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tumhalad2 · 10-07-2007, 02:28 AM

I found this link and message on a blog:

http://revolutionsf.com/article/953.html

THE TOLKIEN CRITIQUE I stumbled across this critique of "The Lord of the Rings" at Boing Boing and read it largely because it was written by author Michael Moorcock, whose own take at darkly heroic fantasy writing has a flavor all its own. Moorcock sees Tolkien's work as conservative and backward-looking (which it is), and too forgiving of (or too inspired by) the "common man" as embodied by those merry hobbits. A complex, dense work of writing, LOTR doesn't delve deep into human nature, he argues -- but, then, what do you expect from a rabid consumer of Nordic culture and medieval literature? Moorcock says: "The Lord of the Rings is much more deep-rooted in its infantilism than a good many of the more obviously juvenile books it influenced. It is Winnie-the-Pooh posing as an epic. If the Shire is a suburban garden, Sauron and his henchmen are that old bourgeois bugaboo, the Mob -- mindless football supporters throwing their beer-bottles over the fence the worst aspects of modern urban society represented as the whole by a fearful, backward-yearning class for whom "good taste" is synonymous with "restraint" (pastel colours, murmured protest) and "civilized" behaviour means "conventional behaviour in all circumstances". This is not to deny that courageous characters are found in The Lord of the Rings, or a willingness to fight Evil (never really defined), but somehow those courageous characters take on the aspect of retired colonels at last driven to write a letter to The Times and we are not sure -- because Tolkien cannot really bring himself to get close to his proles and their satanic leaders -- if Sauron and Co. are quite as evil as we're told. After all, anyone who hates hobbits can't be all bad."

10-07-2007, 02:28 AM	#25
tumhalad2 Haunting Spirit Join Date: Sep 2007 Posts: 95	I found this link and message on a blog: http://revolutionsf.com/article/953.html THE TOLKIEN CRITIQUE I stumbled across this critique of "The Lord of the Rings" at Boing Boing and read it largely because it was written by author Michael Moorcock, whose own take at darkly heroic fantasy writing has a flavor all its own. Moorcock sees Tolkien's work as conservative and backward-looking (which it is), and too forgiving of (or too inspired by) the "common man" as embodied by those merry hobbits. A complex, dense work of writing, LOTR doesn't delve deep into human nature, he argues -- but, then, what do you expect from a rabid consumer of Nordic culture and medieval literature? Moorcock says: "The Lord of the Rings is much more deep-rooted in its infantilism than a good many of the more obviously juvenile books it influenced. It is Winnie-the-Pooh posing as an epic. If the Shire is a suburban garden, Sauron and his henchmen are that old bourgeois bugaboo, the Mob -- mindless football supporters throwing their beer-bottles over the fence the worst aspects of modern urban society represented as the whole by a fearful, backward-yearning class for whom "good taste" is synonymous with "restraint" (pastel colours, murmured protest) and "civilized" behaviour means "conventional behaviour in all circumstances". This is not to deny that courageous characters are found in The Lord of the Rings, or a willingness to fight Evil (never really defined), but somehow those courageous characters take on the aspect of retired colonels at last driven to write a letter to The Times and we are not sure -- because Tolkien cannot really bring himself to get close to his proles and their satanic leaders -- if Sauron and Co. are quite as evil as we're told. After all, anyone who hates hobbits can't be all bad."