(RNS) — The ethos of every modern generation might be defined by its literary movements. The Scriblerus Club of early 18th-century Britain was characterized by wit and satirical bite. The Romantics of the next century embraced free love and radicalism. The Modernists were distant and erudite. The Beat Generation was nothing if not roving, free-spirited and hedonistic.
Now we are seeing the rise of the Fantasy Generation. This is the generation that came of age in the early 2000s amid the “Lord of the Rings” film franchise based on the books by J.R.R. Tolkien. As a result of the fan culture made possible by the parallel rise of the internet, Tolkien’s epic story in all its forms and deliveries — print, e-book, audio book, cable, streaming and endless memes — is omnipresent. Tolkien is now considered the “father of fantasy,” and his imitators — good, poor and in between — are infinite.
The official ascent of the Fantasy Generation may well be marked by the nomination of JD Vance for vice president of the United States.
Vance, as recently reported by Politico, has been deeply influenced personally and politically by “The Lord of the Rings,” as have, seemingly, many young conservative men. (Although, to be sure, it’s not just men: One young trad wife who announced on X that she calls her husband “sir” notes in her profile that she is “made for the shire.”) The fantasy genre, after all, deals in big sweeping themes such as good versus evil, the hero’s journey and epic adventures.
These are good and important ideas, of course, ones found in the tradition of great books across time. But such themes seem to hold a particular appeal for younger generations who’ve grown up in the hinter years of what philosopher Charles Taylor describes as an age of disenchantment, which is one of the main features of what Taylor calls a secular age.
The older, presecular age was one in which the modern distinctions between natural and supernatural didn’t exist the way we define them. Spirits, angels and demons were recognized as being in and part of our world. Everything from the cosmos to a lucky outcome in a card game was imbued with meaning. So was each person. Yet, paradoxically, ordinary individuals didn’t feel the weight of some great need to “change the world” or “do big things for God”—likely because God and his world were big enough already, and those in the presecular world saw themselves as part of a larger, sacred tapestry of life and meaning. But today, even believers can absorb the sense of disenchantment in the ordinary world and, missing the sacred, seek affirmation for it wherever it might be found.
“The Lord of the Rings” by J.R.R. Tolkien. (Courtesy image)
Enter fantasy.
Fantasy is a reminder that the spiritual realm is real and present.
Precisely because it fills such a great hunger in our current day, fantasy seems particularly vulnerable — perhaps by no fault of its own — to misreading, bad reading and manipulative readings. (So, too, is the Bible, not coincidentally.)
“The Lord of the Rings” is often read by either side of the political aisle as advancing that side’s own view. For if the world is a black and white battle between good and evil, then surely one’s own side is good and the other evil.
Politico, linking Vance to others within Tolkien fandom with “rightward nationalism,” quotes Vance as saying, “A lot of my conservative worldview was influenced by Tolkien.” While there is some element of Tolkien’s Catholic faith that might justly be called conservative, there is little, traditionally, in it that would find expression in a movement encapsulated in the phrase “Make America Great Again.” Hobbits, after all, are the antithesis of “greatness” in Tolkien’s Middle-earth.
Thus, some on social media expressed surprise at Vance’s appropriation of the fantasy series for the GOP agenda. One pointed out that Tolkien’s entire vision centers on “sending small, helpless creatures to defeat overwhelming power by giving power up.” Another noted that the series’ theme directly contradicts the politics of the ends justifying the means: “Samwise Gamgee is wise enough to realize that one small garden of a free gardener is all his need and due, not a garden swollen to a realm.”
Tolkien’s good friend C.S. Lewis famously cautioned against manipulative readings like those used to advance partisan politics. In “An Experiment in Criticism,” Lewis says that “unliterary” approaches to reading tend toward “using” rather than “receiving” literary texts. To use literature rather than receive it is to read it badly.
“Make America Great Again” tells a story that is rooted in an idealized version — a bad fantasy — of good versus evil. Good and evil certainly exist. Spiritual realities — both within and around us — play a part in these battles, to be sure. Yet, most of our everyday battles in ordinary life — including national elections and politics — consist not of Sauron versus Frodo, but rather of complicated people, situations and issues that are mixtures of good and bad. Complex people and their stories require the nuance of an expansive language to understand and tell. Indeed, Tolkien himself argued that “Fantasy is a thing best left to words, to true literature.”
“Fantastic forms are not to be counterfeited,” Tolkien cautioned. “Men dressed up as talking animals may achieve buffoonery or mimicry, but they do not achieve Fantasy.”
The line between buffoonery (or mere cosplay) and true myth can be fine.
Loving a story and loving a story well — by reading it well and receiving it faithfully — are not the same thing. This is true of the stories about Middle-earth and the heavens and the earth. Loving well — like wisdom itself — comes with the knowledge that only time and experience can bring. “Frodo,” after all, comes from an Old English word meaning “wisdom by experience.”
Tolkien defined Fantasy as “the making or glimpsing of other worlds.” The power in making or glimpsing worlds outside our own is twofold: one, so we can better see and set our own world aright, and two, so that we can better imagine the world to come. And that world — that kingdom — is already at hand. It is enchanting because of its real presence.