Talk:J. R. R. Tolkien/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

TolkIEN inspired by Wagner

someone look into this? it turns out the lord of the rings series isn't that original. see wagner's "The Ring Cycle" lol

Lots of people have looked into it, but there's really not that much to it. Sure, there's a ring in both (with very different powers), and some people see Alberecht the evil dwarf as a gollum-prototype, but other than that the shapes and meanings of the sagas are quite different. Tolkien himself rejected the idea firmly, For more info, google "tolkien wagner" — almost half a million hits! --ubiquity 22:49, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The libretti of the tetralogy of operas "Der Ring des Nibelungen" by Richard Wagner is inspired by an older germanic myth which was anonimously written down in the middle-ages. Tolkien's work is influenced by germanic mythology and that's the reason for the similarities. This topic is actually a non-sense and should be deleted. I wonder if tolkien ever "rejected the idea firmly" since the idea is a non-sense, so a quotation about it would be welcome.

Letter #229 (Commenting on Ohlmarks' intro to the Swedish LotR)

The Ring is in a certain way ‘der Nibelungen Ring’. . . .

Both rings were round, and there the resemblance ceases.

Thu 11:32, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

FA?

right, I would like to elevate this to FA status. A little more work is required, but I think the article is now at least as good as some of the other-language WP's FAs linked above. Any suggestions for what should be fixed? I'll put it on peer review in a couple of days, I think. dab (ᛏ) 07:31, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

I've only made minor contributions here, but in general I think this is very good. It could use a copyedit here and there -- especially in the intro there's the occasional awkward phrase -- and I'm not sure about the organization of some of the later sections, but it's very close to what it needs to be IMO. TCC (talk) (contribs) 17:44, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

I've looked through it, and will list it on FAC now to get more input, we can always improve it as the objections come in. dab (ᛏ) 13:45, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

re-imported section

I have only now realized that the "derivative art" section had been removed. I have re-inserted it. We do have a Works inspired by J. R. R. Tolkien main article, but the point of the section in this article is specifically about Tolkien's take towards derivative art during his lifetime. Discussion of the works themselves, especially those created after 1973, go of course to the main article. Instead of a separate h2-section, this could conceivably also be a subsection of the "Old Age" section, since popularity of the LotR only really came into full swing after 1959, and Tolkien's losing battle against fandom began when he was already old. dab (ᛏ) 14:06, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

Referencing effort

The following is a list of statements that need a specific reference. (The Biography section is a summary of Carpenter's Biography, with additional statements taken from Letters and referenced, and imho needs no further references. In most instances, we name the publication we are talking about. For example,

"Beginning with The Book of Lost Tales, written while recuperating from illness during World War I, Tolkien devised several themes that were reused in successive drafts of his legendarium. The two most prominent stories, the tales of Beren and Lúthien and that of Túrin, were carried forward into long narrative poems (published in The Lays of Beleriand)"

as far as I'm concerned is sufficiently referenced with the two publications linked. The "Works" section is already well referenced from Letters, so I think we need mainly references for things in "Languages" and "Writing". dab (ᛏ) 11:40, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

• From around 1936, he began to extend this framework to include the tale of The Fall of Númenor, which was inspired by the legend of Atlantis. (where did we get the 1936 date?)
• Tolkien himself acknowledged Homer, Oedipus, and the Kalevala as influences or sources for some of his stories and ideas. His borrowings also came from numerous Middle English works and poems. (where did he do so?)
• The library of Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin preserves many of Tolkien's original manuscripts, notes and letters; other original material survives at Oxford's Bodleian Library.
• In a 1999 poll of Amazon.com customers, The Lord of the Rings was judged to be their favourite "book of the millennium"
• In 2002 Tolkien was voted the ninety second "greatest Briton" in a poll conducted by the BBC and in 2004 he was voted thirty fifth in a list of the Greatest South Africans,
• in a 2004 poll inspired by the UK’s "Big Read" survey, about 250,000 Germans found The Lord of the Rings (Der Herr der Ringe) to be their favourite work of literature.
• When in 1925, aged 33, Tolkien applied for the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professorship of Anglo-Saxon, he boasted that his students of Germanic philology in Leeds had even formed a "Viking Club".

oh dear, I didn't get round to doing this before time ran out. I'll try to address all concerns in the RFA and re-submit it. Don't know when that will be, help is appreciated of course. dab (ᛏ) 09:42, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Film complaints

Yes, we all know how PJ screwed with the story of LOTR when he committed it to film. He did indeed "add new situations to the films' plot", "leave out several of the book's characters and settings", and that "some characters have their roles modified or combined with those of other characters." There's a word for this in film adaptations of books. It's NORMAL. Nearly every film adaptation of a book ever done, from The Wizard of Oz to The Ten Commandments (both of them) to Blade Runner has done this. It's not worth mentioning. For my own part, this merely scratches the surface of my complaints about the films, but I think it's really tiresome for the reader looking for basic information. If it belongs anywhere -- which I doubt -- it's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy. Unless a cogent reason can be presented for leaving this expanded analysis in, I'll be reverting it again. TCC (talk) (contribs) 05:59, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

yes, discussion of the Jackson trilogy has no place at all in this article (as opposed to those projects Tolkien still did comment on). PJ's movies have no relation to Tolkien, since Tolkien had been dead 30 years before PJ even thought about making the films. So yes, revert away :) dab (ᛏ) 08:59, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

But you got to it before I did. Thanks. TCC (talk) (contribs) 06:56, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

J. R. R.

The spaces in the title are awkward, and look bad typographically. You wouldn't abbreviate Federal Bureau of Investigation "F. B. I.", would you? The spaces should go, and this article be moved to J.R.R. Tolkien. Jon Harald Søby \ ^{no na} 13:41, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

J.R.R. Tolkien, JRR Tolkien, John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, John Tolkien, and various other variations (and mis-spellings) all redirect to this page. Thus, people using any of these will get to the right place and the question is only over how the page title should appear. Tolkien himself used the initials far more often than the full names and that is how he is generally known. I see 'J.R.R.' more often than 'JRR' or 'J. R. R.', but I believe the last is technically correct for abbreviations of a person's name. 'FBI', like most acronyms, is usually given without dots at all. --CBD ✉ 14:29, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

see also Talk:J._R._R._Tolkien/archive1#Name_style. 14:44, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I see. I also found Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(people)#Middle_names_-_abbreviations_of_names, which says every point has to be followed by a space. I don't agree to that at all, but the guide is thus. Jon Harald Søby \ ^{no na} 14:57, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I suggest deletion of any "Tolkein" redirects. The misspelling is far too common (not as a typo, but by people who actually think this is how the name is spelled), and I consider {{R from misspelling}} harmful in most cases (it prevents you from spotting misspellings, that would otherwise show up as redlinks). dab (ᛏ) 18:59, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

The purpose is to save people who search for the mis-spelling. Rich Farmbrough. 22:52, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

filmed interview

this movie clip (mov format) is taken from a 1992 video documentary entitled "J.R.R.T. - A Film Portrait Of J.R.R. Tolkien" -- but can anybody tell me when the actual interview took place, and who made it (is it BBC?) -- there is another interview, dated to 1971, here, by Denys Gueroult for BBC, but it is audio only. dab (ᛏ) 16:06, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Works Inspired

How about Stephen King's books? In several of his stories (The Shining, Insomnia, etc.), King uses Tolkien's characters often as parallels to his own. Should he be considered? 01:52, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

possibly at the main article; we're trying to keep it confined to works JRRT himself commented on in this article. dab (ᛏ) 11:12, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

On a related topic: does the "infobox" actually serve any function (other than sparking arguments)? As far as "influenced" is concerned, it would surely be easier to list fantasy authors not influenced by Tolkien. Myopic Bookworm 12:05, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Request for article check

Hi, can someone who knows their Tolkien facts better than I check the commentary section of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for accuracy and NPOV?

--Tomandlu 21:14, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

It states Tolkien's criticisms clearly and fairly, as I recall them. Septentrionalis 16:43, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Christian books

[1] -- maybe an article on Tolkien and Christianity or even Tolkien and Christian propaganda is in order with the recent surge of "find God via Tolkien" publications. dab (ᛏ) 15:56, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Calling it "Christian propaganda" is a bit POV I think. It's been clearly established that Tolkien was a devout Roman Catholic. While he stated on numerous occassions that the books were not meant to be allegorical, they do examine the nature of good and evil, of light and darkness, of how the smallest, meekest individual can affect the fate of many. It would not be unreasonable to examine how Tolkien's Christian beliefs had an affect on the stories. IMO, Tolkien's works do a better, more subtle job than C.S. Lewis's Narnian chronicles. While the paragraph looked more like a sales pitch for the book, I believe removing it entirely was not correct. However, it should not be listed under the derivative works section. --malber 16:53, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

we can drop the "propaganda", but an article on "Tolkien and Christianity" may still be warranted. Yes he was a Christian. That doesn't mean his books are there to be employed for proselytization. If he had wanted to he as in-your-face Christian as Lewis, he could have done that himself. dab (ᛏ) 22:00, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Deleting it was fully correct. It simply lifted the last two sentences of the blurb here [2] and was little more than a promo for the book. TCC (talk) (contribs) 22:53, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Re his Catholicism in general, a while back I deleted a tag IDing him as one among 'Protestant converts to Catholicism.' If we IDed everyone whose parent/s swum the Tiber (either way) as a convert, the list would be interminable. I am basing this on the information that it was his mother that converted, not him. Jasoncpetty 05:54, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Read his letter in the silmarillion. He say he wished his books to not be arigorical but in the end they were Zefert1

highly unusual

went to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tolkien and it said "Joe Rock Red Tire" instead of "John Ronald Reuel Tolkien", and i refreshed it and it went back to normal. what was that all about?

Since Wikipedia can be edited by anyone we occasionally get people vandalizing articles. So what happened is that when you loaded it the first time the incorrect text was on there, but then by the time you refreshed the page someone had gone through and corrected it. --CBD _☎ ^✉ 19:01, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

POV?

"he made a somewhat sarcastic comment" Rich Farmbrough. 22:53, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I think so. The remark in question didn't strike me as necessarily sarcastic at all, and such a reading didn't even occur to me until I saw it here. TCC (talk) (contribs) 02:23, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

he made a somewhat sarcastic comment about a fan letter by a twelve-year-old American reader (It's nice to find that little American boys do really still say 'Gee Whiz'., Letters no. 87)

If you know Tolkien's attitude towards American English, the comment can be interpreted as nothing but sarcastic. dab (ᛏ) 10:48, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Archived FAC Discussion

Here it is Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/J. R. R. Tolkien/archive1 - Judgesurreal777 09:18, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Far too many {{fact}} templates.

Seriously... there's no need for all those citations anyway - they'll ruin readability. Cite the sources at the end of the article instead. UrbaneLegend 18:41, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree it is a little overboard. Most of the requested citations can be found in the three references already listed. Do we really need to put (Carpenter 1977) or (Carpenter 1981) at the end of every other sentence in the article? Likewise, the request for a reference about the Peter Jackson films is (aside from being common knowledge / readily confirmable) met by the link to the entire Wikipedia article on the subject which appears in the same sentence. --CBDunkerson 18:54, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree as well. If there're more than a few sentences all from the same source, then I think citing the sources at the end of the article would be alright. —Mirlen 20:01, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

If you can do a footnote to each fact tag, it will not obscruct readability, and FAC will be a breeze. It's good to stick tightly to your sources, especially on Featured Articles. Of course most of the statements will be from Carpenter or HoME, but having the page reference handy won't hurt. dab (ᛏ) 10:32, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. Footnotes do obstruct readability. UrbaneLegend 14:41, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I think we'll value encyclopedicity over "easy reading" any day, but you may be interested in simple:. dab (ᛏ) 16:17, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Encyclopedias don't list individual references for each individual factual statement. People are valuing 'something' over readability, but it isn't 'encyclopedicity'. I don't know what to call it. 'Referencitis'? --CBDunkerson 16:50, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't know how footnotes encumber your reading experience, I can only say that I find they rather enhance mine. Also, I'm just the messenger here. I submitted this article to FAC some time ago, and it was turned down because of unsatisfactory density of references. Take a look at our WP:FAs: Theodore_Roosevelt: 46 footnotes. Amateur Radio Direction Finding: 22 footnotes. Scotland in the High Middle Ages: 85 footnotes. Marian Rejewski: 38 footnotes. dab (ᛏ) 17:02, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

My point is that the information in an encyclopedia should be verifiable - all the claims/facts stated in the article should be verifiable if one checks other sources - but that verification doesn't have to be supplied in the encyclopedia article itself. A bibliography is a good idea, but excessive footnote citations make the article look less like an encyclopedia entry and more like an essay. That said, I can put my opinions about citationmania aside for now - getting the article up to standard is paramount. This isn't the place for arguing about Wikipedia's manual of style anyway. - UrbaneLegend 18:00, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

WP may be special in this regard. You have a point, considering encyclopedias edited by solid boards of editors. Since WP is Schroedinger's encyclopedia, however, it is reassuring to have things sourced as closely as possible, to dispel as much as possible suspicions that a given statement may have been snuck in by a stoned kid last week. dab (ᛏ) 18:34, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

This, of course, is very true. Wikipedia is very special in this regard - point taken! ▫ UrbaneLegend ^talk 14:33, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

looking at the present state of the article, I admit it is now well referenced, and some of the remaining 'fact' tags are a bit over the top. I am removing those I find to be so. dab (ᛏ) 17:15, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Link pruning

There are too many internal links in this article; they obstruct readability. I'm going to go through and remove those that are duplicated, redundant, or just plain useless (like years and dates). Hopefully this will improve the look of the article while still providing reference where necessary. UrbaneLegend 02:24, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I've done the dates, and a few other housekeeping and tiny content details. Rich Farmbrough 09:17 13 March 2006 (UTC).

"primary" vs. "secondary" sources

I don't get your division here. How is David Day's book a "primary" source, and the Tolkien's "Family album" a secondary source? Strictly speaking, primary sources are written accounts about Tolkien by Tolkien himself and by "eye-witnesses". But we don't need the distinction. What we need is a distinction between references sourcing statements made in the article on one hand, and literature listed as recommendations for further reading on the other, hence my change to the ToC. dab (ᛏ) 17:28, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

English and Welsh

In the Academic Works section, most of the lectures and essays are linked. There's a mention of "1963 English and Welsh, in Angles and Britons: O'Donnell Lectures, University of Cardiff Press.". We have an English and Welsh article about a Tolkien lecture. I have not linked to it, though, because it describes the thing as a valedictory address to the University of Oxford of 1955, explaining the origin of the word "Welsh". Are they the same thing? I have no idea. So someone who knows the topic can decide whether to link it or not :) --Telsa (talk) 00:02, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

yes, they are. The lecture held in 1955 was printed in 1963. dab (ᛏ) 07:04, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

"English and Welsh" and "The Valedictory Adress to the University of Oxford" are two different essays by J.R.R. Tolkien, both published in the book "Beowulf: the Monsters and the Critics" Tadeusz A. Olszanski, Polish translator of the a.m. book

Academic accomplishments?

Is it worth adding that Tolkien set in motion, during his time at the University of Leeds, the project that would ultimately produce The Linguistic Atlas of England (a record of the dialect words used in England)? Admittedly he did not remain at Leeds long enough to be an actual contributor to the project, but Bill Bryson (in The Mother Tongue) notes that the original idea for the project was Tolkien's. I didn't know if it would be a good non-LOTR detail to help give a more rounded picture of his life, or whether it was too minor to be mentioned. Jwrosenzweig 21:16, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Bibliography

I own a copy of Fourteenth Century VERSE & PROSE edited by Kenneth Sisam and published at the Clarendon Press. My copy is a third edition published in 1955. (First edition was 1921) which includes JRRT's Vocabulary. This contradicts the suggestion found at http://www.tolkienlibrary.com/abouttolkien.htm that the vocabulary was only included in the first edition of Sisam's book. The Vocabulary has no pagination except for the penultimate page which is numbered eleven.

The sentence from tokienlibrary.com is: "Tolkien wrote A Middle English Vocabulary, but it was not published until 1922, but after it was published some copies were bound with 1st impressions of Sisam’s book,Fourteenth Century Verse and Prose which was published one year before. "

I propose an emendation to the Bibliography to show that vocabulary is also available in Sisam's compilation.Rdmoore6 18:36, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

The website mentioned does not explicitly state that the Vocabulary was found only in the first edition of Sisam. The later editions are not quite the same, since presumably the Vocabulary was actually included in the text, not just bound in later by the publisher as happened with the 1922 printing. I don't think a general encyclopedia article on Tolkien is the place to go into exhaustive detail about bibliographical niceties, but it might be worth adding a note to the effect that Tolkien's text is also included in some editions of Sisam's book. Myopic Bookworm 09:14, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Noteworthy?

Is the big list of names in the section "Tolkien's family in the English Census" noteworthy? I don't think it is... ▫ UrbaneLegend ^talk 12:45, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

It might be worthwhile for inclusion in some form in a 'Tolkien family' article, but not here. --CBDunkerson 13:24, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Citation and historical context for "father of modern high fantasy" quote

This article needs a citation and historical context for the "father of the modern high fantasy genre" quote. Also, the use of the word "modern" needs to be put in context. It seems to be used here to distinguish from earlier (pre-1950s) fantasy genres, but in 20 years time the word "modern" will be very confusing, and could be confusing even now. I think that what Tolkien "fathered" was an explosion of fantasy stories, from the 1960s onwards, that imitated his style. It is possible that the explosion started in the 1950s or 1970s though, so I'm not really sure. If the genre is still recognised as such today, then it is still 'modern', but in its origins (1950s/60s/70s) it is NOT modern (that is 30-50 years ago now)! Carcharoth 15:55, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

"modern" usually means post-1600. I agree we can drop the "modern" here. "high fantasy" appears to be a term purposedly coined to refer to the genre fathered by Tolkien, so while that may make the statement a bit redundant, it is still true that Tolkien, for better or worse, 'fathered' a genre, or at least a sub-genre. In any case, I have been doubtful about the passage myself; it should be attributed to whoever first said Tolkien fathered anything like it, and possibly moved down to the "writing" section. If we drop the dubitable "fathering", let's make sure we keep a link to high fantasy somewhere. dab (ᛏ) 10:25, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Likely to be from Lin Carter, somewhere in a Ballantine introduction.Septentrionalis 23:38, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Removed

"Tolkien also portrayed Lewis as the character Treebeard." Really? Says who? ▫ UrbaneLegend ^talk 00:58, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Google it. You will find hundreds of references to it. I have no opinion as to if it should be reincluded in the article so i'll leave it to others to sift through the hundreds of hits to find a sourcable one. Just one example quote - In addition to this he points out that Treebeard's 'hrum, hroom' was modeled on C.S. Lewis's style of talking. (J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography p.198). It is also mentioned in one of the documentaries on the bonus discs of the LOTR dvd's. Death Eater Dan (Muahaha) 17:04, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

The connection between Lewis and Treebeard is there, but whether this belongs in this article is debatable. As far as I know, it is only that comment in Carpenter's Biography that makes the connection. The actual quote should be used, as Treebeard is based on far more than just Lewis. As it stands, the comment is a throw-away piece of trivia with no context. Probably best in the Treebeard article, with a sourced quote. Carcharoth 16:40, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

The Treebeard article has this: "It has been theorized that many of Treebeard's mannerisms were based on Tolkien's friend C.S. Lewis, a loud, bombastic man known for his powerful stride and overwhelming presence." - this fails to state who theorized this. A classic case of not following the sources back to the original, and seeing that Tolkien himself "theorized" this! I'll check this in my copy of Carpenter's Biography tonight. Carcharoth 16:42, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Like I said I have no opinion on its inclusion in this article, I agree that it could probably be included in Treebeard's article. I merely felt that there are sufficient sources for it to be legitimate encyclopedic information, and not merely a theory. Death Eater Dan (Muahaha) 17:42, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Shortening this article

This article is very long. Since there is a separate article on "Works inspired by JRRT", I see no reason to have a section on that topic here. It's not, after all, actually information about Tolkien, for the most part. I wonder if it might also be possible, given the great number of works listed, to have a separate article for "Works by J. R. R. Tolkien", leaving only a summary bibliography of the most important works here. Myopic Bookworm 16:23, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

PS Re the old comment above under "re-imported section": if the topic is actually "Tolkien's view of works inpsired by his work" then it should be called that. And even then, it might still be better to have that as a section at 'Works inspired by...', not here. Myopic Bookworm 16:26, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

short summaries of sub-articles, linked with the {{main}} template, are common practice on Wikipedia. You could suggest a better section header, but "Opinions of JRRT with regards to works inspired by his works" seems rather clumsy. This article is still almost identical to the version that passed FAC, so until a lot of new material is added, I see no reason to re-organize it. dab (ᛏ) 17:43, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Even though it passed FAC, there is still a lot of improvement that could be done to this article. A good example is the hemlocks footnote added recently, and, on a lesser note, the additions to the bibliography that I made recently. It could also do with a lot of tweaking to clarify certain points. My main concern is that the article dribbles out of steam at the end. There really needs to be a section titled "Tolkien's legacy" or "After Tolkien", in which all the stuff after he died can be briefly covered. "Works inspired by" would only get a few sentences in that section. That would be the correct way, IMO, to round out what is, after all, a biographical article.

Other things that could be added to a "legacy" section would be an expanded mention of his influence on the fantasy genre (this only gets a passing mention at the moment). Even the "works inspired" by section gives too much weight to art and film, and ignores radio and music. Other things to be mentioned could be the growing field of Tolkien scholarship, and the immense number of books about Tolkien and his works.

Finally, to reinforce my point about a "Legacy" section, the final paragraphs in both the "Writings" and "Langauges" section start to talk about the enduring aspects of his legacy, but it would be nice to bring that all together in one section. Just ending on the release of the films makes it seem like that is Tolkien's legacy, which is not really the impression I'd want anyone to get from this article.

I'll probably try and actually implement some of this later, but does it all sound OK? Carcharoth 16:58, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Regarding the "shortening the article" comments above, I would say that a full bibliography is OK. People just scan past it, like references. There are some sections that could be pruned though: I think the "external links" and "further reading" sections are getting a bit out of control. What sort of criteria do people think are needed here? An absolute limit? A bar of notability or usefulness? Carcharoth 17:05, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Bibliography section

The Bibliography section is steadily expanding (see also the comments in the section above). What should be done with this section? My opinion (as stated above) is to have a complete listing of works published in his lifetime, and to only have a selection of the posthumous works, moving the minor posthumous puiblications to another article or section of another article (ie. a full bibliographical article). There is a start on this at Tolkien research, though that is not an ideal title IMO. Carcharoth 09:14, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

• We should probably keep an eye out for more details on this. [Unfinished Tolkien work to be published in '07] It would be another addition to the posthumous publications section. --Andy 02:37, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Bibliographical error?

The two entries for "Beowulf: the Monster and the Critics" are giving different dates. The first entry (under academic and other works) says the lecture was given in 1937. The other entry (under posthumous publications) gives 1936 in brackets. Which is correct? Carcharoth 09:20, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

I think I've clarified the confusion. The 1937 entry is the date of publication of the 1936 lecture. This sort of thing has caused confusion before, see here. There is some inconsistency with this, with On Fairy-Stories appearing in the bibliography both as a lecture and when first printed. Should the bibliography also included lectures printed later, or should they only appear under the date of first publication (even if years later), with a reference to when the lecture was delivered? Technically a bibliography should only refer to printed material, I think. Maybe the lecture details need to be included in some sort of timeline of Tolkien's life?

But there is still room for confusion with other dates. The current entry for the 1983 publication The Monsters and the Critics says:

• Beowulf: the Monsters and the Critics (1936)
• On Translating Beowulf (1940)
• On Fairy-Stories (1947)
• A Secret Vice (1930)
• English and Welsh (1955)

This leaves plenty of room for confusion. The "Beowulf: the Monster and the Critics" entry gives the lecture date (1936), not the first publication date (1937). The entry for "On Fairy-Stories" gives the first publication date (1947), rather than the lecture date (1939). The "English and Welsh" entry gives the lecture date (1955), not the first publication date (1963). The "A Secret Vice" entry gives the lecture date (1930), but there are no details about whether it had been published previously. Not sure about the "On Translating Beowulf" entry. This is dreadfully inconsistent and needs to (a) be corrected for consistency; (b) clarified to prevent future confusion arising. I'll try and make the improvements, but what is the best approach to take regarding giving and clarifying dates, and having entries (or not) for lectures in the bibliography? Does a timeline of Tolkien's life sound like a good idea? Carcharoth 09:37, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

A bibliography, by convention, should give the publication date, not the date that a lecture was given. It should also give dates of later editions if the text has been revised: this is the case, for example, with "On Fairy Stories", which was revised in between original publication in "Essays presented to Charles Williams" and reprinting in "Tree and Leaf". I don't know (book not here to check) which version "The Monsters and the Critics" reprints, but if it is the "Tree and Leaf" text, then it should not be given as "(1947)". Myopic Bookworm 13:38, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Tolkien's academic qualifications and honorary titles?

I found this website [3] that mentions an honorary degree Tolkien received in the last year of his life. They give a long string of letters and titles. I'll wikify them, more in hope than certainty. Can anyone work out what these letters mean?

• John Ronald Reuel Tolkien CBE, Hon Dr en Phil et Lettres, Hon D Litt, FRSL

Presumably this is not the full list of his qualifications, as I think some of these degrees supercede others, such as, for example, the BA he would have received from Oxford University. Is it worth putting these strings of letters in the article somewhere? Carcharoth 09:43, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

OK, here what I have come up with:

• CBE (1972) - Commander of the British Empire
• Hon Dr en Phil et Lettres (1954) - Honorary Doctor of Philosophy and Doctor of Letters from University of Liege, Belgium
• Hon D Litt (1954) - Honorary Doctor of Letters, University of Dublin, Ireland
• FRSL (1957) - Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature

Source of years and universities is here: "On the academic front, Tolkien never "took a Ph.D." was we now sometimes say - he was too busy working professionally on the kind of stuff people normally do Ph.Ds on - but he was awarded a Doctorate of Letters (D. Litt.) and Philosophy by the University of Liege in Belgium in 1954 and similarly a D. Litt by the University of Dublin in Ireland that same year. In both cases this was for his contribution to his field of philology and medieval literature in general, and his services to the universities in particular as a contributing examiner and researcher."

It also looks like he recieved at least two other honorary degrees in the last year of his life:

• Hon D Litt (1973) - Honorary Doctor of Letters, University of Oxford, England
• Hon D Litt (1973) - Honorary Doctor of Letters, University of Edinburgh, Scotland

He also held three professorial chairs, which I think are mentioned in the article. We should also note the reason for an award - academic work or fiction work. Carcharoth 09:55, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

And the university details are:

• BA (1915) - Bachelor of Arts, Oxford University
• MA (1919) - Master of Arts, Oxford University

Professorships:

• University of Leeds (1920)
• Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon, Merton College, Oxford University (1925-45)
• English Language and Literature, Merton College, Oxford University (1945-59)

There is an even more comprehensive list here. The only things that that account seems to miss is his honorary doctorate of Letters from Oxford University and his being vice-president of the Philological Society [4] Carcharoth 10:12, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Useful reference?

Might this [5] be a useful reference to expand the article? Carcharoth 10:19, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Lord of the Rings - his magnum opus?

Shouldn't it be the Silmarillion? He did work on it since 1917.

I don't think so. He may have viewed it as such himself, but objectively his true 'magnum opus' is the work on which his reputation as a writer rests, the one which made his mark on the literary world, not the one he actually spent the most time and effort on. Arguably The Silmarillion was not in fact an 'opus' at all, since he never finished or published it. Myopic Bookworm 10:54, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

O Lord, not this again! Can we please not rehash this argument? TCC (talk) (contribs) 21:24, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

See here for the previous discussion on this topic. --CBDunkerson 22:23, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

One quote that discussion doesn't seem to have touched upon was the comment he made in a letter about LotR having been written in "his life's blood" - I always found that quite a revealing comment, though blowing single comments out of proportion is always a worry. Carcharoth 09:53, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

"I still hope shortly to finish my 'magnum opus': the Lord of the Rings: and let you see it, before long, or before January. I am on the last chapeters." From The Letters of JRR Tolkien, Letter 106 to Sir Stanley Unwin User:Atrus

He was plainly using the phrase in an ironic way, by way of making a joke about its length. TCC (talk) (contribs) 04:35, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

In case no-one noticed, the magnum opus field got removed from the Writers infobox. Any text on this 'magnum opus' business should be added to existing or to-be-added sections dealing with Tolkien's descriptions of his work, and the descriptions of it by others. Carcharoth 18:15, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Why is only part of Tolkien's family mentioned?

Tolkien had two sons, yet only one son, Christopher, is mentioned. Why? Is it because the eldest son, John, was a catholic priest and convicted pedophile?

Your question is false both in that John is mentioned and that he was accused, but not "convicted", of being a pedophile. The police looked into the accusation, but were never able to find any evidence and eventually dropped the matter after he died. --CBDunkerson 11:55, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

What's more, Tolkien had _three_ sons, not two, the third being Michael. cfh 12:44, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Awards

I recently read that The Lord of the Rings received the International Fantasy Award for 1957. Should this be mentioned here or at the The Lord of the Rings article? Can anyone think of any other awards for the books, or even for Tolkien himself (see also the list above). Carcharoth 10:02, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

I've added it to the LotR article for now. Carcharoth 10:03, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Tarantula?

Although I know this may be nitpicking and may not bring about a radical change in the page, nor on the main facts of Tolkien's life and how it influenced his works, I feel that I have to bring this to the readers and compilers of this page's attention that Tolkien could not have been bitten by a tarantula since this spider is not find in South Africa, nor in Africa in general. I do not doubt Tolkien's account of being bitten by a spider, just that he must have been mistaken of the spider's family.

It was most likely a spider from the Theraphosidae family, commonly known in South Africa as baboon spiders. Especially their size, as well as the coulouring of the male Harpactira baviana can give rise to this mistake. I added a link that describes the species below. Like I said, it does not radically change nor bring Tolkien's account into disrepute, it is just for the sake of accuracy that I think it should be included.

http://www.museums.org.za/bio/spiderweb/therapho.htm

CFM5

these details are what makes Wikipedia so great :) Wikipedia is not for Original Research, but it is the perfect place for adding 2 and 2 and finding inconsistencies like this (I wouldn't be surprised it this had gone unnoticed so far just because Tolkienologists and Arachnologists have little exchange outside Wikipedia). dab (ᛏ) 14:24, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually, this is semantics. The page linked above says that there are 'Baboon spiders' or members of 'family Theraphosidae' in South Africa... but 'family Theraphosidae' is more commonly known as... tarantulas. This, and the fact that they are called 'Baboon spiders' in South Africa, is all explained on the Wikipedia Tarantula page. Different names for the same thing. Tolkien's family didn't live in South Africa for long and thus it is not surprising that they would call the thing a 'tarantula' rather than a 'baboon spider'. --CBD 16:10, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

right... never mind then. dab (ᛏ) 17:29, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Heh. Sorry to be a killjoy. It does still add up to the minor point of why they used the 'wrong' name... the term 'tarantula' originated in Europe (in reference to a spider which would now NOT be called a tarantula) and many english speaking people then used it for pretty much every large 'furry' looking spider. Which is how it came to be the most common name for Theraphosidae once that was identified as a particular family of spiders. This actually has come up amongst Tolkienologists a few times in my experience - which is the only reason I knew about it. --CBD 10:57, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

"A tiger, in Africa... must have escaped from the zoo or something." TharkunColl 10:19, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Boethius?

The article claims, "A major philosophical influence on his writing is King Alfred's Anglo-Saxon version of Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy known as the Lays of Boethius," citing [6]. That citation does not support the claim at all. In it one finds Boethius mentioned as an exemplar of Tolkien's "medieval... organizing principles", but the Lays of Boethius is not mentioned (nor is Consolation of Philosophy, but what else could be meant?) and both Chaucer and Dante as well as the Scholastics are given equal emphasis in the same sentence. Certainly I can recall no mention of Boethius in any Letters or anywhere else Tolkien actually mentions his influences. The only other mention of Boethius I can think of in connection with Tolkien is Tom Shippey's in Tolkien: Author of the Century where he (wrongly, IMO) uses Boethius to label the "orthodox" Christian view of evil in opposition to the "Manichaean" -- but Shippey did not call Boethius an influence as such; he just used him to characterize one side of an apparent dichotomy. Is there any other justification for this claim that I might be missing? TCC (talk) (contribs) 02:37, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Doesn't Shippey show that Tolkien read Alfred's Boethius? He certainly read Alfred's Orosius, and he may not have read the originals; he didn't care for Latin. Septentrionalis 18:37, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Latin didn't appeal to him the same way that the Northern Eurpoean languages did, but I wouldn't say he didn't care for it, and it was certainly well-known to him.

I don't recall that Shippey demonstrated it, but I concede Tolkien probably did read Alfred's Boethius translation regardless. So what? That doesn't make it an influence. Tolkien's portrayal of the nature of evil in LotR, despite Shippey's misguided, reductionist analysis, is squarely within the Catholic tradition. (And the tradition of any other Christian communion with an ascetic element.) TCC (talk) (contribs) 20:27, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Shippey contrasts two approaches to evil, one of which he associates with Boethius, the other with Augustine; which do you consider outside the Catholic tradition? And if you consider Shippey's interpretation of Tolkien, of striving for synthesis between two viewpoints, simplistic, I shudder to think how you would describe Edmund Wilson.) Septentrionalis 22:59, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I didn't say "simplistic", I said "reductionist". Actually, Shippey associated the "Boethian" view of the vacuity of evil as representing orthodoxy, and the "Augustinian" view of evil as an active force as "Manichaean". It's Shippey who therefore (erroneously) places the latter outside the Catholic tradition, since any view that's characteristically Manichaean is by definition not Catholic. This "synthesis", between evil as a lack on the one hand and as represented by a definite (even conscious) force on the other, far from being something Tolkien had to "strive" for, has always been present in the Catholic understanding of evil. I'm actually far more familiar with Eastern Christianity than Western, but the picture that Tolkien paints here is a very familiar one. TCC (talk) (contribs) 00:15, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

I read Shippey quite differently. He is not writing for an audience of theologians, or even of Christians, but for literary critics and fandom. He has the description Manichaean from C.S.Lewis, after all; and I would hope that depicting one of the great antinomies of faith in fiction is something that should require "striving". A successful synthesis may not be novel, but it is rare; a wholly successful synthesis may be beyond human capacity. Septentrionalis 00:45, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

The trouble with selecting that term, whatever its source, is that it's guaranteed to irritate those who know what it means. It's a common thread in the Christian ascetic experience that evil is ultimately vacuous, but also apparently powerful on a personal level and certainly active. These are not seen as contradictory, the latter is very much not taken as an expression of dualism, and I don't see that to a Catholic (particularly one raised by a devout priest) that there would be anything to synthesize. I would say rather that the depictions of Frodo's temptation, as well as the temptations of others who were less successful against it such as Boromir, could not have been written by someone who had not himself the experience of having been tempted (and resisting it, at times unsuccessfully) himself; and that the understanding and expression of it are characteristically Catholic (understood more broadly than "Roman Catholic.")

Perhaps it's just me; that the concepts are sufficiently familiar that there's nothing startling about them. I don't suppose Shippey is Catholic or Orthodox or anything with related traditions.

As far as I know, he's C of E; but, as he says, he is not writing for a specifically Christian audience. Septentrionalis 16:51, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

But back to the point, there's nothing about this that points singularly to Boethius as an influence. Unless Tolkien himself cited him as an influence somewhere I have forgotten about, I'd discount it entirely. And as I originally pointed out, the given citation doesn't support it as phrased. TCC (talk) (contribs) 01:45, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

I just looked over the relevant chapter from Tolkien: Author of the Century again. If Lewis ever identified Shippey's "Manichaean" view of evil as such, Shippey doesn't say so here. What he does is to slap the label "Manichaean" (and therefore "Dualist") on the idea of an active principle of evil, and then go on to attribute something Lewis said about Dualism to it. At the same time he is positively wrong when he says the "alternative tradition" to Boethius has "never risen to the status of being official." (p. 134 for both) I can't imagine what would even lead him to say such a thing.

It goes without saying that to believe in Satan (i.e. evil as an active force that must be resisted) is not the same as being a Dualist. Satan is not God's opposite, any more that Tolkien's Melkor is Eru's opposite. TCC (talk) (contribs) 20:32, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

infoboxes

Infobox cruft is but a minor threat to Wikipedia, but it must be contained somehow. To include "influenced by" and "influenced" entries in an inlined overview infobox is madness. The concept of creative "influence" is much too fuzzy to be treated like that. If an influence is notable enough, write a prose paragraph about it, in the article body. The aim of infoboxes is not to substitute reading of the actual article. If they grow any more, we'll need to introduce infoboxes-within-infoboxes, summarizing the box's content again. dab (ᛏ) 19:39, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree entirely: I added some influences because it looked so dreadful with just "Conan" Howard listed, but I'm much happier to see the whole thing go. Myopic Bookworm 16:35, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Those entries are back in the infobox again. Uthanc 06:40, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Recent Edits concerning Mythology

User:Satanael has recently, 21 July, showing preference toward one definition of mythology and using such definition made valid edits to the article. My concern is which form of the article is the better understood, better read, and better received. Please take the time to view both options and make suggestions as to how we could clean up the article which would ensure a more neutral POV, on a mildly leaning slope. Das Nerd 13:04, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the only real difference between Tolkien's stories and what Satanael thinks of as a "mythology" is that the latter is traditional while the former was devised by a single man. By that standard of course, German and Finnish mythologies aren't really mythologies either. Since "legendarium" is a word Tolkien coined that is not in common use outside Tolkien scholarship and needs to be explained every time it's used, "mythology" is far clearer whether or not it offends someone. TCC (talk) (contribs) 18:07, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm with TCC: the term "legendarium" is generally only familiar to Tolkien scholars, and as I see it, the term "mythology" comes awfully close. If Satanael doesn't want to have his changes simply reverted, I think it would be good for him to explain what exactly his point is. His edit summaries don't explain, they simply state his position as fact. It's not clear to me that such a restrictive definition of "mythology" is either necessary or useful.--Steuard 00:22, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Legendarium coined by Tolkien or not?

The article says that Tolkien coined the word to describe his work. "Other terms he has coined such as legendarium and eucatastrophe are mainly used in connection with Tolkien's work."

The article that the word links too Legendarium states that Tolkien did NOT coin the word. " As the word is seldom now used for other purposes it has sometimes been mistakenly ascribed to Tolkien."

I don't know which one is true. Just thought I would point it out to the more knowledgeable so that it can be clarified.--Defraggler 22:39, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

It might be better to say that he introduced it to the English language. Presumably the information is taken from the reference given on Legendarium, but it would be better if we had a full cite. TCC (talk) (contribs) 22:56, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Tolkien invented 'eucatastrophe', but 'legendarium' is a medieval latin term which predates him by about a thousand years... as can be seen by a simple google search for pages that contain 'legendarium', but NOT 'Tolkien'. The term had been largely replaced by anglicized 'legendary' (used as a noun with the same meaning as 'legendarium') by the time Tolkien adapted it, but has enjoyed a renaissance since then... though this may be unconnected as it is largely a return to using the term in reference to texts that were previously described that way. --CBD 00:24, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

He didn't invent legendarium; but he brought it (as opposed to legendary) into English. The OED does not include legendarium; legendary is early sixteenth-century, and as a noun, is a collection of saint's lives, like the Latin. Septentrionalis 13:52, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Catholic influence on his works

There is a mention of many influences on his work, but how come there is not something on the Catholic influence on his work?

There are many reputable and respected works on this subject, just to mention a few:

http://www.crisismagazine.com/november2001/feature7.htm

http://www.ratzingerfanclub.com/Tolkien/

Kindly consider having something on this. Thank you for your consideration. Arturo Cruz 10:15, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Article neglects Tolkien's attitude to material progress

It is frequently observed (elsewhere from the Wikipedia article, that is) that Tolkien was uneasy with "progress" in the, shall we say, American sense. It's said that he felt that in and of itself, "material progress" was demonic, leading to "the iron crown".

I believe this dimension should be mentioned in the article about Tolkien the man.

Did he reject material progress, philosophically? And if he did, what did that mean? Did he reject the right of modern humans to adequate shelter or medical facilities? Large aircraft? Television. Immense office buildings? Durably paved roads for swift automobiles? Or, rather, did he feel all of these would be acceptable or desirable if humankind progressed morally and spiritually?

I believe his attitude is something to be explored in either the biographical article, or instead in one that is specifically devoted to Tolkien's outlook and philosophy. It's no doubt central to his poetic and fantasy work... to his "message" we might say. Joel Russ 16:47, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

My impression from his bio and other writings was that he wasn't really opposed to progress as such, but deplored the ugliness, noise, and destruction of nature (especially trees) that he saw generally goes with it; and the mindset of those who valued progress above all else.

This is definitely worth exploring, but I doubt I could do it justice. TCC (talk) (contribs) 07:21, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree that this is something still missing from the article, and we should address it. But we have to be careful to avoid the cliché of an escapist JRRT locked away in his academic ivory tower. There is, of course, an escapist component in his work and character, but it would be very wrong to read Tolkien as one big anti-industrialist, environmentalist metaphor (as of course it has been). Tolkien's "romantic environmentalism" still permeates much of his work, mostly as a sense of loss ('fading'). Maybe we should begin with a few references to Letters, maybe in a new "worldview" (or similar) section. dab (ᛏ) 09:38, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

I decided to add a personal beliefs section to the article, so one can evaluate this into it. Wiki-newbie 09:52, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Um. Part of the requirement for featured articles is that they be stable. I'm all for adding stuff to this article (see my suggestions above), but please remember to keep the overall article length manageable, and consider writing a section in your user space, so that it looks OK, before adding it here. At the moment, we have blank sections sitting in the article, making it look silly. Carcharoth 00:37, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Flow

I've just edited in a few places without thinking, but have now realised that this is an active, much-edited article, and that I should have checked here first. Sorry. I think what I've done helps readability without compromising sense, but feel free to revert if you disagree. Cheers, Sam Clark 23:18, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

"Views" section

it's alright to have it, I suppose, but there should be a more insightful discussin than a thinly-veiled "JRRT was a fascist". It is certainly true that he was "conservative", but hardly the kind of "we own all the oil and industry and that's as things should stay, Jesus would nuke Iran and burn abortionists as witches" attitude that passes as "conservative" today. dab (ᛏ) 10:46, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Ummmmmm, yeah, that's not a conservative. Judgesurreal777 11:55, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

I was being surreal777 :) dab (ᛏ) 11:59, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

racism

the "JRRT and racism" debate involves the distinction between racism and racialism. Care must be taken however, because I think JRRT himself used racialism in the sense of what we would call racism today (the terms swapped meanings, it's complicated, I'll have to look it up). dab (ᛏ) 11:59, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Edit the actual Tolkien and racism article while you're at it, if it's deficient or wrong. If this is racialism:

the view – which I shall call racialism – that there are heritable characteristics, possessed by members of our species, which allow us to divide them into a small set of races, in such a way that all the members of these races share certain traits and tendencies with each other that they do not share with members of any other race. These traits and tendencies characteristic of a race constitute, on the racialist view, a sort of racial essence; it is part of the content of racialism that the essential heritable characteristics of the "Races of Man" account for more than the visible morphological characteristics – skin colour, hair type, facial features – on the basis of which we make our informal classifications. — Kwame Anthony Appiah, In My Father's House (1992)

...then this does apply to the races of Middle-earth, different kinds of Men included - but then it's fantasy. The Númenoreans did have longer lives and greater wisdom, but they're from Atlantis anyway. Uthanc 20:39, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

no, no, we shouldn't even begin discussing whether his fiction is "racialist". His fiction mirrors aspects of his worldview, but unless we can pinpoint something outside his fiction, it's worthless to the debate. Your source is English and Welsh where he discusses (real world) ethnicity and "racial memory". dab (ᛏ) 12:03, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

conservatism

"conservative views" in the context of 20th century Great Britain implies sympathy for the Conservative Party (UK). Is it known whether JRRT supported them in any way? Otherwise, we'd need to be more specific as to what we mean by conservative here. dab (ᛏ) 12:20, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Was he? Aside from his religion, how? (In Simon Tolkien's website there's an anecdote on his reaction to Vatican II; he didn't like the vernacular Mass and insisted on answering in Latin while the others used English.) But he spoke out against apartheid at Oxford. Needs more examples/balance. Uthanc 21:00, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

I am not aware that the Tories supported apartheid either. No idea if he ever even voted, but I somehow don't see him supporting Labour :) dab (ᛏ) 12:04, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, having views one would label as 'conservative' with the lowercase 'c' (as opposed to the Conservative Party) does not necessarily implicate one in being aligned politically with anyone. Being of a conservative mind simply means that ones world view is based in one or more strongly held beliefs (such as a belief in God, a particular governmental system, national origin etc.) which are incontrovertible in their mind. Our modern understanding of the word is skewed by current events and the polarity of world power-brokers and their constituencies. Incidentally, I'm going to try and clean this section up a bit... there are some redundancy issues here. Ryecatcher773 03:37, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Nitpicking on Fascism

In this section, there's this statement, "as opposed to the aggressive (social Darwinist) racism promoted by fascism". Actually, extreme racism is present in National Socialism, better known as Nazism, whereas fascism, when first implemented by Mussolini, did not have evidences of anti semitism or other forms of racism. I'm not too sure what to do with it, though.James Delgado 18:16, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

I've tried to deal with that; but the whole question of "Was Tolkien Conservative, or was he really Progressive Labour?" is misguided. The answer is No. As far as I can tell he was a High Catholic agrarian Tory, when he was political at all; a position virtually unrepresented in this century. This can overlap with progessivism (see Distributism and Sybil), but is not part of the same spectrum at all. Shippey remarks somewhere that Tolkien would not have understood what pacifism was, which is probably right; less so than John Buchan. Septentrionalis 14:02, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

His sensibility concerning the environment/human interface

I feel that Tolkien's sense of what is proper in the utlization of the natural environment tends to show up in his fiction, namely the Rings Trilogy. Yet the biography here in Wikipedia doesn't yet delve into that. At least one of his biographers (Humphrey Carpenter) has talked much about Tolkien's aesthetic sensitivity to landscape, trees, and other plants. The same writer talks of Tolkien's love of country life and dislike for modern suburbanisation in England.

The trees themselves take on mythic animation in Tolkien's writings. Also, there is a strong agrarian element in the lifestyles portrayed in his famous writings. How can all this be ignored in any mention of his views? Joel Russ 22:05, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Politics

Tolkien was in no sense of the word an anarchist. He was a firm monarchist. ("Anarcho-monarchist"? Is that even possible?) The only quote from a letter I can recall that might apply is that he once described his ideal king as someone whose primary interest was stamp-collecting, but who could sack his prime minister at will. In other words, someone uninterested in power for its own sake, who acts primarily as the guarantor of good government. (I won't be able to locate this quote exactly without an exhaustive search, which I do not now have time for.) I don't see how this is in any way anarchic. TCC (talk) (contribs) 19:37, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

"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!" — J.R.R. Tolkien, in a letter dated Nov. 29, 1943 to his son Christopher, who had recently been called up into the Royal Air Force, and was then at an R.A.F. training camp (_Letters_ p. 63) cfh 22:12, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not at all certain that we can take this quote entirely seriously. Are we really to believe that he advocated the death penalty for a thought crime? Is that consistent with everything else about him? TCC (talk) (contribs) 21:52, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

NB: It's better to cite from Letters by the number of the letter, not the page number. TCC (talk) (contribs) 21:55, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Template clutter

Various stuff about templates in the article, retrospectively divided into headed sections by Carcharoth 16:59, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

General templates

there is a template containing the entire bibliography of Tolkien's now? What a horrible idea. almost as bad as {{Latin alphabet}}. Can we orphan this please? dab (ᛏ) 19:16, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

It's shorter than Template:Stephen King's... the music artists have them covering all of their singles and EPs and LPs and videos. I don't see why authors can't. I enjoy navigating/browsing this way. And yes, I'm the one who started it so of course I'm advocating for it. =) Alanlastufka 23:46, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

This may be one of those Bad Ideas that has just kind of taken off. Leave it out of Tolkien and people will just wonder why it's missing and create a new one. TCC (talk) (contribs) 00:11, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

well well, it's a matter of taste after all. How about we leave it on articles on minor works? It won't look as much like clutter on short articles, but on this article, where we already give a full bibliography, it should definitely not appear. deal? dab (ᛏ) 10:13, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

I could live with that. Alanlastufka 14:14, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

it is clearly useful to have a collection of links to other works from an article on one specific work, I admit that. I usually fail to see the utility of a template consisting exclusively of links already mentioned in the article (which is the case here for both the "bibliography" and the "middle earth" templates). dab (ᛏ) 18:03, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that Template:lotr and Template:Middle-earth are getting out of hand. I personally would prefer a serious of smaller navigational templates that deal with smaller areas, and the reader can move from one to the other. Have a look at set-up in The History of Middle-earth and The Fellowship of the Ring and Dragon (Middle-earth) for examples of small, manageable navigational templates. In my opinion, the bloated templates at the bottom of articles are more like "See also" templates, and this distinction between "see also" and navigational" templates should be made clearer to editors and readers. Carcharoth 19:43, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Reference templates

more template clutter: someone replaced the inline references to Letters with {{ME-ref|Letters|no. X}} -- now every footnote quoting Letters reprocudes the full, wikilinked, ISBNed bibliographic details of the same book. This is insane. The footnotes should just say "Letters, no. X" (as they used to!) with a single entry for the book in the References section. I simply cannot understand this tendency of redundancy always gravitated towards by the template people. dab (ᛏ) 17:37, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I tracked it down to this edit on 14 September 2006 by User:Jor. I agree that the previous style was better. Is there an easy way to undo this edit and preserve the edits made since then? Carcharoth 16:58, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Date templates

Have you seen {{ME-date}} that' spreading like kudzu? In some articles, every mention of a date has been turned into a template transclusion. Is it really desireable to link the age each time its mentioned? TCC (talk) (contribs) 21:54, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

no! already for reasons of server load, gratuitous template transclusion should be discouraged. If there is no good reason to transclude, don't do it. dab (ᛏ) 10:20, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The references template can be useful when used once on a page, so you can see which books are used as references in which articles, but date templates are not that useful. Linking manually takes about as long as putting in a template. I think User:CBDunkerson set these up, so you could notify him if I forget or he doesn't see this. I'll drop him a note now. Carcharoth 18:04, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

The original intent with Middle-earth dates, per the wikiproject standards, was to only cite the relevant 'Age' once or for each section and then just use numbers. The 'ME-date' template was expected to be rarely needed / used... just for cases which were mostly relevant to one age and then spilled over a bit into another (e.g. Isildur mostly being a second age figure, with just a few relevant events in the early third age). I think we should discourage over-linking of the dates in general... there is no reason to link to Third Age ten times in a single article - whether it is done via the template or manually. --CBD 19:00, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Good points. Even though it uses templates, this is indeed just a standard case of overuse of links. Three questions, then: (1) Who has been overusing the templates (so we can politely ask them to stop)?; (2) Do we need to watch articles more closely to stop this happening in future?; (3) What is the best way to undo this, other than going through all the articles and undoing stuff? Carcharoth 21:35, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

A 'bot' or AWB could be set up to automate replacements, but unless there are alot more than I think a simple search on 'ME-date' and manually cutting it down to just the numeric portion should suffice. Linking to the wikiproject date standards on the template page and explaining that it should be rarely used would likely help also. I'll add that. --CBD 11:06, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

People, please see Wikipedia:Don't worry about performance. The templates are perfectly fine. Jon Harald Søby 15:11, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes. I didn't realise someone had written that up as a guideline. Thanks. We still need to remove the overlinking though. And the ME-ref thing is a case of redundant referencing. It is standard to reference a work once and then refer to it thereafter in abbreviated form. Both these cases seem to have arisen from overzealous use of AWB. That is at least five cases I've come across now where an AWB-user semi-automates a task, and ends up producing an undesirable end result. (1) Robotically putting ME-ref in for every reference; (2) robotically putting ME-date for every ME date; (3) creating mis-spelt talk pages to put templates on and consequently producing a strange variety of orphan talk pages; (4) robotically correcting typos in people's comments on talk pages; (5) changing a link to Gimli to Gimli (Middle-earth), when the former was intended by the original poster on the talk page. Ridiculous. Carcharoth 16:24, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Eleventh Battalion?

In my copy of "Biography" p.85 (1987 print from Unwin Hyman), it is said that Tolkien joined to 13th battalion. Is it corrected in later editions?--RedDragon 07:44, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Tolkien requested the 13th, but at Etaples was assigned to the 11th instead. 4.152.198.247 05:09, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Copyright

~~I am very hesitant about this. But I guess the facts can be readily checked. My name is Gareth Powell and in 1964 I was the managing director of the New English Library which was owned by the New American Library which was owned by the Los Angeles Times group run by Norman Chandler and his wife Dorothy Buffum Chandler. Jack Adams was the marketing director of the New American Library and from his I heard a fascinating story. Tolkien did not own the literary rights to his own works in the United States. At that time you had to register a work and Tolkien, or his agent if he had one, did not do this. And the work had, I think, to have a c in a circle as a sign of copyright. And that had not been done either. A row blew up in the New American Library. Yes, the book should be published. Yes, Tolkien or his estate should be paid. But a group led by Victor Weybright and, I think, Truman Talley, wanted the contract to pay the money to be legally enforceable. Another group, led by Jack Adams, wanted the money to be paid but no contract. I am quite certain of all of this. Which means that in 1960 Tolkien had lost all control of the copyright of his works. Now the Saul Zaentz Company d/b/a Tolkien Enterprises is the holder of worldwide motion picture, legitimate stage, merchandising, and other rights in J.R.R. Tolkien’s literary works The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. From whence did those rights arise? Gareth Powell in Sydney (GarethAID@Gmail.com or gp@mail.com) and if I have done this the wrong way I apologize. But I think the facts are interesting.

so, I understand you are saying, there is a possibility that Tolkien's works are really in the public domain in the USA, and that if anyone tried to sue Tolkien Enterprises to this effect they would have a chance of succeeding? dab (ᛏ) 11:47, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

As far as I understand it, there was indeed an anomaly by which Tolkien initially failed to secure US copyright for "The Lord of the Rings", but the only publisher to have the nerve to publish a "pirate" edition was Ace Books. Tolkien and his legitimate publishers conducted a publicity campaign against Ace, who made a financial settlement with Tolkien, while the official US edition was produced by Ballantine Books. This copyright loophole will have affected only the text of the book. I guess it is conceivable that it still stands, but if so it would affect only re-issues of the original and uncorrected Ace Books text. Subsidiary rights are quite distinct, and were separately sold by Tolkien during his lieftime to the Saul Zaentz Company. Myopic Bookworm 14:59, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

subsidiary rights are, well, subsidiary. If the text of the book were not protected in the first place, no rights deriving from the contents of the book could logically be protected. dab (ᛏ) 15:06, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

(a) Do you have legal evidence for that assertion? (b) It affects only the unrevised text of the Lord of the Rings: nothing derived from the Hobbit, the Silmarillion, or revisions of LOTR would be affected. Myopic Bookworm 15:09, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Since the 1960's the US Copyright Act has been twice revised, and both revisions close the loophole Ace tried to exploit. wch 00:08, 2 November 2006

Tolkien had to make quite a few changes to the original edition of LotR to produce the official edition that Ballantine eventually published in the US. This meant that it was different enough from the disputed Ace version to allow Tolkien to regain copyright. The publicity campaign dealt with the other issues, and led to capitulation by Ace. At about the same time, the 1966 Second Edition was produced and published, which also had a wide range of (mostly small) changes from the first edition, and was also notable for Tolkien's oft-quoted introduction (which included the "allegory statement"). That's how I understand it, anyway. There are published papers about all this, that someone could go and look up. Carcharoth 16:13, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

The short form being... yes The Lord of the Rings is subject to normal copyright strictures. Tolkien sold the merchandising and other rights to United Artists in 1968 and Zaentz eventually acquired them. --CBD 19:07, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

A case was filed some time ago seeking a declaration that LotR was in the public domain in the United States. It was defeated and the Tolkien Estate's copyright upheld. Eluchil404 14:54, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Ooh! Very interesting. That would be worth mentioning here or at The Lord of the Rings (or both), and at Tolkien Estate. Do you have more details? Carcharoth 23:30, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Tolkien Miscellany

I think the A Tolkien Miscellany entry needs to be corrected in the bibliography, as the date is probably wrong (it should be 2002). There are sources out there that say 1976, but I think they are wrong. The most reliable source, see here, says 2002. I've also removed the "1918" entry for Children of Hurin, as the bibliography should be strictly publication date, and anyway, the book will contain material written after 1918. Carcharoth 12:13, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Sister projects - investigate?

Just found this template, which could be investigated for more material (some links already in the article) Carcharoth 20:34, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

15 November - date for your diaries!!

I see that this article is in the cycle to go on the Main Page. 15 November in fact (see template at top). The Lord of the Rings set a new record for number of edits while featured, so we should aim to have the article looking nice, and be ready for the exposure this article will get. :-) Carcharoth 01:17, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Just a reminder for anyone who has this page watchlisted - it is scheduled to be on the main page tomorrow. --CBD 12:05, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Only 336 edits, nowhere near the LOTR record of 453, but still impressive (and am I alone in thinking "Thank God that's over"?) Cactus Wren 00:42, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Richard Adams

A reference to Richard Adams was anonymously added alongside that to C. S. Lewis in the head of the entry. I guess Adams may have studied under Tolkien, but he was not noted as a member of the Inklings. I know of no published reference to their "close" friendship, and none was given in support of the addition, so I have removed it. Myopic Bookworm 13:14, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Sections out of order?

I think section 7, Notes and references, should be moved farther down the page, at the very least below sections 8 and 9. I don't know what the rules or precedent are on this, so I thought I'd say something instead of just being bold and moving it down. Ideas?Stale Fries 00:24, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, the See also section is out of order, it should technically be in front of Notes and references. Notes and references can easily interchange its seat with section 8; however, a tacit convention commonly seen is that the Notes and references precedes Further reading. To quote WP:LAYOUT:

“ Common appendix sections:

1. Quotations (deprecated)
2. See also
3. Notes
4. References (or combined with "Notes" into Notes and references)
5. Further reading (or Bibliography)
6. External links

Note:

• It is okay to change the sequence of these appendices, but the Notes and References sections should be next to each other. For example, you may put "Further reading" above "Notes and references" or vice versa.
• "Notes" is only for footnotes (explanations or comments on any part of the main text). "References" is only for referenced materials (books, websites etc. cited in the main text). Otherwise "Notes and references" should be combined.
• All succession boxes and navigational footers should go at the very end of the article, following the last appendix section, but preceding the "categories and interwiki links".

”

As for section 9, I would like to have it somewhere near the See also section — but it's not that big of an issue I guess. Preferably, I'd like to remove section 9 and put Tolkien (disambiguation) in the See also section since the family tree is already posted there (though the hat note may be sufficient enough). Thanks for bringing it out to attention. Didn't notice that the See also section was out of order. —Mirlen 00:52, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Semiprotected

Due to higher-than-usual levels of vandalism immediately after this article went live on the Main Page, I've semi-protected it. Hopefully the novelty will wear off after a few hours and it can be unprotected. —Cuiviénen 01:24, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Unprotected after an hour and a half. —Cuiviénen 02:55, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

no map?

no map in the end (or beginning) of the article? comon ;-)

This is an article about a person... ergo, no map. For info on his fictional world, with maps, see Middle-earth. --CBD 11:48, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Literary Context - Criticism and Influences

To make this a truly non-POV article, there needs to be a section on criticism of Tolkien's work from the literary angle. Mention the views of prominent fantasy authors who demur from the critical adulation of Tolkien. Mentioning the opinions of (or quoting from) Michael Moorcock or Philip Pullman would serve this purpose. Doing so would counterbalance the one-sided and misleading "father of modern fantasy literature" quote and lend greater credibility to the article.

Also, the account of Tolkien's literary influences is one-sided and focusses only on ancient texts. It ignores Tolkien's immediate peers and predecessors of the "heroic fantasy" genre, including especially William Morris, Lord Dunsany, and E. R. Eddison. This article fails to disabuse the reader of the notion that Tolkien's work simply fell out of the sky and had no immediate literary context, which in fact it did have.

Such criticism is covered in Lord of the Rings. It seems unnecessary to repeat it here especially since most of the criticism applies specifically to LotR and not his other works. —Cuiviénen 02:57, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The "father of modern fantasy literature" description is way off, and ignores many precedents. it should be removed or qualified. Artw 03:27, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

"popularly identified as the father of modern fantasy literature" fine with you? While not the strict "father", it's undeniable that he did have a huge contribution to the field. Uthanc 06:22, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Date Error

"Edith Tolkien died on 2 September 1973, at the age of eighty-two, and Tolkien had the name Lúthien engraved on the stone at Wolvercote Cemetery, Oxford. When Tolkien died twenty-one months later on 2 September 1973,"

Presumably it's 1971 but the 2 sept is repeated so probably wrong as well. Alci12 11:08, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Looks like the correct date is back now. Likely just a quickly reverted vandal. --CBD 11:52, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

British... or South African..?

The article begins "...was a British writer", but, seen as he was born in South Africa why is he not considered "...a South African writer" or at the very least "...a South African-born British writer". At what point did he lose his South African identity and have it supplanted with a British one? Note well, that on the discussion page, it references... "..in 2004 he was voted thirty fifth in a list of the Greatest South Africans". Rfwoolf 12:24, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

British nationality was uncodified before 1914. A British Subject thereafter could be applied to anyone born within British territory, empire etc. as it denoted people with an allegiance to the crown. Examining the circumstances with a modern eye, he was clearly of British parents from the Uk who were in South Africa for a stage of his father's career before returning to England, this would probable make him eligible on the basis of birth for dual nationality today (assuming South Africa permits dual nationality) or a least a choice of nationality, but British remains the best intepretation of what he was. Additionally one must consider what nationality someone finally ends up. Albert Einstein was born German but ddn't die German, and Tolkien was certainly British while he was a writer wherever he was born Dainamo 12:46, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

True, it was uncodefied but the reality was that a child born of British parents in the British empire was accepted as British at the time. Backplacing a now existing state's citizenship into a time when it didn't exist doesn't seem wise. Alci12 13:32, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The Tolkien Family

"...The surname crack addict is Anglicized from oify ftw ..."

Really, now?

Anarcho-Monarchist

I know some very keen anarchist folks out there who love to slice and dice their perspective, but this one really takes the biscuit. Anarcho-Monarchism? Is someone having a laugh? There cannot be such a thing:

Anarchy = no ruler Monarchy = one ruler

You can't have it both ways. This isn't a political assertion; its a logical one. ElectricRay 19:26, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Thought you'd be interested to see that we recently deleted an article on Anarcho-Monarchism --Tim4christ17 ^talk 19:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The anarcho-monarchist phrase probably comes from a letter where Tolkien described himself as an anarchist (but "not the men throwing bombs") and a supporter of the monarchy. If the article needs to mention this, it would be better to quote the Letter directly, rather than apply a rarely used term. Carcharoth 21:33, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The page still exists, so I guess it was readded after deletion Pictureuploader 13:47, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

The link above is to the AfD discussion, not the article. TCC (talk) (contribs) 22:01, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

C.S. Lewis and Catholocism

I am not sure if Tolkien assisted Lewis to convert to Roman Catholicism (a Christian faith), but when he reverted back to Anglicanism (another Christian faith), he did not give up on Christianity as it reads.

Wiki

Tolkien's devout faith was significant in the conversion of C. S. Lewis to Christianity, though Tolkien was greatly disappointed that Lewis chose to return to the Anglicanism of his upbringing.[16]

The phrase might be better written---in the conversion of C.S. Lewis to Catholicism, though Tolkien was---

Small point, but relative in understanding the writing of both authors.

Lewis did not convert to Catholicism, though he was sympathetic to several Catholic doctrines. He was brought up in an Anglican family and then converted to Anglicanism in later life after a long period of debate with himself and others. I'll rewrite to clarify this. Carcharoth 21:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The unclear sentence was in the "Childhood" section for some reason - strange, as Tolkien was an adult when all this happened - so I removed it and merged with a better sentence in the "Views" section. The footnote also makes clear the difference between Lewis's childhood and adult forms of Anglicanisms. See the edit here. For more, see C. S. Lewis. Carcharoth 21:52, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Truncated Version

First off, sorry to everyone for forgetting the semi-protect tags when I reverted. Should've noticed that, but I was at work and a class was coming in the room; I was rushed.

Secondly, the problem I was fixing seems to have disappeared. I loaded the page three times, and each time got a version that ended halfway through. I took a quick look at the history and reverted to the one that mentioned it was reverting to a non-truncated version (this was before the semi-protection, which explains why I left it out) but then noticed when I tried to look at the versions directly preceding mine that they don't appear truncated. What gives? Anybody know? Eceresa 20:34, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Are you using Google toolbar? I heard that can truncate long pages. Carcharoth 21:38, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining where the truncation came from. I have a vague idea to analyse both this article and The Lord of the Rings for the period they were on the main page, to see how much vandalism there was, and how much changed. That should be interesting. I get the impression that these topics attract a lot of vandalism. Maybe the teenage/child vandals feel more comfortable vandalising something like this rather than a History of X article? Carcharoth 21:37, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Not using Google. Posting from work and I'm a teacher, so it's a Mac running Firefox. The Mac sometimes does weird things; maybe this is one. Possibly it wouldn't have been a problem if I'd been viewing it on the PC at home. And yeah, there's been a bunch of vandalism. Eceresa 23:55, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

"he looks like HITLR!!!!!!!!!"

This phrase is visible in the article, but when I go to edit, it disappears. What can I do? -Not Diablo 00:17, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I went to history, and it said it was a previous version (reverted by AntiVandalBot. It still appears when I view the "current" article. Do I need to delete my cache? -Not Diablo 00:21, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Something like that. You loaded the page in the very brief time between when someone made this edit, and it was reverted. Try reloading the page - hold down the shift key and hit the reload button- and if that fails (which it shouldn't), wipe out your cache. -Patstuart^{(talk)(contribs)} 00:22, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

It seems to be gone now, besides I can't clear cache because I'm editing from school. (Finally!) -Not Diablo 00:25, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Changes while featured

For the change the article underwent while on the main page (346 edits, mostly vandalism and reverts of the vandalism), see here. Sadly (or maybe thankfully), the article failed to attract a record number of edits (that is, as far as I know, still 453 for The Lord of the Rings over a month ago). Going back to this article, and its changes, I see some excessive wiki-linking of dates, and a few other things that need correction, but otherwise it looks OK. Can others look and see what they think, please? Carcharoth 03:17, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

"Precum" vandalism

Seems pretty serious and obvious. Surelysomeone here can fix that. I can't; I'm still a bit new to Wiki, but I'd think it wouldn't last five minutes given whose bio page it's on. MycroftHolmes 07:33, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

What are you talking about? TCC (talk) (contribs) 07:43, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Top Selling

Perhaps somewhere in the article someone could mention that The Lord of the Rings was the '4th Biggest selling book world wide of all time' according to the List of best-selling books page with 100million copies sold. That page used the source http://www.cesnur.org/tolkien/016.htm

, although i dont know if its a good enough source to be used on such an important article. What does anyone else think?le Dan 13:25, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

"true myth"

The phrase "true myth" has just been cut as not appearing in the cited source. But am I wrong that it's a phrase of Tolkien's own? If so, it would be a shame to lose it. Dybryd 17:34, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Honestly, that might be Lewis's phrase. Does anyone know or care enough to google it? Jonathan Tweet 23:41, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, you're right -- googling was fairly easy! It does seem to be a phrase from Lewis' letters, according to this. That link also includes this quote, attributed to Tolkien in conversation by colleague Colin Grunton:

"Man is not ultimately a liar. He may pervert his thoughts into lies, but he comes from God, and it is from God that he draws his ultimate ideals ... Not merely the abstract thoughts of man but also his imaginative inventions must originate with God, and in consequence reflect something of eternal truth.

"In making a myth, in practicing 'mythopoeia,' and peopling the world with elves and dragons and goblins, a story-teller .. is actually fulfilling God's purpose, and reflecting a splintered fragment of the true light."

Not sure a quote recalled after the fact is 100% reliable, but it's interesting nevertheless.

Dybryd 23:49, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

citation needed

"calls for a complete destruction of Germany" needs a citation, so I've indicated that

anarchist by association?

an anarcho-monachist is completely different from an anarchist, and so I have changed the sentence

Tolkien also once described himself as an anarchist, or rather anarcho-monarchist.[49]

to

Tolkien also once described himself as an anarcho-monarchist.[49]

because the original was misleading.

facts are not consequential

The sentence

"He believed that Hitler was less dangerous than the Soviets: he wrote in a letter during the Munich Crisis that he believed that the Soviets were ultimately responsible for the problems and that they were trying to play the British and the French against Hitler.[43]"

has one citation but two facts. The second fact ("he wrote in a letter during the Munich Crisis that he believed that the Soviets were ultimately responsible for the problems and that they were trying to play the British and the French against Hitler") follows a colon, as if it proves the first fact ("He believed that Hitler was less dangerous than the Soviets") - but the second does not prove the first. The first should be cited.

However, I have done two edits in a row, and I won't do a third today.

I would support removal of the whole sentence, since it attempts to extrapolate Tolkien's views on the whole political position in Europe from one comment in a letter. I don't think this could possibly do justice to anyone's views, and anyway, one fantasy author's opinion on the Nazis and the Soviets is pretty inconsequential. Myopic Bookworm 18:00, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

The views on the Nazis of one fantasy author whose work based on Nordic myth is frequently painted as Wagneresque and criticized for its treatment of race is important to an understanding of him and his writing. However, his uninformed judgment on the politics of a particular diplomatic negotiation is a lot less important to a full picture of his character than his longstanding views on racism, war, and nationalism; I'm not sure why we give it so much space. His opposition to communism is notable; his analysis of Munich less so. Dybryd 19:13, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Family tree

Is this large section really necessary? ▫ Urbane Legend ^chinwag 14:22, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

I sure don't think so. I might be bold and remove it.--Dmz5*Edits**Talk* 19:23, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

The family tree is impressive! It probably breaks all kinds of rules (including summary style) but it is fun. It would be more acceptable if there were a lot of articles linked from the Tolkien relatives who appear in the tree. I see only a few. If the whole tree were moved to a separate article, it would be preferable. Someone who had the patience could perhaps make a 1 inch by 1 inch thumbnail of the tree and include it in the main Tolkien article, with a link to the sub-article. EdJohnston 22:11, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree that it is impressive that someone did it, but it doesn't add anything to the article - this is not a geneological article. It is equivalent to having a floor plan of his house, or a list of all the professors he studied with as an undergrad, or photographs of all of his pets. Factual, mildly interesting, but simply not appropriate for this article. I also would not support it having its own article, as the topic would not be notable (in my opinion, but then there's a lot of stuff I don't think is notable that's on wikipedia anyway!) --Dmz5*Edits**Talk* 22:44, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

I removed the section and replaced it with a link from the see also section. Carcharoth 13:14, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Bibliographical article started as redirect

While looking through Category:Bibliographies by author, I noticed Tolkien wasn't there. In preparation for a possible spin-off article, I created Bibliography of J. R. R. Tolkien as a redirect to the section found here. I also categorised the redirect, so Category:Bibliographies by author now has a bibliographical link for Tolkien. Carcharoth 13:16, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

mystics category

Why Tolkien is under 'Western' and 'Christian mystics'? He never experienced any religious vision, preophecy or anything miraculous. Pictureuploader 00:51, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Since nobody replied I am going to remove them. Restore if a rationale is given Pictureuploader 09:59, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm not going to put it back, but his philosophy, especially as exposed in On Fairy-Stories, doesn't make the label seem very wrong. --Alvestrand 10:57, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

You mean his philosophy that man's 'secondary creation' is a means to approach God? Or something else? Please explain Pictureuploader 13:10, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Tolkien has been described as a mystic. But that is not enough to warrant putting him in that category. It is not what he was famous for. The Category:Mythopoeic writers and the Category:Roman Catholic writers already cover the mythical/mystical/religious aspects, so no need for another category. Carcharoth 03:14, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Tolkien's philosophy of "mythopoeia" may have mystical aspects, but seeing that we have Category:Mythopoeic writers, the argument should be if that category should be categorized as under "mystics". And if we're going to call Tolkien a "mystic" on grounds of "Leaf by Niggle" etc., well, about a third of fantasy authors, including Terry Pratchett and Douglas Adams, will be "mystics". dab (𒁳) 10:34, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Mythopoeic literature also has relevant stuff: "a position opposed to rationalism and materialism, referring to the creative human author as "the little maker" wielding his "own small golden sceptre" ruling his Subcreation (understood as genuine Creation within God's primary Creation)". Of course, by 'mystic' some people mean his enviromentalism and love of trees. And whether or not the authors in Category:Mythopoeic writers are mystics is an interesting question. Something to ponder. Carcharoth 12:51, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Categorisation discussion

Please see the discussion here - about mid-thread, there is a discussion of the categories this article should be in, and whether the article is overcategorised. Carcharoth 03:14, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Views: Odd statements

"Tolkien was a devout Roman Catholic, and in his religious and political views he was mostly conservative…"

Then, a few lines later: "Tolkien became supportive of Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War when he learned the Republicans were destroying churches and killing priests and nuns."

Are we sure that that is right? It seems a bit odd and contradictory; could someone please look it up in the source referenced? --Grimhelm 16:29, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

On the contrary, it makes perfect sense. When Tolkien learnt that the Republicans in Spain were anti-religion, he decided to support their enemy, Franco. TharkunColl 16:36, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Oh, sorry, I confused the two sides. Quite embarrassing. :S --Grimhelm 16:52, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

the "views" section is still misleading, and apparently designed to portray JRRT as a fascist or Nazi supporter. It is outrageous to pretend he was a supporter of the Franco regime, when he was in fact deploring crimes perpetrated on the other side. It is outrageous to portray him as pro-Nazi, when in fact he was criticizing the Allies. Criticizing your own side is not equivalent to buddying up with the enemy, for crying out loud. What characterizes Tolkien's views first and foremost is that he was prepared to look at the petty meanness right outside his door rather than rant against the evil terrorists overseas and would not take a little evil at home as an acceptable price to pay to not "let the Terrorists (Nazis, Communists) win". dab (𒁳) 09:38, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

The Simillarion

It seems no one has added this book to the list, nor does wiki have an article for it, I havn't read it but maybe someone who has can add this in, after all it is based on stories in middle earth.

You spelled it wrong: It's the Silmarillion --Sylent 02:36, 7 March 2007 (UTC)