The Lantern Hall
Painting: an ancient lexicon open on a carved lectern in a dark chapel of books, glowing runes and symbols lifting off its pages like fireflies.
TermLiterature term1939

Eucatastrophe

The sudden, joyous turn in a story when all seems lost, such as the eagles' arrival or the Ring's destruction. Tolkien considered it the highest function of fairy-story: a glimpse of joy beyond the walls of the world.

The sudden, joyous turn in a story when all seems lost, such as the eagles' arrival or the Ring's destruction. Tolkien considered it the highest function of fairy-story: a glimpse of joy beyond the walls of the world.

Origin

Coined by J. R. R. Tolkien, from the Greek eu (good) plus catastrophe, in On Fairy-Stories, based on a 1939 lecture.

Quick answers

What does "Eucatastrophe" mean?
The sudden, joyous turn in a story when all seems lost, such as the eagles' arrival or the Ring's destruction. Tolkien considered it the highest function of fairy-story: a glimpse of joy beyond the walls of the world.
Where does the term "Eucatastrophe" come from?
Coined by J. R. R. Tolkien, from the Greek eu (good) plus catastrophe, in On Fairy-Stories, based on a 1939 lecture.

Nearby in the archive

J. R. R. Tolkien

Author1892–1973

An Oxford philologist who invented languages, then a world for them to be spoken in — and, with The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, supplied the elves, dwarves, orcs and halflings of every roleplaying game since.

Secondary world

Literature term1939

An invented world with its own consistent laws, which the reader enters imaginatively and believes in while inside. Tolkien contrasted it with the Primary World of real life and argued that making one well is a genuine art.

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The Lord of the Rings

Novel1954–1955

A hobbit carries the Dark Lord's ring across a dying world to destroy it — the twelve-year epic that defined high fantasy and handed the tabletop and computer RPG their races, rangers and quests.

Painting: a round green door set into a grassy hillside burrow at golden hour, a brass knob in the center, flowers and a winding lane.

The Hobbit

Novel1937

A comfortable, pipe-smoking hobbit is hired as a burglar by thirteen dwarves and walks out of his round green door into the adventure that invented modern fantasy's map.

Fairy-Tale Fantasy

Literature genre1858

Fantasy built from the stuff of Once Upon a Time — Grimm, Perrault and Andersen stretched into novels, turned inside out, and handed back to adults with the teeth left in.

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