Celebrating Middle-earth: The Lord of the Rings as a Defense of Western Civilization

In Celebrating Middle-earth six writers explore the important place that J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings occupies in the literary, political and religious traditions of Western society. Those writers are: John West, Peter Kreeft, Janet Blumberg, Joseph Pearce, Kerry Dearborn and Phillip Goggans. Each discusses the deeper message beneath the story.

1. John G. West, Jr. is Associate Professor of Political Science at Seattle Pacific University and a Senior Fellow at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute. His publications include The Politics of Revelation and Reason, The C.S. LewisIUdia, The Encyclopedia of Religion in American Politics, and The Theology of Welfare.

2. Peter Kreeft is Professor of Philosophy at Boston College and author of more than twenty-five books, including Back to Virtue, Between Heaven and Hell, Love is Stronger than Death, C.S. Lewis for the Third Millennium, and Heaven: The Heart's Deepest Longing.

3. Janet Leslie Blumberg is Professor of English (Emeritus) at Seattle Pacific University. Her scholarship has focused on Medieval and Renaissance literature.

4. Joseph Pearce is Writer-in-Residence at Ave Maria College in Michigan and co-editor of the St. Austin Review. He is author of such books as Tolkien, Man and Myth: A Literary Life, Solzhenitsyn: A Soul in Exile, Wisdom and Innocence: A Life of G.K. Chesterton, and Literary Converts.

5. Kerry L. Dearborn is Associate Professor of Theology at Seattle Pacific University. She has special interests in the writings of George MacDonald and the Christian imagination.

6. Phillip Goggans is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Seattle Pacific University. His main scholarly interests are ancient philosophy and natural law theory.