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Originally Posted by davem
Tolkien could not have created a genuine mythology - mythologies cannot be 'created' by individuals. Tolkien wrote a series of interlinked tales. I don't know if you genuinely do not understand the nature of 'mythology' or whether you're just attempting to score points here, but we have to get our terms right if we're to get anywhere in this discussion. If Tolkien created a 'mythology' then every writer of fantasy stories has also created a 'mythology'. Making up a story with gods & goddesses in it is not 'inventing a mythology' - though that phrase may be a convenient shorthand.
Myths, clearly, are not 'lies'. They were, in origin, religious tales, believed in as completely as the stories in the Bible or Koran. And that's the point - no-one (if they're classifiable as sane) believes Tolkien's stories are remnants of genuine beliefs. Of course, Tolkien played the game of being merely a 'translator' in both the Hobbit Forword & the Foreword to the First Edition of LotR - though that foreword was re-written for the Second Edition & any idea (however tongue in cheek) that LotR was anything other than a fictional work was removed.
Homer drew on a existing mythology (as did Dante) to produce their Art. Tolkien invented a 'mythological' background for his tales.
Its vital to distinguish between mythology & 'mythology' here.
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Personally I think it might help if I could find a YouTube clip of a certain episode of a now defunct Irish sitcom where Father Ted has to explain to Father Dougal the difference between Dreams and Reality. You know the one where he has all little fluffy bunnies hopping round inside of his head?
Or else something about writing style. I mean, did Helen Fielding really find a certain dizzy thirtysomething's diary on the Circle Line or was it...um...a work of fiction perhaps?!
Mind, I'm quite taken with the idea that one day Discworld might be found to have been a remnant of genuine 20th century belief and that the Tony Robinson and Phil Harding of the 31st Century are sent on a wild goose chase trying to dig for the remains of Ankh-Morpork.