J.R.R. Tolkien, Edward Bach, nature, energy and symbols. What do they have in
common?
British Institute of Florence – Lungarno Guicciardini, 9 - on May 17th at 5.30 p.m.
A meeting with the author Giovanni Agnoloni
What is the leading thread that runs through the pages of J.R.R. Tolkien's masterworks? Giovanni Agnoloni,
author of Tolkien e Bach. Dalla Terra di Mezzo all'energia dei fiori (“Tolkien and Bach. From Middleearth to the Energy of Flowers”) (Galaad Edizioni, 2011), and editor and translator of Tolkien. La Luce e
l'Ombra (“Tolkien. Light and Shadow”) (Senzapatria Editore, 2011), finds this common link in natural
energy as a means of regaining awareness of our Self, the very root of human identity.
Introduced by the counsellor Marina Menichelli, an expert on the Flower Remedies created by Dr Edward
Bach (Bach Flowers), Agnoloni will illustrate his breakthrough into this subtle but most important dimension
of reality, that Tolkien's fantasy, outstandingly close to Dr Bach's sensitivity, has emphasized in such depth.
The emerging key-concept is that of archetypes, the powerful symbolic images that, according to C.G. Jung,
are part of the collective unconscious, and have nourished myths since the beginning of human history. These
prove to be the central element to reach a bigger awareness of who we are and what the world is.
Further insights into these topics will be offered by Professor Giuseppe Panella, a scholar from Pisa's
“Scuola Normale” as well as an expert on fantasy and science-fiction themes, and by Francesco Verso, an
award-winning writer who, like Agnoloni, is part of the literary movement of Connettivismo – one of the
most advanced Italian literary avant-gardes, which proves to be a brilliant contemporary expression of the
universal themes evoked by Tolkien (the English word used for it is Nextilism, invented by Dr Arielle Saiber
of Bowdoin College; see http://escholarship.org/uc/item/67b8j74s).
--Giovanni Agnoloni, Tolkien e Bach. Dalla Terra di Mezzo all'energia dei fiori (ed. Galaad, 2011)
(http://www.galaadedizioni.com/schede/tolkienebach.htm )
J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of The Lord of the Rings, and Edward Bach, the doctor who discovered the 38 healing essences called “Bach
Flowers”. Two lives that began one beside the other, in the village of Moseley, near Birmingham, UK, at the end of the 19 th century.
Two existences imbued with the love for nature and committed to the search for deep meanings, driven by subtle perceptions that
inspired their however different researches.
This book plunges into the secret of their affinity, finds out surprising correspondences between the archetypes of Middle-earth's
places, characters and objects, and the psychological models of Bach's remedies. It aims at emphasizing a perspective and a sense to
their literary and therapeutic creations, against the background of the ethical crisis of the 20 th century, of Jung's analytical psychology
and of the gradual coming to the light of a spirituality shared by all faiths, rooted in the love for nature and coherent with the most
important discoveries of Einsteinian physics and quantum mechanics.
Tolkien. La Luce e l'Ombra (ed. Senzapatria, 2011) (http://www.ibs.it/code/9788897006176/zzz99-agnoloni-
g/tolkien-la-luce-e.html) is collection of essays by some of the foremost Tolkien experts in the world, edited and translated by
Giovanni Agnoloni, based on a fundamental pair of concepts in Tolkien's Legendarium: Light and Shadow, which are opposite but
complementary principles, evocative of ethical, natural, philosophic, psychological and spiritual issues. With articles by Giovanni
Agnoloni, Roberto Arduini, Patrick Curry, Michaël Devaux, Michael D.C. Drout, Colin Duriez, John Garth, Thomas
Honegger, Gino Scatasta and Guglielmo Spirito.
--Giovanni Agnoloni is a writer, translator and blogger. Apart from Tolkien e Bach, he is the author of Nuova letteratura fantasy (ed.
Eumewil e Sottovoce, 2010) and Letteratura del fantastico. I giardini di Lorien (ed. Spazio Tre, 2004). He participates in the
collective blogs lapoesiaelospirito.wordpress.com and www.postpopuli.it and is part of the literary avant-garde of Connettivismo (he
appears in the anthology, a cura di Sandro Battisti, AFO – Avanguardie Futuro Oscuro, ed. Kipple Officina Libraria, 2010). His
personal blog is http://giovanniag.wordpress.com.
Marina Menichelli is the President of the Accademia Centaurea – Associazione Italiana Ricerca Rimedi Floreali, as well as an
ethologist and an expert on the use of Bach Flowers on humans and animals. She is a co-author and an illustrator of the book I Fiori di
Bach – come guarire con l’anima delle piante (Macroedizioni, 2004). She regularly holds art therapy workshops and naturalist
drawing as well as creative writing seminars, as means to a fuller comprehension of the individual nature of every person. In the latter
case, one of her favourite approaches is through Shakespeare's and Tolkien's archetypes.
Giuseppe Panella is a literary critic and professor at the Scuola Normale in Pisa. He is the author of Il Sublime e la prosa. Nove
proposte di analisi letteraria (Clinamen, 2005) and has published several monographs on, among others, Émile Zola and Pier Paolo
Pasolini and on the themes of the Double and the Replicant. He has also published four volumes of poetry, among which Il terzo
amante di Lucrezia Buti (Firenze, Polistampa, 2000), for which he has been awarded the “Fiorino d’oro” in 2001. Finally, he has made,
together with David Ballerini, two art documntaries, La leggenda di Filippo Lippi, pittore a Prato (2000) and Il giorno della fiera.
Racconti e percorsi in provincia di Prato (2002).
Francesco Verso is a writer, winner of the “Premio Urania” 2008 with the novel E-DOLL. He is one the foremost voices of Italian
science-fiction and an active collaborator of the avant-garde of Connettivismo. He is also the author of Antidoti umani (ed. Diversa
Sintonia, 2009). He collaborates with the official review of Connettivismo, NeXt, and is a chief-editor of the publishing house Kipple
Officina Libraria.