"Oh, Most Happy Birthday For Us All!"

 

Then Bilbo woke up and opened his eyes. ‘Hullo, Frodo!’ he said. ‘Well, I have passed the Old Took today! So that’s settled. And now I think I am quite ready to go on another journey. Are you coming?’

 

Today is the 131^st anniversary of J. R. R Tolkien’s birthday in 1892. That would make him the exact age of Bilbo when he headed off for the Grey Havens, after surpassing the Old Took’s record. Every year I like to take a little time to remember Tolkien himself, personally, and not only his incredible literary achievements.  Indeed, there are few authors who can claim that they changed the course of literature in quite the way that he did, almost accidentally, while he was working his day job and raising a family.

This Catholic orphan fought his way up through poverty, using philology, of all unlikely tools, to develop a mythology and a philosophy that has influenced millions. Even when he was finally enjoying a good measure of fame and fortune, he refused to trim his sails to the winds of his fandom or compromise his vision simply for the sake of money. Well, to be fair, he once said that he might, if he was offered a simply enormous, prohibitive amount; it was ‘Cash or Kudos’, meaning either a ton of money or artistic faithfulness to his tale. As neither was forthcoming, he squashed the deal, a deal his grandson later accepted, taking the cash and abandoning the kudos.

Still, Tolkien’s creations stand above the winds of the Zeitgeist, and as Matthew Arnold said about Shakespeare,

“Others abide our question. Thou art free.

We ask and ask—Thou smilest and art still.”

That such an outwardly simple but inwardly profound work was produced by a life of common virtue is a deep consolation and an astonishing example for us all. And it still stands above all the flaws of all the adaptations that have been attempted.

I would like to end this rather rambling post with an acknowledgement and an appreciation for the influence that Tolkien has had on my life. What I would be like now if I had never found him, I cannot even comprehend. He has provided for me a certain depth of thought, a key into an older world, a release from the bondage of the Spirit of the Age. I might not even be Catholic if it weren’t for his protoevangelium.

I look forward to some day meeting him and thanking him face to face. It is a hope that I have.