Creation and Beauty in Tolkien’s Catholic Vision

A Study in the Influence of Neoplatonism in J.R.R. Tolkien's Philosophy of Life as 'Being and Gift'

by Michael Halsall

Book cover: Creation and Beauty in Tolkien’s Catholic Vision

Extent: 296 pages

Publisher: The Lutterworth Press

Subjects: Literary Studies, Philosophy, Religious Studies

Language: English

Paperback (No longer our product)

(September 2020)

ISBN: 9780718895525

5.98 x 9.02 inches

Price: $45.00

In stock

PDF (No longer our product)

(September 2020)

ISBN: 9780718848118

Price: $33.00

An exploration of how Tolkien’s mythology reflects his intellectual background in the philosophical traditions of Roman Catholicism.


This book hopes to invite readers into Tolkien’s world through the lens of a variety of philosophers, of all of whom owe a rich debt to the Neoplatonic philosophical tradition. It places Tolkien’s mythology against a wider backdrop of catholic philosophy and asks serious questions as to the nature of creation alongside the nature of God, what it means to be good, and concerning the problem of evil. This book attempts to set Tolkien alongside both his contemporaries and ancient authors, and how he used similar literary devices in order to express his desire to create a “mythology for England.”

Michael Halsall is a Catholic priest and teaches philosophy at Allen Hall, London.

  • By (author) Michael Halsall

"This is a rich engagement at all levels with Tolkien, full of suggestive comparisons with the tradition of the music of the spheres and with the modernist music of his own time. It is deeply scholarly but clear and accessible. And it is both Catholic in relating Tolkien to Catholic theology, including Maritain, and the Thomism of the early twentieth century, but also in its range of reference, which does full justice to Tolkien's intellectual background and his generosity of spirit, which had room for wild-men and oliphants, wereworms and Barliman's best bitter, all with the mark of createdness upon them, gifted to his readers."From the Foreword by Alison Milbank, University of Nottingham
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