“A Rumour of Adventure” by Kees Paling

It’s May 1938. Four friends embark upon a spring walk, something various members of their group usually do. This time, since the tradition is England, they choose Somerset. This walk is different from its predecessors; the threat of Germany is hanging over Czechoslovakia, and at least two members of the group still have strong memories of the horrors of the Great War.  

The four are members of the Inklings, a group of Oxford dons and various friends who usually meet twice a week at The Eagle and Child pub in in one of the member’s rooms in Magdalen College. The four are C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Owen Barfield, and Charles Williams. A Rumour of Adventure by Kees Paling is the fictional account of such a walk, which never occurred in that year with those participants (Williams wouldn’t become associated with the Inklings until more than a year later). But this is fiction, a novella or short novel, in fact, so it’s okay to invent.

 

It's a charming and engaging story, true to the teachings, beliefs, and personalities of the four. Paling has done a considerable amount of reading and study to get this as right as he does. And that includes works they wrote and biographies and accounts about them.

 

Kees Paling

Of course, the four don’t just walk; they stop at pubs and drink a lot of beer (and hey drink a lot of beer, except for Williams, who drinks a lot of tea). And they talk. Oh, how they talk. 

Their conversations about literature, writing, the growing threat in Europe, imagination, the faerie folk, and more is the heart of the story, and this is what makes the account so true to the real people. And while Tolkien in particular likes his adventures in oral and written stories only, the four will experience an adventure or two along the way. While it’s tempting to compare, the adventures bear almost no similarity to that of the four hobbits in The Lord of the Rings. Note that I said “almost.”

 

Paling has published several books in Dutch on subject ranging from the fall of Prussia and culture on the eve of the new millennium to learning problems in children. He’s contributed to several books on communication and published a rather vast number of newspaper articles. He received a degree in sociology from Utrecht University, served as a lieutenant and counsellor at the Dutch Royal Military Academy, and worked at the Dutch Ministry of Culture and Netherlands Institute for Social Research. He serves as a communication consultant for the Dutch government.

 

A Rumour of Adventure is a delightful story of four men who were good friends and companions in writing (it was Lewis who so strongly encouraged Tolkien to writ The Hobbit and the work that Tolkien called “The New Hobbit”). As the story makes clear, they were also teachers, great conversationalists, and beer drinkers (lots of beer). 

 

Some Monday Readings

 

Does America Still Do Federalism? – Tony Woodlief at Law & Liberty.

 

Cui Bono? – Alan Jacob at The Homebound Symphony.

 

Notes on the Great Vibe Shift – Ian Leslie at The Ruffian.

 

Is Atlas Shrugged the New Vibe? – Henry Oliver at The Common Reader.

 

Shrouded Veterans: The Untold Struggles of an Iowa Colonel’s Widow – Frank Jastrzembski at Emerging Civil War.