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Old 09-03-2004, 03:37 AM   #28
Estelyn Telcontar
Princess of Skwerlz
 
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Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: where the Sea is eastwards (WtR: 6060 miles)
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Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!Estelyn Telcontar has reached the Cracks of Doom and destroyed the Ring!
I’m continuing to ponder the applicability of Tolkien’s afterlife allegory. It seems especially significant to me that the purgatorial corrective is preceded by death. Now, literal death can’t be applicable to life, since it ends life, so it must apply to something else. The Biblical terminology of “dying to sin” comes to mind, or the psychological idea of letting something go. Don’t worry, I won’t begin publicly reflecting on what I need to give up in order to make way for corrective balance in my life, but I had an enlightening thought –

Tolkien meant (perhaps only sub-consciously) this story to be applicable to his life! It was not primarily an allegory for a literal purgatory, though that fit in with his Catholic doctrine. But he wrote Leaf by Niggle relatively early in his life, too early to make it merely an analogy to afterlife. Otherwise he would have been wishing to die in order to gain what he thought he needed, and I don’t think that was the case. He was feeling his lack in important areas of his life and wished for a corrective influence. For those who have read Tolkien’s biography, it isn’t difficult to recognize the similarities of his and Niggle’s character traits and what was needed to balance them.

So, what might he have felt he needed to give up, let go, die to, in order to gain the characteristics he felt were lacking? Niggle had to leave his unfinished painting, which was only completed (then as a reality) in the afterlife. Tolkien wrote this story during a creative crisis, being unable to finish The Lord of the Rings, Carpenter suggests in his biography. Did he think he would have to leave it uncompleted? Or did he realize that his perfectionism, like Niggle’s, stood in the way of completion?

I know that he didn’t appreciate amateur psychologists who try to analyze authors in order to compare them to their works, and that is not my intention. However, I feel that we can learn from understanding what he was trying to tell himself – and his readers – here.


PS - I read davem's post after writing mine - I think our thoughts are going in the same direction there.
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