The "Theory of Transmission"

[solicitr]

Vison:

I'm not sure how you can square

Had he written it, he would have, perhaps, turned all those notes and ideas and plans and descriptions into another masterpiece.

with

I am not a "fan" of scripture from any source, infinitely preferring myth. So, IF Tolkien's intent was to "create a myth for England", he did not create a myth I can accept as such. It is too self-conscious, too obviously "created", IMHO. Parts of it are wonderful, but as either literature or myth, it fails to excite me....I think it is tragic that he did not see what his masterpiece was.

and

The names were the same, but the flavour was different. And why wouldn't the flavour be different? Tolkien didn't write The Silmarillion.

with

I am not complaining about the "Biblical" style, and am, you know, actually capable of figuring that out for myself. Just so you know, you know. I mean, I did see what the guy was driving at.

It seems to me to be the case that, preferring a "well-written novel" and disliking any form of "scripture," it is highly unlikely you would ever have thought much of any form of The Silmarillion, even had JRRT finished and published it himself. That's fine. Your prerogative. De gustibus and all that.

But then why blame Christopher Tolkien for what was not his doing?

[vison]

I'm not blaming Christopher Tolkien for much, really. He can't help it that he's not the writer his Dad was.

Look, a well-written book can engage me - but not if it clouts me over the head. I think Tolkien realized, deep down in his heart, that he wasn't going to be able to make a really readable book out of the material he had that eventually became The Silmarillion. I think that's why he never did it. He wanted to do something that he thought hadn't been done before and he didn't or couldn't do it. Whatever spark produced LOTR was not firing on this.

I think he left it deliberately fragmented, probably unconsciously, to satisfy the idea or longing in himself that this was indeed source material from a world long gone, a fancy that is poignantly lovely in my mind. But that does not make it a book, never mind literature.

I know that some here, and many elsewhere, do not see these things as I do. I do not see Tolkien as a great philosopher, nor do I see his published works as being deeply meaningful in the spiritual sense. If you do, that's dandy for you.

Scripture, as scripture, is one thing. But The Silmarillion is not scripture, it is an imitation, and in my view a not very convincing counterfeit. Tolkein succeeded in showing us his beliefs in LOTR in the form of a history which he manufactured much more effectively.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Has it ever wondered you why he put it aside to write LOTR? Though we are told, over and over again, that he regarded it as his "real work" and of much more importance than anything else he ever wrote? He could never be satisfied with it, writing it over and over, revising, polishing, honing, tuning, etc., and what did he end up with? Or, rather, what did WE end up with?

Actually, we have a pretty good idea of why he set it aside to write LOTR. He showed it to the publisher, who's reader (without actually reading the actual work, though Tolkien apparently didn't understand this) considered it unpublishable, and the publisher instead urgently requested a sequel to the fairly popular Hobbit. So he set out to write a sequel to The Hobbit, and instead ended up writing more of a sequel to The Silmarillion.

And vison, I have seen you actually make some pretty strongly worded criticisms of aspects of LOTR (the book, not the films). So I'm not sure how you can reconcile that with calling it "perfect".

Just sayin'.

[solicitr]

I'm not blaming Christopher Tolkien for much, really. He can't help it that he's not the writer his Dad was.

But you still seem to be asserting he "wrote" the thing, which he didn't.

The Silmarillion is the sort of thing that people who don't like that sort of thing will find they don't like. Okay. The same is true of the LR:

The Lord of the Rings
Is a sort of a thing,
If you like it you do,
If you don't then you boo!

But to go further and denounce it... Well, that reminds me of Lewis, who did rather a lot of book reviews, but declined to review a detective novel. He explained that he didn't like detective novels, and therefore, not knowing what it was that people who did like detective novels found to be characteristic of good ones as opposed to bad, he simply wasn't qualified.

[vison]

Ah, Voronwë, there are many perfectly valid criticisms to be made of LOTR. I can call it perfect in one breath and admit that it is not "perfect' in another.

The experience of experiencing LOTR was and is, nearly unique in my experience of experiencing books. It instantly became, nearly as I read the first chapter, and has remained one of my favourite and most beloved books.

Does it have flaws? Of course it does. Are they important to "the experience"? Not really, unless I'm in a bad mood.

Once I learned something about Tolkien, I always took LOTR as being the work of the man it was the work of, if you can follow me. Rather as I can and do love Trollope's books without "accepting" or "believing" everything Trollope believed or expressed about his beliefs in his writing. I knew nothing about Tolkien before I read LOTR, and knew little more for decades. It was not necessary or even desirable - knowledge of an author is more likely to mar my reading experiences than to enhance them. I was looking for "more" LOTR, and nothing else.

Whoever told Tolkien that The Silmarillion was unpublishable was absolutely right. Had The Hobbit, and to a much greater extent, LOTR, not been so successful, The Silmarillion would never have been published at all. Tolkien had years to perfect it after LOTR was published and took the world by storm - yet he did not do so. Maybe he was just tired. But I think it was more. I could be convinced otherwise, but perhaps not readily.

Does that mean I think it is "trash" or "useless"? Not at all. I think it has some intrinsic value as the physical expression of a man's ideas, and obviously there are people like you who believe it has another value, who find that it speaks to their deepest ideals and feelings.

There is an another subset of Silmarillion fandom - one I have encountered here and there. These are the people who don't really "get it" any more than I do, but who say they do. Because it is dense, turgid, contradictory - it must be superior!And they throw themselves into it with enthusiasm, believing that no one is going to detect their phoniness.

I am not in any way suggesting that is true of you, Voronwë, I have now years of experience reading your posts, following your progress in writing, etc., to know that if there is anything of value to be got from The Silmarillion, you got it.

I admire you, your work ethic, your honesty, your transparent and childlike joy in beauty. In short, you are one of the best men I've ever met.

*admits was nettled and has removed cranky sentences*

[Primula Baggins]

I think I agree with you, vison, about how LotR can be both perfect and "flawed." Sometimes flaws don't matter to the experience of reading. LotR is such a huge canvas that a daub out of place here and there means nothing to its overall power.

And I hope that last paragraph was irony, vison, because there's certainly not a true word in it.

[vison]

It wasn't ironic, it was snotty and out of place, so I removed it.

Or, in other words, "methinks she doth protest too much". Silly, and really childish.

I have not yet descended into my dotage.

As far as I can tell.

[Primula Baggins]

I can't say I see any sign of it, either.

I am someone who does like to know more about books and writers I care about. I have read more commentary and background about LotR than any other book I can think of. I even own a few volumes of HoMe. But what I found with that is that I honestly don't care what Tolkien's writing and revision process was, or when he conceived which event or which character. Reading about revisions is kind of a busman's holiday for me. I am curious about the man himself, have read the Letters with great enjoyment, etc. But for me what matters is what got to the published page. That's the final word, and it's from that I make my judgments, such as they are.

The Silmarillion is a different kettle of fish. The words on those pages are final—for Christopher Tolkien. Because we will never know what JRRT would have done with the Silmarillion, if he'd ever published it himself, I can't think of the words as final from JRRT's perspective (though I do understand, as soli has pointed out, that much of the Silmarillion is made up of long stretches of quite finished work).

It's just that without that last nod from JRRT himself—"This is what I want it to be now; you may publish it"—I continue to think of it as unfinished.

[River]

I have decided that, should it ever come to pass that I become a famous author with people dedicating careers and avocations to studying my work, I shall make a point of destroying all my drafts before I die and then, just in case I miss something, stipulate in my will under no uncertain terms that if it wasn't published while I lived it is not to be published after I am dead. That way, no one will be left sorting through my hen scratch wondering what in the world I was intending to do.

It's a fun fantasy, at any rate.

Of course, if Tolkien had done that, there would be Silmarillion and the world would be the poorer for it. Though, you know, the detail from LOTR is something I sorely missed in the Sil. I enjoyed it, mind, but the parts I enjoyed the most were the parts where the detail began to approach that of LOTR, such as the story of Beren and Lúthien. And, at the same time, I appreciated LOTR all the more against the backdrop the Silmarillion provided.

[yovargas]

I am more or less in this camp, myself.

Maybe not so much as I thought the Sil was glorious and beautiful and inspired.

[vison]

I am more or less in this camp, myself.

Maybe not so much as I thought the Sil was glorious and beautiful and inspired.

Didja?

Super.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I moved the discussion about the tables into the thread that I started dedicated to the tables. I might try to see if I can separate out the discussion about the edits to the female characters as well, since that is also a separate subject from the "theory of transmission"

Edit: I did split off the edit to female character discussion. There is yet another side discussion that I might also try to split off, but this one was more important.

[Galin]

BTW, what do people think of Charles Noad's theory on the notion of 'Elfwine to Eressëa' maybe being preserved (in his essay in Tolkien's Legendarium), which, as I read it, basically suggests that a sailing to the Lonely Isle still occurred in the more recent past and produced information that might have been added to surviving texts derived from the Red Book.

IIRC he presents this as a possible option anyway.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Actually, the concept is pretty similar to my own views. Noad says this:

The Notion Club Papers hinted at a concept that could have saved Tolkien his worries over the cosmology: that of two distinct pasts, the historical and the mythical, "secondary planes and degrees," merging at the fall of Atlantis/Númenor. Before that, the universe of the Ambarkanta was real. After, our astronomical universe, with its round earth, and solar system, and evidences of thousands of millions of lightyears' extension in space is the reality. How the one can be antecedent to the other is simply left as an unfathomable mystery.

It is that last statement that is the key. One has to be willing to accept an unfathomable mystery in order for this to work. However, once one does, the framing device of Aelfwine seeking and finding the straight road can be well incorporated with the existing story of the Red Book (which Noad suggests could have been his motivation for seeking the straight road). All of the old stories of the Two Trees and the creation of the sun and the moon could have been retained under this scenario, parallel to what we currently understand as the true astronomical reality. But only if one accepts that unfathomable mystery.

[Galin]

This raises the interesting possibility that by the mid-60s Tolkien had evolved a rather subtle view... that the Breaking of the World really *did* happen, but Men are too blind/pragmatic/unimaginative/out-of-touch with the Valar to conceive of such a cataclysmic Divine intervention- so they refused to believe it. In other words, Arda globed from the beginning is an incorrect Mannish myth, concocted because Men keep falling back on, well, scientific method rather than faith and revelation.

This confuses me

By the mid 1960s wasn't Tolkien moving toward explaining such notable notions as the Sun and Moon hailing from the Trees, and an originally flat earth made round, as largely due to Mannish influence?

I believe this can be traced. The first hint appears in (probably) the early '60s, with the statement in "The Line of Elros" that Elendil wrote the "Downfall of Númenor, which was preserved in Gondor.". This is of great interest because, as I observed back then, the Akallabêth is explicitly a fusion of the "Elvish" Fall of Númenor and the "Mannish" Downfall of Anadune- it represents in fact the Mannish legend corrected in light of 'true' Elvish lore learned by the Dúnedain.

Where is the Akallabêth noted as a corrected version? especially with reference to a correction concerning the original shape of the world (Elves informing Men that it was originally flat). In DA the Elves teach that the world was originally round, but some Men found this a hard saying.

Yes the Akallabêth was a fusion of texts, as CJRT nicely shows, and he states: 'It seems to me likely that by 'Elvish tradition' he meant The Fall of Númenor, and since 'Mixed Dunedanic tradition' presumably means a mixture of Elvish and Númenórean tradition, he was in this surely referring to the Akallabêth, in which both The Fall of Númenor and The Drowning of Anadune were used (see pp. 376, 395-6).' (Sauron Defeated)

Christopher Tolkien is here referring to a note (guessed to be) written 'some time in the 1960s' and 'on the envelope that contains the texts of the Drowning of Anadune.'

Contains very old version (in Adunaic) which is good -- in so far as it is just as much different (in inclusion and omission and emphasis) as would be probable in the supposed case:
(a) Mannish Tradition
(b) Elvish tradition
(c) Mixed Dunedanic tradition

JRRT

It appears this envelope contained DA, and (IMO) at some later point Tolkien noted that this (now) even 'very old version' DA is good, because it is different enough from other supposed traditions...

... but does he mean the Elvish tradition as in the specific version referred to as The Fall of Númenor III (FN III), a text thought to be written at a: 'relatively early stage in the writing of The Lord of the Rings'? (this version contains the flying ships of the Numenoreans incidentally). The envelope does not appear to contain this, in any event, and the note simply says 'Elvish tradition'.

In other words, could this mean simply an Elvish tradition that could be devised, possibly out of the 'old' FN III? following his commentary on the note, CJRT explains that in DA the confusions and obscurities of the Mannish tradition were deepened in relation to the preliminary sketches; but what are the confusions?

I really mean to ask: does the confusion in DA include what the Elves taught concerning the shape of the world? For myself, I wonder how it could easily be confused that the Elves (Nimri) taught that the world was as an apple and so on (section 23 DA II, retained in subsequent versions of DA) -- or in short, that the world was round; and the King of Númenor thus considers that, if so, by going east, one: 'shall come up at last behind the West, and yet break no ban?' (section 27 DA II again)

I suggest that DA could correctly represent what the Elves told Men, and (DA final form): 'For in the youth of the world it was a hard saying to men that the earth was not plain as it seemed to be, and few even of the Faithful of Anadune had believed in their hearts this teaching;...'

Perhaps the 'Elvish tradition' awaited to be written, intended to fall in line with the Elvish teaching as represented in DA. It still could have been The Fall of Númenor (although again, Tolkien himself does not refer to this text specifically in his note), but a revised version. Although the tale as it stood was still flat world, even FN III is less explicit as to the shape of the world than earlier versions -- where it had been unequivocally expressed that the gods: 'bent back the edges of the Middle-earth, and they made it into a globe'


Or have I made a crucial or simple error here? Let me know, as I feel that I might have. One can still disagree in any case, obviously; and any opinions or comments are welcome.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I think I'll wait and let solicitr respond to this first, since it is his comments that you are responding to. But I will say that I don't think you have made an error, though certainly Tolkien's work is both large enough and ambiguous enough to be subject to a multitude of different interpretations.

[Galin]

Here's the short version: should not the Elvish tradition match up with what the Elves taught in the Mannish tradition?

Why didn't I just say that the first time

Another detail: if CJRT's feelings concerning AAm* (typescript by Tolkien) are correct, the Númenórean transmission in the preamble seems dated to the early 1950s, rather than 1958 or later. CJRT notes this is especially interesting in comparison to the Pengolodh -- Elfwine mode.

[Galin]

I ran across a comment on the web that: the Silmarillion texts being (thought of as) Mannish legends derived from Númenórean traditions in turn derived from Elvish lore, contradict the information from The Lord of the Rings where (as this person on the web put it): '... Bilbo translated his works from Elvish texts in Elrond's Library in Rivendell.'

I realize it's natural enough to think Bilbo translated Elvish lore as in 'lore written by Elves', but I'm not sure that JRRT himself published the notion that the texts Bilbo used were directly Elvish in authorship (I'm not sure he ever refers to the sources as 'Elvish lore' specifically). IIRC, due to the description actually employed for the end of The Lord of the Rings (Many Partings and The Grey Havens) and for the Note on the Shire Records, it is left open that the name of Bilbo's work can be due to so much of the books of lore (used in Imladris) being in an Elvish tongue.

The Note on the Shire Records was added in the 1960s, after Tolkien had started to think of the Númenórean line of transmission, and already with the publication of The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, the Númenórean factor had appeared in print: 'No. 14 also depends on the lore of Rivendell, Elvish and Númenorean, concerning the heroic days at the end of the First Age; it seems to contain echoes of the Númenorean tale of Túrin and Mîm the Dwarf.'

Of course Elvish (including living resources) and Númenórean lore, but this is not unexpected, and is not problematic I think, in part given the blending that occurred even well (well!) before Bilbo was born.

Anything Tolkien-published that necessarily conflicts with JRRT's later idea of transmission?

[solicitr]

I realize it's natural enough to think Bilbo translated Elvish lore as in 'lore written by Elves', but I'm not sure that JRRT himself published the notion that the texts Bilbo used were directly Elvish in authorship (I'm not sure he ever refers to the sources as 'Elvish lore' specifically). IIRC, due to the description actually employed for the end of The Lord of the Rings (Many Partings and The Grey Havens) and for the Note on the Shire Records, it is left open that the name of Bilbo's work can be due to so much of the books of lore (used in Imladris) being in an Elvish tongue.

I agree. In fact, I have a speculative notion that Bilbo would have preferred to use Dundedainic sources (in Sindarin),* since the immortal Elves' notions of Historiography might well be decidedly alien to a mortal mind.

I believe Exhibit A here is the Akallabêth, allegedly written by Elendil, presumably in Sindarin,* and (one would suppose) on file in Elrond's library: Númenórean lore 'corrected' by direct contact with the Eldar.

A great deal of the problem we have in divining Tolkien's "Later Thought" is that we're discussing a period of some fifteen years, during most of which he wrote very little. What we can glean of the way he was thinking circa 1965 comes in driblets, such as the revisions to LR. It appears to be the case (I stress appears) that Aelfwine, still present (on and off) ca. 1958-59, was gone by then. The notion of the Bilbo-vector, and somewhat 'garbled' Númenórean sources, couldn't be squared with the (presumably accurate) lore of Pengolodh.


*Besides the fact that the Faithful and the Exiles used a fairly stable Sindarin as their language of Lore, akin to Latin in our world, Bilbo's late-TA Westron would have been of little use in reading manuscripts in Adunaic or centuries-old Old Westron.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I realize it's natural enough to think Bilbo translated Elvish lore as in 'lore written by Elves', but I'm not sure that JRRT himself published the notion that the texts Bilbo used were directly Elvish in authorship (I'm not sure he ever refers to the sources as 'Elvish lore' specifically). IIRC, due to the description actually employed for the end of The Lord of the Rings (Many Partings and The Grey Havens) and for the Note on the Shire Records, it is left open that the name of Bilbo's work can be due to so much of the books of lore (used in Imladris) being in an Elvish tongue.

I agree. In fact, I have a speculative notion that Bilbo would have preferred to use Dundedainic sources (in Sindarin),* since the immortal Elves' notions of Historiography might well be decidedly alien to a mortal mind.

I agree as well. Certainly, Tolkien suggests as much in the exchange between Bilbo and Lindir regarding Bilbo's song about Eärendil.