The Inklings Variety Hour

The Magician's Nephew, Part 1: Of Rings and Ringing

Happy Sixth Season of The Inklings Variety Hour!

Would you like a present to mark the occasion? One of these fine rings, perhaps?

No, not the green ones. No, I don't care if it's St. Patrick's Day. You. Can't. Have. The. Green. Ones. 

But have a yellow ring. No, seriously, go for it. Why are you hesitating?

But that's preposterous. They won't make you disappear. What do you think this is, The Hobbit?

Why does it always come back to rings? I say none of this on today's episode, but perhaps it's that the Inklings knew that rings bind you to someone else. Or something else. 

In this case, the Wood Between the Worlds? Or Faerie? Or to your evil and intimidating uncle who is a mad magician-scientist with a furnished room that you don't know about and a dead fairy godmother named Mrs. Lefay?

What's up with the strange parallels in this book, anyway? You've got children in England exploring inside because it's rainy. You've got Uncle Andrew and Jadis making essentially the same speeches. You've also got the wood between the worlds and the crawlspace between houses, as well as the troubling ways in which Digory resembles his uncle--both of whom, by the way, end up technically responsible for sending children to another world when they're old men. But what kind of an old man who sends children into peril will Digory grow up to be? The sort who thinks rules don't apply to him, or the sort who makes endless inside jokes with himself about Plato? Character matters.

To talk about some of these riddles, or at least allude to them as we talk about things that are probably more interesting, I have Dr. Luke Mills. Join us on a whirlwind tour through Edwardian England, tunnels behind houses, Guinea Pig paradises that maybe aren't good for humans, and desolate worlds with very strange women among very strange waxworks that definitely aren't good for humans. (Seriously, though, what are the waxworks?)

This may be your last chance to travel to Charn before Netflix ruins it forever with Pink Floyd or the 1950s or whatever-the-[deplorable word] a Barbie auteur wants to put in there.

Among other things, Luke and Chris talk about the figure of Lilith--and why this account of Jadis' origin may not differ so much from that given in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. We also discuss ways to tell whether or not that special someone in your life may not, in fact, be evil.

Let's dive in! Or wonder, till it drives you mad, what would have followed...etc., etc.

 

Tolkien's Father Christmas Letters (Rebroadcast)

Enjoy this gently used Christmas gift from Ghost of Inklings Variety Hours Past!

I think this may be from 2020. 

It's an Inklings Variety Hour Jovial Christmas Extravaganza!  Featuring:

A Discussion of J.R.R. Tolkien's Letters from Father Christmas!

Chris Pipkin and his children, Davey and Virginia!  

Anika Smith! (First half of show) 

Meagan Logsdon!  (Second half of show) 

A cringeworthy impersonation of an old British person by Chris Pipkin!

Bits of music by Steeleye Span and Maddy Prior (The Boar's Head Carol), and Martin Romberg (A Elbereth Gilthoniel), (as well as Virginia Pipkin).

Pipkins' Christmas site promoted: 12tide.com

Thanks for listening to us this year!  As always, if you enjoy this podcast, recommend it to a friend and give us a review on iTunes.  And please do feel more than free to drop us a line at InklingsVarietyHour@gmail.com.  We'd love to hear from you!  Merry Christmas.

Twelve Tide (Pipkin Book) (Rebroadcast)

O.G. Host Anika Smith rejoins the podcast to interview Chris and his beautiful and omnicompetent wife, Glencora, about their new Christmas resource book, Twelve Tide. 

Part of what we're trying to do with this book is make Christmas less a single-morning present binge preceded by anxiety and followed by anticlimax--and more a season of twelve days of giving, feasting, and learning to celebrate better.

Want an idea of what's in the book? Check out our website, 12tide.com. It is likely that if you order now, you will not receive the book before Christmas, but you can find all of the content on our website and order the book (if you like) in time for subsequent days of Christmas (the season lasts until January 6, after all). 

We are all Niatirbians now (and Lewis was dismayed by godless Christmas cards).  We want to reconcile sacred and "secular" aspects of Christmas and equip people with some old ways to celebrate this season. 

Music from this episode includes:

• George Winston's "The Holly and the Ivy"
• Bing Crosby's "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas"
• Loreena McKennitt's "The Holly and the Ivy"
• Choir of Christchurch's "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing"
• Loreena McKennitt's "Gloucestershire Wassail"
• The Chieftains' "Boar's Head Carol"
• Maddy Prior's "Coventry Carol"
• Medieval Baebes' "Adam Lay Ybounden"
• Maddy Prior's "Wassail!"

Also, if you're interested in the Twelve Tide Spotify list Anika suggested on the show, here it is.

Stay tuned...I'm done with grading and I'm turning my attention to an Inklings Christmas Carol.  Won't be easy to finish in time, but I'll do my level best.  If you are interested in reading a part for it, feel free to email me at inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com

God bless and keep you this Advent Season. See you at Christmas!

An Inklings Christmas Carol (Rebroadcast)

All three parts of 2023's Christmas play are edited together. Enjoy, and Merry Christmas.

Previous description:

Enjoy a (Zoom) table reading of my "play" (loosely defined), "An Inklings Christmas Carol."  

Special thanks to Anika Smith, Sørina Higgins, Joe Hoffman, and Ed Powell for reading this episode.  Thanks in general to Sørina's Author's Circle, which you can find out more about (and even join) here. 

Hope you enjoy it--keep in mind this is a first draft, none of us are professional actors, and I'm not making a cent off this episode! As with any holiday movie or play, if you keep your expectations low, you'll have a pretty good time!

Feel free to send me feedback at inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com.  And please rate the show if you like it!

By the way, if you want more Christmas resources from the Pipkins, you can find our Christmas site here: https://12tide.com/

Between Interpretation and Imagination: C.S. Lewis and the Bible

Dr. Leslie Baynes joins Chris to talk about her new book, Between Interpretation and Imagination: C.S. Lewis and the Bible. 

Among other things, we discuss:

• Lewis' familiarity with (and attitude toward) the Bible, before and after his conversion.
• Biblical scholars (like Gore) who influenced Lewis' views of Scripture.
• Lewis and the doctrine of inerrancy
• The trouble with the liar/lunatic/Lord trilemma.
• John and the Synoptics.
• Biblical allusions in Narnia (and Lewis' other imaginative work).

Also:

• Footnotes versus endnotes!
• Epigraphs!
• Bertie Wooster!
• Evangelion and Potatoes at Beaversdam!

A big thank-you to Dr. Baynes for a great conversation. Click here to purchase her book.

Questions? Comments? Concerns? Crumpets? Email me at inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com

 

We'll have a few Christmas episodes (mostly rebroadcasts), but this marks the end of Season 5. We'll put a few more bonus episodes out in the next months, then pick back up in March with Season 6.

Shameless self-promotion: 

If, in the meantime, you feel starved for Pipkin-related content, you can feel free to buy the book Chris and his wife, Glencora, have written about celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas: Twelve Tide. If you want a free, blog-based version, just go to 12tide.com, and feel free to sign up for our email list while you're at it.

 

Also, there's always this, from Chris' (or Dr. Pipkin's) recent King Arthur class. 

Rebroadcast: The Gangurru of Lantern Waste

Cryptids in Narnia! Happy Halloween!

A parody of the excellent Camp Monsters podcast.

Apologies for posting this twice--people with Apple Podcasts didn't seem to be getting it, so I'm trying again with a new file!

inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com

 

Rebroadcast: The Gangurru of Lantern Waste

Rebroadcast:

Cryptids in Narnia!

Parody of the excellent Camp Monsters podcast.

Happy Halloween!

Feel free to email us at

inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com

if you have other ideas for Narnia fan fiction (such as that Caspian the Werewolf one).

C.S. Lewis Ruins the Renaissance (OHEL Intro)

Dr. Katherine Wyma joins me to discuss C.S. Lewis' longest and most ambitious undertaking: The Oxford History of English Literature in the Sixteenth Century, Excluding Drama.

Or, as he called it, the OHEL. It lay, he said, "like a nightmare on my chest."

It's a brilliant work of scholarship, and we highly recommend it. But just in case you can't make it through 700 pages of paradigm-shattering, witty and insightful prose about the greatest (and worst) poets of the sixteenth century, we've got you covered. We'll be discussing the highlights from the Introduction here, and from subsequent chapters in subsequent podcasts.

So, put on your best pair of pantaloons and join us for this romp through what used to be called the Renaissance (but isn't usually anymore, thanks in part to Lewis).

Today, we'll cover just the introduction to his work, entitled: New Learning and New Ignorance. 

Questions? Concerns? Criticisms? Compliments? Complaints? Condolements? Candy?

Email us at inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com.

 

First Animated Hobbit

Connor Salter joins me to talk about the first "animated" Hobbit, made by Rembrandt Films in 1966 to allow the studio to hold onto the rights for the film.

Feel free to watch it here before you listen! It is...something.

By the way, I am aware of the fact that the sound is not ideal in this, and I apologize for some of the problems in quality. I am taking steps (as soon as possible) to remedy this.

As always, feel more than free to email me at inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com. Thank you for listening, and I'd love to hear from you.

By the way, I have no idea why my software cut off the music at the end, but it seems to have. Hopefully no one was too bothered by that.

Narnia for Grown-Ups: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe

Dr. Sørina Higgins joins me to talk about The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe and why adults should read it.

If you enjoyed this conversation and would like to take Sørina's course on the same, go here: https://wyrdhoard.com/2025/07/18/come-through-the-wardrobe-with-me/

We get into a lot of really interesting subjects related to Narnia here, and The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe in particular. I don't have time to detail them in the show notes this time.

See you in two weeks! There will be far less of a break between seasons this year, as I still have plenty of material to share (and quite a few upcoming conversations). It's just a matter of finding time to edit as the school year begins.

Stay tuned!