“Material facts are good enough for him. Until it comes to religion. And then, suddenly, the child who has been forbidden to believe in Jack the Giant Killer must believe in Goliath and David. There are no fairies, but you must believe that there are angels. The magic sword and the magic buckler are nonsense, but the child must not have any doubts about the breastplate of righteousness and the sword of the Spirit. What spiritual reaction do you expect when, after denying all the symbolic stories and legends, you suddenly confront your poor little Materialist with the Most Wonderful Story in the world?” Edith Nesbit
This post is a pinboard of sorts for articles, essays, and books which elucidate the wholesome power of magic in fairy tales in a Christian fantasy. As we find more links, we will add them.
Adam Andrews & Andrew Pudewa
Bradley Birzer
The Christianity of Harry Potter
Stratford Caldecott:
Landscapes With Dragons and Angels
Speaking the Truths Only the Imagination May Grasp
G.K. Chesterton
Vigen Guroian
Dwight Longnecker
Myth and Magic in the Mundane: The Old Testament as Fantasy Literature
George MacDonald
The Imagination: Its Functions and Its Culture
David Mills
Edith Nesbit
Imagination in Wings and the Child
Michael O’Brien
Joseph Pearce
Chesterton, Tolkien and Lewis in Elfland
Chesterton Casts a Spell on Tolkien
Andrew Peterson:
Angelina Stanford
Imago Dei and the Redemptive Power of Fantasy
S.D. Smith
J.R.R. Tolkien
N.D. Wilson
“Magic was the abuse of preternatural powers, by lower agents whose work was preternatural but not supernatural.” -GK Chesterton, Magic and Fantasy in Fiction