"On Fairy-Stories" (Introduction and Part 1)

[cressidarambles]

On the Brothers of Gondor board, we've been having a group reading of Tolkien's essay "On Fairy-Stories." I'd been meaning to read it for ages, and I'm glad that I've finally gotten around to it. The board discussion thread is here, but I'm also going to cross-post my thoughts in this journal, section by section. I'd really love to discuss this

Comments

[lilan14]

Oh yay, you've posted it here too! I'm hoping to do some reading today, so maybe I'll have something more to say that just a "yay" comment. :-D

[lilan14]

P.S. And oh my, what cuuuuute fairies!! I'll risk being despised by Tolkien's spirit too by saying I really like them...

[dreamflower02]

Here from middleearthnews.

You hit on a many of the things that struck me on first reading the essay nearly forty years ago.

I know that I sometimes feel a bit of dismay at knowing what JRRT would think of my own fondness for Disney animation--he despised it. But I also think he'd recognize that taste is, well, a matter of taste.

One of the things that truly struck me as a revelation was his analogy about escapism: That the only people who should object to escaping are the jailers. (Loosely paraphrased, as my own copy is out of reach.) It seemed to put into perspective for me all the objections of other people to my love for Middle-earth and the escape from the dreary mundane that it represented.

And that quote,"both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords." is one of my favorite Tolkien quotes. It reminds me so much of the passage in the Cormallen chapter of RotK: "And he sang to them, now in the Elven-tongue, now in the speech of the West, until their hearts, wounded with sweet words, overflowed, and their joy was like swords, and they passed in

[cressidarambles]

Hi! Thank you so much for stopping by and commenting! I've seen your comments here and there on other entries that I've read, and I've frequently found myself nodding along. Do you mind if I friend you?

That section on the escape of the prisoner is one of my favorite things that Tolkien ever wrote. I'd seen it quoted before I read the entire essay, and I always nodded along emphatically at it. I'm planning to do one post on each section of the essay, and I can't wait to get to the one on Escape and Consolation!

And oooh, good catch on the Cormallen quote! I'm mostly a Stewardist, so I haven't memorized that chapter as well as some in the book. ;)

[dreamflower02]

Feel free to friend away! And I'll friend you back.

I'm basically a hobbit-fancier, though I do enjoy writing cross-cultural with hobbits interacting wtih Men and Elves and Dwarves. And I *have* written just a few in which I mostly featured Men, including Faramir!