a note under the clock

[extemporanea]

Say what you will about Tolkien (I'm looking at you, China Miéville), his worlds do fill your headspace. Having re-watched the LotR films and re-read the books, and The Hobbit, and some random stuff from Unfinished Tales and things, over the last few weeks, I can certainly testify to that: I've pretty much been in Middle-Earth for the last month.

Comments

[grumpyolddog]

Yes, but....

Tolkein wasn't building worlds. He was building languages and then giving them stages to work on, that's all. He even invented a philological society, dammit.

[extemporanea]

Yes, my point exactly. He wasn't building worlds in anything but a highly specific sense, and it amuses and amazes me that he gets away with the resulting inconsistencies.

Although I think there's more to it than a stage for the languages. The languages are important, but the quest/mythology/heroic narrative impulses actually form the backbone the languages flesh out, not the other way round.

Also, I am very aware that I've been thinking way too much about Tolkien lately.

[grumpyolddog]

you mention that the Rohirrim are essentially Anglo-Saxons - so is their language, where Sindarin shares many similarities (lack of irregular verbs, sentence structure) with Latin and thus informs - in the society of Men - a far more high middle ages feel.

And the Shire is built on rustic menials rather than middle-class values. It's a place of Gaffer Gamgee and Farmer Maggot, not Lobelia Sackville-Baggins. This, I think, informs its technological level (as well as the dialects spoken) far more than any deliberate planning.

[extemporanea]

Point taken re the effect of languages, but I think Tolkien's problem is that he wants to have his cake and eat it: yes, it's about Gaffer Gamgee, but he does also include Lobelia and in fact Frodo himself. Those are a sort of lower landed gentry, not rustic menials; you're right that "middle-class" is not quite the right term, but their lifestyle comes across as middle class where that of Sam, at the start of the novel, is clearly menial.

All I'm trying to say, I suppose, is that on some levels of representation of lifestyle and technology Tolkien's messages are very mixed, and that it's interesting that we generally don't even think about it.

[tngr_spacecadet]

*nags Extemporanea to come play LOTRO*

[extemporanea]

oh, lord, sorry, I still owe you an answer to that email. I looked at it, thought "Cool! love to do that!", then thought "aargh it'll eat my life, fear!, and the resulting conflict imploded my head enough that I never replied. I still have very mixed feelings. Probably not right now, is the short answer, but maybe once I've killed this outstanding paper I'm supposed to be writing?

[tngr_spacecadet]

It WILL eat your life! On the other hand, it's the best fun I've had in simply ages. Also, playing with people you know in Real Life is very cool, so hurry up with the paper already!

[herne_kzn]

The Shire remains a problem, but the co-existence of Gondor and Rohan is not something I have a problem with. see for example the co-existence and cultural contact between Byzantium (which heavily informs my mental Gondor) and the vikings.

[extemporanea]

Yes, I also find Rohan/Gondor reasonably believable, ship-wise ;>. The Shire, on the other hand, is a complete Mary Sue: the humble, completely instrumental outsider.

Why Byzantium, though? Interesting.

[ext_301110]

I was going to say a similar thing - that wildly different cultures existed in our history, with one being quite more advanced than the other. Funnily enough, I thought of Byzantium and Vikings (and Anglo Saxons), which I suspect comes from my adoration of anything Guy Gavriel Kay.

To me, it feels like Tolkien took these disparate and separate cultures as inspiration, but moved them closer together geographically for the purposes of keeping the story going - avoiding having to go across oceans and vast expanses of land to get to one another, in order to keep the story from taking too long.

Cheers, Dayle