[Bêthberry]

It is possible I should not be responding now, for I am a little frustrated with what has been made of my argument in my last post.

Aiwendel is ascribing to me points I never made and which do not follow logically from any of my points.(Edit: and I will respond to it in a later post.) Child is insinuating that for some reason I am discriminating against Tolkien because he is not modern. And Estelyn is saying the direction of the arguement is wrong. However, I read your posts as defensive rather than as a legitimate analysis of my argument.

For your information, I have supplied a plausible reason for Tolkien's use of archaic style. It is just that none of you like the reason.

I am sorry if my analysis impinges upon your faith and love of an author, but to say that other people are not being fair or right in their reading--people who like the author also--is taking authorial enjoyment a tad too far I think.

And, by the way, the issue about inverted sentences is not that they are wrong or should not be used. I did not say that. It is the way they are foregrounded in the text, the way they are used in the text. It is the pattern-making feature of literary language which makes it significant.

And, yes, "Borne upon the wind they heard the howling of wolves" is a grammatical error. It would be significant and meaningful if this kind of misplaced modification were a regular feature of Tolkien's style, as are the many, many ways which Joyce challenges language structure. But it is not. (Joyce, by the way, is not without his detractors, so when you refer to him, Child, you need to acknowledge that his 'modernity' does not go unchallenged. It is not a simple case of modernity being accepted and Tolkien's conservatism not.) And, if it is important to emphasise the aspect 'borne upon the wind', then the subject could easily be changed, so that the sentence could read, for example, "Borne upon the wind, the howling of wolves echoed over and again upon their ears." (I repeat, this is offerred as an example of the pattern only, not as a superior sentence.)

Perhaps I should explain that I pointed to this sentence not out of some pedantic demand to enforce the rules of grammar, but merely in a teasing way to Squatter, who had set up an "Oxford professor of English" as an authority beyond question. It was a rejoinder to his argument, not a requirement for flawless perfection. Edit: For the sake of clarity I would like to point out that my post of November 3/03 at 3:19 did point out what, for me, are outstanding features of Tokien's work--the breadth and extent of his imagination and his profound respect for fairie and, in fact, it takes as one of the strengths of LOTR its sprawling nature.

I would agree with Child that Tolien's article on Beowulf and the Monsters is a brilliant work of scholarship. (Liriodendron, when you feel so hostile towards academics, you should perhaps consider that Tolkien himself was one.) I have argued its excellence elsewhere on earlier threads. However, his brilliant writing on Beowulf (and in "On Fairy-Stories") does not automatically mean that his creative or fictional writing will implicitly be as good.

Furthermore, I think a legitimate avenue for discussion is how we go about defining, ascribing or recognizing quality in language.

I think Finwe has come close to providing one way to recognize a great read: when we are completely taken up in the created world an author presents to us. I, too, feel this way about Tolkien's world and writing. Yet I also feel let down. I come crashing back to 'reality' when I come to certain passages in LOTR and this is disappointing. I think it is an acceptable and legitimate endeavour to try to explain why this happens. And it saddens me when I am told I should not do this because it attacks the professor unfairly. This, I think, it where the cultish aspects of Tolkien fandom come into play.

[ November 11, 2003: Message edited by: Bêthberry ]