[davem]

Originally Posted by Mr U

It's relevant when you accuse one side of making convoluted explanations while simultaneously implying that your own is not.

My own position is not 'convoluted' at all. I'm saying the style, mood, tone, the races & even individual characters in TH do not 'fit' with the rest of the Legendarium, & I've given my reasons for that.

An interesting point, that last -- that the only truly "fixed" points of Silmarillion lore are those published in two books, one of which you seek to exclude.

I think its clear from the context that CT is refering not to TH as such but to the references to the Legendarium it contains.

If anything, in a grouping of TH, LotR, and The Sil, it's usually the Sil (in the forms in which it exists) which is the odd man out, the one that "doesn't fit", as Lalwendë has already noted.

How can The Sil not 'fit' when it was first. LotR does fit perfectly the mood & tone of the Sil writings - only TH does not.

You're also ignoring Tolkien's later statements to the effect that Bilbo's intrusion into the legendarium was a fortuitous accident, and, indeed, his reservations about publishing the Silmarillion at all. Why? "No hobbits!"

And you're ignoring Tolkien's clear statements about the work being 'peripheral' to the Legendarium in the Letters which I qouted.

Look, we can both bounce quotes from the letters & writings back & forth & get nowhere because Tolkien contradicted himself (never realising that his comments in his letters would be taken as definitive statements). Letters 19 :

I think it is plain that ...a sequel or successor to The Hobbit is called for. I promise to give this thought & attention. But I am sure you will sympathise when I say that the construction of elaborate & consistent mythology (& two languages) rather occupies the mind, & the Silmarils are in my heart....Mr Baggins began as a comic tale among conventional & inconsistent Grimm's fairy-tale dwarves, & got drawn into the edge of it...And what more can Hobbits do? They can be comic, but their comedy is suburban unless it is set against things more elemental.

& 257

Even so it (TH) could really stand quite apart, except for the references (quite unneccessary, though they give an impression of historical depth) to the Fall of Gondolin. Letter 257.

Clearly imply it is not part of the Legendarium in the way The Sil writings & LotR are. But the Letter to Milton Waldman seem to imply the opposite. What we are left with are the texts themselves & the question of whether the individual texts are consistent with each other the only one that isn't is TH, for the reasons I've given.

H-I Sorry, but that's just a satyrical dig at lawyers - it doesn't show a complex social structure.