Phantastes: A Faerie Romance for Men and Women

George MacDonald

Mar 2021 · Masterpiece Book 403 · LA CASE Books · AI-narrated by Madelyn (from Google)

About this audiobook

In MacDonald's fairy tales, both those for children and (like this one) those for adults, the "fairy land" clearly represents the spiritual world, or our own world revealed in all of its depth and meaning. At times almost forthrightly allegorical, at other times richly dreamlike (and indeed having a close connection to the symbolic world of dreams), this story of a young man who finds himself on a long journey through a land of fantasy is more truly the story of the spiritual quest that is at the core of his life's work, a quest that must end with the ultimate surrender of the self. The glory of MacDonald's work is that this surrender is both hard won (or lost!) and yet rippling with joy when at last experienced. As the narrator says of a heavenly woman in this tale, "She knew something too good to be told." One senses the same of the author himself.

About the author

George MacDonald (1824 1905) is well known for writing fantasy and fairy tales that have inspired notable authors such as J. R. R. Tolkien, W. H. Auden, Madeleine L Engle, G. K. Chesterton, Elizabeth Yates, Mark Twain and C. S. Lewis. The Scottish author once served as pastor of Trinity Congregational Church, Arundel, and later was also engaged in ministerial work in Manchester. He eventually settled in London and taught at the University of London, and lectured successfully in the United States during 1872 1873. MacDonald was also editor of "Good Words for the Young" for a time."