Dear John Howe,
I was recently watching the making of the Lord of the Rings again and wished to send this to you and Alan Lee. You were both given great talent in artistry. In the Genesis tale of the Fall of Man, the serpent is generally portrayed as a snake. Yet one of the punishments given the serpent is to crawl on its belly. Well if we were talking about a garden snake it might say. “Great. no problemo, thanks for nothing”. If you were talking about a serpent, that is to say a dragon such as you two have so often wonderfully drawn the rebuke makes far more sense with the tempter now rendered wingless and cast from the heavens. This idea of a dragon as the source or symbol of great evil is seen across many, it seems to me all cultures. I apologize that I am neither an artist nor one who may comment knowledgeably on other’s art. That said, personally, I have never seen in art the serpent of the Garden of Eden portrayed as a dragon, a portrayal which I would say is entirely consonant with the text.
Like the Pieta and other portrayals signifying and commemorating the sacrifice of the Messiah, the Fall of Man is a quite serious and disturbing topic occurring within the context of the redemption of Man. To put it another way as JRR Tolkien once said (if my memory is not a myth) “Christianity is the myth that came true”. As the Alpha and Omega Jesus the Messiah would have in some sense been witness to all that happened, while our ancient for-bearers might not, I would say likely could not, have recognized the evil the serpent was relaying or it would have been rejected.
So the cartoon version is the serpent of Eden was a dragon as attested in varied cultures and strongly hinted at in the text. The more correct version is it is a most serious topic, outside of myth the story of whatever the tragic fall of man actually was, which you might care to ruminate on and illustrate for us with your considerable talents. I don’t know if I would want to, or find it too disturbing. It is enough to, as the great Italian mystic Padre Pio said, “work pray and be happy”. All that said to cut to the chase, you both have wonderfully drawn many dragons. I would say Genesis tells the most dramatic story of a dragon, I kinda bet you would like to illustrate it.
Kind Regards,
Paul “Duffy”
I was recently watching the making of the Lord of the Rings again and wished to send this to you and Alan Lee. You were both given great talent in artistry. In the Genesis tale of the Fall of Man, the serpent is generally portrayed as a snake. Yet one of the punishments given the serpent is to crawl on its belly. Well if we were talking about a garden snake it might say. “Great. no problemo, thanks for nothing”. If you were talking about a serpent, that is to say a dragon such as you two have so often wonderfully drawn the rebuke makes far more sense with the tempter now rendered wingless and cast from the heavens. This idea of a dragon as the source or symbol of great evil is seen across many, it seems to me all cultures. I apologize that I am neither an artist nor one who may comment knowledgeably on other’s art. That said, personally, I have never seen in art the serpent of the Garden of Eden portrayed as a dragon, a portrayal which I would say is entirely consonant with the text.
Like the Pieta and other portrayals signifying and commemorating the sacrifice of the Messiah, the Fall of Man is a quite serious and disturbing topic occurring within the context of the redemption of Man. To put it another way as JRR Tolkien once said (if my memory is not a myth) “Christianity is the myth that came true”. As the Alpha and Omega Jesus the Messiah would have in some sense been witness to all that happened, while our ancient for-bearers might not, I would say likely could not, have recognized the evil the serpent was relaying or it would have been rejected.
So the cartoon version is the serpent of Eden was a dragon as attested in varied cultures and strongly hinted at in the text. The more correct version is it is a most serious topic, outside of myth the story of whatever the tragic fall of man actually was, which you might care to ruminate on and illustrate for us with your considerable talents. I don’t know if I would want to, or find it too disturbing. It is enough to, as the great Italian mystic Padre Pio said, “work pray and be happy”. All that said to cut to the chase, you both have wonderfully drawn many dragons. I would say Genesis tells the most dramatic story of a dragon, I kinda bet you would like to illustrate it.
Kind Regards,
Paul “Duffy”