George MacDonald: Victorian Mythmaker

George MacDonald (1824-1905) is often considered the father of the modern fantasy novel. He influenced practically all the masters of the genre, including J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Madeline L'Engle, Neil Gaiman, and others. C.S. Lewis wrote, "I have never concealed the fact that I regarded him as my master; indeed I fancy I have never written a book in which I did not quote him." And, "What he does best is fantasy--fantasy that hovers between the allegorical and the mythopoeic. And this, in my opinion, he does better than any man." Lewis acknowledged MacDonald's work as uneven in quality, but calls the following titles the "great works": PHANTASTES, THE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN, THE PRINCESS AND CURDIE, THE GOLDEN KEY, THE WISE WOMAN, LITITH. (Many MacDonald scholars recommend beginning with THE GOLDEN KEY, followed by the Curdie books.) There are three major biographies of MacDonald: GEORGE MACDONALD AND HIS WIFE, by the author's son, Greville MacDonald (1924); GEORGE MACDONALD, by fellow Scot William Raeper (1987)George Macdonald; and the above work by Rolland Hein, America's leading MacDonald scholar. All three have their strengths; no MacDonald scholar or serious fan would want to do without any one of the three. Hein, Professor Emeritus of English at Wheaton College, brought decades of research and teaching to the task. A distinguishing element of Hein's biography is his extensive use of information and quotations from MacDonald's largely unpublished letters housed at Yale University. Hein is one of a handful scholars who have an intimate familiarity with these letters (Another is Glenn Edward Sadler; see his AN EXPRESSION OF CHARACTER: THE LETTERS OF GEORGE MACDONALD, 1994An Expression of Character: The Letters of George Macdonald). Hein's balanced approach and breadth of information make this the MacDonald biography to read if you are going to read only one. Perhaps it is also the best one to read first before enjoying the unique perspectives of MacDonald's son and of Raeper, whose family comes from MacDonald's home town of Huntly, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. I'd like to briefly recommend three other books by Hein: THE HARMONY WITHIN: THE SPIRITUAL VISION OF GEORGE MACDONALDThe Harmony Within: The Spiritual Vision of George Macdonald, CHRISTIAN MYTHMAKERSChristian Mythmakers: C.S. Lewis, Madeleine L'Engle, J.R.R. Tolkien, George MacDonald, G.K. Chesterton, and Others, and GEORGE MACDONALD:IMAGES OF HIS WORLD. This last title is a coffee-table style pictorial biography illustrated with approximately 140 color pictures of the places MacDonald lived in and wrote about, from his birth place in Huntly to his grave site in Italy. The photographs capture much of the beauty of nature so present in MacDonald's fiction. It also includes a chronology, a complete bibliography, and quotations, chosen by Hein, that serve as captions for the pictures. Many of these are from the letters and have not been published elsewhere. Hein'