Episode 329: "On Fairy Stories" Revisited with Jenn Rogers
The Literary Life Podcast
Angelina Stanford
4.7 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 19 May 2026
⏱️ 116 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On today's episode of The Literary Life, our hosts Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks are joined by Jenn Rogers for a new discussion of "On Fairy Stories" by J.R.R. Tolkien. After sharing some opening commonplace quotes, Jenn gives us background and context for how "On Fairy Stories" comes to us today. She talks about the conversations being had by Tolkien and other philologists and folklorists that set the stage for this essay. Angelina highlights the idea of the Tree of Tales and its importance to understanding all of literature. Other topics they discuss together include sub-creation, the soup of story, the real versus the ordinary, recovery and escape, plus so much more!
Don't forget to check out everything going on over at HouseofHumaneLetters.com to stay up to date on all the upcoming new summer classes and webinars, including Heather Goodman's May webinar on Mary Poppins.
To view the full show notes for this episode, please visit https://theliterary.life/329.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is not just another book chat podcast. |
| 0:21.6 | Lifelong reader Cindy Rollins joins teachers Angelina Stanford and Thomas Banks for an ongoing conversation about the skill and art of reading well. |
| 0:32.6 | Explore the lost intellectual tradition and discover how to fully enter end to the great works of literature. |
| 0:40.2 | Learn what books mean while delighting in the sheer joy of imagination. Each week, we will rescue |
| 0:47.1 | story from the ivory tower and bring it to your couch, your kitchen, and your commute. The literary life is for everyone because in the |
| 0:55.9 | words of Stratford Caldecott, to be enchanted by story is to be granted a deeper insight into |
| 1:02.2 | reality. Join us for an ever-unfolding discussion of how stories will save the world. |
| 1:09.7 | This is the Literary Life Podcast. |
| 1:31.2 | Hello and welcome back to the Literary Life podcast. |
| 1:36.3 | I'm Angelina Stanford, and here with me is my favorite and only partner in crime, |
| 1:38.1 | the mysterious Mr. Banks. |
| 1:39.9 | Whoa, did I say Mr. Branks? |
| 1:40.3 | You did. |
| 1:44.8 | It's Mr. Branks, the doppelganger of Mr. Banks. |
| 1:47.4 | I'm stepping out on Mr. Banks with Mr. Branks. |
| 1:47.9 | Hello, hello. |
| 1:49.6 | Whatever my surname happens to be. |
| 1:59.3 | Today, we are revisiting on fairy stories, the speech slash essay by J.R.R.R. Tolkien. |
| 2:20.1 | And I got to say, all those R's is just so hard for me to say. I kind of run out of steam like halfway through the R's. I just want to call him J.R. But he probably wouldn't like that. Towers. I don't, we don't know each other well enough, I think, to go I don't like it when right, when, you know, contemporary podcasters, critics, professors, get on a first name basis with people they've never actually met. Another one is, well, it's not a first name basis with a person, |
| 2:25.4 | but when people call Les Miserables, Le Mise. Oh, wow. I mean, there's nothing, there's nothing wrong with |
| 2:30.5 | that. It just bothers me for some reason. Did I call him Professor Tolkien? Is that better? |
| 2:34.9 | Showing him the proper better? Air on the side of, air on the side of too much seriousness, maybe. |
... |
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