The Great Tales Never End: Into the Archives

 

The Great Tales Never End: Essays in memory of Christopher Tolkien

Edited by Richard Ovenden & Catherine McIlwaine

“Over more than four decades, J. R. R. Tolkien’s son and literary executor Christopher Tolkien completed some twenty-four volumes of his father’s work, much more than his father had succeeded in publishing during his own lifetime. Thanks to Christopher’s extraordinary publishing efforts and scholarship, readers today can survey and understand the vast landscape of Tolkien’s legendarium.

“The book is illustrated with color reproductions of J. R. R. Tolkien’s manuscripts, maps, drawings, and letters, as well as photographs of Christopher Tolkien and extracts from his works. Many of these documents have never been seen before, making this volume essential reading for Tolkien scholars, readers, and fans.”  - Amazon

I really didn’t expect this book to come for another ten to twelve days, so its sudden appearance (it didn’t really turn up on Amazon tracking) was a very pleasant surprise. It is filled with essays by tried-and-true Tolkien scholars and family members, such as Catherine McIlwaine, Priscilla Tolkien (Tolkien’s only daughter just recently deceased this March), Verlyn Flieger, John Garth, Wayne G. Hammond, Christina Scull, Carl F. Hostetter, Tom Shippey, and Brian Sibley. There is a contribution by Baillie Tolkien (Christopher’s second wife) in the form of a translation of the eulogy delivered in French (the couple lived in France for a large part of their life) by Maxime H. Pascal at Christopher’s funeral. These are the kind of “influencers and super-fans” that I need to hear from right now, to reassure myself of the continuity and quality of the Middle-earth legacy.

I have not, of course, read much in it just yet. I suppose I shall probably start with Priscilla’s memoir first. I have to say it is a particularly beautiful book. In time, I expect to see a full biography of Christopher Tolkien produced; in the meantime, this volume of essays can be taken as an opening theme.

I must admit that in the latter half of the Seventies I did not know a great deal about Christopher Tolkien, only what gets mentioned in Carpenter’s 1977 biography of JRRT. I also concede that I was suspicious and even jealous of him: to be the son of the Professor seemed an unearned privilege. That he was to edit together The Silmarillion seemed a presumptuous task and possibly just a money grab. But the more I learned about his scholarly background, and as proof after proof of his zealous conservatorship of his father’s legacy was established, the more my cautious acceptance turned into enormous respect. His death filled me with profound dismay and sadness. What would happen now that Horatio did not hold the bridge?

By a strange coincidence, the arrival of this book coincides with the death of Elizabeth II, another end of an era, which, though long expected, brings with it consequences that cannot be foreseen. I am far from being a Royalist, but I am something of an Anglophile, and Tolkien has much to do with that. Something has gone out of the English Thing that was there all my life, and indeed before I was born. When old trees fall, the skyline changes. And lately the skyline has been changing with the fall of these monarchs.  

The Shadow Library: In a Shandean Sense

I got a copy of the Airmont classic paperback of Tristram Shandy back when I was still in high school, mostly because of references in James P. Blaylock’s books. I found it at Yesterday’s Warehouse, and its condition was poor: the pages very yellowed, the cover speckled with brown age spots, and the spine a bit iffy for such a thick brick of a book. This made reading it problematical. It is a tale that jumps around and repays looking back and forth, and much handling would have almost surely destroyed the volume. But I had it on hand to look into (oh so gingerly) now and then, and to be a placeholder until I got my Norton Critical Edition, with the original illustrations and translated Latin.

It brings to my mind the DVD copy I bought of Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (2005). It stars Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon as fictionalized versions of themselves, trying to make a movie of a constitutionally unfilmable book. Although it contains some bits that are key incidents from the novel which are fairly well done, I eventually sold it because it was too much 'modernity' and not enough Shandy. Thus, it goes into the select DVDs of the Shadow Library. 

Oh My God: Walt Disney Comics Digest #22

Walt Disney Comics Digest #22

So, I’m continuing to try to collect all the old Walt Disney Comics Digests but slowing down a bit. This month I sent off for the June 1970 issue, #22, wondering what it would be like. It arrived today, I unpackaged it, opened the cover, and was completely gobsmacked.

It was better than any old issue that I had remembered. It was better than any old issue I had never seen. It was, in fact, an old issue that I had completely forgotten, but whose recognition came rushing out of the darkest recesses of my brain to greet it with delight!

Scrooge and Glomgold pile up their money to see who has the most, with Glomgold first cheating by ‘inflating’ his pile and then trying to shrink Scrooge’s. Madam Mim takes a genie’s place to give him a rest. Morty and Ferdie try to hoax Goofy with ‘Smart Apples’. Jiminy Cricket rescues a ladybug from a spider’s hole by climbing the sticky web with a gradated series of shoes. Minnie and Mickey use the old ‘who doesn’t touch it’ trick to catch a thief (saw that later on M*A*S*H). There's an adaptation of ‘Peter and the Wolf’, Daisy finds a mysterious ring and tries to make Donald jealous, Captain Hook enslaves Dumbo, and the Big Bad Wolf wins a medal for Champ Bad Guy that brings him trouble with the Wicked Witch.

I don’t remember the cover or the last three stories in the volume (Donald and Dimwitty, Chip and Dale with Micky camping, and April, May, and June taking on a dog watching business), which makes me wonder if, when we got it, the digest was already in a damaged condition (maybe it was given by a friend or a cousin or even bought at a garage sale). Or maybe it’s just been so long (52 years or so) that I can’t recall those details. But anyway, a little piece of my childhood is restored to my memories, and my collection gets one step closer to completion.

That's Ripping, You Know (Off the Wish List)

The Complete Ripping Yarns (2 DVD Set)

Quite by surprise (today being Labor Day) I looked up to find that my order of Ripping Yarns (1976-1979; DVD release 2005) had already arrived. This short series (9 episodes) starred Michael Palin and in the pilot episode Terry Jones; both Pythons wrote the show.

To quote Wikipedia (always good for a potted explanation), “Each episode had a different setting and characters, each looking at a different aspect of British culture and parodying pre-World War II literature aimed at schoolboys. In the title, "ripping" is a chiefly British slang colloquialism for "exciting" or "thrilling", with "yarn" used in the sense of a story.”

Ripping Yarns was part of our Sunday evenings back in the day, and certain phrases entered our common jargon. “Thank you, School Bully;” “I think it was G. K. Chesterton who once said …;” and “The Claw!” were among them. Though I have had a book of the complete scripts for a long time and episodes can be found on YouTube, I really wanted to have my own copy. And now I do.

 

The Rings of Power: We Come To It At Last

 

          Yesterday (September 3) I went over to my brother John’s house to watch the first two episodes of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. He and his family already had an Amazon+ subscription and a nice big television to watch it on. Though I could not help hearing many things before I went over and knowing many people’s opinions, I scrupulously avoided any detailed reviews, so I could go in with a clear mind.

To rehearse my pedigree once more, I was introduced to Tolkien in 1972 in Third Grade; read The Hobbit in 1975 and The Lord of the Rings in 1976; watched the Rankin Bass Hobbit in 1977 and the Bakshi LOTR in 1978; got my first copy of The Silmarillion in 1979, and every posthumous Tolkien publication from then on, including the complete The History of Middle-earth in fourteen volumes from 1983 – 1996 to The Nature of Middle-earth just one year ago in 2021. I saw the explosion of ‘Ringers’ with the Jackson movies, suffered through his Hobbit films, and in 2020 mourned the death of Christopher Tolkien, the gatekeeper of his father’s legacy. I am not of the first generation of Tolkien’s readers, nor even the second Hippie generation. I cannot write in elf-runes. My first love for Tolkien and for Middle-earth grew in isolation, almost in secret, in a small Texas town, away from fandoms and encouragement, almost amid contempt.

I have chanted my qualifications. Now I feel rather like one of those priests, scarred and crippled by the Julian persecutions, who were called by Constantine to pronounce for the newly accepted Church what is heresy and what can legitimately be affirmed. It is a daunting feeling.

Well. We ate lunch. We got comfortable. We settled down and spent a couple of hours watching the first two episodes of The Rings of Power. We talked about it a bit and found that we pretty much agreed about it.

It wasn’t good. It wasn’t absolutely horrible. It was a billion dollars’ worth of ‘meh’ (so far).

Let’s consider the ‘not horrible’ bits first. The first thing you will find on most positive reviews of ROP is that its design is visually appealing. This is true; the cities, the towns, and the wild lands tend to be quite pleasing, the costume design mostly adequate, and the background music does its job without being particularly intrusive - or inspiring. These are of course cosmetic festooning; no series will survive just on good looks. The one verified glance we get at Sauron is static but satisfying.

The actors do a fair job as well, considering the material they have been given to work with. I particularly came to like the characters of Celebrimbor and Elrond, who were not as objectionable as we had been led to believe they were going to be. I enjoyed nearly everything about Khazad-dûm, and even found the much-reviled Disa to be pleasant, if not lore-accurate (no beard). Elanor (Nori) Brandyfoot and her friend Poppy are an interesting pair, and not simply a gender-flipped Frodo and Sam, unless you’re thinking of the clownish Sam in Bakshi’s LOTR.

Alas, now I must turn to the ‘not good’ portion of ROP.

The worst thing, of course, is that it is not Tolkien. It is playing with a few of Tolkien’s action figures, and with the skeletal outline of The Appendices of The Lord of the Rings, which are informational and not exactly narrative. There is much that could be done with that, even so, but the writers and showrunners seem to be fixed on studiously subverting the lore whenever possible. They want to make a Middle-earth that conforms to modern sensibilities, when Tolkien’s Middle-earth did not even conform to the sensibilities of the time that it was written. It is, instead, a yardstick that measures and is measured by the age in which it is read.

Tolkien’s work, and especially The Lord of the Rings, is, to borrow a phrase, a heartbreaking work of staggering genius. Every attempt to adapt it has been flawed, even Jackson’s much touted trilogy of movies. It is not essentially a franchise, it is not ‘intellectual property’, save by unhappy chance and the ‘dirty devices of this world’. It is this, not being a troll or gatekeeping, that makes those who love Tolkien hold anything that has to do with Middle-earth to high standards. We do not wish it to change but to grow; we do not want to see a shoddy suburb spring up around it.

ROP’s Elves are not Elvish. Tolkien’s Elves (even the lowest) are distant and aloof from other races, even displeased if interfered with, but not snooty. ROP’s Elves are politicians: they set up an occupation force in the East, among other things. In Tolkien, there is no Elvish word for ‘politician’ though there are plenty for other kinds of rulers. Although there are examples of Elves Behaving Badly (Feanor and Maeglin – Elf princes - spring to mind, but also Saeros in the tale of Turin) it is hard to imagine Tolkien’s elf-children (in the Days of the Bliss of Valinor, no less) acting quite as Orcish as they do in the Prologue. Elf/mortal pairings are referenced in ROP as being rare and ending in tragedy (quite canonical), only to be subverted with a look that says “Well, we’re getting one now,” thus repeating one of the most ill-advised story lines from Jackson’s Hobbit movies.  

And one just weeps for the lore. For every good instance (the entrance into Khazad-dûm is not yet ‘The Doors of Durin’ which Celebrimbor will later help decorate) there is a terrible ham-handed element that makes anyone with even a passing acquaintance with Tolkien’s work shudder.

Among the worst is the naming. Middle-earth (more than many works) is based on words, on language, on names: Tolkien, as a philologist, did very careful building that way. There is so much background available, which need not have been referenced, but worked with behind the scenes to make sure that what was invented didn't clash. Instead, we get several abominations that make the ‘toxic’ fandom boil.

Take for example the name Elanor Brandyfoot. Not only does her nickname ‘Nori’ pointlessly recall one of the dwarves from The Hobbit, the name of Elanor for a hobbit would not have been possible until the Third Age when Sam Gamgee named his daughter after an Elven flower he saw in Lothlorien. Brandyfoot would also be impossible, because the ‘Brandy’ element had not entered their naming tradition until they had crossed the Baranduin (Brandywine) River and founded the Shire. It seems the writers just wanted a ‘Hobbitlike’ name without any of the inner historical significance.

Whenever anyone tries to sound profound, they produce wisdom on par with a bumper sticker. The Harfoots’ idiomatic references to carts and wheels seem forced.  The Tirharad insults about Elves seem strangely reminiscent of those that have been used about Vulcans. The name of Hordern seems to needlessly recall (to me at least) the name of Michael Hordern who voiced Gandalf on the 1981 BBC radio show. And so on … and on.  

BUT … all these things being considered, is it the absolute dumpster fire that many are proclaiming? Well, no, not exactly. But it is certainly not the unmitigated success that others are exalting it as, either. Like I said, it is one billion dollars’ worth of ‘meh’. It can best be enjoyed by divorcing it in your mind from Tolkien, Middle-earth, or The Lord of the Rings, and thinking of it as an alternative timeline, a bit of ascended fanfiction, like The Iron Tower trilogy. It is mediocre, a questionable C at best, which is disappointing for a Tolkien … well, it’s not an adaption; maybe an association, I guess? But for just another TV series, it's watchable. There are storylines with a bit of intrigue that one wants to see play out (Is the Stranger Gandalf, despite appearing in the Second Age? Does his ‘cold fire’ have anything to do with the heat-draining presence of evil in the Snow-Troll's chamber? Is the Stranger Sauron, or some other evil?), and that act as just enough of a lure to prompt further viewings.

John and I have tentative plans to gather again every weekend and watch until the season’s end. Will we boost the numbers of an unworthy series? Perhaps. In the long run it will not matter. Tolkien and Middle-earth will remain as they are, and we will at least have had the pleasure of a day’s visit and an interesting critical discussion afterward. And that's all I've got to say about it at the moment.

Not Too Grieved

 

"Do not be grieved for me, Starbrow," [the Queen] said. "Nor too much ashamed of your own folk. Better a little doll, maybe, than no memory of Faery at all. For some the only glimpse. For some the awaking.” -- from Smith of Wooton Major, J. R. R. Tolkien.

"Kren": Part Four (Into the Inn)

Kren stalked through the empty streets, eyes burning, head down, seeing nothing until he suddenly found himself drawing up short in front of the battered door of The Guesthouse. He put one heavy paw on the handle but stopped at the sudden burst of laughter from within. It seemed the folks inside were growing rather uproarious. He only paused an instant, smiling wryly, then pushed on in.

The laughter stopped immediately. The patrons looked at him astonished, rather blearily; most were his fellow reapers. Even Pappy, the bartender, looked surprise. Kren was not a regular customer, barely even an irregular customer. The Morg looked around the room and smiled a sharp, toothy grin.

“Good evening, folks,” he said flatly, and headed for the bar. The laughter sprang up again, muted, but with a new hint of amusement, even mockery, as whispered comments in sun-burned ears were exchanged around rickety tables. Pappy looked uncomfortable as Kren approached, his eyes darting into every corner rather than at the advancing Morg, who stopped with his palms flat on the board in front of him.

“Well, hello, Mr. Kren,” he said, tongue flicking nervously around his dry lips, eyes blinking. “We don’t see you in here very often.”

“Actually, Mr. Kegs suggested it,” Kren said ironically, voice raised, gesturing toward the man who sat nearby with several cronies. Kegs looked offended and stuck his face in his mug as if to hide. “Ale, please.”

“Ah. Pitcher or a tankard, then?”

“A pitcher. Your biggest too.”

Pappy hesitated.

“Can I see your penny afore I draw it? Policy, you know.”

Kren slapped his pocket, suddenly realizing he had tromped out without any money. He frowned.

“I’ll have to owe you,” he growled.

“Can’t do it.” The old barkeeper seemed almost relieved. “Sorry, there, but house rules …”

“Look!” Kren leaned in, muzzle quivering, a minatory claw raised. “You still owe me for work on your roof, and if you don’t serve me a pitcher now, I will march your marker right over to town hall and turn it in and go home with a barrel of ale, which I very much doubt you can spare a month before the autumn brewing. Or I can come in with my pennies tomorrow.”

Pappy gulped.

“You may have a point there, sir. One pitcher coming right up.” 

He served the pitcher with a shaky hand, offering a pewter mug which Kren refused. The Morg took the pitcher to a dark corner, to the single table that the regulars called Hermit’s Hole. He settled back and took a long pull straight from the pitcher. He waited to relax, or at least to quit thinking.