's Phato, which discusses the immortality of the soul and what those who love wisdom might expect in the life to come, and then we'll spend four weeks with some of the great Stoics, including Epictetus, Emperor Marcus Aurelius,
and Seneca. Finally, we will turn our attention to till we have faces for the final two weeks with original content and so this will not be the same as what you may have seen in the Fiction and Philosophy of CS. Lewis course. Each week of this eight week study will include readings from primary sources that will be provided as PDFs, although these are all texts that belong in your personal library. You'll be provided with recommendations for
secondary readings. You'll have recorded presentations for you to watch at your leisure, ongoing discord checks, and weekly life meetings to discuss the readings enrolled today by going to patreon dot com slash Mythic Mind and checking out the job. Or we can gain access to all courses, past, present and future this year by purchasing a Tier three annual subscription. I hope to see you there.