The World’s Greatest Novels

These two works of fiction have stood the test of time:

I discuss here two of the greatest novels ever written, but I must begin by way of a slight detour. I will get to the two novels shortly and explain why they are the greatest, but first, a bit of some autobiographical and personal information.

I miss my late wife for many reasons (and simply typing this now again starts the water works). But one thing that actually first drew me to her when I met her in the Netherlands back in 1979 was the fact that she loved books and she loved reading.

I thought: ‘Hey, that’s me: I love books and reading too!’ Two people who are exactly the same may not make for an ideal marriage, but in this regard we also had some significant differences. Probably 97 per cent of my reading is non-fiction, whereas perhaps 97 per cent of her reading was fiction. So in that sense we nicely complemented each other!

And for those who know a bit about me, what I say next might come as a bit of a shock. While I read all the time, and am surrounded by piles of books, Averil actually read MORE than I did. Hard to believe perhaps, but it is true. With all this by way of background, let me look at – yep, you guessed it – a new book that is worth being aware of.

Peter Kreeft on the two greatest novels

The new book is exactly the sort of book I would have handed to my wife and asked for her assessment. It would have been right up her alley, and she would have enjoyed it even more than I have. I refer to the new book by Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft: The Two Greatest Novels Ever Written: The Wisdom of The Lord of the Rings and The Brothers Karamazov (Word On Fire, 2025).

I only read Dostoevsky’s BK once, and Tolkien’s LOTR several times, but my wife would have read both often. Years ago she told me she had read the LOTR trilogy some 30 times – I believe it! So here I want to just alert you to this book and share some quotes from it.

Before even looking at the two novels in some detail, his 34-page Introduction offers so much to ponder. It is worth the price of the book alone. Here are a few snippets from it. First, he discusses why novels are necessary:

“Although the definition of a novel may not be important, novels themselves are, in fact, they are more important than most of us realize, if ‘important’ means life-changing or making a difference.” (p. 2)

“Although the events in novels are fictional, they can also be ‘real’ because they can be like the real events in our lives in the most fundamental ways. That is how fiction can be more factual than facts, in that it can shine light on the meaning of the facts.” (p. 3)

“What is the light that fiction can shine on the facts? What is the meaning of life? Great authors, when asked what the meaning of their story is, often saying that it is the story itself. Life itself is a story, so the question of the meaning of life is really the question of what kind of a story we are in.” (p. 6)

And truth is at the heart of a great novel:

“Fundamental answer to the question of what makes a novel great is truth: not truth in the accidental details, which are fictional inventions – namely, the details in the setting, in the plot, and in the characters – but in the essential and universal truths about ourselves and our human lives that frame what is accidental.” (p. 8)

“God’s truth gives us wisdom, his goodness gives us holiness, and his beauty gives us joy. These are the three things all of us need and want: wisdom, holiness, and joy; truth, goodness, and beauty – and not just in finite way, such that it contents and satisfies us here on earth, but in an infinitely open-ended ecstatic, self-transcending way, such that it serves as an appetizer of the heavenly banquet, a rehearsal for the heavenly play, a foreplay for the heavenly love.” (p. 9)

Kreeft explains why LOTR and BK are the greatest:

Ultimately, because they reveal Christ, and Christ is the meaning of life, the Logos, the logic of life, the Mind of God, the deepest truth about both God and man – the two most important things we need to know. For God and yourself are the only two persons we will never be able to escape or avoid for a single second, either in time or in eternity….

 

So since the greatest task of a novel is to show the greatest truth about ourselves and our lives, and since that truth is Christ, therefore, the greatest novels are the ones that reveal Christ, and the mind of Christ, most effectively.

 

That does not mean that they must be explicitly Christian (i.e., that they are explicitly about Christ as their object). In fact, I think there has never been and probably never will be a great novel about Christ….  (pp. 10-11)

And he speaks about the beauty of stories:

A great work of art is an evangelist, missionary.  It can’t help it. It is like a beautiful face. . . . God is not a “Force” but a face. God has a face because he is personal, and an artist. With the universe is his second greatest work of art, second only to a saint. A great work of art, such as a great book like BK or LOTR, is a remote but precious hint of the beauty of the Writer behind the writer, the Artist whose art is not the novel, but the novelist.

 

The “good news” of the Gospel is that we are destined to meet and mingle with that divine face that is the source of all beauty, truth, and goodness…. (p. 19)

The rest of this slim volume looks at various key themes, such as evil, goodness, love, wisdom, courage and heroism. Let me look at his chapter on Justice. I have always had a strong sense of justice, and when I read a book or watch a film with these themes, I get quite interested – especially when some bad guys do some terrible things to innocent people, and then the hero comes along and metes out much-deserved justice to the bad guys.

He starts the chapter as follows:

According to Plato’s Republic, justice is the complete virtue, the umbrella virtue, surrounding and ordering all the other virtues….

 

In the Bible, justice is not the end but the beginning of all virtues, the most basic, the foundation an assumption for all the others. That is why it is often the first one that small children understand (“That’s not fair!”), thereby proving the existence of the natural moral law that is denied by our “adult” society, which seldom listened seriously to children until the children become consumers.

 

Justice is the standard that first defines itself over against not only evils below it (for all evils are also injustices) but also goods above it, such as mercy. When Gandalf says that “the pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many,” he cannot say this meaningfully except against an assumed background of justice. There can’t be “more than justice” unless there is justice. A world without justice would also be a world without mercy. Mercy is not the same as charity; mercy is undeserved charity, charity that goes beyond justice. Justice is the first and foundational moral virtue, just as “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Prov. 9:10) – but not the end.

 

The foundation of justice is truth. Justice means standing in, living in, and acting in the light of truth. Justice cannot be real in a relativistic or subjectivistic philosophy. For justice means essentially giving each one what they deserve – what they really, objectively, truly do deserve, and not just what some individuals or groups decree with their will they deserve by the rules of their man-made game of ethics, which change as much as the human wills that makes those rules change. Where the power to make a thing is also the power to change it from one individual or a culture to another. (pp. 116-117)

Kreeft goes on to say this:

The ultimate agent dispensing justice is not other people but God – the very nature of God, not just the will of God, for the will of God is never alone or arbitrary, but is always one with the reason of God, and both are one with his eternal and unchangeable nature. . . . God is love, but the love that God essentially is, is true love, just love, right love, perfect love.

 

If either Dostoevsky or Tolkien had not believed that, they could not have written these two novels. Justice in both novels is like the sky: it is over everything, surrounding everything.

 

Thus, Fyodor and Gollum, both of whom choose darkness over the light of truth, must suffer their just deserts in the end…. (pp. 118-119)

He closes the chapter with these words:

One of the secondary themes in both LOTR and BK is this psychology of damnation. We see it clearly in Gollum, though Frodo has hope for him until the end, just as Jesus had for Judas when he called him “friend” as he was in the very act of betraying him (Matt. 26:50). We see it more definitely in the tortured shudder of the Inquisitor, and also in Wormtongue and Fyodor. It is a terrifying possibility. In fact, it is the only truly terrifying possibility in the end. It’s existence and real possibility for anyone – for me, for you – is what makes human life infinitely dramatic. And it is based on the fact that justice is as eternal, absolute, and nonnegotiable as love. (pp. 120-121)

It is hoped that these few quotes from this vital and valuable book will interest you enough to get a copy and read it for yourself. You can thank me later!

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