[Lush]

Originally Posted by davem

First, I don't think we can compare the Legendarium to traditional tales. The Legendarium has a single author, traditional tales have multiple authors over millenia (some themes/episodes in traditional tales have been traced back to the stone age). These tales (the same applies to traditional folksong, especially the 'magical ballads') are the products of many voices through many ages. They are also the products of oral cultures. This is essential, because the culture(s) which produced the tales would have had a whole store of lore, history, & tradition which would have supplied a lot of background information for the hearers which would not have been present in the tale itself. If a fox appears in a traditional tale the hearers of that tale would have drawn on a whole range of other stories & sayings about foxes as they listened - something we can't do, as most of that lore will have been lost.

Davem, I can agree, but up to a point. I think we should not discount Tolkien's debt to the oral tradition, or to the recordings and refashionings f such tradition, to the likes of the Brothers Grimm, Perrault, and so on. I think his texts themselves establish the importance of the wide base of myth that human storytelling rests upon.

As an example of something closer to home, if I mentioned Star Wars here, most people would think of the movies. If I had mentioned Star Wars back in the 80's people might also have thought of Reagan's satelite defence system. Cultural references change so the meaning of tales can also change. This is why feminist or marxist interpretations of traditional tales are at best questionable & at worst completely misleading - we cannot know the worldview(s) of the culture(s) & individuals which produced, adapted & altered them. We cannot know what they meant to our ancestors or what they will mean to our decendants. To state, as some 'experts' do, that this particular tale means 'such & such' & so our ancestors must have believed such & such is nonsensical. 19th-20th century political theories tell us nothing about traditional songs & tales.

First of all, I think you're misreading my intentions in starting this thread. I am not necessarily advocating such a reductionist approach to tales, in fact, this is what I am working against in this thread.

Yet to say that a feminist reading of Lord of the Rings has no basis is also, in my opinion, reductive. Feminism and marxism are not strictly modern phenomena, in my opinion, they did not plop into our collective laps out of the ether. These strains of thought exist under different guises in different cultures and societies. The rhetoric changes from time to time and storyteller to storyteller, but don't tell me there is nothing we can pick up on when it comes to gender dynamic in a story such as the Grimms' "The 12 Brothers," in which a king with 12 sons decides to murder all of them if his 13th child is to be a girl.

I'd say the same thing about such analyses of Tolkien's writings, which are steeped in traditional tales & images. The Legendarium is the Legendarium. Only Tolkien could have produced these tales & he could only have written the tales as he did write them. What would you sacrifice of the Legendarium in order to get more women in LotR? You can't have everything. Complaining that's its not 'perfect' in your opinion is fine, but if it was somehow made more acceptable to you I suspect it would be a damn sight less acceptable to others. Until we can say we fully understand every aspect of the story, every nuance of meaning, have assimilated every meaning & reference of the story (& the very fact that we keep going back to it shows we have not) I think we should take what we've been given.

Davem, once again, I think you are misinterpreting my intention. Who is talking about "getting more women in LotR"? Not me, and not anybody else in this thread, or so it seems. Your attitude is exactly of the sort that I was bewailing when I decided to open this thread; this immediate reaction that attempts to brand all feminist (and otherwise) cricics of Tolkien as deeply unsatisfied, even hateful readers that somehow wish to alter the stories to their own liking. This is now what's going on here at all.

Above all else, I fear that the word "women" and the word "feminism" are simply red herrings to some. Any attempt at a serious discussion is thwarted at the root.