J.R.R. Tolkien Chapel with Peter Kreft

J. R. R. Tolkien

Tolkien was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.He served as the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College, Oxford, from 1925 to 1945 and Merton Professor of English Language and Literature at Merton College, Oxford from 1945 to 1959. He was a close friend of C. S. Lewis—they were both members of the informal literary discussion group known as the Inklings. Owing to the influence of Tolkien and other Inkling members, Lewis embraced Christianity at the age of 32.While many other authors had published works of fantasy before Tolkien, the great success of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings led directly to a popular resurgence of the genre and a number of films released by New Line Cinema, directed by Peter Jackson. Tolkien is popularly identified as the "father" of modern fantasy literature—or, more precisely, of high fantasy.

Peter Kreft, Professor of Philosophy, Boston College

Peter Kreeft, Ph.D., is a professor of philosophy at Boston College and at the King's College (Empire State Building), in New York City. He is a regular contributor to several Christian publications, is in wide demand as a speaker at conferences, and is the author of over 67 books including The Philosophy of Tolkien: The Worldview Behind The Lord of the Rings. In it Kreeft takes the reader on a voyage of discovery into the philosophical bones of Middle earth. He organizes the philosophical themes in The Lord of the Rings into 50 categories, accompanied by over 1,000 references to the text. Since many of the great questions of philosophy are included in the 50-theme outline, this book can also be read as an engaging introduction to philosophy. For each of the philosophical topics in The Lord of the Rings, Kreeft presents tools by which they can be understood.