Quote:
Originally Posted by davem
Well, as I stated earlier - we may just be dealing with the Estate putting its foot down over letters that are the equivalent of 'Dear Hilary, went into Brum for a cuppa & forgot me brolly - Doh!, Yours Ronald'. But if its the alternative, & its facts about Tolkien they are attempting to prevent getting out then I think at the very least that morally questionable, even if its legally shiny. Either say nothing, or tell the truth, warts & all.
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Well no disputing that morality and legality are very different things ... but I don't think it is moral for example to take a yard when an inch has been given - which may also be the case.. I think saw somewhere that the earlier book breached copyright in which case it is hardly suprising the Estate clamped down.
Also there is a distinction between private and secret. If you have read Douglas Adams as well as Tolkien you will know that people telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth ends up with learning more than anyone really wants to know about frogs
. Speaking for myself I have few scandalous secrets but there are plenty of things I wouldn't want broadcast to the nation. Privacy may be a disappearing concept in an era when people seem happy to bleat the most intimate details of their lives into their mobile phones on trains, but the older Tolkiens are certainly of a generation that did not believe in washing linen in public even if not very dirty. I don't see that saying something places a moral obligation to tell everything and that not doing so make you dishonest de facto.
Children may have a more relaxed view than grand children even as regards what is private to the family and may feel they want to keep it that way for their lifetimes at least. I don't think that is an immoral choice if it were the case. One thing is fairly certain that whatever their private feeling, the Tolkiens as a family of scholars are unlikely to have destroyed anything no matter how personal any "facts" are unlikely to disappear if they are held only in these letter - which frankly seems unlikely in the light of the Estate's statement . Seems to be much more "a boundary dispute" and a matter of principle.