MYTHCON XXXVIII Program Schedule

August 3-6, 2007

Clark Kerr Conference Center, Berkeley, CA

Registration is open in the Administration Building lobby on Friday, August 3, 12 Noon-6:00 PM, and in the Krutch Theatre lobby Friday, 7:00-8:00 PM, and on Saturday, August 4, 8:00-9:00 AM. To register outside of these hours, check the table to see if anyone is stationed there. If not, look for Bonnie Rauscher.

Daytime program items are 60-minute timeslots unless otherwise noted. Program items in 60-minute slots should actually run 45-50 minutes; those in 90-minute slots should run 60 minutes or a bit over.

Programming changes and important announcements will be made at Opening Ceremonies, Saturday evening festivities, and the Banquet, and will be posted on the Official Easel in the Krutch Theatre lobby.

Do-it-yourself programming: Have a topic you’d like to discuss with others or a reading you’d like to give? Announce a time and place on the Unofficial Easel in the Krutch Theatre lobby. We suggest that you gather at meals or in dorm lounges during the daytime. Please do not use unoccupied program rooms for this purpose.

Dealers’ room hours are: Friday, 3:00-6:00 PM; Saturday, 9:00 AM-6:00 PM; Sunday, 9:00 AM-4:00 PM.

The Bardic Circle: This a long-time Mythcon tradition, a round-robin session of poetry and songs that can go on ‘till the wee hours. Gather together your favorite short lyrics (by yourself or others), tune up your instruments, and bring them to the residence hall library each evening.

FRIDAY, August 3

12 Noon Registration opens (Administration Building lobby)

3:00 Dealers’ Room opens (Room 204)

Paper: Taryne Jade Taylor * Forget Bombadil: Who in Helm’s Deep is Goldberry? (Room 203)

3:30 Book Discussion: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Room 102) 90 minutes

4:00 Paper: Amy Clarke * “Real Mages Do It with Their Staffs”: Revising the Erotic Life of Earthsea (Room 203)

5:00 Paper: Robin Anne Reid * Slashing the Fathers: Who's Anxious Now? (Room 203)

Reading: Diana L. Paxson (Room 102)

6:00 Dealers’ Room closes

Registration closes

DINNER(Dining Room) served until 7:00

7:00 Registration reopens (Krutch Theatre lobby) open until 8:00

7:15 Procession (gather outside the Dining Room)

followed by Opening Ceremonies (Room 102), including a dramatization from The Fall of the Kings by Ellen Kushner and Delia Sherman

followed by Opening Night reception (Building 12, 2nd floor Central lounge)

English country dancing * with live music * dancemaster Alan Winston will instruct all these easy and fun dances (Building 12, 1st floor West lounge)

Bardic Circle (Building 12, Library, ground floor South lounge)

Mad Doctor Smith’s Video Laboratory * Shhhh! (Building 12, 1st floor South lounge) Total running time 240 min.

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed - 1926) 65 min.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer - “Hush” (1999) 45 min.

Blood Tea and Red String (2006) 69 min.

The Call of Cthulhu (2005) 47 min.

SATURDAY, August 4

7:00 BREAKFAST(Dining Room) served until 9:00

8:00 Registration opens (Krutch Theatre lobby)

9:00 Registration table closes

Dealers’ Room opens (Room 204)

Paper: Diana Pavlac Glyer, Cathy Hansen, and Hannah Thomas * Adept at Scholarship: Allies and Obstacles in the Field of Inklings Studies (Krutch Theatre)

Paper: Douglas C. Kane * Arda Reconstructed: The Creation of the Published Silmarillion (Room 102)

Paper: Sarah Lynne Bowman * The Great Mother Archetype in Classic and Contemporary Fantasy Fiction (Room 104)

10:00 Paper: Natasha Minnerly * Snowflakes out of Fire: Tolkien’s Anatomy of Joy (Krutch Theatre)

Paper: Mark Hall * The Biography of Conan the Cimmerian: Time to Thank the Editors and Pasticheurs? (Room 102)

Reading: Ellen Klages (Room 104)

11:00 Panel: The Inklings as a Writers’ Group: Collaborators, Critics, or Curmudgeons? (Krutch Theatre)
Mike Glyer (moderator), Diana Glyer, David Bratman, Mike Foster

Paper: Victoria Oldham * Contemporary Mythological Constructions of Gender and the Social Implications of Mythological Female Mastery (Room 102)

Paper: Lisa Padol * Passing the Torch: Masters taking Apprentices in the works of Ellen Kushner (Room 104)

12:00 LUNCH (Dining Room) served until 1:30

1:00 Panel: Becoming Adept: The Journey to Mastery (Krutch Theatre) 90 minutes

Ellen Klages (moderator), Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman, Alexei Kondratiev, John S. Lawrence

Reading: Susan Palwick (Room 104)

2:00 Paper: Romuald Ian Lakowski * “A Wilderness of Dragons”: The Treatment of Dragons in Tolkien’s Children’s Stories and Medieval Literature (Room 102)

Paper: Mike Foster * George Sayer: Pupil, Biographer, and Friend of Inklings (Room 104)

2:30 Panel: Coming of Age: Life in the Interstices (Krutch Theatre) 90 minutes

Lynn Maudlin (moderator), Delia Sherman, Sherwood Smith, Autumn Rauscher, Cat Lenander

3:00 Paper: Karen Sullivan * Gardeners and Thieves: Metaphors for Good and Evil Mastery in The Lord of the Rings (Room 102)

Paper: Donald T. Williams * English Literature in the Sixteenth Century: C.S. Lewis as a Literary Historian (Room 104)

4:00 Panel: Magic in Fantasy: Art, Craft, Science? (Krutch Theatre) 90 minutes
Edith Crowe, Diana Paxson, Lisa Goldstein, Sarah Goodman, Grace Monk

Paper: Deborah Sabo * Tolkien’s Noble Savage: Construction of the Primitive in The Lord of the Rings (Room 102)

Paper: Karla Powell * How Does Awareness Fit into the Journey from Apprentice to Mastery? (Room 104)

5:00 Reading: Ellen Kushner (Room 102)

Paper: Ethan Campbell and Robert Jackson * Good, Not Safe: Structure vs. Chaos in Narnia and the Writing Workshop (Room 104)

6:00 Dealers’ Room closes

DINNER(Dining Room) served until 7:00

7:30 Evening festivities (Krutch Theatre)

Lord of the Ringos * the Tolkien musical that the Beatles would have written * Presented by Lynn Maudlin and Mike Foster

The Not-Ready-for-Mythcon Players will be … not ready.

Thomas the Rhymer * a one-woman show by Ellen Kushner based on her Mythopoeic Fantasy Award winning novel

followed by Hospitality suite (Building 12, 2nd floor Central lounge)

Bardic Circle (Building 12, Library, ground floor South lounge)

Mad Doctor Smith’s Video Laboratory * Kids in Strange Places (Building 12, 1st floor South lounge) Total running time 210 min.

The Cat Returns (Neko no ongaeshi - 2002) 75 min.

The Great Yokai War (Yôkai daisensô - 2005) 124 min.

SUNDAY, August 5

7:00 BREAKFAST(Dining Room) served until 9:00

9:00 Dealers’ Room opens (Room 204)

9:30 Paper: Nancy Martsch * Knighthood in Middle-Earth (Room 104)

Book discussion: Mythopoeic Fantasy Award nominees (Room 102)

10:00 Panel: The Door-Wardens of Fantasy (Krutch Theatre) 90 minutes

Mary Kay Kare (moderator), Alexei Kondratiev, Tom Whitmore, Jacob Weisman, Tim Callahan

10:30 Talk with recorded music: Ellen Kushner * The Making of Sound & Spirit’s “The Lord of the Rings” (Room 104) 90 minutes

11:00 Reading: Jon DeCles (Room 102)

12:00 LUNCH (Dining Room) served until 1:30

1:00 Panel: Fantasy, Reality, Other: Interstitial Imaginary Worlds (Krutch Theatre) 90 minutes

Sherwood Smith (moderator), Delia Sherman, Susan Palwick, Madeleine Robins, Pat Murphy

Paper: Kerrie Le Lievre * If We Can Just Get Through This Part: Rethinking Mastery in Gwyneth Jones Bold as Love Series (Room 102)

Paper: Nicolle Minnerly * The Metafantasy of Middle-earth (Room 104)

2:00 Talk with recorded music: David Bratman * Music and Middle-earth (Room 104) 90 minutes

2:30 Mythopoeic Society Auction (Room 203) (2 ½ hours)

3:00 Reading: Pat Murphy (Room 102)

3:30 Panel: “the lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne...” (Room 104) 90 minutes

Eve Sweetser (moderator), Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman, Jon DeCles, Marjorie Burns

4:00 Reading: Madeleine Robins (Room 102)

Dealers’ Room closes

5:30 Mythcon BANQUET(Dining Room)

Commemoration of The Mythopoeic Society’s 40th anniversary

Presentation of The Mythopoeic Awards

Delia Sherman * Guest of Honor speech

followed by Brocelïande in concert * including settings of Tolkien poems from their renowned album The Starlit Jewel (Krutch Theatre)

followed by Hospitality suite (Building 12, 2nd floor Central lounge)

Bardic Circle (Building 12, Library, ground floor South lounge)

Mad Doctor Smith’s Video Laboratory * Classics Gone Wild (Building 12, 1st floor South lounge) Total running time 210 min.

Pyramus and Thisbe from A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1964) 7 min.

The Cave of Silken Web (Pan si dong - 1967) 86 min.

The Tain (2007) 18 min.

Alice (Neco z Alenky - 1988) 84 min.

MONDAY, August 6

3:13 Sale of College Land (Rubber Room)

7:00 BREAKFAST(Dining Room) served until 9:00

9:00 Reading: G. Ronald Murphy * Gemstone of Paradise: The Holy Grail in Wolfram’s Parzival (Garden Room)

Paper: Skye Cervone * From Elfland to Technological Wasteland: Illuminating the Effect of Lord Dunsany on the Work of J.R.R. Tolkien (Room 102)

10:00 Reading: Delia Sherman (Garden Room)

Paper: David Westlake * Escaping Hell: Williams on the Importance of Relationships (Room 102)

11:00 Mythopoeic Society Members' Meeting (Garden Room)

followed by Closing Ceremonies (Garden Room)

followed by Walking tour of fantastic and historic Berkeley * featuring sites from novels by Beagle, Bradley, Goldstein, Paxson, and others (interested persons should gather outside the dining hall) about 4 hours, beginning with lunch on Telegraph Avenue

Mythcon 38 Panel Descriptions

The Inklings as a Writers’ Group: Collaborators, Critics, or Curmudgeons?

Mike Glyer, Diana Glyer, David Bratman, Mike Foster

Much has been written abut the Inklings as a group of friends, and even of their influence upon each other. What new insights can be gained by viewing them specifically as a writers’ group? Do they fit contemporary definitions of such groups—groups well-known and often very important among today’s genre writers? How do they differ? (Saturday, 11 AM)

Becoming Adept: The Journey to Mastery

Ellen Klages, Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman, Alexei Kondratiev, John S. Lawrence

Fantasy is rich in characters who begin as untrained and ignorant, and gradually develop mastery over their circumstances. What are the stages and the process such characters go through on the journey from beginner to adept, from apprentice to master? Is achieving mastery their goal or is it incidental to some other goal? How do they demonstrate mastery once achieved? (Saturday, 1 PM)

Coming of Age: Life in the Interstices

Lynn Maudlin, Delia Sherman, Sherwood Smith, Autumn Rauscher, Cat Lenander

Adolescence and young adulthood can be viewed as interstitial states—a series of steps on the road to maturity. How is this reflected in children's fantasy? Panelists will consider both the events described and how the books are written for this particular audience. (Saturday, 2:30 PM)

Magic in Fantasy: Art, Craft, Science?

Edith Crowe, Diana Paxson, Lisa Goldstein, Sarah Goodman, Grace Monk

The portrayal of magic is almost synonymous with fantasy literature, but can be portrayed in very different ways. Interpretations run the gamut from art to craft to science/technology to religion and/or mysticism (or combinations thereof). What are the merits and problems of these various approaches, and which writers provide examples of notable successes (or failures) in the treatment of magic? (Saturday, 4 PM)

The Door-Wardens of Fantasy

Mary Kay Kare, Alexei Kondratiev, Tom Whitmore, Jacob Weisman, Tim Callahan

“Welcome, my lords, to fantasy! We are the door-wardens.” How publishers, booksellers, and others shape the fantasy field and guide readers to good work in it. (Sunday, 10 AM)

Fantasy, Reality, Other: Interstitial Imaginary Worlds

Sherwood Smith, Delia Sherman, Susan Palwick, Madeleine Robins, Pat Murphy

In much of the best fantasy, magic takes a secondary role, or it's elusive—is it really there or not? It certainly doesn't operate with mechanistic simplicity or predictability. Kushner's Swordspoint, for example, looks and “feels” like fantasy but has no magic whatever. And what of the elusive but central and subversive role that magic plays in The Fall of the Kings? These not-quite-fantasy worlds (interstitial between fantasy and reality) raise interesting questions. Is it truly a fantasy world without any magic? Do medieval historical novels qualify as fantasy because there's some magic in them? What is the relationship between “imaginary” and “fantasy”? What other works illuminate this categorical confusion? (Sunday, 1 PM)

“the lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne...”

Eve Sweetser, Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman, Jon DeCles, Marjorie Burns

It is not only characters who can be viewed in terms of the journey to mastery. What of the creation of fantasy as a journey to mastery in writers’ own development as creative artists? What highways and byways do writers go down on the way to achieving their own mastery? Some paths may be fairly direct; others more convoluted, wandering along the roads less traveled and into those interesting interstices… (Sunday, 4 PM)

Mythcon 38 Paper Abstracts

Sarah Lynne Bowman

The Great Mother Archetype in Classic and Contemporary Fantasy Fiction

This paper explores the remnants of a particularly potent archetype in fantasy fiction, that of the Great Mother. According to depth psychologist Erich Neumann, religions before the advent of complex civilization worshiped not an omnipotent male deity, but a female god empowered with the ability to both create and destroy. Though the rise of patriarchy split the Great Mother into two aspects, one Beautiful and one Terrible, Her archetype recurs and is extensively explored in certain modern fantasy texts, including Guy Gavriel Kay's The Fionavar Tapestry, J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, and Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Mists of Avalon. These fictional representations of the Great Mother suggest an ambivalence with this symbol of ultimate femininity, straddling the gap between celebratory neo-paganism and orthodox patriarchal monotheism. (Saturday, 9 AM)

Ethan Campbell and Robert Jackson

Good, Not Safe': Structure vs. Chaos in Narnia and the Writing Workshop

C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was the product of an institution with which nearly every contemporary writer is intimately familiar—the writing workshop. The Inklings no doubt shared many traits with today’s workshop readers: a preference for tangible language over the abstract, a focus on structure, and a basic concern for audience and market, among others. All of these issues were on Lewis’s mind as he composed, as he revealed in a 1962 letter about the “rules” of children’s storytelling. As important as structural guidelines and self-imposed limitations are, however, writing remains a mysterious and chaotic process. Finding those places in the novel where Lewis appears to lose control, where his prose breaks free from its predetermined boundaries, can also provide inspiration as we strive to master our own voices. (Saturday, 5 PM)

Skye Cervone

From Elfland to Technological Wasteland: Illuminating the Effect of Lord Dunsany on the Work of J.R.R. Tolkien

When discussing important influences on Tolkien’s work, Lord Dunsany remains largely ignored. This study will carefully trace the influence of Lord Dunsany on J.R.R. Tolkien’s fictional and critical work. Both men were troubled by man’s increasing removal from nature and valued man’s return to nature. This theme was a paramount influence on the work of both authors. Lord Dunsany’s depiction of the realm of Faery was very important to Tolkien’s understanding of that “Perilous Realm.” Using the work of S.T. Joshi this paper will discuss the two authors’ similar concerns and fears about a mechanical age, and the importance of these concerns for their respective works of fiction. Tolkien’s “On Faery Stories” will be used to explore his understanding of the realm of Faery, and highlight Dunsany’s important influence on that understanding. Through close reading striking similarities in the authors’ works of fiction will be explored. (Monday, 9 AM)

Amy Clarke

“Real Mages Do It with Their Staffs”: Revising the Erotic Life of Earthsea

Ursula K. Le Guin’s most recent Earthsea books make much ado about wizardly celibacy. They focus on the disconnection between the power of the mage as embodied in the staff and the “real” work of life. This work involves throwing down the staff and picking up the hoe: husbanding the earth rather than lording over it. Thus when Ged loses his magic—he literally leaves his staff behind—he finds himself a middle-aged virgin, one who must earn a living on the land while discovering the mysteries of sex. These recent books also dismantle the wizard-constructed myth of an afterlife; as in sex, accepting death entails submerging the self in the procreative powers of the earth. In fact, Le Guin’s recent work represents a virtual paradigm shift, a re-imaging of magic, death, and the erotic life of Earthsea. (Friday, 4 PM)

Mike Foster

George Sayer: Pupil, Biographer, and Friend of Inklings

C. S. Lewis described him as “that most unselfish man.” His encouragement led J.R.R. Tolkien to submit The Lord of the Rings to publisher Rayner Unwin. This presentation includes reminiscences and review of Sayer’s C.S. Lewis biography Jack, his recordings of Tolkien reading The Hobbit and the then-unpublished Lord of the Rings and his other essays about Tolkien and Lewis. Prof. Foster’s recollection includes personal accounts of four meetings between 1978 and 1996 in Wheaton, Ill, Oxford and Great Malvern, and their discussions of Tolkien, Chesterton, and Lewis, who was his tutor at Magdalen College, Oxford. (Saturday, 2 PM)

Diana Pavlac Glyer, Cathy Hansen, and Hannah Thomas

Adept at Scholarship: Allies and Obstacles in the Field of Inklings Studies

This is a practical overview of the joys and challenges of research, writing, and publishing on Tolkien, Lewis, and Williams. It is aimed at emerging scholars. We will tackle research questions: What do the Wade Center, Marquette, and the Bodleian have to offer? What research tools should you know about? We'll talk about writing: How do you organize your notes and your drafts? How do you stay productive when you've got a million other things to do? How do you overcome writer's block? And we'll take a look at publishing: How do I get a contract for a book? What will my publisher do (and not do) for me? How much money do authors get anyway? What are the guidelines for getting (and paying for) permission to quote from other sources? How do I handle unpublished material? What challenges are there in dealing with Estates? (Saturday, 9 AM)

Mark Hall

The Biography of Conan the Cimmerian: Time to Thank the Editors and Pasticheurs?

Starting with the Lancer paperback series, readers got a "cradle to grave" account of the life of Conan the Cimmerian (aka Conan the Barbarian). This chronological approach made sense to the series editor, but this was not the way the character was originally developed and written by Robert E. Howard. Howard saw writing the Conan series in much the same as talking to a cowboy—reminisces being told in a fashion to stress the high and exciting moments. For Conan, the stories of his later years were often written contemporaneously with tales of his youth. The stories appeared in Weird Tales essentially in the order that Howard wrote and revised them. The result is that the Conan stories deal less with Conan's character development and more with how his character is expressed to those surrounding him. (Saturday, 10 AM)

Douglas C. Kane

Arda Reconstructed: The Creation of the Published Silmarillion

This paper reveals a tapestry woven by Christopher Tolkien from different portions of his father's work that is often quite mind-boggling, with inserts that seemed initially to have been editorial inventions shown to have come from some remote other portion of Tolkien's vast body of work. Kane demonstrates how material that was written over the course of more than 30 years was merged together. He also makes a frank appraisal of the material omitted by Christopher Tolkien (and in a couple of egregious cases the material invented by him) and how these omissions and insertions distort and often diminish his father's vision of what he considered—even more then The Lord of the Rings—to be his most important work. It is a fascinating portrait of a unique collaboration that reached beyond the grave. (Saturday, 9 AM)

Romuald Ian Lakowski

“A Wilderness of Dragons”: The Treatment of Dragons in Tolkien's Children's Stories and Medieval Literature

In my paper I plan to examine Tolkien's treatment of Dragons in his writings for children, starting briefly with his "Lecture on Dragons" and the treatment of the Sea Serpent and the White Dragon in Roverandom, before going on to treat Chrysophylax in Farmer Giles of Ham, and then finally Smaug in The Hobbit. Since so much has already been written on Smaug, I will limit my discussion of The Hobbit to the new insights that can be gleaned from a reading of The History of the Hobbit. I will examine at least briefly the treatment of Dragons in Beowulf and the Volsunga Saga, and also in medieval folklore, but will also include some less obvious medieval and renaissance "sources" such as Geoffrey of Monmouth and Spenser's Fairie Queene. However, I am more concerned with tracing how Tolkien reshapes this traditional medieval material to create something paradoxically new and original. (Saturday, 2 PM)

Kerrie Le Lievre

If We Can Just Get Through This Part: Rethinking Mastery in Gwyneth Jones Bold as Love Series

In her recent “near-future” fantasy series Bold as Love, Gwyneth Jones interrogates the traditional fantasy theme of the journey to mastery in unique ways. The series follows three characters as they achieve mastery in separate but related fields: the interpersonal or political (Ax Preston); the scientific or spiritual (Sage Pender); and the magical (Fiorinda Slater). This paper examines how, through these characters, Jones redefines not only the idea of the journey to mastery, but also the concept of mastery itself, and questions the consequences of achieving it. It explores why the characters must give up the intense, heightened awareness of reality they experience after achieving mastery in their fields, despite its apparent benefits. And finally, it discusses why Ax, Sage and especially Fiorinda must in the end renounce mastery altogether in order to achieve a greater good. (Sunday, 1 PM)

Nancy Martsch

Knighthood in Middle-Earth

At the Field of Cormallen, Pippin proudly announces “We are knights of the City and of the Mark, as I hope you will observe.” Tolkien uses the word “knight” at various times in his works, to describe a warrior. What constitutes a “knight” in Middle-earth? This paper will first briefly survey European knighthood of the 11-13th centuries, then the careers of Merry and Pippin, Frodo and Sam, in an attempt to define Middle-earth knighthood. How did a person become a knight? What were the training, duties, obligations? What ceremonies (if any) were involved? Can a similar pattern be discerned in the careers of other persons not formally styled “knights”? And, finally, did knighthood exist in the First Age as well? (Sunday, 9:30 AM)

Natasha Minnerly

Snowflakes out of Fire: Tolkien’s Anatomy of Joy

Tolkien writes that joy is the “mark of the true fairy-story.” Joy in fantasy literature is seldom given critical attention and often dismissed it as childish or even insufficiently realistic—escapist. Using The Lord of the Rings this study will examine how fantasy literature expresses theories of joy—not just in the happy ending of the fairy tale, but also the manner in which plot and characters show theories of joy, how authors use language, and how the text itself creates joy in the reader. Tolkien establishes a philosophy of joy, but also enacts it, using characters and plot to dramatize his theories. Belief in the joy of language allows the reader to take an even greater joy in reading works of fantasy. The metafantastical element allows the reader to see our own language, the very words the story is written in, as something wonderful, sublime, and above all, joyful. (Saturday, 10 AM)

Nicholle Minnerly

The Metafantasy of Middle Earth

Works of postmodern metafiction, by highlighting the story as an artifact, may sometimes have the effect of distancing the reader from the story by separating that story from reality. The metafantasy of Middle-earth, however, foregrounds the nature of fantasy in order to show that words are magical, incantatory, and far from being separate from reality, can create realities of their own. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings effectively combines all of the elements of metafantasy, and in doing so illustrates the theory of fantasy he mentions in “On Fairy Stories.” Tolkien shows that the sounds of words, the sounds of voices, words themselves, and language as a whole are capable of communicating meaning to a reader, whether the reader is consciously aware of the effect or not. Legends, stories, and songs, have a similar ability to communicate truths that can allow readers to see their own world with wonder and clarity. (Sunday, 1 PM)

Victoria Oldham

Contemporary Mythological Constructions of Gender and the Social Implications of Mythological Female Mastery

Reading contemporary literature through a gender studies lens allows the reader to see current cultural views of gender construction. Three particular texts, The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown, The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley, and The Incubus by Laurell Hamilton provide very distinct pictures of gender construction through the use of mythological sources. There are three primary myths in these texts: the classical “sacred feminine,” the Arthurian myth, and the vampire myth, all of which examine gender construction and the “proper” roles of women. These three novels contain female characters who learn about themselves and the world around them, becoming, in a way, masters/mistresses of their environments. Yet, we see that in many ways “normative” gender roles continue to prevail. We can see these living myths and gender constructions of female mastery through the texts examined, all of which show the reality of the importance of myth and gender construction. (Saturday, 11 AM)

Lisa Padol

Passing the Torch: Masters taking Apprentices in the works of Ellen Kushner

The archetypal Hero's Journey includes an important step: the hero returns bearing gifts. In the case of a master of a craft, the most precious gift the master can offer is knowledge. This paper will explore the patterns of masters taking, or failing to take, apprentices in Ellen Kushner's Riverside stories, and will examine how certain master-apprentice relationships change the society of Riverside over time, as the torch of knowledge is passed from hand to hand. If time permits, the paper will also examine Kushner's novel Thomas the Rhymer in the context of “The Ballad of True Thomas” and of Kipling's “The Last Rhyme of True Thomas.” (Saturday, 11 AM)

Karla Powell

How Does Awareness Fit into the Journey from Apprentice to Mastery?

The journey to mastery may not be specifically and consciously chosen. In this case the decision-maker is often the master recognizing something in the apprentice and either forcing the journey or placing the apprentice in a situation that sets them on the journey. The apprentice may not even realize that within the journey they are working towards mastery. How is the journey created for the Pevensie children by C.S. Lewis in his Narnia stories? Who made the choice? When, if ever, did the children recognize the journey’s purpose? When, and how, did they achieve mastery? Did they understand the purpose once the journey ended? And most importantly, how does the journey affect their lives in both of the worlds in which they find themselves? (Saturday, 4 PM)

Robin Anne Reid

Slashing the Fathers: Who's Anxious Now?

Bloom's theory of influence focuses on how [male] writers respond to strong [male] predecessors. I disrupt the boundaries he draws around "writers" and "literature" and replace his examples with original fantasy and slash fiction written by women which are strong responses to Tolkien's influence. I focus on homosocial, homoerotic, and homosexual relationships between men as portrayed in Ellen Kushner's and Delia Sherman's novel, The Fall of the Kings and selected slash stories from The Lord of the Rings fandom. I redefine "slash" to describe specific genre conventions and define a mode of discourse. If fans "slash" characters from a novel they love but find lacking, one can argue that Kushner and Sherman have slashed genre conventions in a genre they love but find lacking—in gender relations, sexuality, power and vulnerability. I argue for the possibility that slashing, as a type of "queering," works across boundaries between original fiction and fan fiction. (Friday, 5 PM)

Deborah Sabo

Tolkien’s Noble Savage: Construction of the Primitive in The Lord of the Rings

Tolkien’s portrayal of Ghân-buri-Ghân and the Wild Men was influenced by academic sources, popular imagery, and the intellectual atmosphere of a University. From the medieval wild man, through Neanderthal Man, to contemporary primitive man, the inhabitants of Drúadan Forest find their heritage. With elements drawn from the noble savage motif, adventure novels, and social anthropology and prehistoric archaeology, the Wild Men present an amalgam, not a reproduction of any single influence. Ghân-buri-Ghân’s linguistic style, though coded “primitive,” is rooted in a long literary and popular tradition. By pairing unlovely appearance with admirable skills and character, Tolkien breaks the noble savage stereotype. His “othering” of the Wild Men, contextualized for his time, can be understood not as marginalization, but as a statement against empire, and as insistence on self-determination for the least powerful people in a multicultural world. (Saturday, 4 PM)

Karen Sullivan

Gardeners and Thieves: Metaphors for Good and Evil Mastery in The Lord of the Rings

Power in Middle-earth is often described as a physical object—something that can be “given”, “stolen”, or “wielded”. However, good and evil powers are “obtained” in different ways. In Tolkien’s world, mastering good power is “receiving an inheritance” or “bearing the burden” of leadership, magic, or other power. Evil mastery, on the other hand, consists of “seizing” power by force, or “stealing” it by trickery. But evil power is fickle. Evil power can come alive and turn on its former masters— “possessing” them and “devouring” them like a wild animal. Good powers are described as plants rather than animals. These powers have “roots” and can either “bloom” or “wither”. Good powers are “cultivated” by benevolent leaders, but evil “blight” or “disease” can attack these carefully cultivated plants, and “thieves” are always waiting to steal their fruits. Learn how to tell the gardeners from the thieves among the powerful of Middle-earth! (Saturday, 3 PM)

Taryne Jade Taylor

Forget Bombadil: Who in Helm’s Deep is Goldberry?

This paper will discuss Goldberry’s predecessors in myth, archetypal aspects, and investigate the nature of her home; then uncover her undervalued purpose in the LOTR. Discussing Bombadil, Tolkien notes that in a story “there must be some enigmas…Tom Bombadil is one.” If Bombadil is an enigma, Goldberry is more so. She is not, in Steuard Jensen’s terms, “a relatively simple character” (11). Tolkien hints that “an explanation already exists” for the enigmas in his work. Scholars who lightly dismiss Goldberry and lump her together with Bombadil are overlooking Goldberry as another well-conceived piece of Tolkien’s intricate mythology. I will examine Goldberry as a character to discover “an explanation that already exists” within Tolkien’s legendarium. In doing so, I will rely on the LOTR, The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, The Silmarillion, and The Book of Lost Tales I, and secondary sources such as The Letters, the Carpenter biography, and critical essays. (Friday, 3 PM)

David Westlake

Escaping Hell: Williams on the Importance of Relationships

Charles Williams, writing during the long weekend between the two World Wars, wrestled with the existential question of aloneness and alienation. Much of the philosophy of the time emphasized the absolute experience of being thrust into a world alone without meaning. For Williams, this path only led one to experience deep disconnection. Once reached, this level of isolation pushed one to move further and further away from the world and ultimately into a state of such self-absorption that relationships became impossible creating a personal hell. Williams pointed to another road of finding meaning; it came through contact and compassion for others, only through this gate could one escape the path to personal hell. (Monday, 10 AM)

Donald T. Williams

English Literature in the Sixteenth Century: C.S. Lewis as a Literary Historian

C. S. Lewis’s most substantial work of literary scholarship, English Literature in the Sixteenth Century, Excluding Drama has been praised as brilliant and criticized as unsound. Valued for its learning, its enthusiasm, its insight, and its engaging style, it has been criticized (often by the same scholars) for a misleading set of period labels and an unbalanced portrait of Renaissance Humanism. A reexamination of Lewis’s book will show that the praise it has received is fully justified and the criticism partially so. When all its merits and weaknesses are fully weighed, it remains a testimony to a more humane approach to literary study we would do well to recapture. (Saturday, 3 PM)