[davem]

Title: Tolkien's Legendarium: Essays on the History of Middle Earth
Authors: Numerous, edited by Verlyn Flieger & Carl F Hostetter.
Date of Copyright: 2000
First Edition

Summary of contents:
Basically, this is a collection of 14 essays on the History of Middle Earth series, edited by Christopher Tolkien. It s edited by Verlyn Flieger & Carl F. Hosteter, who both contribute essays. Flieger has stated that they had originally thought of calling it a ‘Festschrift’, but decided that such a title might put off some potential readers! It is divided into 14 essays, plus a bibliography of Christopher Tolkien’s published work - useful for those who think the only thing he has given us is those of his father’s writings which were unpublished at the time of his death. How many people knew that he has edited & translated The Saga of King Heidrek the Wise?

The volume itself is divided into three sections: The History (5 essays); The Languages (3 essays);& The Cauldron & the Cook (6 essays).

1:Early days of elder Days by Rayner Unwin. This is a first hand account of the publishing history of the postumous writings, & gives us a real insight into the practicalities of the venture. Unwin tells us that when Tolkien first offered some parts of the ‘History’, the Silmarillion as it was then unfolding, it was turned down flat, The Lost Road in particular being described as ‘a hopeless proposition’ , a view which we know Tolkien hiimself was to come to agree with, but which proved to have inspired the later Notion Club Papers, an altogether more accomplished work, & one which along with Of Tuor & his coming to Gondolin is sadly incomplete.
After the success of The Lord of the rings, however, the publishers interest in these legends of the Elder days suddenly grew intense. Unwin writes ‘Within a year or two of the publication of The Lord of the Rings, as I well know, it was not for lack of urging that ‘The Silmarillion’ failed to be published. I was shown from time to time the serried ranks of box files that contained, as I was told, like beads without a string, the raw material of ‘The Silmarillion’, & tried to be encouraging. But by then it was too late.’

He goes on to tell us thatafter Unfinished Tales he ‘did not believe that more would come from the box files via the literary executor’’, but that he was ‘quite wrong’. Christopher believed that a true vision of Middle Earth was incomplete if the ‘serious pilgrim could not be guided along all the paths’.A profit sharing agreement was made & the rest is history (or ‘History’)

2: The development of Tolkien’s Legendarium by Christina Scull. This is a fascinating essay on the development of the mythology, useful especially for the concise insight it gives into the way Tolkien worked & the way the tales ‘grew in the telling’.

3: A continuing & growing creation by Wayne G Hammond. In short, an analysis of how Tolkien couldn’t leave his creation alone, & kept returning to it, changing it, right up to the end of his life. As Hammond states ‘Tolkien’s difficulty, which increased as the years passed, was that he was pulled in two directions by competing forces:by mythology on one side, & by History & Science on the other. ...These are difficult forces to assimilate without conflict.’ A good point for those who demand complete consistency throughout Tolkien’s writings.

4: On the Consruction of ‘The Silmarillion’ by Charles Noad. Noad is a recognised expert of tolkien’s work, & has proof read many of the volumes of HoME. What Noad attempts to do is construct ‘The Silmarillion’ which he feels Tolkien would have given us if he had been able to complete it. He gives a well reasoned argument, & finally comes up with:

Quenta Silmarillion
Concerning the Powers:
Ainulindale
Valaquenta
The Great Tales:
The Lay of Leithian
Narn i Chin Hurin
The Fall of Gondolin
Earendil the Wanderer
The Later Tales:
Akallabeth
Of the Rings of Power
Appendices:
The Tale of Years
Of the Laws & Customs among the Eldar
Dangweth Pengolod
Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth
Quendi & Eldar

5: The Literary Value of the History of Middle Earth by David Bratman. Bratman looks at HoME as literature & asks if it is worth reading for itself, rather than as simply a mine for interesting background information. As he states ‘The History of Middle Earth was not designed by its editor for casual reading, & only scattered parts of it have the potential for the kind of widespread popularity that came to the Hobbit & the Lord of the Rings. but there is much of it that can be read as straightforward narrative, ignoring the textual notes , by a reader with a sympathetic attitude towards the author’s & editor’s intent’. He goes on to refer readers to specific parts of HoME which might appeal, for instance:’Readers who, Like Sam Gamgee, want to hear more about Elves...should read the Silmarillion...& follow it with The Book f Lost Tales..’ & Readers who like Tolkien’s poetry for its own sake should definitely read The Lays of Beleriand’.

The second section, The Languages, is quite difficult for anyone like myself who struggles with complexities of Tolkien’s languages.

6: Gnomish is Sindarin: the conceptual evolution of an Elvish Language by Christopher Gilson is an examination of the way the Gnomish of the Lost Tales develops into Sindarin.

7:Certhas, Skirditalia, Futhark: A feigned history of Runic origins by Arden R Smith. this essay purports to show how the Cirth developed into the Norse Runes.

8: Three Elvish Verse Modes: Ann Thennath, Minlamad thent/estent, & Linnod by Patrick Wynne & Carl F Hostetter. Taking as their starting point Tolkien’s statement that the chief criterion by which one could measure the success of an ‘art language’ was the ability to use it to write poetry, the authors examine elvish verse forms. Ann-Thennath is the form in which the original Lay of Luthien, which Strider sings to the Hobbits was composed. Minlamad Thent/estent was the metre used in the composition of the Narn. An example of Linnod can be found in Gilraen’s prediction of her impending death, ‘Onen i-Estel Edain, u-chebin estel anim’.

9: Tolkien’s Lyric Poetry by Joe R Christopher. Christopher examines Tolkien’s lyric verse, beginng with Kor, through the Lay of Luthien & the Death of St Brendan to such works as Winter comes to Nargothrond.

10: Some of Tolkien’s Narrators by Paul Edmund Thomas. An analysis of the way Tolkien uses the narrative voice to conceal & reveal, offer opinions & judgements. He shows how the narrative voice cahnges through out the writing of the early drafts of LotR, showing how the narrative voice of the first draft is similar in some ways to that of the Hobbit, but subtly different in others.

11: The Footsteps of Aelfwine by Verlyn Flieger. Flieger examines the role & significance of the ‘Elf-Friend throughout Tolkien’s fiction, showing that it means, or at least came to mean, something far more than merely someone who is friendly to Elves. She points out that the greatest ‘Elf-friend’ is Tolkien himself, ‘For of course the ultimate, the overarching Elf-friend is Tolkien, no other. He is the bridge between the worlds. The foootsteps of Aelfwine, sometimes faint, sometimes clear, are Tolkien’s footsteps...His footsteps lead us as readers from character to character, from story to story, to a fuller understanding of the world of his imagination, & to a deeper understanding of the man himself’.

12: The Lost Road, The Dark Tower, & The Notion club Papers: Tolkien & Lewis’s Time Travel Triad by John d Rateliff. Most of us know that Tolkien began The Lost Road as a result of a bet with CS Lewis - Lewis would write a space travel story, while tolkien would deal with the theme of time travel. As Flieger has shown in her book, A Question of Time, Concepts of time, of how past & future interact & consciousness can be free to move between past, present & future, the relativity of time & conciousness were all ideas that played a major part in tolkien’s thinking.

13:Gandalf & Odin by Marjorie Burns.An exanination of the way Tolkien used the figure of Odin. She finds that Tolkien has somewhat Christianised the mysterious wander of Norse myth, atributing his positive qualities to Gandalf, notably his wisdom, but some of his ‘darker’ aspects get passed on to Saruman & Wormtongue among others. She also notes that just as Odin has Eagles to bring him news of the world outside, Odin Has Ravens, but this is perhaps due to the ‘negative’ connotations that the Raven has developed.

14: Turin’s Ofermod by Richard C West. Ofermod is an anglo-saxon word, for haughtiness, over-weening pride. Tolkien relates it in his Homecoming of Beortnoth to the behaviour of this leader, giving a ‘fair chance’ to the invading Vikings, who far outnumbered the English defenders & resulted in slaughter of the defenders. Tolikien didn’t approve, seeing it as a Pagan attitude, one more thing inwhich Christianity had taught us to know better. As an aside, it was pointed out by Jean Chausse in a talk he gave at last year’s Oxonmoot, that Turin & Boromir are the only two of Tolkien’s major heroes who actually go out to seek glory in battle, & both come to bad ends, Boromir only managing a last minute act of redemption, & Turin’s final victory over Morgoth floating in & out of Tolkien’s plans.

Strengths & Weaknesses: Strengths - too many to mention. this is one of the great collections of essays on Tolkien, worth reading at least once, but would repay numerous re-readings. Weaknesses: well as the titale says, the essays focus on HoME, & only those who have read the series willl really get full value from it - though, having said that, I got hold of it before reading HoMe & it inspired me to go out & buy the set!

I would generally recommend the book to those who have read HoMe, or as a primer for those who are intending to make the assault!

Would I specifically recommend it for novices? No, it is only for the commited, or those who intend to be commited (& to be honest, taking the price into acccount, commitment is required to purchase it!).