Myth and Folklore

Breaking the rules of fantasy: Alan Garner’s The Owl Service at 50

* This is the original first draft of my Times Literary Supplement article “Alan Garner’s The Owl Service at fifty”. The published version (which appeared on 21 August 2017 to celebrate 50 years from the publication of this novel) is…

By Dimitra Fimi | 17th October 2021 | Alan Garner, Children's Fantasy, Children's Literature, Fantasy Literature, Myth and Folklore, Welsh myth an folklore | No Comments |

Celtic Myth in Contemporary Children’s Fantasy wins Mythopoeic Award!

I was absolutely thrilled to find out a couple of months ago that my recent monograph, Celtic Myth in Contemporary Children’s Fantasy, had won the Mythopoeic Scholarship Award in Myth and Fantasy Studies! This is my second Mythopoeic Award: my…

By Dimitra Fimi | 18th November 2019 | Alan Garner, Awards, Books, Celtic Myth, Children's Fantasy, Children's Literature, Fantasy Literature, Folklore, Henry Neff, Irish myth and folklore, Lloyd Alexander, Myth and Folklore, Welsh myth an folklore | No Comments |

Demiurgic Beings: A Platonic word in Tolkien

Back in 2016, I was very privileged to watch the “lost recordings” from J.R.R. Tolkien’s 1968 interview for the BBC. Those were previously unbroadcast offcuts from a filmed interview with Tolkien by John Izzard, a small part of which had…

By Dimitra Fimi | 5th May 2019 | Interviews, Myth and Folklore, Tolkien, Uncategorized | No Comments |

Sailing to the West: The Fall of Arthur, Beowulf, and Tol Eressea (Keynote Lecture for Oxonmoot 2017)

The last few years have seen the publication of two of Tolkien’s works that scholars and serious fans have known about for a very long time: Tolkien’s unfinished alliterative poem The Fall of Arthur[i] and Tolkien’s prose translation of Beowulf…

By Dimitra Fimi | 23rd September 2018 | Beowulf, Celtic Myth, Fantasy Literature, Myth and Folklore, The Fall of Arthur, Tolkien | No Comments |

Tolkien TV interview for TRT World

Yesterday I gave a brief interview on J.R.R. Tolkien for the Turkish TV channel TRT World. It’s now available on YouTube and can be accessed here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=90OMuDIbliA

By Dimitra Fimi | 4th September 2018 | Interviews, Media, Myth and Folklore, The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien | No Comments |

Celtic Myth in Contemporary Children’s Fantasy in the 2018 Mythopoeic Awards Finalists!

I have just found out that my latest monograph, Celtic Myth in Contemporary Children’s Fantasy (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), has been shortlisted for the Mythopoeic Scholarship Award in Myth and Fantasy Studies! The Mythopoeic Awards are divided into four categories, two for fiction, and…

By Dimitra Fimi | 26th May 2018 | Alan Garner, Awards, Books, Celtic Myth, Children's Fantasy, Children's Literature, Fantasy Literature, Folklore, Henry Neff, Irish myth and folklore, Lloyd Alexander, Myth and Folklore, Welsh myth an folklore, Worldbuilding | No Comments |

Forthcoming talks and lectures: Glasgow, Kalamazoo, Essex, Oxford and North Wales

The next few months are going to be a bit hectic! If you are attending any of the conferences or events below, don’t hesitate to come and say hello! 26-27 April – Keynote for GIFCon (Glasgow International Fantasy Conversations) 2018: ‘In the…

By Dimitra Fimi | 23rd April 2018 | Academic Teaching, Books, Celtic Myth, Children's Fantasy, Conferences, Fantasy Literature, Folklore, Irish myth and folklore, Literature Wales, Myth and Folklore, Public Lecture, Tolkien, Welsh myth an folklore | No Comments |

Ursula K. Le Guin: In Memoriam

I was saddened this morning to hear about the death of Ursula K. Le Guin, one of the giants of fantasy literature, and an author I have written about and taught for many years. I was asked to write a…

By Dimitra Fimi | 24th January 2018 | Children's Fantasy, Fantasy Literature, Myth and Folklore, Ursula K. Le Guin, Worldbuilding | No Comments |

New article on J.R.R. Tolkien’s Father Christmas Letters in The Conversation

I had a new (festive) article published yesterday on the The Conversation, titled: “J.R.R. Tolkien’s Christmas letters to his children bring echoes of Middle-earth to the North Pole”. In this article I discuss the letters from Father Christmas Tolkien sent…

By Dimitra Fimi | 22nd December 2017 | Children's Fantasy, Children's Literature, Christmas, Invented Languages, Myth and Folklore, The Hobbit, Tolkien | No Comments |

Alan Garner’s The Owl Service has its 50th anniversary today!

One of the books I’ve worked with very closely during the last few years is Alan Garner’s The Owl Service. Garner’s creative re-use of the tale of Lleu, Blodeuwedd, and Gronw from the Welsh Mabinogion made it a prime candidate…

By Dimitra Fimi | 21st August 2017 | Academic Teaching, Alan Garner, Books, Celtic Myth, Children's Fantasy, Children's Literature, Fantasy Literature, Myth and Folklore, Welsh myth an folklore | No Comments |

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