Podcast appearances and mentions of angelina stanford

Today on The Literary Life podcast, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks have a much-awaited conversation all about Angelina's own literary life and education. Thomas gets to ask the tough questions and put Angelina on the spot in this episode! She begins by sharing her childhood love of books and what her favorite books were when she was young. They then discuss the turning point Angelina had when she read A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle. She also talk about the reason she so disliked literary analysis when it was introduced in high school and continues to speak out against the new criticism to this day. Thomas and Angelina then turn to her experience in higher education and how she ended up studying and teaching literature. She highlights the impact Flannery O'Connor had on her, as well as studying with Burton Raffel. After describing her graduate school experience, Angelina shares how and why she walked away from that path to teach her own children and eventually start a school. Finally, looking at what House of Humane Letters, she talks about the joy and blessing of doing what she loves with people who care about the same books and ideas she does. Please visit HouseofHumaneLetters.com to check out all the past and upcoming classes, conferences, and webinars mentioned in this episode. To view the full show notes including links to all the books mentioned, head over to our podcast webpage at https://theliterary.life/275. 

This week on The Literary Life Podcast, our hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks are back with a new “Literary Life of…” interview, this time with their teaching colleague at House of Humane Letters, Dr. Anne Phillips. In addition to her classes at HHL, you can also find Dr. Phillips writing on Substack. Angelina starts off the conversation asking Anne about her reading life growing up and her homeschool experience. She talks about how she came to love the Greek myths and started pursuing Latin. The three of them discuss how having a diet of truly good literature cultivates discernment in reading less valuable books. They also share thoughts on writing as imitation and the great importance of having good ideas over knowing particular forms. Anne also talks about her college and graduate school experiences and the challenges of being in academia in our current culture. They wrap up the conversation with a little look into what Dr. Phillips reading life looks like now as a working, homeschooling mother and wife. To register for Dr. Phillips and Jenn Rogers' upcoming mini-class, “The Great Divide”, please visit HouseofHumaneLetters.com. To view the full show notes for this episode, along with all the books mentioned, please visit our website at https://theliterary.life/274. 

Welcome back to The Literary Life podcast with Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins and Thomas Banks. This week we are bringing you another episode from the vault, this time part one of our series on The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim. Thomas gives some interesting biographical information about von Arnim, and Angelina shares some perspective on appreciating the art and the life of artist. Cindy highlights the fact that we see only caricatures of the women in England, and it isn't until they get to Italy that we begin to see their real selves. Angelina also points out that all the women are on identity quests in this story. Angelina unpacks some of the metaphors in this book and the Dante-esque images, in addition to the key place beauty has in the story.  Don't forget to sign up for this year's Literary Life Online Conference coming up later this month! Register today for “Living Language: Why Words Matter” at HouseofHumaneLetters.com for full live or later access. To view the full show notes for this episode, please visit our website at https://theliterary.life/282. 

This week on The Literary Life, we bring you a gem from the archives. In this episode hosts Angelina Stanford, Thomas Banks, and Cindy Rollins discuss “How Much Land Does a Man Need?” by Leo Tolstoy. To start off the discussion of this short story, Thomas gives us some background to help answer Angelina's question about why this story seems so very different from other Tolstoy works. Angelina shares how to approach this story like a parable. Cindy brings up the question of the difference between ambition and vocation in terms of contentment.  The Literary Life Online Conference “Living Language: Why Words Matter” is coming up this month, so now is the time to register for lifetime access. Head over the HouseofHumaneLetters.com to sign up today! Don't forget to visit our website at https://theliterary.life/270 for the full show notes for this episode.

This week's episode is a continuation of Cindy Rollins and Angelina Stanford's discussion of An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis. They start with an exploration of the difference between loving a book and evaluating a book as a work of art, followed by an explanation of Lewis' idea that works of art do not teach us. Angelina goes in depth about why it is not our job as readers to find the “nugget of truth” in a book. Cindy brings up Lewis' point about “using” literature as an academic tool, versus “receiving” literature as a work of art. In covering chapter 9, Angelina and Cindy dig into the dangers of rushing to express an opinion about what we read, rather than getting ourselves out of the way when approaching a book. Cindy points to the many similarities between what Lewis says in these chapters and what Charlotte Mason says about true education.  The seventh annual Literary Life Online Conference is coming very soon! Please visit HouseofHumaneLetters.com to sign up for that as well as all the other upcoming webinars of 2025! To view the full show notes for this episode, please visit https://theliterary.life/267/. 

Our guest this week is Ali Noël. Ali lives with her three young children in the rainy shadow of Mount Rainier. When she isn't spear-heading her first year of homeschooling or chasing her stubborn bulldog around the yard, you can find Ali whittling poetry and chipping away at her biblical fiction novel. Ali had a B.S. in Biblical Studies from Indiana Wesleyan University and is currently a poetry intern for Twenty Hills Publishing. Some of Ali's most recent poetry publications and other places to find her:Light of the World published by Vessels of Light The Day Bringer published by Vessels of LightToo Often I Forget published by Calla Press Publishing, Spring Literary Journal Tenderly, He, published by Calla Press Publishing, Spring Literary Journal Watch As It Wakes published by Storyboard Community Spring Journal Book 1 in The Ratcatcher ChroniclesThe Kingdom of GallimaufriaChapter One: The Boy from RavoFrom the Desk of Periwinkle Twist- SubstackInstagram: The.Poetess.Life PeriwinkleTwist_WritesBooks referenced and discussed in this episode:Redeeming Love (please read reviews when deciding if this is a good read for You)Sense and Sensibility by Jane AustenLittle House on the Prairie series (specifically Farmer Boy) The Joy Luck ClubHarry PotterTo Kill a Mockingbird Emma Wingfeather Saga Shel Silverstein's poemsThe Brontë Sisters booksNorthanger Abbey by Jane AustenMary Oliver (her complete works) Favorite Poems, Old and New “The Wreck of the Hesperus” by Henry Wadsworth LongfellowAnne of Green Gables The Pied Piper of HamelinThe Princess and the Goblin Give and Take Hidden Truths The Awakening of Miss Prim The Lord of the Rings Resource:House of Humane Letters: How to Read Fairy Tales class with Angelina Stanford.A Year with Mary Oliver free guide from Amy Parilee Rickards of @livingwellread.

This week on The Literary Life Podcast, we bring you the first installment of our series reprising C. S. Lewis' An Experiment in Criticism. Join us over the next few weeks as we replay the original discussions of this book hosted by Angelina Stanford and Cindy Rollins. Then come back for a new episode at the end of the series in which Angelina and Thomas Banks will add some further thoughts and clarity in reply to questions listeners have had over the years. The seventh annual Literary Life Online Conference is now open for registration. Please visit HouseofHumaneLetters.com to sign up for that as well as all the other upcoming webinars of 2025! Angelina and Cindy discuss Lewis' approach to literature and the point of this book being a critique more of readers than of books. Some main ideas they bring out of the first chapter are the importance of rereading, the fact that real readers will carve out time for books, how books have the power to change us, and the way readers can't help but talk about books. Cindy highlights the connection between Lewis critique of the literati and Mr. Bons in “The Celestial Omnibus.” Angelina talks about the challenge of keeping the love of literature for those whose profession it is to teach it, especially in the modern American university culture.  Our hosts discuss the idea of reading to improve oneself as opposed to submitting to the experience of reading a challenging book. Angelina makes the point that it is about motive and whether or not you are trying to control the outcome. The benefits are the byproducts. From chapter 3, Angelina and Cindy contemplate how we approach art and the need to get ourselves out of the way so that we can enter the work of art. Finally, they cover the five characteristics of the unliterary reader according to Lewis. For the full show notes of this episode, including links to books mentioned, please visit our website at https://theliterary.life/265. 

Welcome back to our series on Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing here on The Literary Life Podcast. Our hosts, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks, open the episode with some thoughts on disguises and appearance versus reality in Shakespeare. They talk about how the eavesdropping in this play works together with the things not being as they seem. Angelina shares some clarifying ideas on discussing characters and their function in the story without pulling them out of the story and psychoanalyzing them. Other topics they discuss in this episode are: the importance of the song lyrics in this play, Dogberry and his companions, Claudio's instability, and the shape of comedy. Join us next week for the final two acts of Much Ado About Nothing. To see the full show notes for this episode, including links to resources mentioned this week, please visit https://www.theliterary.life/262. 

Welcome to The Literary Life Podcast and our first book series of 2025, covering Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare. Our hosts, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks begin by sharing their commonplace quotes, then lead into a little biographical background on William Shakespeare and the way in which he wrote his plays. They also talk a little about Elizabethan period drama as a whole, as well as how Shakespeare bucked the standards of form for the time period. Some other topics they cover are how Shakespeare was received in his time, how later literary periods saw his influence decrease and increase, and Elizabethan cosmology and the setting of the Globe Theatre. To view the full show notes for this episode, including links to all the books mentioned, please visit https://theliterary.life/260/.   

Welcome to this special preview episode of The Literary Life Podcast! In this episode, our hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks share the books and topics you can look forward to in the upcoming 2025 season of the podcast. This episode was recorded live with the Patreon supporters for our December All Fellows Eve. In addition to giving a taste of what to expect in the coming year, they also look back at the past year and touch on a few favorite books covered in 2024. In this coming year we plan to have several new “Literary Life of…” interviews, as well as several topical episodes discussing ideas such as classical education, the literary tradition, and what to do when you don't like the characters in a book. A few book titles that we will be covering in 2025 include: The Age of Innocence, The Jungle Book, and Moliere's Don Juan. For complete show notes and links to all the books mentioned, please visit https://theliterary.life/254/. 

Welcome back to The Literary Life Podcast and a new series on Oscar Wilde's play An Ideal Husband. This week hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks will give an introduction to Oscar Wilde and the time period in which he wrote this play, then discuss Act 1. They discuss the cultural pendulum swing that happened in the Late Victorian period into the Edwardian era, as well as the Aesthetic Movement as it relates to literary development. As they begin the discussion of this play itself, they talk about how Wilde wrote his plays not just for the stage but also to be read. Thomas and Angelina talk a little about each character who is introduced in this first act and make some notes about the elements also found in Greek plays. To view the full show notes including links to any previous episodes and books mentioned in this episode, please visit our website at https://theliterary.life/252/. 

This week on The Literary Life Podcast we are pleased to bring you a conversation hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks had with Dr. Jason Baxter, author of the new book Why Literature Matters from Cassiodorus Press. You can find out more about Dr. Baxter and his other books at JasonMBaxter.com. Together they discuss how this book came about and the importance of knowing who your audience is. They share some hopes for this book to reach those who don't understand why literature is still worthwhile in our current culture. Angelina brings up the challenges of reading in this fast-paced, consumeristic age. Jason uses metaphors of gardening and learning a piece of music to think about reading and understanding as a process requiring time and perseverance. Please visit our website for complete show notes including commonplace quotes, book links, and this week's poem at https://theliterary.life/251/. 

Welcome back to The Literary Life podcast! Due to a scheduling conflict, this week we are re-airing a previous episode with Dr. Jason Baxter, author of the new book Why Literature Matters from Cassiodorus Press. Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks sit down for a special conversation with Jason Baxter. Jason is a speaker, writer, and college professor who writes primarily on medieval thought and is especially interested in Lewis' ideas. You can find out more about him and his books at JasonMBaxter.com. Our hosts and Jason discuss a wide range of ideas, including the values of literature, the sacramental view of reality, why it is important to understand medieval thought, the "problem" of paganism in Lewis' writings, and how to approach reading ancient and medieval literature. To see all the books and get the full show notes for today's episode, visit our website for the complete show notes here: https://www.theliterary.life/250/.

On The Literary Life podcast this week, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks begin their newest series, this time discussing Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner. First, Thomas and Angelina speak to the question of different editions of this poem, then they dive into the background on Coleridge, William Wordsworth, and the lyrical ballads. They discuss the artistic and cultural moment in which Coleridge is writing, particularly the Romantic period in literature. Angelina talks about the Romantics and why they used so much medieval language and used allegory so heavily. She shares some examples of the writers in this vein seeking to rediscover and return to ancient tradition and stories. Thomas also considers Coleridge as a poet and a person. Finally, they give some helpful information and tips for those approaching this text for the first time. To see all the books and get the full show notes for today's episode, visit our website for the complete show notes here: https://www.theliterary.life/247/.

Today's episode of The Literary Life podcast is one in our “Best of The Literary Life” series. This week's remix is a conversation from 2019 between Angelina Stanford and Cindy Rollins in which they discuss Dorothy L. Sayers' essay “Are Women Human?“ They explore the ideas that Sayers wrestles with in the essay, including: the Victorian view of women, the significance of the industrial revolution, the human need for meaningful occupation, and the early feminist movement and women's suffrage. Angelina and Cindy also discuss the history of women's work inside and outside of the home and how they have been impacted by industry and our production-consumption culture. They take a fascinating look at the effects of the Enlightenment on women in the modern western world, as well as the problem of over-generalization and categorizing people according to classes. Finally, Cindy and Angelina highlight the importance of asking yourself the question: “Who am I supposed to be as a mother and a woman?” To see all the books and links mentioned in today's episode, visit our website for the complete show notes here: https://www.theliterary.life/246/.

Today on The Literary Life podcast, hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks wrap up their series on Murder Must Advertise by Dorothy L. Sayers. To begin the conversation, Thomas shares his reaction on finishing this book. Angelina then dives into her discoveries of Alice in Wonderland references throughout all of Sayers' detective books. They talk about how the cricket game relates to the whole story arc, review the descent and parody imagery ideas from last episode, and look at Lord Peter's arrest and its significance in the form of the romance. More topics they cover in these final chapters include the ascent imagery, Tallboy's confession, the act of justice in the detective novel, and how the ending of this book is actually quite fitting. We hope you have enjoyed this series and will be picking up more Sayers novels soon! To see all the books and links mentioned in today's episode, visit our website for the complete show notes here: https://theliterary.life/245/.

On this week's episode of The Literary Life podcast, we are excited to bring you a new conversation with hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks and their guest Dr. Jason Baxter. They open the discussion with some thoughts on why Dante has had renewed popularity in recent days. Jason talks about the big questions that poets seek to answer, and what some of the obstacles modern readers might have when approaching Dante for the first time. Thomas asks whether Dante had a precedent for making himself a character in his own epic. Angelina brings up the question of what it means that The Divine Comedy is poetry rather than some other genre. Other topics they discuss are Dante's cosmology, his psychological precision, how to approach The Divine Comedy for the first time, and Jason's own translation work. To see all the books and links mentioned in today's episode, visit our website for the complete show notes here: https://theliterary.life/241/.

Welcome back to The Literary Life Podcast with Angelina Stanford, Thomas Banks, and Cindy Rollins. Thomas starts the conversation with some general thoughts on the biography as a branch of literature and as an art form. He also mentions some types of biography he does not care to read at all. Cindy brings up the tension between white-washing historical figures and dragging out every piece of their dirty laundry in biographical treatments. Angelina poses a question about the place of biographies in children's education. To get a list of all the books mentioned and any other links mentioned in this episode, visit https://www.theliterary.life/238/.

Welcome to today's episode and another “Best of” remix on The Literary Life Podcast! Today our hosts Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins and Thomas Banks explore Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. After their commonplace quote discussion, each cohost shares some personal thoughts on Robert Louis Stevenson. Be aware that this episode will contain some spoilers, though we will not spoil the full ending. Thomas shares some biographical information about R. L. Stevenson. Angelina points out the mythic quality of this story and the enduring cultural references inspired by Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. She and Thomas also discuss some of the differences between early and late Victorian writers. They also begin digging into the first section of the book. Join us again next week for the second part of this discussion. Check out our Upcoming Events page for if want to know what we will be reading and talking about on the podcast next! Don't forget to check out our sister podcast, The Well Read Poem, as well as Cindy's new podcast, The New Mason Jar! Commonplace Quotes: I would rather (said he) have the rod to be the general terrour to all, to make them learn, than tell a child, if you do thus, or thus, you will be more esteemed than your brothers or sisters. The rod produces an effect which terminates in itself. A child is afraid of being whipped, and gets his task, and there's an end on't; whereas, by exciting emulation and comparisons of superiority, you lay the foundation of lasting mischief; you make brothers and sisters hate each other. Samuel Johnson, as quoted by James Boswell Do not talk about Shakespeare's mistakes: they are probably your own. G. M. Young The most influential books, and the truest in their influence, are works of fiction. They do not pin the reader to a dogma, which he must afterwards discover to be inexact; they do not teach him a lesson, which he must afterwards unlearn… They disengage us from ourselves, they constrain us to the acquaintance of others; and they show us the web of experience, not as we see it for ourselves, but with a singular change–that monstrous, consuming ego of ours being, for the nonce, struck out. Robert Louis Stevenson R L S by A. E. Houseman Home is the sailor, home from sea: Her far-borne canvas furled The ship pours shining on the quay The plunder of the world. Home is the hunter from the hill: Fast in the boundless snare All flesh lies taken at his will And every fowl of air. ‘Tis evening on the moorland free, The starlit wave is still: Home is the sailor from the sea, The hunter from the hill. Book List: The Life of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell Daylight and Champaign by G. M. Young “Books Which Have Influenced Me” by Robert Louis Stevenson David Balfour by Robert Louis Stevenson Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson The White Company by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes by Robert Louis Stevenson King Solomon's Mines by H. Ryder Haggard The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde Beowulf translated by Burton Raffel Robert Louis Stevenson by G. K. Chesterton God in the Dock by C. S. Lewis Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen The Body-Snatcher and Other Stories by Robert Louis Stevenson 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Welcome back to The Literary Life podcast and our series on J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter: Book 1. After sharing some thoughts on detective fiction as it relates to Rowling, our hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks discuss chapters 8-12. Some of the ideas they share are the following: Homeric echos and classical allusions in this book, the identity quest, the significance of characters' names, the four houses and the bestiary, the three parts of the soul, the Christian influence on Rowling's stories. Angelina also seeks to teach something about symbolism and structure of literature and art as seen through the Harry Potter books. Visit HouseofHumaneLetters.com for updates on classes with Angelina, Thomas, and other members of their teaching team. Previous episodes mentioned in this podcast: The Importance of the Detective Novel (Episode 3/174) Series on Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers (Episodes 4-8) Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie (Episode 79) Commonplace Quotes: The wise man combines the pleasures of the senses and the pleasures of the spirit in such a way as to increase the satisfaction he gets from both. W. Somerset Maugham, from The Narrow Corner For it is through symbols that man finds his way out of his particular situation and “opens himself” to the general and the Universal. Symbols awaken individual experience and transmute it into a spiritual act, into metaphysical comprehension of the world. Mircea Eliade, from The Sacred and the Profane The Fairies By William Allingham Up the airy mountain, Down the rushy glen,We daren't go a-hunting For fear of little men;Wee folk, good folk, Trooping all together;Green jacket, red cap, And white owl's feather!Down along the rocky shore Some make their home,They live on crispy pancakes Of yellow tide-foam;Some in the reeds Of the black mountain lake,With frogs for their watch-dogs, All night awake.High on the hill-top The old King sits;He is now so old and gray He's nigh lost his wits.With a bridge of white mist Columbkill he crosses,On his stately journeys From Slieveleague to Rosses;Or going up with music On cold starry nightsTo sup with the Queen Of the gay Northern Lights.They stole little Bridget For seven years long;When she came down again Her friends were all gone.They took her lightly back, Between the night and morrow,They thought that she was fast asleep, But she was dead with sorrow.They have kept her ever since Deep within the lake,On a bed of flag-leaves, Watching till she wake.By the craggy hill-side, Through the mosses bare,They have planted thorn-trees For pleasure here and there.If any man so daring As dig them up in spite,He shall find their sharpest thorns In his bed at night.Up the airy mountain, Down the rushy glen,We daren't go a-hunting For fear of little men;Wee folk, good folk, Trooping all together;Green jacket, red cap, And white owl's feather! Book List: Cormoran Strike Series by Robert Galbraith Murder Must Advertise by Dorothy L. Sayers The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco Agatha Christie Margery Allingham Ngaio Marsh Fanny Burney Northrop Frye The Odyssey by Homer Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by J. K. Rowling The Book of Beasts trans. by T. H. White The Once and Future King by T. H. White Fabulous Tales and Mythical Beasts by Woody Allen 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On today's episode of The Literary Life podcast, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks continue their series on Harry Potter: Book 1 by J. K. Rowling. This week we are covering chapters 3-7. Angelina opens the book discussion with an overview of the literary motifs used by Rowling in the Harry Potter books to help modern readers better understand these kinds of stories. One of the motifs she highlights is the identity quest and how we see Harry on a journey of the soul. She also shares some thoughts on the fairy tale “magic” of these stories in contrast to actual witchcraft as well as the symbolism used to show us that this is a fairy world. Thomas and Angelina talk about the characters we meet in these chapters, including the symbolism of some of their names. Other ideas discussed in this episode include the importance of alchemy, the Gothic literary tradition, the layers of the quest, the rise of the fantasy genre, and so much more! Visit HouseofHumaneLetters.com for updates on classes with Angelina, Thomas, and other members of their teaching team. The Literary Life series on Bram Stoker's Dracula Commonplace Quotes: It is very often a man's digressions that reveal his true character and interests. T. R. Glover, from Springs of Hellas I am not suggesting that all works of literature are much the same work or fit into the same general scheme. I am providing a kind of resonance for literary experience, a third dimension, so to speak, in which the work we are experiencing draws strength and power from everything else we have read and may still read. And, second, the strength and power do not stop with the work out there, but enter into us. Northrop Frye Walking Away By Cecil Day-Lewis It is eighteen years ago, almost to the day –A sunny day with leaves just turning,The touch-lines new-ruled – since I watched you playYour first game of football, then, like a satelliteWrenched from its orbit, go drifting awayBehind a scatter of boys. I can seeYou walking away from me towards the schoolWith the pathos of a half-fledged thing set freeInto a wilderness, the gait of oneWho finds no path where the path should be.That hesitant figure, eddying awayLike a winged seed loosened from its parent stem,Has something I never quite grasp to conveyAbout nature's give-and-take – the small, the scorchingOrdeals which fire one's irresolute clay.I have had worse partings, but none that soGnaws at my mind still. Perhaps it is roughlySaying what God alone could perfectly show –How selfhood begins with a walking away,And love is proved in the letting go. Book List: The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody by Will Cuppy Enid Blyton The Lord of the Flies by William Golding An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis Hard Times by Charles Dickens Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens MacBeth by William Shakespeare Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On today's episode on The Literary Life podcast, we begin our much-anticipated series on Harry Potter: Book 1 by J. K. Rowling, with hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks. After sharing a little on their own backgrounds as teachers and their commonplace quotations for the week, Angelina and Thomas open the book discussion with some introductory information on this book and series. They address the controversy surrounding these books in Christian circles. For our previous episode on magic, listen to our Best of Series Episode 168: Wizards, Witches and Magic, Oh My! Angelina sets up this series with some background on children's publishing in the 1990s, the why there are differences in the British and American editions, the basis for this book in the classic literary tradition, the form and structure of stories. They also share some thoughts on these first couple of chapters. Join us again next week for chapters 3-7! Visit HouseofHumaneLetters.com for updates on classes with Angelina, Thomas, and other members of their teaching team. Commonplace Quotes: To what extent people draw their ideas from fiction is disputable. Personally, I believe that most people are influenced far more than they would care to admit by novels, serial stories, films, and so forth, and that from this point of view, the worst books are often the most important. George Orwell, in “Boys' Weeklies“ Do you think I am trying to weave a spell? Perhaps I am, but remember your fairy tales. Spells are used for breaking enchantments as well as inducing them, and you and I have need of the strongest spell that can be found to wake us from the evil enchantment of worldliness that has been laid upon us for nearly a hundred years. C. S. Lewis, from “The Weight of Glory“ A Selection from “A School Song” By Rudyard Kipling 'Let us now praise famous men' - Men of little showing - For their work continueth, And their work continueth, Broad and deep continueth, Greater than their knowing!And we all praise famous men - Ancients of the College;For they taught us common sense - Tried to teach us common sense Truth and God's Own Common Sense, Which is more than knowledge! Book List: Cormoran Strike series by Robert Galbraith The Giver by Lois Lowry Holes by Louis Sachar The Tiger in the Smoke by Margery Allingham Tom Brown's School Days by Thomas Hughes Stalky and Co. by Rudyard Kipling The Hobbit 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life podcast Angelina Stanford is joined by friends and fellow readers Cindy Rollins, Emily Raible, and Jone Rose to discuss how to deal with overwhelm with your literary life. Angelina opens the conversation with the acknowledgment that everyone has moments when they feel overwhelmed by the amount of things to read and to know. Jone talks about how she tries to avoid comparing herself and her reading life to that of others. Cindy talks about how she has seen the Enemy twist something that is a good gift and made it into a negative. Other encouraging and helpful ideas they discuss are the following: motivation of making connections, how to work up to more challenging books, protecting your brain and attention span, learning to enjoy the feast, and continuing the literary life for the long haul. Find out more about Cindy's summer Narration Bootcamps over at MorningTimeforMoms.com. Look for more information about the summer classes over HouseofHumaneLetters.com, too! Commonplace Quotes: Now you must remember, whenever you have to deal with him, that Analysis, like fire, is a very good servant but a very bad master, for having got his freedom only of late years or so he is, like young men when they come suddenly to be their own masters, apt to be conceited and to fancy that he knows everything when he really knows nothing and can never know anything but only knows about things, which is a different matter. Emily shares her eye-opening understanding after starting out discouraged about being “behind” in her self-education journey. Charles Kingsley Words can come to the ear like blowing wind and neither stop nor remain, just passing by like fleeting time, if hearts and minds aren't awake, aren't ready and willing to receive them. Only the heart can take them in and hold them and keep them. Chrétrien de Troyes, trans. by Burton Raffel, from Yvain, The Knight of the Lion I have my doubts about all this real value in mountaineering, of getting to the top of everywhere and overlooking everything. Satan was the most celebrated of alpine guides when he took Jesus to the top of an exceeding high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the earth. But the joy of Satan standing on a peak, in not a joy in largeness, but a joy in beholding smallness in the fact that all men look like insects at his feet. It is from the valley that things look large. It is from the level that things look high. I am a child of the level and have no need of that celebrated alpine guide. Everything is an attitude of the mind, and at this moment I am in comfortable attitude. I will sit still and let the marvels and the adventures settle on me like flies. There are plenty of them, I assure you. The world will never starve for want of wonders, but only for want of wonder. G. K. Chesterton, from Tremendous Trifles And prodigies with a vengeance have I known thus produced, prodigies of self-conceit, shallowness, arrogance, and infidelity. Instead of storing the memory during the period when the memory is the predominant faculty with facts for the after-exercise of the judgement, and instead of awakening by the noblest models the fond and unmixed love and admiration which is the natural and graceful temper of early youth, these nurslings of improved pedagogy are taught to dispute and decide, to suspect all but their own and their lecturers' wisdom and to hold nothing sacred from their contempt but their own contemptible arrogance, boy graduates in all the technicals and in all the dirty passions and impudence of anonymous criticism. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, as quoted in Mariner by Malcom Guite from “Il Penseroso” by John Bunyan But let my due feet never failTo walk the studious cloister's pale,And love the high embowed roof,With antique pillars massy proof,And storied windows richly dight,Casting a dim religious light.There let the pealing organ blow,To the full-voic'd quire below,In service high, and anthems clear,As may with sweetness, through mine ear,Dissolve me into ecstasies,And bring all Heav'n before mine eyes.And may at last my weary ageFind out the peaceful hermitage,The hairy gown and mossy cell,Where I may sit and rightly spellOf every star that Heav'n doth shew,And every herb that sips the dew;Till old experience do attainTo something like prophetic strain.These pleasures, Melancholy, give,And I with thee will choose to live. Book List: Beyond Mere Motherhood by Cindy Rollins The Life of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell Little Women by Louisa May Alcott Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson The Hobbit 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life we return to the podcast vault for a re-airing of Episode 11, in which Cindy Rollins and Angelina Stanford enjoy a discussion of the short story “Araby” by James Joyce. Delving into “Araby,” Angelina talks about the history and development of the short story form. Cindy gives a little of her own background with reading James Joyce and why she loves his short stories. Angelina and Cindy also discuss the essential “Irishness” of this story and all the tales in The Dubliners. Angelina walks us through the story, highlighting the kinds of questions and things we should look for when reading closely. Themes discussed in this story include: blindness and sight, light and darkness, romanticism, religious devotion, the search for truth, money, courtly love, and the knight's quest. If you want to find replays of the 2019 Back to School online conference referenced in this episode, you can purchase them in Cindy's shop at MorningTimeforMoms.com. Check out the schedule for the podcast's summer episodes on our Upcoming Events page. Commonplace Quotes: Whoever wants to become a Christian must first become a poet. St. Porphyrios of Kafsokalyvia A ritual for letting a son or daughter go free, handing them over under the protection of God, is not something that we naturally include as part of growing up today in the West. Yet we are here reminded of one of the most important steps of all of the transitions in life, moving from the confines of the family into freedom and maturity. Esther de Waal Huxley Hall by John Betjemen In the Garden City Cafe‚ with its murals on the wall Before a talk on “Sex and Civics” I meditated on the Fall. Deep depression settled on me under that electric glare While outside the lightsome poplars flanked the rose-beds in the square. While outside the carefree children sported in the summer haze And released their inhibitions in a hundred different ways. She who eats her greasy crumpets snugly in the inglenook Of some birch-enshrouded homestead, dropping butter on her book Can she know the deep depression of this bright, hygienic hell? And her husband, stout free-thinker, can he share in it as well? Not the folk-museum's charting of man's Progress out of slime Can release me from the painful seeming accident of Time. Barry smashes Shirley's dolly, Shirley's eyes are crossed with hate, Comrades plot a Comrade's downfall “in the interests of the State”. Not my vegetarian dinner, not my lime-juice minus gin, Quite can drown a faint conviction that we may be born in Sin. Book List: To Pause on the Threshold by Esther de Waal The Dubliners by James Joyce Ulysses by James Joyce A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt The Abbot by Sir Walter Scott The Memoirs of Vidocq by Eugene Françios Vidocq 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life, we are dipping back into the archives for one of our “Best of” series of episodes. In this week's remix from Season 1, Angelina Stanford and Cindy Rollins discuss Guy de Maupassant's short story “The Necklace.” Before getting into the short story discussion, Cindy and Angelina chat about what a “commonplace book” is and how they each go about recording quotes and thoughts, including the QuoteBlock app. First off, Angelina gives us a little background on the author Guy de Maupassant and some information on French naturalism. Then she digs into her thoughts on how this story is a fairy tale in reverse and what that might mean in context. Cindy points out the perfection of de Maupassant's writing and his economy of style. They also bring up some of the formal elements of the story, particularly the key role the reversal takes in the plot. The main themes they find in “The Necklace” touch on common human struggles with ambition, discontentment, loss, suffering and gratitude. If you want to find replays of the 2019 Back to School online conference referenced in this episode, you can purchase them in Cindy's shop at MorningTimeforMoms.com. Check out the schedule for the podcast's summer episodes on our Upcoming Events page. Check out the brand new publishing wing of House of Humane Letters, Cassiodorus Press! You can sign up for that class or any of the HHL Summer Classes here. Sign up for the newsletter at HouseofHumaneLetters.comto stay in the know about all the exciting new things we have coming up! Commonplace Quotes: If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star, you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy. Terry Pratchett, from Wee Free Men “A vocation is a gift,” said Dame Ursula. “If it has been truly given to you, you will find the strength.” Rumer Godden, from In This House of Brede On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer by John Keats Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold, And many goodly states and kingdoms seen; Round many western islands have I been Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold. Oft of one wide expanse had I been told That deep-brow'd Homer ruled as his demesne; Yet did I never breathe its pure serene Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold: Then felt I like some watcher of the skies When a new planet swims into his ken; Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes He star'd at the Pacific—and all his men Look'd at each other with a wild surmise— Silent, upon a peak in Darien. Books Mentioned: Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett Kristen Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset In This House of Brede by Rumor Godden Gustave Flaubert O. Henry Somerset Maugham Henry James Kate Chopin Anton Chekhov 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Welcome back to The Literary Life Podcast and the continuation of our series on Anne Brontë's Agnes Grey. Angelina and Thomas open with their commonplace quotes which lead into the book discussion. Angelina kicks it off with a comparison between the work of the Brontës and Jane Austen's writing which will continue throughout the conversation. Thomas and Angelina also look at the expectations of Victorians for courtship and marriage, the ways Anne Brontë weaves this tale as a variation on other themes, the true woman versus the false woman, and more! Check out the schedule for the podcast's summer episodes on our Upcoming Events page. In August, Angelina Stanford will guide us through the world of Harry Potter as she shows us its literary influences and its roots in the literary tradition. You can sign up for that class or any of the HHL Summer Classes here. Sign up for the newsletter at HouseofHumaneLetters.com to stay in the know about all the exciting new things we have coming up! Commonplace Quotes: The ideal of education is that we should learn all that it concerns us to know, in order that thereby we may become all that it concerns us to be. In other words, the aim of education is the knowledge not of facts but of values. Values are facts apprehended in their relation to each other, and to ourselves. The wise man is he who knows the relative value of things. William Ralph Inge, from The Church in the World But while Emily Brontë was as unsociable as a storm at midnight, and while Charlotte Brontë was at best like that warmer and more domestic thing, a house on fire–they do connect themselves with the calm of George Eliot, as the forerunners of many later developments of the feminine advance. Many forerunners (if it comes to that) would have felt rather ill if they had seen the things they foreman. This notion of a hazy anticipation of after history has been absurdly overdone: as when men connect Chaucer with the Reformation; which is like connecting Homer with the Syracusan Expedition. But it is to some extent true that all these great Victorian women had a sort of unrest in their souls. And the proof of it is that… it began to be admitted by the great Victorian men. G. K. Chesterton, The Victorian Age in Literature The Recommendation By Richard Crashaw These houres, and that which hovers o're my End, Into thy hands, and hart, lord, I commend. Take Both to Thine Account, that I and mine In that Hour, and in these, may be all thine. That as I dedicate my devoutest Breath To make a kind of Life for my lord's Death, So from his living, and life-giving Death, My dying Life may draw a new, and never fleeting Breath. Book List: Mansfield Park by Jane Austen Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen Emma by Jane Austen Antony and Cleopatra by William Shakespeare The Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB  

Today on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks begin a new book discussion series covering Anne Brontë's Victorian novel Agnes Grey. This week they are giving an introduction to the social and literary climate in which Anne was writing, as well as discussing chapters 1-5 of the book. Thomas shares a little information on Utilitarianism, and Angelina talks about how this affected the literature of the Victorian period. She also points out that the Brontës were writing in the medieval literary tradition rather than the didactic or realistic style, and as such we should look for symbols and metaphors in their journey of the soul. Thomas and Angelina explore the background of the Brontë sisters, discuss the position of the governess in this time period, and compare Agnes Grey to other governess novels. Diving into the first five chapters of this book, Angelina and Thomas look at the life of young Agnes Grey and at her family. In treating the characters in the early chapters, they talk about Agnes Grey's first forays into the life of the governess, the horrid children in her care, their irresponsible parents, and more. Check out the schedule for the podcast's summer episodes on our Upcoming Events page. If you haven't heard about Cindy Rollins' upcoming Summer Discipleship series, you can learn more about that over at MorningTimeforMoms.com. In June Mr. Banks will be teaching a 5-day class on St. Augustine, and in July Dr. Jason Baxter will be teaching a class on Dostoevsky. Also, don't miss the launch the HHL publishing wing, Cassiodorus Press! Sign up for the newsletter at HouseofHumaneLetters.com to stay in the know about all the exciting new things we have coming up! Commonplace Quotes: Truth is the trial of itself,/ And needs no other touch. Ben Jonson The previous literary life of this country had left vigorous many old forces in the Victorian time, as in our time. Roman Britain and Mediæval England are still not only alive but lively; for real development is not leaving things behind, as on a road, but drawing life from them, as from a root. Even when we improve we never progress. For progress, the metaphor from the road, implies a man leaving his home behind him: but improvement means a man exalting the towers or extending the gardens of his home. G. K. Chesterton, The Victorian Age in Literature Ganymede By W. H. Auden He looked in all His wisdom from the throneDown on that humble boy who kept the sheep,And sent a dove; the dove returned alone:Youth liked the music, but soon fell asleep. But He had planned such future for the youth:Surely, His duty now was to compel.For later he would come to love the truth,And own his gratitude. His eagle fell. It did not work. His conversation boredThe boy who yawned and whistled and made faces,And wriggled free from fatherly embraces; But with the eagle he was always willingTo go where it suggested, and adoredAnd learnt from it so many ways of killing. Book List: George MacDonald Charles Dickens Lewis Carroll Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot Tom Jones by Henry Fielding Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe Adam Bede by George Eliot Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier My Cousin Rachel by Daphne Du Maurier The Infernal World of Bramwell Brontë by Daphne Du Maurier Thomas Hardy Villette by Charlotte Brontë Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray Mary Poppins by P. L. Travers The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope The Turn of the Screw by Henry James Esther Waters by George Moore 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks delve into a new literary series as we read the comedic play Tartuffe by Jean-Baptiste Moliere. If you want to listen in to the read along of this play, you can view replays on the readings on the House of Humane Letters YouTube channel. Thomas begins the conversation on this play by setting up the cultural and literary context in which Moliere was working, as well as some more biographical background on the author and actor himself. Angelina points out some differences between satire and didacticism. She and Thomas also talk about the influence of Roman comedy in Moliere's playwriting. Angelina introduces Act 1 with a question of how Moliere shows the audience what to think of Tartuffe before the character himself ever comes on stage. Thomas talks a little about the characters we first meet, and Angelina highlights the references to enchantments as they read through key portions of these opening scenes. Join us again next week when we will finish up this entertaining play! If you weren't able to join us for the sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination“, you can still purchase the recordings and find out what you missed! Also, don't miss the launch the HHL publishing wing, Cassiodorus Press! Sign up for the newsletter at HouseofHumaneLetters.com to stay in the know about all the exciting new things we have coming up! Commonplace Quotes: He had the comic vision of himself as well as of the rest of humanity. He might mock the vices of the world, but he could also mock himself for hating the world, in the spirit of a superior person, on account of its vices. Robert Lynn, from his essay “Moliere” in Books and Authors We think old books are strange; but we are the aliens. Dr. Jason Baxter The Burial of Moliere By Andrew Lang Dead–he is dead!  The rouge has left a trace   On that thin cheek where shone, perchance, a tear,   Even while the people laughed that held him dear But yesterday.  He died,–and not in grace, And many a black-robed caitiff starts apace   To slander him whose Tartuffe made them fear,   And gold must win a passage for his bier, And bribe the crowd that guards his resting-place. Ah, Moliere, for that last time of all,   Man's hatred broke upon thee, and went by, And did but make more fair thy funeral.   Though in the dark they hid thee stealthily, Thy coffin had the cope of night for pall,   For torch, the stars along the windy sky! Book List: Menaechmi, or The Twin-Brothers by Plautus Code of the Woosters by P. G. Wodehouse   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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Welcome to a new episode of The Literary Life podcast and an interview with special guest Dr. Vigen Guroian, retired professor of Religious Studies and Orthodox Christianity at the University of Virginia and author of twelve book and numerous scholarly articles. Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks discuss with Dr. Guroian the new edition of his book, Tending the Heart of Virtue. They start out talking about how the first edition of this book came about, which leads into a discussion about the current approach to fairy tales and children's stories in both academia and the publishing industry. Other topics of conversation include the problem with reducing stories down to a moral, story as mystery, the place of fairy tales in classical education, and the Biblical literacy of the authors of fairy tales. Dr. Guroian also shares his thoughts on people like John Ruskin and Rudyard Kipling. Finally, he shares some suggestions on finding good editions of fairy tale collections. (Scroll down for links to his book recommendations.) Commonplace Quotes: It seems to me appropriate, almost inevitable, that when that great Imagination which in the beginning, for Its own delight and for the delight of men and angels and (in their proper mode) of beasts, had invented and formed the whole world of Nature, submitted to express Itself in human speech, that speech should sometimes be poetry. For poetry too is a little incarnation, giving body to what had been before invisible and inaudible. C. S. Lewis, from Reflections on the Psalms Reason is the natural organ of truth, but imagination is the organ of meaning. C. S. Lewis Inertia has served them so well that they did not know how to relinquish it. E. M. Forster, from Pharos and Pharillon “Happy children,” say I, “who could blunder into the very heart of the will of God concerning them, and do the thing at once that the Lord taught them, using the common sense which God had given and the fairy tale nourished!” The Lord of the promise is the Lord of all true parables and all good fairy tales. George MacDonald, from The Elect Lady The Spring By Thomas Carew Now that the winter's gone, the earth hath lost Her snow-white robes, and now no more the frost Candies the grass, or casts an icy cream Upon the silver lake or crystal stream; But the warm sun thaws the benumbed earth, And makes it tender; gives a sacred birth To the dead swallow; wakes in hollow tree The drowsy cuckoo, and the humble-bee. Now do a choir of chirping minstrels bring In triumph to the world the youthful Spring. The valleys, hills, and woods in rich array Welcome the coming of the long'd-for May. Now all things smile, only my love doth lour; Nor hath the scalding noonday sun the power To melt that marble ice, which still doth hold Her heart congeal'd, and makes her pity cold. The ox, which lately did for shelter fly Into the stall, doth now securely lie In open fields; and love no more is made By the fireside, but in the cooler shade Amyntas now doth with his Chloris sleep Under a sycamore, and all things keep Time with the season; only she doth carry June in her eyes, in her heart January. Book List: Tending the Heart of Virtue, 2nd Edition by Dr. Vigen Guroian Reflections on the Psalms by C. S. Lewis Pharos and Pharillon by E. M. Forster The Elect Lady by George MacDonald The King of the Golden River by John Ruskin The Lost Princess or The Wise Woman by George MacDonald The Victorian Fairy Tale Book ed. by Michael Patrick Hearn The Classic Fairy Tales ed. by Iona and Peter Opie The Classic Fairy Tales ed. by Maria Tatar Brothers Grimm: Selected Tales trans. by David Luke The Complete Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm trans. by Jack Zipes Hans Christian Andersen: The Complete Fairy Tales and Stories trans. by Erik Christian Haugaard Den Lille Havfrue og andre historier/The Little Mermaid and Other Stories by Hans Christian Andersen, trans. by Tony J. Richardson Hans Christian Anderson: Fairy Tales trans. by Tina Nunnally “Fairy Tale Wars” by Vigen Guroian 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Today on The Literary Life Podcast, we bring you another episode in our “Best of” series in which Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks discuss the importance of reading old books. They begin the conversation by addressing head on the idea that old books are irrelevant. They touch on the fact that when we use the phrase “old books” we mean not just any piece of literature from the past, but those which have stood the test of time.  It's not too late to join us for the sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination” happening this week! During the live or later series of webinars, we will seek to dis-spell the Myth of Modernity and gain eyes to see and ears to hear Reality as it truly is. Speakers include Jason Baxter, Jenn Rogers, and Kelly Cumbee, in addition to Angelina and Thomas. Commonplace Quotes: So, when his Folly opens The unnecessary hells, A Servant when He Reigneth Throws the blame on some one else. Rudyard Kipling I am informed by philologists that the “rise to power” of these two words, “problem” and “solution” as the dominating terms of public debate, is an affair of the last two centuries, and especially of the nineteenth, having synchronised, so they say, with a parallel “rise to power” of the word “happiness”—for reasons which doubtless exist and would be interesting to discover. Like “happiness”, our two terms “problem” and “solution” are not to be found in the Bible—a point which gives to that wonderful literature a singular charm and cogency. . . . On the whole, the influence of these words is malign, and becomes increasingly so. They have deluded poor men with Messianic expectations . . . which are fatal to steadfast persistence in good workmanship and to well-doing in general. . . . Let the valiant citizen never be ashamed to confess that he has no “solution of the social problem” to offer to his fellow-men. Let him offer them rather the service of his skill, his vigilance, his fortitude and his probity. For the matter in question is not, primarily, a “problem”, nor the answer to it a “solution”. L. P. Jacks, Stevenson Lectures  Most of all, perhaps, we need intimate knowledge of the past. Not that the past has any magic about it, but because we cannot study the future, and yet need something to set against the present, to remind us that the basic assumptions have been quite different in different periods and that much which seems certain to the uneducated is merely temporary fashion. A man who has lived in many places is not likely to be deceived by the local errors of his native village; the scholar has lived in many times and is therefore in some degree immune from the great cataract of nonsense that pours from the press and the microphone of his own age. C. S. Lewis To Walter de la Mare  by T. S. Elliot The children who explored the brook and found A desert island with a sandy cove (A hiding place, but very dangerous ground, For here the water buffalo may rove, The kinkajou, the mungabey, abound In the dark jungle of a mango grove, And shadowy lemurs glide from tree to tree – The guardians of some long-lost treasure-trove) Recount their exploits at the nursery tea And when the lamps are lit and curtains drawn Demand some poetry, please. Whose shall it be, At not quite time for bed?… Or when the lawn  Is pressed by unseen feet, and ghosts return Gently at twilight, gently go at dawn, The sad intangible who grieve and yearn; When the familiar is suddenly strange Or the well known is what we yet have to learn, And two worlds meet, and intersect, and change; When cats are maddened in the moonlight dance, Dogs cower, flitter bats, and owls range At witches' sabbath of the maiden aunts; When the nocturnal traveller can arouse No sleeper by his call; or when by chance An empty face peers from an empty house; By whom, and by what means, was this designed? The whispered incantation which allows Free passage to the phantoms of the mind? By you; by those deceptive cadences Wherewith the common measure is refined; By conscious art practised with natural ease; By the delicate, invisible web you wove – The inexplicable mystery of sound. Book List: The Mind of the Maker by Dorothy L. Sayers The Weight of Glory by C. S. Lewis The Giver by Lois Lowry The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

In anticipation of our upcoming sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination,” this week we are re-airing a previous episode with Jason Baxter, our conference's special keynote speaker. Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks sit down for a special conversation with Jason Baxter, author of The Medieval Mind of C. S. Lewis. Jason is a speaker, writer, and college professor who writes primarily on medieval thought and is especially interested in Lewis' ideas. You can find out more about him and his books at JasonMBaxter.com. Our hosts and Jason discuss a wide range of ideas, including the values of literature, the sacramental view of reality, why it is important to understand medieval thought, the “problem” of paganism in Lewis' writings, and how to approach reading ancient and medieval literature. Commonplace Quotes: My part has been merely that of Walter Scott's Old Mortality, who busied himself in clearing the moss, and bringing back to light the words, on the gravestones of the dead who seemed to him to have served humanity. This needs to be done and redone, generation after generation, in a world where there persists always a strong tendency to read newer writers, not because they are better, but because they are newer. The moss grows fast, and ceaselessly. F. L. Lucas It is the memory of time that makes us old; remembering eternity makes us young again. Statford Caldecott It is my settled conviction that in order to read old Western literature aright, you must suspend most of the responses and unlearn most of the habits you have acquired in reading modern literature. C. S. Lewis, from “De Descriptione Temporum” What then is the good of–what is even the defense for–occupying our hearts with stories of what never happened and entering vicariously into feeling which we should try to avoid in our own person?…The nearest I have yet got to an answer is that we seek an enlargement of our being. We want to be more than ourselves…[In] reading great literature I become a thousand men and yet remain myself. Like the night sky in the Greek poem, I see with myriad eyes, but it is still I who see. Here as in worship, in love, in moral action, and in knowing, I transcend myself; and am never more myself than when I do. C. S. Lewis Victory by C. S. Lewis Roland is dead, Cuchulain's crest is low, The battered war-rear wastes and turns to rust, And Helen's eyes and Iseult's lips are dust And dust the shoulders and the breasts of snow. The faerie people from our woods are gone, No Dryads have I found in all our trees, No Triton blows his horn about our seas And Arthur sleeps far hence in Avalon. The ancient songs they wither as the grass And waste as doth a garment waxen old, All poets have been fools who thought to mould A monument more durable than brass. For these decay: but not for that decays The yearning, high, rebellious spirit of man That never rested yet since life began From striving with red Nature and her ways. Now in the filth of war, the baresark shout Of battle, it is vexed. And yet so oft Out of the deeps, of old, it rose aloft That they who watch the ages may not doubt. Though often bruised, oft broken by the rod, Yet, like the phoenix, from each fiery bed Higher the stricken spirit lifts its head And higher-till the beast become a god. Book List: Beauty in the Word by Stratford Caldecott An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis The Discarded Image by C. S. Lewis The Art of Living: Four Eighteenth Century Minds by F. L. Lucas Transposition by C. S. Lewis The Weight of Glory by C. S. Lewis Til We Have Faces by C. S. Lewis The Divine Comedy by Dante Nicholas of Cusa The Life of St. Francis of Assisi by St. Bonaventure The Consolation of Philosophy by Boethius Confessions by St. Augustine 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Today on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks are joined by Atlee Northmore to explore the various screen adaptations based on Howards End by E. M. Forster. They begin the discussion with the question of what is the good of translating one art form, in this case a book, into another art form, such as a screen play. They talk about the beauty of the Merchant Ivory film adaptation, while critiquing the casting and chemistry of the cast, sharing their favorite and least favorite scenes. In contrast, they praise the BBC-Starz series for its excellent adaptation, although it missed some important things that the 1992 film did include. Atlee also highlights some of the ways in which the screen adaptations serve as subtle visual cues for ideas from the story. In the end, Angelina, Thomas, and Atlee share thoughts on enjoying a film as a stand-alone work of art versus judging it as an adaptation of a novel. There are still spots open in many of the classes at House of Humane Letters, so if you or your student are interested in taking something, head over to houseofhumaneletters.com to register today! We hope you will join us for the sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination.” You can visit the HHL Facebook page or Instagram to find the post to share and enter our giveaway for a $20 discount code! During the live or later series of webinars, we will seek to dis-spell the Myth of Modernity and gain eyes to see and ears to hear Reality as it truly is. Speakers include Jason Baxter, Jenn Rogers, and Kelly Cumbee, in addition to Angelina and Thomas. Commonplace Quotes: Every poet, in his kind, is bit by him that comes behind. Jonathan Swift, from “Critics” Narrative prose, especially the novel, has taken, in modern societies, the place occupied by the recitation of myths and fairy tales in traditional and popular societies. Furthermore, the ‘mythic' structure of certain modern novels can be discerned, demonstrating the literary survival of major mythological themes and characters. Mircea Eliade Now, doesn't it seem absurd to you? What is the good of the ear if it tells you the same as the eye? Helen's one aim is to translate tunes into the language of painting and pictures into the language of music. It's very ingenious, and she says several pretty things in the process, but what's gained, I'd like to know? E. M. Forster, from Howards End Cargoes By John Masefield Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir, Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine, With a cargo of ivory, And apes and peacocks, Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine. Stately Spanish galleon coming from the Isthmus, Dipping through the tropics by the palm-green shores, With a cargo of diamonds, Emeralds, amythysts, Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores. Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack, Butting through the channel in the mad March days, With a cargo of Tyne coal, Road-rails, pig-lead, Firewood, iron-ware, and cheap tin trays. Book and Link List: From Pharos from Pharillon by E. M. Forster Howards End (1992) Howards End (BBC-Starz) Howards End Episode 1 The Remains of the Day The English Patient 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Welcome back to The Literary Life Podcast and our series discussing Howards End by E. M. Forster. This week Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks cover chapters 26-34. Together they continue to talk about the ideas Forster is presenting in the book as seen in this section, including Howards End as a character, the echoes of Wind in the Willows (thanks to Jen Rogers!), Helen's idealism, Margaret and Henry's conflict, the idea of rootedness, and more. On March 7, 2024 you can join Thomas and his brother James live for a webinar on King Alfred the Great. Register today at houseofhumaneletters.com. The webinar recording will also be available for lifetime access after that date. We hope you will join us for the sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination.” During the live or later series of webinars, we will seek to dis-spell the Myth of Modernity and gain eyes to see and ears to hear Reality as it truly is. Speakers include Jason Baxter, Jenn Rogers, and Kelly Cumbee, in addition to Angelina and Thomas. If you want to get the special literary themed teas created by our Patron Erin Miller, go to adagiotea.com to check them out! Commonplace Quotes: Everything has been said already; but since nobody was listening, we shall have to begin all over again. Toutes choses sont dites déjà; mais comme personne n'écoute, il faut toujours recommencer. Andre Gide, from “Narcissus” It is under these “present conditions” of materialism, urbanization, and cosmopolitanism that Howards End poses the question, “Who shall inherit England?” This question is given a lyrical resonance shortly after Margaret tells Helen of her intention to marry Henry. The two women, visiting Aunt Julie at Swanage, gaze across Poole Harbor and watch the tide return. “England was alive, throbbing through all her estuaries, crying for joy through the mouths of all her gulls, and the north wind, with contrary motion, blew stronger against her rising sea,” the narrator records, and then asks: “What did it mean? For what end are her fair complexities, her change of soil, her sinuous coast? Does she belong to those who have moulded her and made her feared by other lands, or to those who had added nothing to her power, but have somehow seen her, seen the whole island at once, lying as a jewel in a silver sea, sailing as a ship of souls, with all the brave world's fleet accompanying her towards eternity?” These questions are at the heart of the book. More crudely stated, they ask whether England belongs to the imperialist or to the yeoman, to those who see life steadily or to those who see it whole, to the prosaic or to the poet. Put another way, they ask whether the inheritors of England are to be people of action or vision. Claude J. Summer, from “E. M. Foster” To E. M. Forster By W. H. Auden Here, though the bombs are real and dangerous, And Italy and Kings are far away, And we're afraid that you will speak to us, You promise still the inner life shall pay. As we run down the slope of Hate with gladness You trip us up like an unnoticed stone, And just as we are closeted with Madness You interrupt us like the telephone. For we are Lucy, Turton, Phillip, we Wish international evil, are excited To join the jolly ranks of the benighted Where Reason is denied and Love ignored: But, as we swear our lie, Miss Avery Comes out into the garden with the sword. Book List: Theodore Dreiser 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Welcome to a new series on The Literary Life Podcast with Angelina Stanford and husband Thomas Banks. This week they begin talking about E. M. Forster's book Howards End, giving some introductory information about Forster and also cover the first seven chapters of the book. Thomas shares some background on the Bloomsbury Group authors in contrast to their Victorian predecessors. Angelina highlights the literary tradition of naming books after houses and invites us to consider the importance of place in this story as we go forward. We hope you will join us for the sixth annual Literary Life Online Conference, “Dispelling the Myth of Modernity: A Recovery of the Medieval Imagination.” During the live or later series of webinars, we will seek to dis-spell the Myth of Modernity and gain eyes to see and ears to hear Reality as it truly is. Speakers include Jason Baxter, Jenn Rogers, and Kelly Cumbee, in addition to Angelina and Thomas. Also, The House of Humane Letters is expanding to include more classes, and pre-registration for returning students and registration for new students opens soon. Sign up for their email list to find out when you can sign up at houseofhumaneletters.com. Commonplace Quotes: We are not concerned with the very poor. They are unthinkable, and only to be approached by the statistician or the poet. E. M. Forster, Howards End Howards End is Mr. Forster's first fully adult book. It is richly packed with meanings; it has a mellow brilliance, a kind of shot beauty of texture; it runs like a bright, slowish, flickering river, in which different kinds of exciting fish swim and dart among mysterious reedy leptons and are observed and described by a highly interested, humane, sympathetic, often compassionate, and usually ironic commentator. The effect is of uncommon beauty and charm; the fusion of humor, perception, social comedy, witty realism, and soaring moral idealism, weaves a rare captivating, almost hypnotic spell; and many people think it (in spite of the more impressive theme and more serious technique of A Passage in India) Mr. Forester's best book. Rose Macaulay, The Writings of E. M. Forster The Pity of It By Thomas Hardy April 1915 I walked in loamy Wessex lanes, afar From rail-track and from highway, and I heard In field and farmstead many an ancient word Of local lineage like 'Thu bist,' 'Er war,' 'Ich woll', 'Er sholl', and by-talk similar, Nigh as they speak who in this month's moon gird At England's very loins, thereunto spurred By gangs whose glory threats and slaughters are. Then seemed a Heart crying: 'Whosoever they be At root and bottom of this, who flung this flame Between kin folk kin tongued even as are we, 'Sinister, ugly, lurid, be their fame; May their familiars grow to shun their name, And their brood perish everlastingly.' Source: Thomas Hardy: The Complete Poems (Palgrave, 2001) Book List: Howards End by E. M. Forster The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim Rose Macaulay Dorothy Parker Virginia Woolf George Eliot Matthew Arnold Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen Mansfield Park by Jane Austen Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole The House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne Wendell Berry An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

David had the honour of interviewing one of his favourite podcasters, Angelina Stanford from "The Literary Life Podcast", about Lewis' literary theory and one of his students, Northrop Frye. [Show Notes]

This week's episode of The Literary Life we bring you a special interview with Jenn Rogers! Angelina Stanford and Cindy Rollins talk with Jenn about her own literary life and how she learned the things she is now passing on to others through The House of Humane Letters. Jenn shares how languages and literature were a part of her life from a young age as a child of missionaries in the Dominican Republic and homeschooled in a Charlotte Mason style. She also shares how surprising challenges ended up opening a door for her family to use AmblesideOnline and other resources, using their imaginations and creativity in getting a great education. The House of Humane Letters is currently having their Christmas sale until December 31, 2023. Everything is now 20% OFF, so hop on over and get the classes at their best prices now. In addition to the sale, you can also sign up for Atlee Northmore's webinar “A Medieval Romance in a Galaxy Far, Far Away: How to Read Star Wars.” Cindy is also offering at 20% OFF discount throughout the holidays. Use coupon code “advent2023” on MorningTimeforMoms.com/shop until January 2024. Commonplace Quotes: But if literature teaches us anything at all, it is this, that we have an eternal element free from care and fear which can survey the things in life we call evil with serenity, that is, not without appreciating their quality but without any disturbance of our spiritual equilibrium. Not in the same way, but in some such way, we shall all doubtless survey our own story when we know it, and a great deal more of the Whole Story. J. R. R. Tolkien, from The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien This final argument is an indication of how monastic writers like Ælfric sought to understand the cycle of the seasons. They wanted to read and interpret the natural world, to learn to recognize the meaning God had planted in it. They saw time and seasons, from the very first day of the world, as carefully arranged by God with method and purpose, so they believed it would be possible to organize the calendar, not according to the randomness of custom and inherited tradition, but in a way that reflected that divine plan. Eleanor Parker, from Winters in the World It is both the glory and the shame of poetry that its medium is not its private property, that a poet cannot invent his words and that words are products, not of nature, but of a human society which uses them for a thousand different purposes. In modern societies where language is continually being debased and reduced to nonspeech, the poet is in constant danger of having his ear corrupted, a danger to which the painter and the composer, whose media are their private property, are not exposed. On the other hand, he is more protected than they from another modern peril, that of solipsist subjectivity; however esoteric a poem may be, the fact that all its words have meanings which can be looked up in a dictionary makes it testify to the existence of other people Even the language of Finnegan's Wake was not created by Joyce ex nihilo; a purely private verbal world is not possible. W. H. Auden, from The Dyer's Hand Cliche Came Out of Its Cage by C. S. Lewis You said 'The world is going back to Paganism'. Oh bright Vision! I saw our dynasty in the bar of the House Spill from their tumblers a libation to the Erinyes, And Leavis with Lord Russell wreathed in flowers, heralded with flutes, Leading white bulls to the cathedral of the solemn Muses To pay where due the glory of their latest theorem. Hestia's fire in every flat, rekindled, burned before The Lardergods. Unmarried daughters with obedient hands Tended it By the hearth the white-armd venerable mother Domum servabat, lanam faciebat. at the hour Of sacrifice their brothers came, silent, corrected, grave Before their elders; on their downy cheeks easily the blush Arose (it is the mark of freemen's children) as they trooped, Gleaming with oil, demurely home from the palaestra or the dance. Walk carefully, do not wake the envy of the happy gods, Shun Hubris. The middle of the road, the middle sort of men, Are best. Aidos surpasses gold. Reverence for the aged Is wholesome as seasonable rain, and for a man to die Defending the city in battle is a harmonious thing. Thus with magistral hand the Puritan Sophrosune Cooled and schooled and tempered our uneasy motions; Heathendom came again, the circumspection and the holy fears ... You said it. Did you mean it? Oh inordinate liar, stop. Or did you mean another kind of heathenry? Think, then, that under heaven-roof the little disc of the earth, Fortified Midgard, lies encircled by the ravening Worm. Over its icy bastions faces of giant and troll Look in, ready to invade it. The Wolf, admittedly, is bound; But the bond wil1 break, the Beast run free. The weary gods, Scarred with old wounds the one-eyed Odin, Tyr who has lost a hand, Will limp to their stations for the Last defence. Make it your hope To be counted worthy on that day to stand beside them; For the end of man is to partake of their defeat and die His second, final death in good company. The stupid, strong Unteachable monsters are certain to be victorious at last, And every man of decent blood is on the losing side. Take as your model the tall women with yellow hair in plaits Who walked back into burning houses to die with men, Or him who as the death spear entered into his vitals Made critical comments on its workmanship and aim. Are these the Pagans you spoke of? Know your betters and crouch, dogs; You that have Vichy water in your veins and worship the event Your goddess History (whom your fathers called the strumpet Fortune). Books Mentioned: The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Volume 3 by C. S. Lewis Macbeth by William Shakespeare 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life podcast, we have a very special 200th Episode for you! Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins and Thomas Banks are joined by their Patreon Friends and Fellows for a live episode recording to launch the 2024 Reading Challenge! This year's challenge theme is “Book of Centuries” and features a timeline of literary periods from which you can choose works to read throughout the next year. The discussion featured suggestions for each literary period and century, and you can get the complete list of book and author suggestions right here. (Due to the length of this list, we will not be adding hyperlinks this week, so please see the document to find any book titles and authors you want to explore.) As usual, there will also be a kids' version of the reading challenge! To download a PDF version of the adult reading challenge, click here. To download a PDF of the kids' version, click here. The House of Humane Letters is currently having their Christmas sale until December 31, 2023. Everything is now 20% OFF, so hop on over and get the classes at their best prices now. In addition to the sale, you can also sign up for Atlee Northmore's webinar “A Medieval Romance in a Galaxy Far, Far Away: How to Read Star Wars.” Cindy is also offering at 20% OFF discount throughout the holidays. Use coupon code “advent2023” on MorningTimeforMoms.com/shop until January 2024. Commonplace Quotes: Chaucer had the rare gift of an author of liking people he did not respect. G. K. Chesterton, from Chaucer Modern education promotes the unmitigated study of literature and concentrates our attention on the relation between a writer's life, his surface life, and his work. That is the reason it is such a curse. Madeleine L'Engle, from Walking on Water A very famous writer once said, “A book is like a mirror. If a fool looks in, you can't expect a genius to look out.” J. K. Rowling Whitsunday by George Herbert Listen sweet Dove unto my song, And spread thy golden wings in me; Hatching my tender heart so long, Till it get wing, and fly away with thee. Where is that fire which once descended On thy Apostles? thou didst then Keep open house, richly attended, Feasting all comers by twelve chosen men. Such glorious gifts thou didst bestow, That th'earth did like a heav'n appear; The stars were coming down to know If they might mend their wages, and serve here. The sun which once did shine alone, Hung down his head, and wisht for night, When he beheld twelve suns for one Going about the world, and giving light. But since those pipes of gold, which brought That cordial water to our ground, Were cut and martyr'd by the fault Of those, who did themselves through their side wound, Thou shutt'st the door, and keep'st within; Scarce a good joy creeps through the chink: And if the braves of conqu'ring sin Did not excite thee, we should wholly sink. Lord, though we change, thou art the same; The same sweet God of love and light: Restore this day, for thy great name, Unto his ancient and miraculous right. Books Mentioned: 200th Episode Literary Life Book Suggestions 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On The Literary Life Podcast today, Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks continue discussing Dorothy L. Sayers' The Mind of the Maker. In today's conversation, they cover the ideas in chapters 3-5, including the following: the creative process in relation to the members of the Trinity, the relationship of the writer to his own creation, the misconception of art as self-expression, the problem with poetic justice, and much more! If you missed the live webinar Can Dante's Inferno Save the World? with Dr. Jason Baxter, you can still purchase the recording. Also, coming up from House of Humane Letters on November 16, 2023, Jennifer Rogers' webinar on Tolkien and The Old English Tradition. You can sign up now and save your spot! Commonplace Quotes: He remained altogether inimitable, yet never seemed conscious of his greatness. It was native in him to rejoice in the successes of other men at least as much as in his own triumphs. Arthur Quiller-Couch, from “The Death of Robert Louis Stevenson” Only one hour of the normal day is more pleasurable than the hour spent in bed with a book before going to sleep and that is the hour spent in bed with a book after being called in the morning. Rose Macaulay, as quoted by Christian McEwan in World Enough and Time The unity of a work of art, the basis of structural analysis, has not only been produced solely by the unconditioned will of the artist, for the artist is only its efficient cause: it has form, and consequently a formal cause. The fact that revision is possible, that the poet makes changes not because he likes them better but because they are better, means that poems, like poets, are born and not made. Northrop Frye, from Fables of Identity Nondum by Gerard Manley Hopkins " Verily Thou art a God that hidest Thyself." ISAIAH xlv. 15. God, though to Thee our psalm we raise-- No answering voice comes from the skies; To Thee the trembling sinner prays But no forgiving voice replies; Our prayer seems lost in desert ways, Our hymn in the vast silence dies. We see the glories of the earth But not the hand that wrought them all: Night to a myriad worlds gives birth, Yet like a lighted empty hall Where stands no host at door or hearth Vacant creation's lamps appall. We guess; we clothe Thee, unseen King, With attributes we deem are meet; Each in his own imagining Sets up a shadow in Thy seat; Yet know not how our gifts to bring, Where seek Thee with unsandalled feet. Books Mentioned: The Towers of Trebizond by Rose Macaulay David Copperfield by Charles Dickens Vanity Fair by William Thackeray 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks are kick off a new series on The Mind of the Maker by Dorothy L. Sayers. Before discussion the book itself, Angelina gives a little biographical information on Sayers for those who are new to her and her work. They begin talking about the book with the preface and Sayers own purpose in writing it. Cindy shares a little about her first reading of The Mind of the Maker when she was a young newlywed and the impact it made on her. Thomas points out the “laws” Sayers outlines and reads some important quotes from this section. If you are listening to this episode on the day it drops, it's not too late to get in on today's live webinar Can Dante's Inferno Save the World? with Dr. Jason Baxter. You can also purchase the recording any time if you missed the live class. Also coming up from House of Humane Letters on November 16, 2023, Jennifer Rogers' webinar on Tolkien and The Old English Tradition. You can sign up now and save your spot! Episode 9: “Are Women Human” by Dorothy L. Sayers Episodes 5-8 on Gaudy Night Episode 62: The Literary Friendship of Dorothy and Jack Commonplace Quotes: Think not, Mistress, more true dullness lies In Folly's cap, than Wisdom's grave disguise. Alexander Pope, from “The Dunciad” We do not own stories, and when we try to limit them, squeeze the life out of them, lose the love that gave them to us, and fall back into that fatal human flaw–pride, hubris–we are right back to Adam and Eve, who listened to the power of the snake instead of the creativity of God. Madeleine L'Engle, from Bright Evening Star This is the first “little book on religion” I have read for a long time in which every sentence is intelligible and every page advances the argument. C. S. Lewis, in a review of Mind of the Maker Reason Has Moons by Ralph Hodgson Reason has moons, but moons not hers, Lie mirror'd on the sea, Confounding her astronomers, But O! delighting me. Books Mentioned: Walking on Water by Madeleine L'Engle Murder Must Advertise by Dorothy L. Sayers “Learning in Wartime” by C. S. Lewis 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Welcome back to The Literary Life Podcast this week as we wrap up our series of discussion on C. S. Lewis' novel Out of the Silent Planet. Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks are covering from chapter 16 to the end of the book in today's episode. After sharing their commonplace quotes, Angelina starts the conversation comparing the ideas in Gulliver's Travels with what Lewis is doing in this book. Thomas quotes a passage from the Aeneid in Latin as they talk about the parallels to Out of the Silent Planet. The structure of the medieval romance is seen fully as we finish the story, as noted by Angelina. She and Thomas also point out more connections with Paradise Lost. Cindy brings everything together with some thoughts on the unraveling of modernity. Join us next week as we kick off a new series on The Mind of the Maker by Dorothy L. Sayers! House of Humane Letters is thrilled to announce an all new webinar from Dr. Jason Baxter coming October 31st! Register today for Can Dante's Inferno Save the World? Also coming up from House of Humane Letters on November 16, 2023, Jennifer Rogers' webinar on Tolkien and The Old English Tradition. You can sign up now and save your spot! Commonplace Quotes: But unlike most artists, Ruskin valued the seeing more than the doing. “The sight is more important than the drawing,” he said. “The greatest thing a human being ever does in this world is to SEE something, and tell what he saw in a plain way. Hundreds of people can talk for one who can think, but thousands of people can think for one who can see. To see clearly is poetry, prophecy and religion—all in one.” from The World Enough and Time, by Christian McEwan Build, build your Babels black against the sky- But mark yon small green blade, your stones between, The single spy Of that uncounted host you have outcast; For with their tiny pennons waving green They shall storm your streets at last. F. L. Lucas, from “Beleaguered Cities” The old universe was wholly different in its effect. It was an answer, not a question. It offered not a field for musing but a single overwhelming object; an object which at once abashes and exalts the mind. For in it there is a final standard of size. The Primum Mobile is really large because it is the largest corporeal thing there is. We are really small because our whole Earth is a speck compared with the Primum Mobile. C. S. Lewis, from Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Literature Science-Fiction Cradlesong by C. S. Lewis By and by Man will try To get out into the sky, Sailing far beyond the air From Down and Here to Up and There. Stars and sky, sky and stars Make us feel the prison bars. Suppose it done. Now we ride Closed in steel, up there, outside Through our port-holes see the vast Heaven-scape go rushing past. Shall we? All that meets the eye Is sky and stars, stars and sky. Points of light with black between Hang like a painted scene Motionless, no nearer there Than on Earth, everywhere Equidistant from our ship. Heaven has given us the slip. Hush, be still. Outer space Is a concept, not a place. Try no more. Where we are Never can be sky or star. From prison, in a prison, we fly; There's no way into the sky. Books Mentioned: The Secular Scripture by Northrop Frye A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On The Literary Life podcast today, our hosts continue their discussion of C. S. Lewis' science fiction novel Out of the Silent Planet, covering chapters 6-15. Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks begin by sharing their commonplace quotes, including some heated debate about sausages, then dive in to this section. They start by looking at Ransom's need to let go of some of his own modern preconceptions and categories, in spite of being steeped in the classics. Angelina, Thomas, and Cindy also discuss a variety of other themes, including: the contrasts between Lewis and Tolkien in world-building, Lewis' crafting a medieval tale in the genre of modern science fiction, and the problems with Ransom's anthro-centric perspective. House of Humane Letters is thrilled to announce an all new webinar from Dr. Jason Baxter coming October 31st! Register today for Can Dante's Inferno Save the World? Also coming up from House of Humane Letters on November 16, 2023, Jennifer Rogers' webinar on Tolkien and The Old English Tradition. You can sign up nowand save your spot! Commonplace Quotes: It is to me inconceivable that Nature as we see it is either what God intended or merely evil; it looks like a good thing spoiled. C. S. Lewis, from Letters of C. S. Lewis What do you usually do when you are shut up in a secret room, with no chance of getting out for hours? As for me, I always say poetry to myself. It is one of the uses of poetry–one says it to oneself in distressing circumstances of that kind, or when one has to wait at railway stations, or when one cannot get to sleep at night. You will find poetry most useful for this purpose. So learn plenty of it, and be sure it is the best kind, because this is most useful as well as most agreeable. Edith Nesbit, from The House of Arden Lewis began the trilogy as a conscious critique of what he called “Wellsianity,” a philosophy that applies Darwinism to the metaphysical sphere, believing that humans may evolve into a new species of gods, spreading from world to world and galaxy to galaxy. Though one finds this quasi-religious belief sometimes called “Evolutionism” in Olaf Stapledon, G. B. Shaw, and C. H. Waddington, Lewis found it most fully embodied in Wells' novels, and he set out to produce a Wellsian fantasy with an anti-Welsian theme. Lewis' Ransom books contrast so sharply from other stories of space voyages that Robert Scholes and Eric S. Rabkin credit him with inventing a new genre: “anti-science fiction.” from Reading the Classics with C. S. Lewis, edited by Thomas L. Martin A Selection from “I Saw Eternity the Other Night” by Henry Vaughn I saw Eternity the other night, Like a great ring of pure and endless light, All calm, as it was bright; And round beneath it, Time in hours, days, years, Driv'n by the spheres Like a vast shadow mov'd; in which the world And all her train were hurl'd. Books Mentioned: Kingsley Amis William Morris 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 www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On this week's episode of The Literary Life, we bring you another installment in our “Best of” Series. 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 MorningTimeforMoms.com. 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 Brown Kill 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 MacDonald There 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 Levet by 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: 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 morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/CindyRollinsWriter. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

“There can be no great art without great fable. Great art can only exist where great men brood intensely on something upon which all men brood a little. Without a popular body of fable there can be no unselfish art in any country. Shakespeare's art was selfish till he turned to the great tales in the four most popular books of his time…” James Masefield, as Quoted by Charlotte Mason, Vol. 6, Toward a Philosophy of Education Show Summary: Today on the New Mason Jar, Cindy and Dawn welcome back previous guests Angelina Stanford and Timilyn Downey to cover some questions listeners had about Episode 60: The Building Blocks of Story Is there an objective answer to the question “What is art?” What do we mean when we say literature is art? Why do we say fairy tales are the building blocks of story? What is the danger of not giving children a foundation in myths, fairy tales and the Bible? Is it ever too late to develop a taste for these stories? What is the difference between historical fiction and literature? How does a wide and varied literary education add to our understanding of story?   Let us take it to ourselves that great character comes out of great thoughts, and that great thought must be initiated by great thinkers; then we shall have a definite aim in education. Thinking and not doing is the source of character. Charlotte Mason, Toward a Philosophy of Education   Books Mentioned: Northrop Frye C. S. Lewis J. R. R. Tolkien The Adventures of Robin Hood by Roger Lancelyn Green The Three Little Pigs by Paul Galdone Beowulf trans. by Burton Raffel English Literature for Boys and Girls by H. E. Marshall   Find Cindy, Angelina, and Timilyn: Morning Time for Moms Cindy's Patreon Discipleship Group Mere Motherhood Facebook Group The Literary Life Podcast Cindy's Facebook Cindy's Instagram House of Humane Letters Angelina's Facebook Angelina's Instagram The Literary Life Online Conference 2023

Welcome to another episode of our “Best Of” Series on 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“. 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 Mason The 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 Milton by 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 https://www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On The Literary Life podcast today, our hosts Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins and Thomas Banks discuss chapters 7-10 of C. S. Lewis' The Great Divorce. Angelina points out the way in which Lewis uses the “newcomer” character to explain the world he has created. They discuss the various personalities Lewis presents who choose not to take the journey to heaven, sharing how these sketches often hit a little too close to home. They also talk about the influence of George MacDonald on Lewis and his role in this story. Thomas helps us make some connections with Lewis and Virgil, as well as explaining some of the references made by MacDonald's character. Cindy points out how our loves can be entryways into either heaven or hell. Join us again next week as we finish up our discussion of The Great Divorce together! There is still time to sign up for Thomas' upcoming mini-class on G. K. Chesterton taking place live from June 26th through July 7th. Register at HouseofHumaneLetters.com today! Commonplace Quotes: Meanwhile, you will write an essay on self-indulgence. There will be a prize of half a crown for the longest essay, irrespective of any possible merit. Evelyn Waugh Shame belongs, rather, to the bookish recluse who knows not how to apply his reading to the good of his fellows or to manifest its fruit to the eyes of all. Cicero It is simply my lifelong experience—that men are more likely to hand over to others what they ought to do themselves, and women more likely to do themselves what others wish they would leave alone. Hence both sexes must be told “Mind your own business,” but in two different senses! C. S. Lewis To a Skylark by William Wordsworth Ethereal minstrel! pilgrim of the sky! Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound? Or, while the wings aspire, are heart and eye Both with thy nest upon the dewy ground? Thy nest which thou canst drop into at will, Those quivering wings composed, that music still! Leave to the nightingale her shady wood; A privacy of glorious light is thine; Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood Of harmony, with instinct more divine; Type of the wise who soar, but never roam; True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home! Book List: Letters to an American Lady by C. S. Lewis Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh Pro Archia Poeta by Cicero Farmer Giles of Ham by J. R. R. Tolkien The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams George MacDonald Surprised by Joy by C. S. Lewis Psychomachia by Prudentius Holy Living and Dying by Jeremy Taylor Satires of Circumstance by Thomas Hardy 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 morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On The Literary Life podcast today, our hosts Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins and Thomas Banks discuss chapters 2-6 of C. S. Lewis' The Great Divorce. Angelina reminds us as we begin this exploration of Lewis' narrative not to read too much theology into the details of this dreamlike world he creates. Cindy points out the similarities between these chapters and his descriptions at the end of The Last Battle. Thomas highlights the passage on Napoleon from chapter 2, showing what Lewis envisioned hell to be like. Angelina, Cindy and Thomas talks about the description of the land near heaven, the various characters' responses, as well as the weight of the actual environment and Lewis' picture of those who people it. Be sure to check out Thomas' upcoming mini-class on G. K. Chesterton taking place live from June 26th through July 7th. Register at HouseofHumaneLetters.com today! Commonplace Quotes: We long for paradise because we were created for paradise. We were created to live in an environment that cooperates with, not fights against, our desires. We were created for Eden, a place we've never been, and so we desire a perfect life full of healthy relationships. Julie Sparkman Anyone who puts himself forward to be elected to a position of political power is almost bound to be socially or emotionally insecure, or criminally motivated, or mad. Auberon Waugh “The secret is not to dream,” she whispered. “The secret is to wake up. Waking up is harder. I have woken up and now I am real. I know where I come from and where I'm going. You cannot fool me anymore. Or touch me. Or anything that is mine.” Terry Pratchett The Stricken Deer by William Cowper I was a stricken deer, that left the herd Long since; with many an arrow deep infixt My panting side was charg'd, when I withdrew To seek a tranquil death in distant shades. There was I found by one who had himself Been hurt by th' archers. In his side he bore, And in his hands and feet, the cruel scars. With gentle force soliciting the darts, He drew them forth, and heal'd, and bade me live. Since then, with few associates, in remote And silent woods I wander, far from those My former partners of the peopled scene; With few associates, and not wishing more. Here much I ruminate, as much I may, With other views of men and manners now Than once, and others of a life to come. I see that all are wand'rers, gone astray Each in his own delusions; they are lost In chace of fancied happiness, still wooed And never won. Dream after dream ensues, And still they dream that they shall still succeed, And still are disappointed; rings the world With the vain stir. I sum up half mankind, And add two-thirds of the remainder half, And find the total of their hopes and fears Dreams, empty dreams. The million flit as gay As if created only like the fly That spreads his motley wings in th' eye of noon To sport their season and be seen no more. Book List: Unhitching from the Crazy Train by Julie Sparkman Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett “Unspoken Sermons: The Last Farthing” by George MacDonald The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis The Personal Heresy by C. S. Lewis and E. M. Tillyard East of Eden by John Steinbeck The Weight of Glory by C. S. Lewis Tramp for the Lord by Corrie Ten Boom Paradise Lost by John Milton The Brook Kerith by George Moore 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 morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On The Literary Life podcast today, Cindy Rollins, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks begin their series on The Great Divorce by C. S. Lewis. Today you are going to get a crash-course in Medievalism through Lewis' story, and we hope you will enjoy this book as much as our hosts do. Angelina kicks off the discussion even while sharing her commonplace quote, sharing some information about the epigraph and front matter. She gives us some historical context, both for where this books comes in Lewis' own timeline, as well as some ideas of the journey of the soul and medieval dream literature. Thomas gives some background on Prudentius and his allegorical work The Psychomachia. Angelina goes into some comparisons between The Great Divorce and Dante's Divine Comedy. Thomas talks about Nathanial Hawthorne's short story The Celestial Railroad as a satire of Pilgrim's Progress. Also, if you haven't read and listened to E. M. Forster's Celestial Omnibus, see Episode 17. As they get into discussing the Preface, Thomas give us some information on William Blake. We will be back next week with a discussion on Chapters 2-6. Be sure to check out Thomas' upcoming mini-class on G. K. Chesterton taking place live from June 26th through July 7th. Register at HouseofHumaneLetters.com today! Commonplace Quotes: We do not obtain the most precious gifts by going in search of them but by waiting for them. Man cannot discover them by his own powers and if he sets out to seek for them he will find in their place counterfeits of which he will be unable to discern the falsity. Simone Weil, from “Reflections on the Right Use of School Studies with a View to the Love of God“ A poet is not a man who says “look at me”, but rather a man who points at something and says “look at that.” C. S. Lewis No, there is no escape. There is no heaven with a little of hell in it–no plan to retain this of that of the devil in our hearts or our pockets. Out Satan must go, every hair and feather. George MacDonald, from “Unspoken Sermons: The Last Farthing“ MCMXIV by Philip Larkin Those long uneven lines Standing as patiently As if they were stretched outside The Oval or Villa Park, The crowns of hats, the sun On moustached archaic faces Grinning as if it were all An August Bank Holiday lark; And the shut shops, the bleached Established names on the sunblinds, The farthings and sovereigns, And dark-clothed children at play Called after kings and queens, The tin advertisements For cocoa and twist, and the pubs Wide open all day– And the countryside not caring: The place names all hazed over With flowering grasses, and fields Shadowing Domesday lines Under wheat's restless silence; The differently-dressed servants With tiny rooms in huge houses, The dust behind limousines; Never such innocence, Never before or since, As changed itself to past Without a word–the men Leaving the gardens tidy, The thousands of marriages, Lasting a little while longer: Never such innocence again. Book List: The Princess and Curdie by George MacDonald The Personal Heresy by C. S. Lewis and E. M. Tillyard The Aeneid by Virgil The Divine Comedy by Dante Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan The Holy War by John Bunyan Ourselves by Charlotte Mason A Preface to Paradise Lost by C. S. Lewis The Scarlett Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne Songs of Innocence and Experience by William Blake Paradise Lost by John Milton Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett That Hideous Strength by C. S. Lewis The Weight of Glory by C. S. Lewis 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 morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life podcast with Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins and Thomas Banks, we have a very special episode for you. Our hosts are joined by guests Dan Bunting and Anthony Dodgers, both of whom are pastors, for a discussion on why pastors should read fiction books. Dan is also host of the the Reading the Psalms podcast. Angelina starts off the conversation by asking why these men would prioritize taking literature classes. Anthony shares about his own literary life journey and how rediscovering literature has helped him personally. Dan talks about the book club that he and a couple of his pastor friends have and what kinds of books they read together. They discuss many other deep topics and crucial questions that we hope will be encouraging and thought-provoking to everyone who listens to and shares this episode. If you want to get the replays of the 2022 Back to School Conference, “Education: Myths and Legends” with special guest speakers Lynn Bruce and Caitlin Beauchamp, along with our hosts Cindy Rollins, Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks, you can learn more at Morning Time for Moms. Commonplace Quotes: If education is beaten by training, civilization dies. C. S. Lewis, from “Our English Syllabus” How am I a hog and me both? Flannery O'Connor He who has done his best for his own time has lived for all times. Freidrich Schiller Whoever wants to become a Christian, must first become a poet. St. Porphyrios of Kafsokalivia It is hard to have patience with those Jeremiahs, in press or pulpit, who warn us that we are “relapsing into paganism”. It might be rather fun if we were. It would be pleasant to see some future Prime Minister trying to kill a large and lively milk-white bull in Westminster Hall. But we shan't. What lurks behind such idle prophecies, if they are anything but careless language, is the false idea that the historical process allows mere reversal; that Europe can come out of Christianity “by the same door as in she went”, and find herself back where she was. It is not what happens. A post-Christian man is not a Pagan; you might as well think that a married woman recovers her virginity by divorce. The post-Christian is cut off from the Christian past, and therefore doubly from the Pagan past. C. S. Lewis, from “De Descriptione Temporum” A Boy in Church by Robert Graves ‘Gabble-gabble, . . . brethren, . . . gabble-gabble!' My window frames forest and heather. I hardly hear the tuneful babble, Not knowing nor much caring whether The text is praise or exhortation, Prayer or thanksgiving, or damnation. Outside it blows wetter and wetter, The tossing trees never stay still. I shift my elbows to catch better The full round sweep of heathered hill. The tortured copse bends to and fro In silence like a shadow-show. The parson's voice runs like a river Over smooth rocks, I like this church: The pews are staid, they never shiver, They never bend or sway or lurch. ‘Prayer,' says the kind voice, ‘is a chain That draws down Grace from Heaven again.' I add the hymns up, over and over, Until there's not the least mistake. Seven-seventy-one. (Look! there's a plover! It's gone!) Who's that Saint by the lake? The red light from his mantle passes Across the broad memorial brasses. It's pleasant here for dreams and thinking, Lolling and letting reason nod, With ugly serious people linking Sad prayers to a forgiving God . . . . But a dumb blast sets the trees swaying With furious zeal like madmen praying. Book List: Put Out More Flags by Evelyn Waugh Asterix Comics by René Goscinny Tin Tin by Herge Sigrid Undset Giants in the Earth by Ole Rolvaag Roald Dahl A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle John Donne George Herbert The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carré Graham Greene Alfred Lord Tennyson The New Oxford Book of Christian Verse edited by Donald Davie Waiting on the Word by Malcolm Guite Word in the Wilderness by Malcolm Guite Neil Gaiman Bill Bryson Ursula Le Guin Terry Pratchett Reflections on the Psalms by C. S. Lewis 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 morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

This week on The Literary Life Podcast our hosts, Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks, continue discussing P. G. Wodehouse's Code of the Woosters together, covering chapters 5-9 today. They share some similarities in Wodehouse's work to Shakespearean and Roman comic characters. Some of these stock characters are the couple, the helpful servant, the unhelpful servant, the irritable old man, and more. Angelina shares her take on Wodehouse's ability to complicate the comedic form. Cindy makes a comparison between the ease created by habits in life and form in stories. Delighting in Wodehouse's skill to turn a phrase, our hosts share many humorous passages throughout this episode, so be sure to stay tuned to the end to catch it all. Find annotations for the slang, quotes, etc., for The Code of the Woosters here. To find out more about Thomas' summer class on G. K. Chesterton and sign up for that, go to houseofhumaneletters.com. To register for Cindy's summer discipleship session, visit morningtimeformoms.com. Commonplace Quotes: The gentleness and candour of Shakespeare's mind has impressed all his readers. But is impresses us still more the more we study the general tone of sixteenth-century literature. He is gloriously anomalous. C. S. Lewis He wrote to Sheran: What do you find to read these days? I simply can't cope with the American novel. The most ghastly things are published and sell a million copies, but good old Wodehouse will have none of them and sticks to English mystery stories. It absolutely beats me how people can read the stuff that is published now. I am reduced to English mystery stories and my own stuff. I was reading Blandings Castle again yesterday and was lost in admiration for the brilliance of the author. P. G. Wodehouse, as quoted by Frances Donaldson You notice that popular literature, the kind of stories that are read for relaxation, is always very highly conventionalized…Wodehouse is a popular writer, and the fact that he is a popular writer has a lot to do with his use of stock plots. Of course he doesn't take his own plots seriously; he makes fun of them by the way he uses them; but so did Plautus and Terence. Northrop Frye …when you go to his residence, the first thing you see is an enormous fireplace, and round it are carved in huge letters the words: TWO LOVERS BUILT THIS HOUSE. Her idea, I imagine. I can't believe Wells would have thought of that himself. P. G. Wodehouse, in a letter to William Townend Fashion's Phases by P. G. Wodehouse When first I whispered words of love,  When first you turned aside to hear,  The winged griffin flew above,  The mammoth gaily gamboll'd near;  I wore the latest thing in skins  Your dock-leaf dress had just been mended  And fastened-up with fishes fins –  The whole effect was really splendid.  Again – we wondered by the Nile,  In Egypt's far, forgotten land,  And we watched the festive crocodile  Devour papyrus from your hand.  Far off across the plain we saw  The trader urge his flying camel;  Bright shone the scarab belt he wore,  Clasped with a sphinx of rare enamel.  Again — on Trojan plains I knelt;  Alas! In vain I strove to speak  And tell you all the love I felt  In more or less Homeric Greek; Perhaps my helmet-strap was tight  And checked the thoughts I fain would utter,  Or else your robe of dreamy white  Bewildered me and made me stutter.  Once more we change the mise-en-scene;  The road curves across the hill;  Excitement makes you rather plain,  But on the whole I love you still,  As wreathed in veils and goggles blue,  And clad in mackintosh and leather,  Snug in our motor built for two  We skim the Brighton road together.  Books Mentioned: English Literature in the Sixteenth Century by C. S. Lewis P. G. Wodehouse, A Biography by Frances Donaldson The Educated Imagination by Northrop Frye Arabian Nights trans. by Burton Richard The Renaissance Studies in Art and Poetry by Walter Pater Unnatural Death by Dorothy Sayers 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 morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

On this episode of The Literary Life Podcast with Angelina Stanford, Cindy Rollins, and Thomas Banks, are introducing P. G. Wodehouse's entertaining book, Code of the Woosters. This week they will cover chapters 1-4. Our hosts start the conversation sharing some interesting tidbits about P. G. Wodehouse the man, as well as the Wodehousian world in general. Then they begin discussing the story, highlighting Bertie's code of manners that sets up so many problematic situations and Jeeves' unflappable mastery of every circumstance. Find annotations for the slang, quotes, etc., for The Code of the Woosters here. To find out more about Thomas' summer class on G. K. Chesterton and sign up for that, go to houseofhumaneletters.com. To register for Cindy's summer discipleship session, visit morningtimeformoms.com. Commonplace Quotes: A craftsman is excellent in his craft according to his degree of attainment towards its end and his use of the means toward that end. Now the end of writing is the production in the reader's mind of a certain image and a certain emotion. And the means towards that end are the use of words in any particular language; and the complete use of that medium is the choosing of the right words and the putting of them into the right order. It is this which Mr. Wodehouse does better, in the English language, than anyone else alive, or at any rate, than anyone else that I have read for many years past. Hilaire Belloc Mr. Wodehouse has created Jeeves. He has created others, but in his creation of Jeeves he has done something which may be respectably compared to the the world of the Almighty in Michelangelo's painting. He has formed a man filled with the breath of life…If in, say, fifty years Jeave and any other of the that great company – but in particular Jeeves – shall have faded, then what we have so long called England will no longer be. Hilaire Belloc For Mr. Wodehouse there has been no fall of Man; no ‘aboriginal calamity.' His characters have never tasted the forbidden fruit. They are still in Eden. The gardens of Blandings Castle are that original garden from which we are all exiled. The chef Anatole prepares the ambrosia for the immortals of high Olympus. Mr. Wodehouse's world can never stale. He will continue to release future generations from captivity that may be more irksome than our own. He has made a world for us to live in and delight in. Evelyn Waugh [This critic] has probably by now been eaten by bears, like the children who made mock of the prophet Elisha; but if he still survives he will not be able to make a similar charge against Summer Lightning. With my superior intelligence, I have outgeneraled the man this time by putting in all the old Wodehouse characters under the same names. Pretty silly it will make him feel, I rather fancy. P. G. Wodehouse from In Memoriam A. H. H. by Alfred, Lord Tennyson I held it truth, with him who sings To one clear harp in divers tones, That men may rise on stepping-stones Of their dead selves to higher things. But who shall so forecast the years And find in loss a gain to match? Or reach a hand thro' time to catch The far-off interest of tears? Let Love clasp Grief lest both be drown'd, Let darkness keep her raven gloss: Ah, sweeter to be drunk with loss, To dance with death, to beat the ground, Than that the victor Hours should scorn The long result of love, and boast, `Behold the man that loved and lost, But all he was is overworn.' Books Mentioned: The Man Who Was Thursday by G. K. Chesterton Summer Lightning by P. G. Wodehouse 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 morningtimeformoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB