“Speak friend and enter” – so reads the famous inscription the heroic party encounters at the Doors of Durin, the West-Gate of Moria, in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. At first misinterpreted by Gandalf, the wizard finally realises that no secret password is required – the magical doors give clear instructions: say “friend” (mellon in the Elven language Sindarin) and the gates will open.
In Tolkien’s novel, this episode illustrates the long-forgotten friendship between Elves and Dwarves, who cooperatively built the doors. A sign of friendship, of making the effort of learning each other’s language (and, by extension, their way of thinking and culture) is all that is needed for the doors to open and grant the friendly visitors free access to the Dwarven city of Khazad-dûm.
Free and open access is an idea that researchers of Tolkien and other fantasy authors can embrace whole-heartedly these days, for the Yearbook of the German Inklings Society is now available in Diamond Open Access in our online repository, The Stacks!
The Inklings Society
“Inklings” was the name of a group of Oxford scholars and writers; its best-known members were J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. The Inklings Society for Literature and Aesthetics e.V. (German: Inklings-Gesellschaft für Literatur und Ästhetik e.V.), is dedicated to the discussion and dissemination of the works of these authors and of writers commonly associated with them (in particular, Charles Williams, Dorothy Sayers, George MacDonald and G.K. Chesterton) and to the study of the fantastic in literature, film and the arts in general.
Every year the Inklings Society organizes an international symposium in Germany, the proceedings of which are published in the Inklings Yearbook (German: Inklings: Jahrbuch für Literatur und Ästhetik). The Inklings Yearbook is a forum for scholarly articles on international fantastic literatures past & present, with special regard to the authors of the Oxford Inklings. The articles are not restricted to literary criticism; they also deal with philosophical, theological, sociological and pedagogical aspects, with the arts, music, and the new media. The texts are published in both English and German.
Contents of the Inklings Yearbook
Starting with volume 40, the Inklings Yearbook will be published in our online repository, The Stacks. The current volume was edited by Maria Fleischhack, Patrick Schmitz and Carsten Kullmann and includes the papers held at the 2022 Inklings Symposium in Bochum on the topic of “Religion, Faith and the Fantastic”, as well as a selection of reviews. The texts discussed in this Yearbook range from popular young adult fiction like Kerstin Gier’s Ruby Red trilogy and Leigh Bardugo’s Shadow and Bone to television series such as Supernatural and Star Trek, as well as comic books, British and American fantasy literature, and Japanese myths in anime and games.
You can explore the Inklings Yearbook free of charge and read or download all individual texts as well as a PDF of the whole volume. We are currently in the process of digitizing older editions of the Yearbook as well – volumes 23-27 are available in part already, more will follow soon. Our thanks go out to the editorial board of the Inklings Society for their great cooperation on both of these projects! Here is the landing page for the Inklings Yearbook in our repository.
So, if you are a friend, or mellon, of fantastic literature, proceed like Gandalf and his companions and get access now!
