If you’d like to explore the Book of Kells, Ireland’s greatest medieval work of art (one the Vikings somehow missed), the entire work has now been made available online in digital form, thanks to the Trinity College Library, here.
Hat tip to Open Culture, where I got the link.
Loren Eaton writes, “We love Aslan breaking endless winter’s chill grip on Narnia and Aragorn being crowned King Elessar and Christ the Bridegroom triumphing over that serpent of old. Yet in appreciating these good tales, we’ve largely ignored what Frye calls ‘the story of winter,’ those narratives that slide from bliss into torment.”
On Story Warren, he is writing about tales of winter and the virtues of exposing children to downbeat stories. It reminds me of the beautiful animated movie, The Secret of Kells, and how my girls didn’t like it. It also makes me wonder what we would have gotten if Lewis had written of the story in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe as a trilogy–longer, deeper, and probably darker because winter would have lasted for two books at least.
Jeffrey Overstreet writes, “I finally saw The Secret of Kells. Wow. I haven’t been so hypnotized and enthralled by animation in a very long time. It’s remarkable how, in this era of increasingly lifelike digital animation and 3D, something that seems handmade can still work the most powerful magic.”
He interviews critic Steven D. Greydanus, because he’s troubled by the film. “Had I just watched a film about The Book of Kells that never once acknowledged what is written on the book’s pages?”
