I don’t get to see that many movies in the theater, although I do serve as our Hogwarts Film-Fancier in Chief. Now that we’re done with new Harry Potters and Twilight films (at least until the inevitable re-boots), I’m patiently waiting for Catching Fire this fall, but I did recently get to catch Star Trek into Darkness. I am an unabashed Star Trek fancier as well, having really enjoyed writing “Shakespeare (and the Rest of the Great Books) in the Original Klingon” for the newly released Star Trek and History. Though I enjoyed the film very much, I noticed that it was loaded with plenty of wonderful allusions to other pieces of the Star Trek universe, but somewhere along the way, had lost one of the most important features of that universe: its deft use of literary allusions. So join me in the transporter room as we beam around the beautiful and complex world of literary allusions and think about why it’s so troubling that we see them less and less these days, in both books and films, or that people don’t recognize them when they see them. Energize!
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Only an Allusion?: Star Trek Into Darkness and the Death of Literary Literacy
‘Catching Fire’ Film Posters: Roses, Chairs, and Costumes that Show at least One of the Gamesmakers Does Still Read
Even though the release of the film adaptation of the next Hunger Games installment is over six months away (9 November, 22, to be precise), the Hollywood stylists are already pulling out all the stops on the teaser posters and other publicity tools in their arsenal to ensure that the 75th Hunger Games will be, shall we say? smoking hot. What is particularly fascinating about these images is how they tie into the text, history, the trilogy’s metanarrative and, yes, the sick, sad, real Hunger Games we call Hollywood. So let’s take a peek at the shiny film posters and those fascinating (and still coming) “official” Capitol portraits, at least one of which was foreshadowed on the Oscar red carpet.
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’10 Questions’ with Veronica Roth, author of the Divergent Trilogy: Part 2 — Elizabeth Baird-Hardy’s Questions
Part 1 of our 10 Questions Interview with Veronica Roth, author of the Divergent Trilogy, the part featuring the questions of Prof Louise Freeman, can be found here. Today, Hogwarts Prof Elizabeth Baird-Hardy (pictured at right) asks Ms Roth about names, the Christian content of the series, and, yes, tattoos! Enjoy the generous and thoughtful responses!
7. Why isn’t Joshua an Abnegation name, as Marcus points this out when Christina uses it in her babbling cover story to the guards at the gate in Insurgent?
I’ve actually gotten asked this a lot, and it was really just an instinct I had– I choose names mostly based on how they feel to me, and Abnegation names tend to feel stuffy or old-fashioned (Beatrice, Tobias, Susan, Marcus). Joshua doesn’t feel stuffy to me, it feels tough, strong—maybe a Dauntless or Candor name?
I also think the way we use names in groups over time is somewhat arbitrary, and has less to do with the meanings of the names than you’d think. Why are half of my mother’s friends named “Barbara,” but there were a dozen “Katherine”s in my graduating class? Certain names are popular in certain groups and not in others and I’d be hard pressed to explain why, though I’m sure someone else has.
8. Each of the factions celebrates a characteristic (courage, meekness, wisdom, peace, truth) that is, somewhere in Scripture, seen as one Christians should seek to attain, and yet, as we see, the results are disastrous. How do you see the story of Tris as being one about our faith and the dangers the apostle Paul pointed out in I Corinthians 12? [Read more…]
Reclaiming the “Discarded Image”: Guest Review of Dr. Monika Hilder’s The Feminine Ethos in C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia
Last year, I had the great honor of writing the preface for a new and fascinating book by a delightful scholar. Unfortunately, since I wrote the Preface, it might be in poor taste for me to write the glowing review I would like post so that everyone would check out this fantastic contribution to Lewis Studies. So instead, I recruited my friend and fellow Narnian, the brilliant Ralph Lentz, to review the book. He produced this amazing essay, which I am proud to share. I believe his talents may be just as useful in English as they are in the History Department. We may steal him yet. Enjoy!
Reclaiming the “Discarded Image”:
Monika B. Hilder’s The Feminine Ethos in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia
A Theological Review by Ralph E. Lentz II, Appalachian State University
C. S. Lewis wrote, by his faith and his studies, from a pre-Modern thought-world that was not schizophrenic—from a world that did not divide faith and reason, the natural and supernatural, fact and value. As a Medievalist, Lewis had digested the Whole, from Thomas Aquinas’ notion that grace perfects nature, to Nicholas of Cusa’s idea of the “coincidence of opposites.” In her brilliant new book The Feminine Ethos in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia (Peter Lang, 2012), Monika B. Hilder reveals Lewis’s dedication to this pre-Modern, orthodox Christian vision of an integrated world of beautiful paradox. And, following Lewis, she does it in a wonderfully imaginative and subversive way by focusing on what she calls “theological feminism” (12, et passim.). Through her analysis of all seven books of the Narnia series, Hilder demonstrates how Lewis, far from being chauvinist and misogynistic (as some critics have charged), actually challenges the pagan conception of power based on force and the twisted image of sexuality that it supports. In contrast, Lewis’s use of “theological feminism” points to “another City”[1] where the “sword between the sexes” has been cast away, and where the contraries of Male and Female can become one without confusion or contradiction (cf. Genesis 2:24). A model of careful analysis, comprehensive scholarship, and eloquence, the book itself merits a substantial review—particularly in light of its theological implications. Hence the purpose of the present essay.
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The Break Down on Breaking Dawn Part 2: Best of Series
In the spirit of full disclosure, I must say up front that this is not a movie review. I am not a film critic (a fact that I am sure is patently obvious to my friends who are film critics and scoff at my preference for Indiana Jones over Citizen Kane and The Princess Pride over Pulp Fiction). I am a literary critic, so what follows is actually a literary critic’s reaction to a film based on a book. In fact, before the film started, a well-meaning former student sitting in front of me asked me the trite “team affiliation ” question, to which I responded stiffly, ” I am Team Literary Unity,” prompting some head scratching from many of the people sitting around me.
In any case, this analysis breaks a number of rules one might see in a film review. Primarily, I will make no attempt whatsoever to keep secrets, so this is a post best suited for the readers who have no intention of seeing the film or for those who have also seen it and would like to join our thoughtful conversation about what works, what doesn’t, and why, on nearly every level, this is the best film of the five, despite some very troubling elements. So drag that rock over here, Emmett, because I am rolling up my sleeve and getting ready to rumble. [Read more…]
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