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Author: J[ohn] R[onald] R[euel] Tolkien (1892-1973)
Published by: Collins, 1998 (1st Edn: George Allen and Unwin, 1954-1955) ISBN 0007144083 Other Reviews
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"J.R.R.Tolkien: Author of the Century"
Author: Tom Shippey Published by: HarperCollins 2001 ISBN 0261104012 Other Reviews
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Ah, the Lord of the Rings. A book, or rather, six books arranged in three parts, often printed as three volumes, conceived and developed over half a lifetime, with over fifty million copies sold (and inspiring a set of three films that have together earned nearly a billion dollars) - everything about it is on an epic scale. It is also a book that provokes strong feelings, from hero-worship to open hatred - the latter especially from the literary establishment. (Tom Shippey's thorough and scholarly critique looks at those factors in convincing detail - it is a masterpiece of analysis, combining a deep love and knowledge of Tolkien, an academic's trained eye, and a novelist's prose.)
Why, then, does this book stir such powerful responses? It's probably best not to dwell too long on the negative side, though it's not hard to imagine that academic and professional critics are enraged by a work that is at once popular, the product of deep learning, and way outside the mainstream (Tolkien even disliked Shakespeare, for his mistreatment of the 'fairy' elements in Macbeth -- such as the way that Shakespeare explains away the movement of Birnam wood to Dunsinane; the movement of the Entwood to Helm's Deep is very different). The deeper parallels drawn by Shippey, however, do suggest that Lord of the Rings is indeed a response to the 20th century: a fantastic response, just as in their different ways Brave New World, 1984, and Catch-22 are. Perhaps the horror of the trenches demanded that kind of literary response, a search for something better, some kind of alternative explanation and outcome, as well as a warning.
On the positive side, Tolkien clearly strikes deep. His themes are varied, including a love of wild nature; a longing for Old England and a time of peace and good government; an Odyssey of a long and dangerous quest; and simply a tale "that grew in the telling". It has been called a heroic romance, but that genre is narrow and hard for modern readers to accept. Instead, Tolkien writes in many genres, from comedy to satire, and the heroic slowly emerges as the dominant mode as the reader becomes attuned.
The underlying themes are if anything even more diverse, and have been endlessly speculated about: the nature of individual freedom; duty to one's country; political doublespeak; good and evil; addiction to power; and much besides.
I guess almost everyone knows that Tolkien was a professor of Anglo-Saxon, and exceptionally knowledgeable about Beowulf (see his wonderful The Monsters and the Critics, which transformed the field of Old English literature). It's also well-known that he intended to create something to help fill the gap in the Mythology of England: unlike the Nordic countries with their Trolls and Dwarves and the Elder Edda, we hardly have any gods or mythical monsters of our own (except perhaps The Green Man), and scarcely any stories -- with the lucky exception of Beowulf, which survived in a single manuscript. Perhaps it's less well known that Tolkien was fascinated by invented language, and that Lord of the Rings grew out of his two invented Elvish languages, each complete with a graceful script and a carefully-worked out grammar, which he never expected anyone else to be interested in. He writes as skilfully as a professor of our language ought; and it gradually becomes clear that he has an unparalleled mastery of styles and voices - from rough Shire gardeners to wily men skilled in politics, and of poetry as well as prose.
An early critic made what Shippey wryly remarks must have seemed a safe-enough comment: 'this is not a book that many adults will want to read more than once'. How wrong he was. Readers habitually come back to Lord of the Rings. Some re-read it annually; some are drawn into the critical literature to find out more; some, astonishingly, learn Elvish; others read Beowulf in translation, or in the original, learning Old English in the process; others again watch the fine films of the work, admirably directed by Peter Jackson; yet others are drawn into fantasy games (indeed, Tolkien has spawned an entire industry). The films together total more than nine hours of cinema, yet, as Tolkien himself noted of the printed book, people complain that "it is too short".
The extended versions of the 3 Peter Jackson films of Lord of the Rings can be found on DVD at:
Fellowship of the Ring (Amazon.com)
Fellowship of the Ring (Amazon.co.uk)
The Two Towers (Amazon.com)
The Two Towers (Amazon.co.uk)
Return of the King (Amazon.com)
Return of the King (Amazon.co.uk)
Perhaps the most striking observation, however, is a simple one: the reader's appreciation of Lord of the Rings grows with each reading, and with background study; on each visit, there is more to discover. Tolkien worked hard to create the illusion of 'depth': that behind each casual reference, the reader would feel there to be much more to be known, going back into the barely-glimpsed misty distances of ancient time. Little did early readers realize that there really was a mass of stories, genealogies, mythology, and linguistics - spanning decades of Tolkien's life - behind the published text. Today, Christopher Tolkien has elegantly organized and published much of his father's unfinished writings (some readable, some frankly difficult), but the mystery remains: how did one man, single-handedly create such a vision, and the world's bestselling novel? Shippey unfolds many parts of the mechanism, and many secrets; but as with all great works of art, enjoyment rests with the individual who encounters it and is absorbed by it.
© Ian Alexander 2004