Tolkien's WW I experience and it's influences on middle-earth.

Something interesting I noticed as we were watching everyone's videos this week was that all but one of the stories seemed to have clearly been impacted by Tolkien's experiences fighting in WW I. However thinking about it I realized that I didn't notice anything so obvious on the surface within the hobbit and the lord of the rings.

So I am now thinking about what parts of those stories might be drawn from Tolkien's experience. The first things that came to my mind were the battle of five armies and the battle on the fields of Pelennor. These are the only two truly large-scale battles that we read about in the hobbit and the lord of the rings. I am thinking that these two massive battles, and the way that the buildup for them casts a shadow across each of the books means that they are either consciously or unconsciously representing the way that WW I tended to involve long times of relatively small scale conflict mostly consisting of skirmishes, building up to the massive battles like the battle of the Somme.

Thinking about it this way Tolkien's experience may really have substantially informed the way that these two stories were written, even though they were focused on the small but important adventures of the characters we cared about, they were inevitably drawn into these huge battles, much as it could have felt being a soldier in WW I.

Romance in Lord of the Rings

I explored this a bit in my comment from last week, but I wanted to expand on that thought in this post. Here’s my comment, for reference: 

“Having grown up watching the Lord of the Rings and then the Hobbit, when it was adapted into the three-part film series, before ever lying my hands on a copy of the books, I also think it’s interesting how much Hollywood loves to ramp up romantic tension in the movies that don’t exist in the books.  

There’s absolutely not a hint of romance in the Hobbit, and yet the filmmakers create this grand romance between Kili and the Mirkwood elf, Tauriel, creating this weird love triangle thing with Legolas. Tauriel doesn’t even exist in the books and Legolas doesn’t come in until the Lord of the Rings.  

Hollywood just loves to create so much drama. Even going into the lost love of Thranduil, Legolas’ mother, and how it’s taboo to speak of her as the pain of the loss is still so prevalent for him. It’s a little too much and strays so far from Tolkien, in my opinion, as interesting a plotline as it is.”  

What I want to examine in my post today is the opposite of this. The one romance Tolkien explores to a higher degree, then just a pass over mention, as he does with most, is the budding affection between Aowyn and Farmir while they both recover in the House of Healing. I know we haven’t gotten to this part yet in our class reading, but wanted to cover this now as it fits with the ideas I explored last week, as remarked above.  

I find it highly interesting that Tolkien chose to go in-depth and show us how romantic feelings developed between Aowyn and Farmir, as he generally simply tells us about the others, like with Aragorn and Arwen. I loved reading this part of the books, it was so sweet, especially after everything both of them had gone through. What I find the most intriguing is how despite Hollywood loving to ramp up and create, in their movies, more romance than exists in the books, they completely overlook and glance over the romance between Aowyn and Farmir.  

Tolkien goes into considerable detail about their meetings, interactions, and Farmir expressing his feelings for Aowyn to her. The only nod or acknowledgment the movie gives us to indicate they were even aware Aowyn had switched her affection from Aragorn to someone else is a mere few second shot of Farmir and Aowyn standing next to each other and exchanging a glance at Aragorn’s crowning in Gondor. That’s it. That’s all we get. I can’t help wondering over the decision to do it this way as I’d have loved to have seen this part played out in the movies.  

Reflection of the Multimedia Project

I greatly enjoyed watching all of the groups videos this week. I think everyone did a fantastic job. Although I had already read all of the stories that were presented in videos, I still learned new information, and saw new perspectives on the material that I already had at least some degree of familiarity with.

Now personally I greatly dislike creating media projects such as this. I am not a talented filmmaker, artist, or even very creative with anything visual. The only kind of visual art/work that I have ever had any real interest in doing was photography. All throughout my school career, I would have far rather written an essay than made a collage, drawn a picture, or made a poster. Even in elementary school I was never interested in the kind of projects that teachers were so fond of having us do. Let's just put away the crayons and colored pencils and give me some math problems. I still look at glue sticks with distaste.

In my schooling, I have also traditionally had a distaste for group work. It's not because I am antisocial, or don't work well with others for any reason. But I feel like I usually just get work done faster when I can just sit down by myself and do it. That also avoids the juggling act that many group projects are of trying to arrange times and locations to meet, as well as getting every group member on the same page in  regards to the vision of the project/assignment.

Now it would be a great conclusion to this to say that this project was different, and I had my eyes opened to the great benefits of visual projects and group work. That isn't the case though. But this project was certainly different than other projects I have done in the past, however. I feel like I did in fact gain a benefit from this, particularly because of the collaboration. If I was just assigned to write an essay on my topic, I probably would have found it easier, but I also would have missed some of the unique insights of my teammates.

This class seems like an ideal setting for group collaboration. Everyone has different experiences with Tolkien, and even with everyone reading the exact same work, no two people will read it the same way. Tolkien's profound talent for writing and nuance makes it impossible to gather all of the information in one reading, but when you have an entire class reading it, that helps make up the difference. Because of my group members, I feel like I have read the work we were assigned more times than I actually have, which not only helps me gain knowledge and understanding, but also just saves me time. Its like reading it three times for the price of one.

So although I dislike visual projects, and I also tend to view being assigned group work grudgingly, I see the value in this project.

An Appreciation Post for the Multimedia Projects

Firstly, I want to give everyone a high five for finishing their multimedia projects and successfully producing really interesting, insightful, and oftentimes funny videos. As far as group projects go, this assignment was definitely not the easiest, but I would say after watching all the finished videos, the results were pretty darn impressive.

I also have an appreciation for the subject matter of the projects. I especially appreciate the videos related to the Silmarillion that were presented on Tuesday since they're directly relevant to the material we're reading currently. As I read The Fellowship of the Ring again, I feel like I'm getting much more out of the story than I did the first time I read it.  I attribute this feeling to now being familiar with the ancient characters whose names are dropped everywhere and all the "historical" references that are mentioned in The Lord of the Rings. Being more aware of the history of Middle Earth and learning the significant stories of the Elder Days, like those of Beren and Lúthien, Eärendil, and Turin Turambar, makes reading The Lord of the Rings almost easier. Being in-the-know on who or what LOTR characters are referring to makes it easier to focus on the story instead of being lost in a sea of names and places you've never heard of. Essentially, despite the challenge of this group project, I can say with certainty that the results have improved my enjoyment of Tolkien's stories. 

Tom Bombadil = Tolkien?!?!

I recently read a post on tumblr (I know, not a legitimate source) that brought up a really interesting idea. It discussed how Tom Bombadil could be the Tolkien inserting himself into the story and world. The character "is eldest, because he existed before the books" he isn't affected by the Ring and has enough power to fight against the darkness by himself, but he chooses not to for the sake of the readers. The way Tom feels about his wife is also indicative of being drawn from Tolkien's own love for Edith. This all suggests that Tom Bombadil is not originally of Middle Earth.

As a writer, I understand how hard it is to keep yourself out of your characters. It is impossible. Writing is such an emotional experience, for me at least, that I can never leave myself and my feelings on the side while I write in a world of my creation.

Maybe this is Tolkien wanting to actually live in this world and intentionally giving himself a way to be there, or maybe he hadn't intended it at all. Personally, I think he did intend it because you could get rid of the whole Old Forest chapter and it wouldn't ruin the plot line of the story. So either, Tolkien wanted to play around a little in his world, or it has some other meaning which further explains the natures of his characters.

More On Shelob

Everyone that has read or even watched the Lord of The Rings knows of Shelob, the giant spider that attacks Frodo and Sam on their journey into Mordor. She is one of the most overwhelming obstacles that Frodo and Sam have to overcome on their perilous journey. I thought that the detailed description that you get of Shelob in the book was super interesting, especially because you will miss out on this if you've only seen the movie.

"But still she was there, who was there before Sauron, and before the first stone of Barad-dûr; and she served none but herself, drinking the blood of Elves and Men, bloated and grown fat with endless brooding on her feasts, weaving webs of shadow; for all living things were her food, and her vomit darkness".

With this description, it feels like the text is describing Shelob as existing from the beginning of time. The book tells us that she is the last descendant of Ungoliant, an evil spirit in the form of a spider. Ungoliant is mentioned briefly in The Lord of the Rings, and plays a supporting role in The Silmarillion. However, even Ungoliant's origins are unclear, as Tolkien's writings do not explicitly reveal her nature, other than that she is from "before the world". Ungoliant is one of a few instances, along with Tom Bombadil, where Tolkien does not provide a clear background for an element of his fiction.

Although we don't know much about Ungoliant, we do know some things about Shelob. She dwelt for many years in Nan Dungortheb with her countless brothers and sisters, even after Ungoliant ventured elsewhere. Shelob fled from ruin the War of Wrath and established her lair high in the mountains of Mordor, before Sauron claimed that land as his own. And her descendants were to be seen in Ephel Dúath and Mirkwood.

Changing Styles of Presentation

After watching and listening to all the multimedia projects, one thing that stuck out to me was just how many different styles and methods we used to present the information about the stories, history, and life connections to Tolkien that we had discovered in our research. Some groups created podcast-esque presentations, others used a more formal bullet-points and associated speech, and others used imagery to emphasize points (of course, all projects contained aspects of more than just one of these categories). This made me wonder about the many ways Tolkien writes for his different literature.

The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth was written in a very “radio-drama” manner, while keeping many of the alliterative and rhyme aspects of the way the original poem was written.

The Hobbit, Farmer Giles of Ham, and Smith of Wootton Major all have aspects of “children’s bedtime story” to them, and the art styles for Farmer Giles and Smith of Wootton Major (as well as some of the drawings for The Hobbit) are created to have a very medieval feel.

The Silmarillion is meant to contain and provide history for Middle Earth, and both it and the Lord of the Rings begin with a history textbook-esque method of providing readers with information.

Each method Tolkien uses for his works provides a very specific feel for the works and changes how they behave as pieces in the wider world of literature. If the Silmarillion were written as a children’s bedtime story, the purpose of the stories would change drastically, as would the amount of information. If the story of Turin Turambar were told for children, Tolkien might have decided to leave out the three suicides and instead have a happier ending. If The Hobbit were meant to sound more like Beowulf, would Bilbo have been our hero? Or would Tolkien have chosen to follow Thorin, the King returning to claim his throne only to fall at the end of his journey?

We’ve played around with removing seemingly “unimportant” sections of Tolkien’s works, seeing how that might change his overall messages, but I think it would be interesting to look at changing the overall styles of his stories, and how that would impact the messages and themes overall.

“In a hole in the fabric of the universe there lived a god.

Now, this was not one of those minor gods of bedtime stories or petty wars for heaven; this was the One God, all-loving and all-knowing, who created the world – only he hadn’t created the world just yet, which is why he was sitting in a hole in the fabric of the universe.”

(Credit: Tumblr user "lintamande-reblogs")

Bombadil and the Ring

While reading The Council of Elrond, one exchange really caught my attention, because it explains both the danger of the one ring, as well as it's shortcomings, but despite it having a weakness, it is still a danger.  This exchange happens when Erestor proposes giving the ring to Tom Bombadil to hide:

"I seems that he has a power even over the ring"

"no, I should not put it so", said Gandalf.' Say rather that the ring has no power over him.  He is his own master.  But he cannot alter the ring itself, nor break its power over others'"(265).  It seems odd that the one ring can so easily be disregarded if a person chooses not to hold it as a thig to be worthy of attention, and seems like an oversight by its creator.  However, the ring is still dangerous even in this disregard, because one person's decision to ignore the ring does not mean others are no longer at risk.

 Tom "were given the ring, he would soo forget it , or most likely throw it away'"(265)

 meaning it would again be waiting for someone who is vulnerable to find it and be taken over.  The ring is not any less dangerous even with someone who could not fall under its power.  Therefore, the only way to rid the world of this harmful object is to destroy it.  I think that Tolkien's decision to include someone like Bombadil this conversation is key to showing why the ring will always be a threat so long as I exists because it takes hold of those who will let it, and cannot be held onto those who resist its power, because they refuse to do so.  

Thoughts on Multimedia Projects

After wrapping up all of the multimedia projects today, I noticed a lot of similar themes in each story discussed.  The writing style of all the stories is quite a bit denser than The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings, perhaps because some of them were published posthumously and Tolkien was not finished with them.  What stuck out to me the most was the significance of World War I in Tolkien's life and how strongly it directly influenced the stories.  Tolkien invested a lot more of his personal life and experiences into his writing than I initially thought.  The story of Beren and Luthien or Turin Turambar are based on his life's story and things that he witnessed firsthand.  I am taking another class on screenwriting and we have been studying how writers generally make stories directly from their personal experiences.  I suppose that most writers are sharing their experiences through their work.  I think it is admirable that Tolkien used even his negative life experiences to share stories of hope with the world. 

Final Thoughts: Multi-Media Group Project

It's safe to say that I have a love-hate relationship with the multi-media group project. The process of completing the assignment was such a stressful, frustrating, and time-consuming thing that now all I feel is an immense amount of relief and pride in what was accomplished. Having never taken a class in video editing, or having no experience with editing in general, it feels great to see a product of our hard work come to life. As projects go, the multi-media assignment is fun but can also be really stressful and complicated. I am happy with what we as a group managed to create but I'm also really happy that's it's over.

Tolkien Forshadowing

As we have brought up many times in class, Tolkien loves his foreshadowing. We saw it many times in the Hobbit and are now seeing it in Lord of the Rings. Whats interesting about Tolkien is how small and subtle his forshadowing is. I'm sure we have all read a book or had someone tell us a story where the forshadowing was laid on way too thick and the ending is not at all a suprise. However, Tolkien does his very diffferently from this. Nothing is too small of a detail to be left unnoted, there are no accidents in the stories. From the hobbits greed shown in the mushrooms, even if unconventional, to Frodo's suprise at giving up the ring so easily to Tom Bombadil, Tolkien sews the seeds early for what the Ring will become to Frodo and his attachment to it. In addition to this, Tolkien shows the weariness to come, with each stage of the journey almost reflecting back to the last, yet each time they are able to overcome the hardships (except Boromir).

Unnecessary Passages In Lord Of The Rings

We discussed in depth how different the Lord Of The Rings would be if we cut out all the fluff and "unnecessary" passages. To be completely honest it would be a completely different book series if all of the random detailed passages were taken out. These paragraphs are necessary for world building because they add in a whole other level of depth that would be missing if they were taken out. These tiny details are what make the books seem alive and seem more thought out and real. The small details really do make you feel like are in Middle Earth and when books lack tiny details the story might still be great and still be there but the book itself seems more like fiction and less real in that instance. I believe Tolkien wanted these books to feel real so readers could easily relate to characters and situations that are seen in the series. These random seemingly unnecessary paragraphs are really very necessary to the Lord of The Rings and these books would be very much different if they were removed because the books would no longer be the same books.

In-Class Exercise: The Fellowship of the Ring, Prologue through Book I, Chapter 8

Group 3 - Book I, Chapter 3, "Three Is Company"

Passage: " '... at any rate, I have found a good home for this!' said Frodo, as he drained his glass. It was the last drop of Old Winyards."

Question: Why does Tolkien mention this is the last of this vintage?

With both the passage and the question in mind, it was decided that Tolkien decided to keep this seemingly meaningless passage within the text because it establishes that Frodo is appreciating the life that he's about to leave behind once he undertakes this massive quest. Furthermore, it kind of foreshadows that once the hobbit returns from his journey, he won't be able to enjoy the vintage the same as he once could because he is no longer the same person. There is also a sense of irony in the fact that the Old Winyards found a "home" within Frodo and yet, once he accomplishes what he set out to do, along with the other members of the fellowship, Frodo lacks a sense of home.

It is really interesting to see how everything that J.R.R. Tolkien decided to put within his stories had meaning. Knowing that what we are reading is not just "filler" context but actually has a place within the text only makes reading his works more fun and engaging.

Thoughts on cutting unnecessary passages in LOTR

In class on Thursday, we all discussed essentially redacting pieces of information without changing or altering the story. I think this type of redacting would be fun to do to the whole book. People redact for a living, getting the cut-and-dry or need-to-know on important documents.

If someone were to actually redact, or maybe even multiple, I would be interested to see what people would redact. A fun experiment would to have a side-by-side redaction with someone with little Tolkien knowledge, versus someone like Dr. Donovan, and see what would come out of their redactions.

Tolkien is known for his vivid imagery, and I would be intrigued to see how much would get taken out and see how much we could still picture. I mean, it sucks that most people (like myself) put a lot of the imagery from the movies (still upset To Bombadil was not even MENTIONED) and not from their imagination; However, Tom is a perfect example. How important are certain things and characters when it comes to a need-to-know basis.

I guess I pose the question:

What would you expect to see redacted in both a noob and expert in Tolkien's work? Why?

Some Thoughts on Hobbits - Friendship

I know that a lot of people have already written posts on hobbits and their nature, but I wanted to share some of my thoughts on them in the Lord of the Rings.  So far in class, we have discussed only The Fellowship of the Ring, which has some of my favorite plot points concerning Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin.  It is clear that hobbits are purposefully designed to appear plain and ordinary, rather than strong and powerful.  They surprise the reader with their resilience and character, each in their unique way.  I like how Tolkien created each of these hobbits with similar traits but totally diverse personality traits that all work well together.  I would say that one of the most, if not the most, important theme in Lord of the Rings is friendship.  And I mean real, lifelong, sacrificial friendship, most likely based off of John 15:13 in the Bible, which says, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."  There are so many instances in the Lord of the Rings where the hobbits show their willingness to sacrifice themselves for the others. 

I think that especially between Merry and Pippin, there is much development in their friendship.  It starts off with Pippin being rather foolish and ignorant and thinking they are just going on an adventure, but over all the trials they go through, they take it more seriously.  These two go from merely helping Bilbo on his adventure and being friends that do silly things together, to caring for the fate of the world and the other's life more than their own.  Frodo and Sam have a different kind of friendship that has more willing servitude on Sam's part, but it is no less powerful and sacrificial. 

Tolkein's World

Hello, everyone!

As we read more of LotR, I am reminded of one of the original things that got me so invested in Rivendell - Elvish language. Which, of course, got me thinking more on Tolkein's works in languages.

As with everything the man did, Tolkein invested an ungodly amount of time into his fictional languages to the point that you can actually speak them and people are still working on them to this day. There are regional dialects, dialectal shift over time, written varieties, and more. Tolkein so unabashedly loved languages and Middle Earth it's inspiring.

This level of work is another example of why people love Middle Earth so much, I think. Many times now, and then, some vocabulary and rough pronunciations are created for worlds, enough to make it feel like "another language". Tolkein legitimately created an entire system though! Furthermore, he created a beautiful script for it I might add. It has vocabulary, calligraphy, a proper syntax structure, pronunciations, and MORE. All of this, the history of the world, the Valar, the languages, the maps, the changing physical geography, all of it spanning thousands of years... Sometimes it makes me wonder if Tolkein almost thought it was real. As if this was his own personal world to cope with his emotions, as well as escape into a land with magic and prophesies and fantastical creatures but not one for children, one that reflected the reality of our world with tragedies and miracles. While yes, I know that writing is an author's playground and anything can happen but the fact Tolkein decided to use blank pages as a place with people sometimes realer than our own makes me wonder.

Could Tolkein see Middle Earth almost as real as well?

Elendil

Essential vs. nonessential details in stories

One thing that I found fascinating about our exercise on Thursday was that a lot of the passages chosen by people as "nonessential" were not advancing the plot but they were, in my view, crucial to the quality of the story. For example the two passages we discussed about the ring, the one where Frodo shows Bilbo the ring and the other one where Frodo puts on the ring to try to avoid the black riders. When I first heard those passages my first thought was "These are nonessential? Really?" But as I thought about it more I realized that what we were talking about was the advancement of the plot, but the way I had been thinking about it was more about what you could remove without affecting the quality of the story too much.

These two passages I mentioned certainly would not be mentioned in a bare-bones plot outline, but at the same time without them you would not have the slow building understanding of the powers of the ring, and the sense of a dread hanging over everything that comes with it. Without this you could have a story with the same plot, but it would not be the same story. These touches of detail and foreshadowing are what distinguish a good plot from a good story.