Finding the Numinous

An Ecocritical Look at Dune and The Lord of the Rings

Willow Wilson DiPasquale

• Publisher: The Kent State University Press
• Year: 2025
• Print ISBN: 9781606354926
• eBook ISBN: 9781631015670
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism in Science Fiction
• Index: Literature

Analyzing how the mythopoeic fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien and Frank Herbert portray the natural world

Finding the Numinous explores the premise that the environments depicted in The Lord of the Rings and the Dune saga are not only for the purpose of world-building; rather, these imagined worlds' environments are sacred spaces fundamental to understanding these texts and their authors' purposes. Willow Wilson DiPasquale applies Tolkien's three functions of fantasy—recover, escape, and consolation—to demonstrate how both authors' works are intrinsically connected to their ecocritical messages and overarching moral philosophies.

This book also compares Tolkien's Roman Catholic viewpoint with Herbert's Zen Buddhist perspective, arguing that the authors' religious beliefs and biographical, historical, and cultural influences impacted how they chose to craft their creative works and write about nature.

Applying various ecocritical positions to the text, Finding the Numinous explores descriptions of the natural landscapes in both authors' texts, as well as the relationships characters and communities have with those natural spaces. As our current society's relationships with nature are increasingly challenged and changed by various ecocrises, DiPasquale convincingly argues, these worlds offer readers various environmental models to critique, to condemn, or, in some cases, to adopt.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 Mirrors and the Numinous: Mythopoeia, Ecocriticism, and Sacred Nature
• 2 Forests and Deserts: Tolkien’s and Herbert’s Landscape Descriptions
• 3 Halflings and Harkonnens: How Middle-earth and Dune’s Communities Model Environmentalism
• 4 Nature’s Voice: Language in the Legendarium and Duniverse
• 5 “To Hold Communion with Living Things”: The Lives and Beliefs of Tolkien and Herbert
• Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index