Footnote #55 - Lewis' In Defence of the Fairytale (with Terry Lindvall)
The Fantasy/Animation podcast takes listeners on a journey through the intersection between fantasy cinema and the medium of animation. Available via Apple Podcasts, Spotify and many of your favourite podcast hosting platforms!
Fantasy/Animation welcomes back special guest Professor Terry Lindvall to the podcast to continue the discussion of C.S. Lewis, this time with a focus on Lewis’ own work on fairy stories and the value the writer places on the importance of the ‘unexpected’ in fairytales as a mode of narration. Topics include Lewis’ professional history and views on the crafting of child curiosity within the literary imagination; how Lewis’ own students were directed to bring back enchantment via side stories and personal images of haunting; Lewis’ use of female characters, storytelling, and questions of empowerment; distinctions in worldbuilding and world creation between Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien; and the qualities that make Lewis such a seminal writer of popular fantasy.
**Fantasy/Animation theme tune composed by Francisca Araujo**
**As featured on Feedspot’s 25 Best London Education Podcasts**
Suggested Readings
Cowan, Yuri. 2006. “Allegory and Estheticism in the Fantasies of George MacDonald.” North W Journal of George MacDonald Studies 25: 39-57.
Lewis, C.S. 1961. An Experiment in Criticism. Massachusetts: Cambridge University Press.
Lindvall, Terry. 1996. Surprised by Laughter: The Comic World of C.S. Lewis. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Rice, Constance. 2004. “In Defense of the Fairy Tale: C.S. Lewis’s Argument for the Value and Importance of the Fairy Tale.” Inklings Forever 4, available at: https://pillars.taylor.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1096&context=inklings_forever.