By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
The Valkyries are a key part of Norse myth. But who are the Valkyries, and what role do they play in the stories of northern Europe? Many of us are familiar with the piece of music by the German composer Richard Wagner, ‘Ride of the Valkyries’, which has been used countless times in films (most famously in Francis Ford Coppola’s Vietnam war film, Apocalypse Now). But where did the Valkyries ‘ride’, and why?
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘The Remarkable Rocket’ is one of the fairy tales for children written by the Irish author Oscar Wilde (1854-1900). It was published in the 1888 collection The Happy Prince and Other Tales.
‘The Remarkable Rocket’ is about a firework which is set to be let off as part of the spectacular wedding celebrations held in honour of a prince and princess, but because he cries and makes himself damp, he doesn’t go off. Instead, he is set off by two boys and his great explosion is witnessed by no one.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘The Ice Palace’ is a short story by the American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940), originally published in the Saturday Evening Post in May 1920. The story is about a southern belle who becomes engaged to a man from the North; however, she almost freezes to death in an ice palace at a winter carnival and this leads her to rethink the engagement.
Among other things, ‘The Ice Palace’ is about the North-South divide in the United States and the differing attitudes and outlooks Northerners and Southerners have.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
Although it was a last-minute addition, the myth of the Fisher King plays an important part in one of the greatest poems of the twentieth century: T. S. Eliot’s modernist poem The Waste Land (1922). But what is the story of the Fisher King, and what is its meaning and significance? Who was the Fisher King, and where did the myth originate?
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘What is Enlightenment?’, full title ‘Answering the Question: What is Enlightenment?’, is a 1784 essay by the philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804). As the longer title suggests, Kant’s essay is a response to a question (posed by a clergyman, Reverend Johann Friedrich Zöllner) concerning the nature of philosophical enlightenment.
What is enlightenment, and how best might it be achieved in a civilised society? These are the key questions Kant addresses, and poses answers to, in his essay, which can be read in full here. Below, we summarise the main points of his argument and offer an analysis of Kant’s position.