Tolkien & anarchy
Those luck few of you who have been on the receiving end of e-mail from me will recognize the following quote, as it is appended to 95% of my outgoing mail:
"My political opinions lean more and more to anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs).... [T]he most improper job of any man, even saints (who at any rate were at least unwilling to take it on), is bossing other men. [...] There is only one bright spot and that is the growing habit of disgruntled men of dynamiting factories and power stations. I hope that, encouraged now as patriotism, may remain a habit."
-JRR Tolkien
I liked this quote from the start because, well, for one thing, I agree with him. Furthermore, I took this quote as evidence for an inkling (if you will forgive the pun) I had about a "hidden tradition" of (a variety of) anarchism on the part of otherwise genteel Englishmen. The prototype for this is, honestly, a fictional character---or, perhaps, a fictionalized version of a real person, i.e., Grandfather George in John Boorman's film Hope and Glory. Grandpa George is both conservative and radical; he is a country gentleman, and he despises the encroachment of the city on the country---much like another favorite I have discussed here, John Betjeman, whose call for "friendly bombs to fall on Slough" so as to destroy the "ghastly suburb," as Grandfather George would have said, would have been understood by both Tolkien (calling, as he does, for the "dynamiting" of "factories and power stations") and Boorman's character, who shakes his fist at an electrical transfer tower and calls out "I curse you volt, watt, and amp!" Indeed.
All that I have ever known of its provenance is that my source (which I have now forgotten) claimed it was extracted from one of John Ronald Reuel's many letters to his son Christopher. This morning, I found a source for the quote, but it only throws the matter into further doubt, because it is incomplete:
My political opinions lean more and more to Anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning abolition of control, not whiskered men with bombs) - or to 'unconstitutional' Monarchy. I would arrest anybody who uses the word State (in any sense other than the inanimate realm of England and its inhabitants, a thing that has neither power, rights nor mind); and after a chance of recantation, execute them if they remained obstinate! If we could get back to personal names, it would do a lot of good. Government is an abstract noun meaning the art and process of governing and it should be an offence to write it with a capital G or so as to refer to people. If people were in the habit of referring to 'King George's council, Winston and his gang,' it would go a long way to clearing thought, and reducing the frightful landslide into Theyocracy.
Anyway the proper study of Man is anything but Man; and the most improper job of any man, even saints (who at any rate were at least unwilling to take it on), is bossing other men. Not one in a million is fit for it, and least of all those who seek the opportunity. And at least it is done only to a small group of men who know who their master is. The medievals were only too right in taking nolo episcopari ['I do not wish to be made a bishop'] as the best reason a man could give to others for making him a bishop...
I know that I have been on about all this before, but it is endlessly fascinating to me. I have also admitted that curmudgeonliness, which could be all that I am talking about here, and not "true anarchism," is not a political platform nor a political philosophy. I am attracted to it emotionally first, intellectually second, I might as well admit that as well. Still and all, I am not willing to say that there is not something in it worthwhile, something worth learning. Frankly, I prefer Betjeman's writings on the landscape and architecture of the British countryside to much of what passes for contemporary anarchism---especially in its "Green" iterations. There is more wisdom in Yeats and Betjeman than in all the collected writings of John Zerzan.