Echoes in Age from the World of J.R.R. Tolkien
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Volume 14 Number 4 Article 4 Summer 7-15-1988 Echoes in Age From the World of J.R.R. Tolkien E. L. Edmunds Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore Part of the Children's and Young Adult Literature Commons Recommended Citation Edmunds, E. L. (1988) "Echoes in Age From the World of J.R.R. Tolkien," Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: Vol. 14 : No. 4 , Article 4. Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol14/iss4/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Mythopoeic Society at SWOSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature by an authorized editor of SWOSU Digital Commons. An ADA compliant document is available upon request. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To join the Mythopoeic Society go to: http://www.mythsoc.org/join.htm Mythcon 51: A VIRTUAL “HALFLING” MYTHCON July 31 - August 1, 2021 (Saturday and Sunday) http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-51.htm Mythcon 52: The Mythic, the Fantastic, and the Alien Albuquerque, New Mexico; July 29 - August 1, 2022 http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-52.htm Abstract An author who encountered Tolkien at Oxford recounts a series of personal and literary responses after long familiarity with Tolkien’s work. Additional Keywords Tolkien, J.R.R. The Hobbit—Personal reactions; Tolkien, J.R.R. The Lord of the Rings—Personal reactions This article is available in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol14/iss4/4 MYTHLORE 54: Summer 1988 Page 19 Echoes in Jlg e Trom the W orld of }R .R .Tolkien E.L. Edmunds and Tolkien, because the world of both is full of Introduction its own ancient codes of chivalry. My mind wanders to King Theoden’s funeral. You will remember he I did have the pleasure, once upon a time, of was laid upon a golden bier; and they passed knowing rather well, if from a distance, both J.R.R. through the city in silence. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. Both were at Oxford at the time. I took tutorials at Magdalen College from C.S. Then the drums rolled loudly, and Lewis and heard lectures from Tolkien who was were silent.... But Merry stood at the foot Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon of the mound and he wept and when the at the University. For me, as a wide-eyed north song was ended he rose and cried, country boy, they epitomized the great friendships 'Theoden king! Theoden king! Farewell! As of old times when they came together at the Beow a father you were to me, for a little while. ulf soirees which C.S. Lewis organized for his stu Farewell!’ dents in his rooms. I remember receiving as a uni versity prize a copy of The Hobbit, which is still Then there is the funeral of Boromir, which in one of my most treasured possessions. turn leads me back to the funeral of Balder Dead as described in Matthew Arnold’s poem. Fifty years later and now "out to grass" so to speak in this so-called million acre farm of Prince Alternatively, The Hobbit in particular can be Edward Island, I still read much of Tolkien but read as a children’s book. That delicious blend of now with a different background, and obviously curiosity, fantasy, and "played-out" fear of "things from a different vantage point. that go bump in the night"; though the "things that go bump in the night" in the world of Tolkien 1. The Association of Words, Phrases, Incidents are not caused by such gentle folk as "the Bor rowers," of by Masefield’s "Midnight Folk," or by It is possible, of course, to read the works of the wee, wee man in the ballad of that name, or Tolkien as straight-forward story. It is, as it were, those "wee folk, good folk trooping all together." I like seeing a Shakespearian play first time. But once read The Hobbit to my eight-year-old daugh after several readings, our appreciation begins to ter and 1 was confident she would read it from the change. We accumulate those complex associations of point of view of being safe-in-the nursery when: memories and emotions which are sometimes called thoughts. Like a pebble dropped into a pool of still Some one came knocking water, Tolkien’s words for me now yield ever- At my wee, small door; widening ripples in the mind. They can never be Some one came knocking, fully shared with anyone else. Nevertheless, 1 pro I’m sure— sure— sure; pose to try and describe some of these widening I listened, I opened, ripples which may sometimes become so fascinating I looked to left and right, that I have to stop reading and simply ruminate, But nought there was a-stirring very much in the original meaning of that word. In the still dark night; Only the busy beetle 2. The Art of Fabling: Parallels with Tolkien Tap-tapping in the wall, Only from the forest Tolkien’s interest in fabling was no passing The screech-owl’s call, whim. He liked to "spin a good yarn" as did the Only the cricket whistling Anglo-Saxon scop of old, or the minstrel on the While the dewdrops fall, troubled border land between England and Scot So I know not who came knocking, land. Sir Walter Scott picks up something of this in At all, at all, at all. "The Lay of the Last Minstrel." For him, you will ["Some One” by Walter de la Mare] recall: The way was long the wind was cold, In subsequent conversation, my daughter tells The Minstrel was infirm and old; me that all went well until I came to Smaug and his His wither’d cheek and tresses grey "dragon talk" and the danger of picking up "dra Seem’d to have known a better day; gon sickness." It kept her awake at night— in The harp, his sole remaining joy, other words I frightened her. Was carried by an orphan boy. The last of all the Bards was he Another association which never leaves me Who sing of Border chivalry. when I read the opening chapters of The Hobbit i6 Walter de la Mare’s "Traveller." He may not be a It is this mention of chivalry that sends echoes Black Rider as in The Lord of the Rings, but nev down my mind between Sir Walter Scott’s minstrel ertheless he has something of the character of a Page 20 MYTH LORE 54: Summer 1988 barrow wight about him. He is, in fact, physically of this world’s life. Let him work who may real. to achieve a reputation before he dies. That is far the best for a warrior to keep "Is there anybody there?" said the Traveller, his name alive.) Knocking on the moonlit door; And his horse in the silence champed the There iB a suggestion hern that in both the grasses world of the Rings and in the world of Beowulf, Of the forest’s ferny floor: courage is what matters. It is found in most And a bird flew up out of the turret, unlikely places. Sam would have killed Gollum, even Above the Traveller's head: when Shelob was about to kill Frodo. Elsewhere, And he smote the door a second time; Sam says doggedly, "I must see it through." And "Is there anybody there?" he said. then there is Eowyn’s advice to Merry: "Where will wants not, a way opens." My mind wanders to Sometimes my mind wanders from Tolkien to the Elendil and Gil-galad leading the last alliance of names of A.A. Milne and Kenneth Grahame. "The elves and men against Sauron. Both know they will Wind in the Willows" may be regarded as a similar perish; but never do they flinch. story to The Hobbit in that both make use of anthropomorphic creatures. But "Tigger" or "Winnie Intermixed with this fatalistic attitude to life is the Pooh" or "Mr. Toad" and his associates (as well an overtone of immortality. In the world of the as his enemies) are a far cry from the inhabitants Rings, mortals do in fact exist side by side with of Mordor, Gondor, Mirkwood, and the Shirelands. immortals. There is the constant echo of the world "Smaug" has not a drop of blood relationship of of Odin and Valhalla. Gandalf the White has a white any kind to the rather tinselly creature whom we beard and light beams from him "as if his blue call "the reluctant dragon" and created by Kenneth mantle was only a cloud over sunshine." The love Grahame (though significantly, both like to indulge of Aragorn and Arwen is the love of the mortal for in lots of dragon-talk!) the immortal. Arwen is a beautifully tragic heroine, who gives up her "twilight" immortality for pure 3. The Anglo-Saxon Connection love of a mortal. "Her choice was made and her doom appointed." For Tolkien, The Hobbit could be regarded as a kind of prototype, a mock-up, testing-bed, if you 4. Two Individual Words "Dark" and "Cold" like, even "mach-one" for the more fully developed, more highly structured history of "The Third Age" The intense, scarifying heat of the Jewish as portrayed in The Lord of the Rings.