Great blog. Here’s to seeing you next year. Anthony & I haven’t been to a Mythcon in a few years (much to our chagrin).

One note– you say that “Exploring the creation of myth can be lonely work; it’s not a field with widespread appreciation…” I think you’ll see that that’s not exactly true– the more you delve into the field and the more events you attend. Exploring the creation of myth is by far the least lonely of all the academic disciplines primarily because Mythies are a Fellowship, to the truest expression of the word. As a college instructor, I find academia often chock full of people who pretend to support you, only to knock you down and trample you whenever they have the opportunity.

I’ve also been told, by mainstream scholars, that Tolkien and Inkling studies is not a valid, worthy, or “real” field– and that somehow because people who study Mythopoeic fiction– ie Mythies– are by and large on friendly terms, it’s somehow less academic…. bollocks. If you are an honest person, have a true value for myth and enjoy attending something like Mythcon, then this is the friendliest, best, most socially diverse group of people you can hope to spend a raucous evening with…. and where else can you get completely inebriated while being serenaded in Elvish (albeit neo-Elvish)?

In Fellowship
Jessie