[Lush]

The Sumo analogy was used primarily for the imagery, Underhillo, [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] .

Still, I think that Beth has a lot of insight into literary style in general, and while you don't have to agree with her, I think it's kinda intersting just to take in what she has to say.

And Huckleberry Finn always struck me as a very structured literary exercise, wherein the believability of the text itself, as impacted by the language, was not central to my understandig and (profound) appreciation of the book itself. But that's just me.

Regardless, jal, I don't think it was Beth's intent to say that Tolkien didn't know what he was doing. Rather perhaps she is saying that some of his linguistic overtures do not sit well with her, and using her background in explaining why.

Anyway, if the whole point of this thread is just to prove to someone that Tolkien wasn't above reproach, well ha, no writer is above reproach.

Nothing and nobody under the sun (or under the clouds of Britannia, as the case may be) is perfect.

Perhaps some think that harping on about flaws is a fruitless and thankless exercise in general, but it has to be done from time to time, if only for us to better understand the craft of writing and to learn from the mistakes of others (so that we can go on to commit our own errors, woo hoo).