Brian Murphy > Quotes

“His essay “Epic Pooh,” originally published in 1978, skewered Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, and Richard Adams (author of Watership Down) for, among other perceived offenses, writing the equivalent of coddling, consolatory, nursery-room tales for grownups, stories that reinforced the paternalism of the establishment: I suppose I respond so antipathetically to Lewis and Tolkien because I find this sort of consolatory Christianity distasteful, a fundamentally misanthropic doctrine. … It is moderation which ruins Tolkien’s fantasy and causes it to fail as a genuine romance. … The Lord of the Rings is much more deep-rooted in its infantilism than a good many of the more obviously juvenile books it influenced. It is Winnie-the-Pooh posing as an epic (126–127).”
― Brian Murphy, Flame and Crimson: A History of Sword-and-Sorcery