Caleb Woodbridge

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe 75th anniversary book group livestream Hi, I'm Caleb Woodbridge and I write about the deeper dimensions of stories at www.biggerinside.co.uk. I'm hosting a livestream to discuss C S Lewis's children's classic The Lion, the Witch and the W...

I'll also be hosting a livestream discussion of Narnia 8pm on 30th October to unpack it all. Sign up for that here: forms.gle/sifnnBTYWPoQ...

What I did in Narnia, and Narnia did to me My reflections on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at 75. Plus sign up for a Narnia @ 75 online book group discussion, 8pm GMT on 30 October

Happy 75th anniversary The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, published this day in 1950!

What does Narnia mean to you? Here's the impact it's had on me – I still haven't got over the disappointment at not finding my own way into Narnia: www.biggerinside.co.uk/p/what-i-did...

This is a key problem with digital ID: you have to trust not only the present government not to turn it into a China-style social credit system, but also anyone who might be elected in future

Doctor Who and the Nostalgia Trap, Part 2: It's the Writing, Stupid What's gone wrong with Doctor Who? Looking at the seeds sown in the Chibnall era and the heated question of whether the show is 'too woke'

Just mulling over recent issues with Doctor Who and the dangers of nostalgia rot undermining storytelling. Plus, is being "woke" the problem?

(Spoiler warning: it's the quality of the writing, not politics, that's the fundamental issue) www.biggerinside.co.uk/p/doctor-who...

Doctor Who and the Nostalgia Trap 20 years on from its triumphant return to TV, I explore the highs and lows of the show through to the present faltering reign of Russell T Davies 2.0

While I enjoyed much of the series, I was left disappointed by the Doctor Who finale and that backward-looking regeneration into Billie Piper. I dive into 20 years of the modern show as I consider the State of the Whoniverse:
www.biggerinside.co.uk/p/doctor-who...

Creativity and spiritual inspiration: Iain McGilchrist and C.S. Lewis on Reason and Imagination The surprising connections between McGilchrist's brain science, the origins of Narnia and the idea of Christianity as "myth become fact"

How does creativity work – what’s going on in our brains when we exercise our imaginations? And how can imagination point us to spiritual truth? I dig into these questions with the help of C.S. Lewis and neuroscientist/philosopher Iain McGilchrist... www.biggerinside.co.uk/p/creativity...

So it’s fitting that Tolkien chose it to be the date for Sauron’s downfall in The Lord of the Rings, a work that he described as ‘fundamentally religious and Catholic work… unconsciously at first, and consciously in the revision’.

25th March is a date full of spiritual associations: it was traditionally thought to be the date the Crucifixion took place, as well as the Annunciation when the angel came to Mary and Mary accepted her role bearing the Saviour.

Happy Tolkien Reading Day! The compiler of A Year with Timothy Keller knew what he was doing on 25th March, the day in Middle-Earth when the Ring was destroyed, with this selection from Walking With God Through Pain and Suffering. (Yes, it was me!)

Just throwing this out to my network – I'll be in London for London Book Fair #lbf25 Tue-Wed next week. I've still got some meeting time free on Wednesday lunchtime/afternoon.

If you'd like to connect in or near Olympia, especially if you'd like to talk about my freelance services, drop me a line!

This Thursday! Join me for the next Estuary Conversation at Parc Arts, Treforest, 7.30-9.30pm.

Estuary offers a friendly space to listen and be listened to in meaningful conversation - everyone welcome!

Free to attend but RSVP here: www.meetup.com/uk-estuary-m...

Today at 9am - hear me discussing The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at 75 years’ old on BBC Radio Wales (and to listen back later on BBC Sounds).

I had a fun time recording this chat with Roy Jenkins, Hannah Hess and Catherine Butler!

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

So I want to introduce my 7-year-old to the stories of King Arthur. What do people think is the best version for reading aloud together?

I really like T H White but I'd prefer a more straightforward retelling rather than 'clever'; faithful to tradition but with contemporary-feeling pace and style

Friday BoM Estuary Style Livestream YouTube video by Paul VanderKlay

So after running my first ‘Estuary’ conversation in-person yesterday, today I took part in a live-streamed Estuary hosted by Paul Van der Klay, one of the originators of the format, on YouTube - I had fun in the wide-ranging conversation!

www.youtube.com/live/aGYo4oK...

The Machine vs Human Touch How Wallace & Gromit and Doctor Who's Christmas TV outings explore the power of technology and the need for embodied relationships

At Christmas, Doctor Who and Wallace & Gromit both tackled our anxieties about technology in surprisingly similar ways. They explored what happens when tech goes wrong - an the importance of embodied connection

Read my analysis:
www.biggerinside.co.uk/p/the-machin...

Yes, God’s glory is the spreading of his goodness - his self-giving love is glorious.

Or separate his art from his actions, to be clearer.

There Is No Safe Word How the best-selling fantasy author Neil Gaiman hid the darkest parts of himself for decades.

Saddened and angered by Neil Gaiman's 'alleged' sexual abuse of women - I believe these women and my heart goes out to them.

I enjoyed Gaiman's writing, admired him as a writer, but I'm going to find it hard if not impossible to separate the man from his actions:

www.vulture.com/article/neil...

Loving the Behold the Lamb of God concert with Andrew Peterson, the Arcadian Wild, the Goudies and more - wonderful to experience and to experience it among lots of familiar faces in the audience from Highfields, Hutchmoot UK and elsewhere.

having kids in the next 5 years might be a tragic mistake every smart bio founder/scientist i’ve talked to seems to think embryo editing for things like short sleeper, reduced cancer risk, etc is possible on a near term horizon imagine having two kids a couple years apart, one is a super human and the other isn’t “sorry jim, little timmy won’t get cancer, only needs 4 hours of sleep and you’re normal you were just born in the wrong order"

I am *begging* techbros to read some cautionary scifi

No wait -- their media literacy is so poor, they should hire a lit coach and THEN read some cautionary scifi

No wait -- they should just hire me to be their lit coach, and I'll just bonk them with a stick while yelling "BAD IDEA!" all day.

Me, a bearded brown haired man with my eyebrows arched, wearing a red nose, and a Christmas jumper in red, white and green with red Welsh dragons in the design.

Caleb the Red-Nosed Publisher! Getting in the Christmassy spirit for the UWP/Calon Christmas party as I head towards my last week in the role (finishing 18th December)

To the Christian Writer Bring the fire

Anyway, here's the article if you want to read it for yourself. I think the impulse to read widely is a good one, but it rubbed me up the wrong way otherwise!
currentpub.com/2024/12/05/t...

The article also says that art shouldn't "conclude" - to clearly communicate definite themes and ideas.

Good art is more of a debate and dialogue rather than monologue of a single viewpoint, otherwise it lacks tension.

But good art usually contains resolution too, including of its themes

I think Tolkien and Lewis are 'uncool' in part because they are very Christian.

But Christians need to resist the temptation to see 'Christian art' as inherently cringe.

A lot of it is, but being a Christian and an artist means seeing the world through the eyes of faith, and that has an impact

Can some Christians be too narrowly fixated on the Inklings? Sure, but let's be additive rather than subtractive.

There's no need to ditch the Lord of the Rings re-read, but do branch out from there - Beowulf, T S Eliot, T H White are just a short hop away, for example, which might appeal

More Christians should read beyond Narnia and LotR, of course:

Till We Have Faces, the Ransom Trilogy, The Great Divorce, The Abolition of Man, The Silmarillion, Leaf by Niggle, and so on...

Also the Inklings can be a great bridge into medieval & renaissance literature - they were my gateway drug!

IQ bell curve meme showing a low IQ person saying 'Lewis & Tolkien are the GOATs', a crying midwit saying 'Christian writers should stop obsessing on the Inklings' and a high IQ genius saying 'Lewis & Tolkien are the GOATs'

There's an article going around addressed to writers who are Christians saying 'stop reading' Tolkien and C S Lewis.

I'm all for encouraging reading widely, but it's a midwit take to stop reading the Inklings out of some kind of literary snobbery. They are genuinely great!

On the last point, if you want to get books sold in, say, Waterstones’, they need to have been “sold in” to the book trade at least 6 months ahead.

The traditional publishing distribution model is slow, even if you speed up making the actual book

So the major factors are:
1) Backlog and project management of multiple titles means books are in a queue
2) Multiple stages of editing (creative/structural edit, copy-editing, proofreading)
3) Printing, warehousing, distributing vs POD
4) Lead times for bricks & mortar booksellers’ sales cycles