‘Canonicity’: the Book or the Reader?

[HerenIstarion]

Heren Istarion wrote:

H-I, I'm trying to figure out why, and to whom.

To Aiwendil and Saucepan Man. The statement was speculative (and in personal way at that), we can not judge what both of them fear or anticipate, unless they explicitly tell us so. And though Aiwendil admitted being an atheist, but that does not lead to that he fears to believe if argued into it by means of reason (he seems the type for such a way to me - now me being speculating in personal way, hum), but it does not follow he is scared. Nor are we their analysts, neither them our patients. Would not it be equally unfair of them to tell us that we were afraid to admit the harsh 'reality' of Godless world and were trying to find sort of a blindfold in religion to sooth our fear?

I hope that no one gets offended by this particular entry of mine, though

[mark12_30]

OK, point taken.

[The Saucepan Man]

Should we judge the truth of the maxim of 'murder (not mere killing, or accident, but deliberate murder) is bad' on the ground that murderer him/herself, perhaps, has different code of conduct which carries along his/her personal truth of "murder is good"?

In many cases (although not all), I do not doubt that the murderer is acting in accordance with his or her personal values. Happily such individuals are in the minority since murder (as a general proposition) is regarded by the overwhelming majority of people as detrimental to society and therefore "wrong". Equally happily, I find myself in the majority on that one.

However, there are cases where deliberate murder is regarded as “good” by society itself. State-sanctioned murder, in the form of capital punishment, is regarded by many as morally acceptable. I cannot accept it as such. Different values. Different truths.

Now I can't help feeling that was a bit unfair, though

I wouldn’t regard it as such, given that Aiwendil and I are perfectly capable of speaking up for ourselves. I hope that I have made my position clear. If not, then I doubt that there’s much more I can say on this question of truth and belief.

Would not it be equally unfair of them to tell us that we were afraid to admit the harsh 'reality' of Godless world and were trying to find sort of a blindfold in religion to sooth our fear?

I would be more likely to point to the problems caused throughout history when one set of people claims a monopoly on the truth and asserts that there is something wrong with those who will not or cannot see it in the same way.

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Greetings all. It’s been a while since I posted to the thread, but I have been watching the debate unfold with great interest. The discussion of Truth/truths is fascinating and I think central to what Tolkien was working through in his subcreation. To belabour a point I first may a while ago on this thread, I think that it is entirely appropriate to see the confrontation between the Nazgûl and the Fellowship as a confrontation between those who wish to defend the right of the Free Peoples to maintain their own sense of truth(s) against the false imposition of a totalitarian Truth by the forces of Mordor.

If that paragraph makes it look as though I am equating capital-T Truth with the project of Sauron – well, yes, I am. But please bear with me davem, Mark 12_30, Lyta, Child and H-I as I am not calling you Nazgûl (although I bet you’d all look totally cool in black)

Sauron’s project, as far as I can figure it, is to force a situation upon the world in which his own personal vision of truth (through his ego I/Eye) becomes the vision of Truth. And that’s some really dangerous territory that I think this thread is beginning to slip into. In this ‘enchanting’ or ‘joyous’ or ‘through a glass darkly’ kind of truth-apprehension that we are celebrating here (and that many of us find in Tolkien’s works) there is a real danger that we will mistake a mirror for a window, and project onto others our own personal views.

In this intuitive moment of apprehension of Truth, there are two possibilities of what’s happening. First, we are engaging with Truth (whatever that might be) but we will only ever be able to do so from our own limited and individual perspective. So while we may ‘see’ Truth we can only ever bring it into our own lives – yoke it to the horizons of our own historical experience – as an individually-understood version or truth of that Truth. The other, rather more simple and disturbing possibility that we’ve explored, is that there is no Truth, and all we see is ourselves, and we then pretend that truth of our own making is the Truth (and this is the Sauron approach).

I believe that most of us here are proceeding in the first mode – that is, we gain some apprehension of Truth through and in the very act of imaginatively engaging with Middle-Earth (which is itself the record of Tolkien’s imaginative engagement with Truth), but where we need to be very careful is in saying that “we’ve glimpse the Truth” and either leaving it there or, worse, begin to work out what that Truth might be for other people. To do this is to slip back into a more Sauron-like mode, as we take our own limited and individual perspective and try to extrapolate from that to what other people might think of it.

As I said in my last post (way back in box 201), I believe that there is a way past or through these individual experiences of truth – and I believe that Tolkien, in the Fellowship, gives us a nice model of that. Actually, where I think we see a way past the fragmentary nature of the endless plurality of truths (or, the endless plurality of individual perspectives on Truth that we experience in our historical time as our own truths) is in chapters like “The Council of Elrond” where reasoned dialogue and stories, conversation, equality of relationships, debate and argument are used to navigate and negotiate through the complicated nature of the history that they are confronting, without ever really pretending to understand the nature of that history. The task of the Council, remember, is not to decide What Does The Ring Mean? But What Must We Do With The Ring?

It’s this process of debate, confrontation, negotiation, conversation that allows us to integrate our own truths (as perspectives onto Truth) into and with one another. The goal, then, is not to achieve Truth-as-Object (to look through some window and ‘just know’ that we are beholding Truth) but to find a way in which we can proceed in our explorations in a truth-full manner. And again, Tolkien has anticipated us: the point of the Quest is not, as Auden pointed out, to achieve the Precious Object but to destroy it. The whole purpose of the Fellowship is to rid the world of the dangerous and totalitarian idea of a single overbearing Truth with which to unite and bind all ‘lesser’ truths (“One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them / One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them”).

There is a unity of Truth, but it is not the unity that comes from singularity (“we all see the same Truth, even though we have different perspectives or versions of that Truth”); instead it is the kind of unity that we find in the Council of Elrond or amongst the Fellowship (“we are on the same journey with different paths, we have the same purpose but different ends”). Capital-T Truth cannot exist as a stationary object in the historical time of human experience, it can only be captured in and through the process of truth-full speaking that we enact as we engage with each others in reasoned and equal dialogue about our own truths (be those truths self-constructed or individual versions of the Truth).

[mark12_30]

(although I bet you’d all look totally cool in black)

Thank you.

However...

Sauron’s project, as far as I can figure it, is to force a situation upon the world in which his own personal vision of truth (through his ego I/Eye) becomes the vision of Truth.

(a) Is it really that simple? Domination, subjugation and lust for power have nothing to do with it?

(b) If it is that simple, does that preclude Eru from having "his own personal vision of truth" or (alternately) does it preclude Eru's "own personal vision of truth" from being True?

and

(c) At what point have I (or davem, Lyta, Child and H-I ) stated that you must see the Truth as we see it? If the Truth is as large as I have proposed (and I have proposed that it is, indeed, infinite, since it "contains" an infinite God -- horrible choice of words, but to continue) then no human mind can possibly claim to have it all. At best, each of us gathers what glimpses we can. ("Five nearsighted hobbits approach an oliphaunt...")

I also stated that in my opinion those who claim to "have" or to have "mastered" the Truth haven't been pursuing it long enough to realize how big it is. So how do you extrapolate from that that I aim to impose my view-- Sauron-like, "own personal vision of truth (through his ego)?"

BTW, "beyond cloud nine " sounds like quite a nice place to be.

[Bêthberry]

Playing catch-up here! I would like to look back to Child's post # 268 and davem's post # 271. I think that ultimately my comments will point back to the idea Fordim has just made about the value and worth of discussion (which I think harkens back to my idea of 'interpretive community').

Child I thank you for the eloquence with which you have pointed out that there are many ways to seek this light. I would, however, like to comment on this well-taken point you made:

Yes, you are right. Something may be gained from a discussion of views like Greer and the neo-Nazis. (Poor Germain Greer! I've never liked her, but it seems cruel to put her in the same boat as those other folk.)

Yet, I am likely to learn considerably more by reading someone like Flieger or Shippey, whose perception and views on Middle-earth are far more acute.

I have no doubt that you (and I) will gain more from reading someone like Flieger or Shippey than reading the neo-Nazis. Who is to say, though, whether our experiece is greater or lesser than that of others. I can think of many readers, some beginning readers, some not so beginning, whose understanding of story and narrative might well be expanded greatly by considering how both Wagner and Tolkien were or can be appropriated by the neo-Nazis. For them, the enlightenment could well be far greater than that which you and I experience. For this reason, that there are many different kinds of reading experiences and many different ways to examine a subject, I hesitate to say that my experience reading Flieger is more successful or valuable than someone else's experience addressing the white supremacists. This, I think, relates to Sauce's point about the value of individual reading experiences.


davem,

When we read his reasons & his explanations for what he wrote, we are as likely to respond by thinking 'Of course! that explains what I felt!' as we are to respond 'Why, that's not it at all! I never felt that!' I would say that the former response is more common.

Even granted that this is so (which I do no think has been proven here), does that negate the experience of those who say "that's not it!" ? At most it proves that the position is uncommon or unusual, but it does not make it wrong. Many ideas in human history began with one or two voices having different experience and wanting to make that experience known and understood. The next step is, as Fordim suggests, to talk, to engage in a comparative process of understanding.

The Legendarium was Tolkien's manifesto, & it means what he intended it to mean, & while we may take from it what we will, or reject it all entirely, we can't claim it means nothing at all, & was not intended to do what the writer has stated clearly it was meant to do. I just can't see how anyone can seperate the story from its meaning, or claim it means whatever they choose it to mean. Tolkien is the only one who can claim the Humpty Dumpty role here -'when I use a word it means precisely what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less'

I find it strange that there is this tendency to equate the position of multiple interpretations with a Humpty Dumpty role or total chaos. The reader is in fact under the same kind of injunction which Tolkien made of the writer in "On Fairy Stories", that his understanding must be consistent. It must be consistent with the reader's own experience (and where this can be shown to be inconsistent, new understanding arises) and it must be consistent with the text. In Tolkien's case, that text is, as I said before, implicit rather than explict. As Child astutely observed, Tolkien was not Lewis. It seems to me, davem, that you draw conclusions from the text and then want to say this is explicit. This is, I humbly suggest, a "misreading" of the text based upon your insistence that there must be an authorising intention found in the text. Your argument, to me, does not recognise the indeterminant nature of much of Tolkien's narrative. You pull the strands together to create an overarching metatheory of meaning, but Tolkien's stories hold that only in potential and in part. He gave us the glass darkly. He didn't want it any other way. So, you see, my position does not in fact ignore what the writer meant.

EDIT: Perhaps another point is that we react to the way you phrase your points, davem. Look at this sentence:

So when we leave Middle Earth we feel a lack

That "we" certainly sounds all-encompassing and authoritative, but I am going to ask you to reconsider it. I don't think I have this experience you claim for all of us. What I feel when I finish reading Tolkien is little different than feelings of departures from other extremely well imagined worlds of fiction. It is narrative cessation--a post-reading desire comedown--not a sense that this world somehow fails. While you might well think that you are not enforcing your "Truth" on us, your style does not seem to suggest there are other possibilities out there.

And now I leave, taking my prism with me outside and dangling it in the sunshine, to watch the play of lights that dances around it.

[Child of the 7th Age]

To belabour a point I first may a while ago on this thread, I think that it is entirely appropriate to see the confrontation between the Nazgûl and the Fellowship as a confrontation between those who wish to defend the right of the Free Peoples to maintain their own sense of truth(s) against the false imposition of a totalitarian Truth by the forces of Mordor.

If that paragraph makes it look as though I am equating capital-T Truth with the project of Sauron – well, yes, I am. But please bear with me davem, Mark 12_30, Lyta, Child and H-I as I am not calling you Nazgûl (although I bet you’d all look totally cool in black)

Fordim --

Ahem! That's the second time, you've hinted at a certain kinship I may have with the Nazgûl. As I read your posts, I feel a strong compulsion to go down to the Shire and dig up an RPG where I can fly around and instill terror in folk's heart!

I am, however, puzzled why I ended up with the MIB. Not that I can't appreciate a dark hooded cloak as well as the next fellow. I can't speak for anyone else lumped together in that group, but I thought I had clarified my position in my last two posts.

As far as "Truth" goes (with a capital 'T'), I have strong feelings that flow naturally out of my own personal experiences as well as my background as an historian. My preference is that we completely discard the term "Truth" in these discussions because I think it leads to a dead-end. I do not personally doubt that there is a core of Truth at the center of existence. But my own view would be similar to that expressed in Helen's last post. That Truth so transcends our personal experience that, whatever we may feel we think or know, can only be a partial and flawed approximation of what actually exists. We see through a glass darkly, and it would be presumptious of me to judge anyone or ask them to conform to my own opinions.

As I said before, if I want to talk about how I personally perceive that which transcends the corporeal or visible world, I would far rather employ the symbol and image that Tolkien used in his own writings -- that of Light. Light is both a reality and a perception. Unlike "Truth", there is no suggestion of a single, unvarying standard. By its very nature, light changes and shifts. There is an interplay of brightness and shadow. To me that is a closer approximation of how we individually perceive what lies beyond, and it is a response closer to Tolkien's own, at least what he has delineated for us in LotR. I am not comfortable with a monolithic "Truth" by which we judge everyone and everything a lá Sauron

In all his writings, Tolkien stresses the flawed nature of Man: the fact that the best we can hope for at this point in time is a "long defeat", with only an occasional, temporary victory. Even with his strong Catholic beliefs, I have little doubt that JRRT would say that it is simply impossible for Man, as flawed as he is, to see or understand the Truth in all its complexity. Whatever we see is a tiny piece of the whole and, since we are all looking from varying perspectives and backgrounds, it is no wonder that we all sense and describe something different.

Like Saucepan Man, I sometimes shudder at what humanity has managed to do historically all in the name of Truth: group after group coming forward and claiming to hold the ultimate solution and imposing that on others: religious, political, racial, you name it.... I think Tolkien was equally suspicious of any kind of moral, spiritual, or political coercion. The Shire, perhaps his ideal statement of community, is a laissez-faire enterprise where the mayor's most onerous duty is presiding at banquets. His Hobbit heroes, especially Bilbo and Frodo, are delightful non-conformists who would hardly fit into a regimented state. His good Kings of Gondor and Rohan did little more than act as military leaders and moral examples. Tolkien once described himself as an anarchist, albeit not the kind with a bomb. He would have objected to our faceless government bureaucracies as being another manifestation of the spirit of Sauroman, determined to bludgeon us into obedience and conformity.

Fordim - I do agree that at the heart of Sauron's evil lay his desire to compel others to accept his own personal view of things. Subjegation and domination, the extinction of the individual personality, were simply a way to implement that "Truth". Even his lust for Power presumed that there was an end goal or product that must be achieved at any cost.

Tolkien, the devout Catholic who personally paid homage to Truth, was also the great champion of diversity and the freedom of the individual to act with as few constraints as possible. Middle-earth is filled with a diversity of peoples, all with different ideas and cultures, and the author takes delight in each. There is no one universal pattern that his characters must emulate to achieve goodness. Each one in the Fellowship has a different path to follow. It is only Sauron and his ilk who insisst on an unwavering "Truth" (with a big T), a final solution that everyone is expected to bow down in front of. Sauron's insistence on "Truth" is not only an affront to all the free peoples of Middle-earth, but more critically an affront to Illuvatar who remains the final and only guardian of Truth, the only one who truly understands all the strains of the Music.

What Tolkien seems to be hinting at is that we should all be wary of anyone who proposes to understand Truth, especially all the Sarumans who are floating around in our modern world and who want to force their own Truths down our throats, since true knowledge of the Music can lie only with Eru. Gandalf alludes to a similar thing when he explains how the Ring would corrupt his own good intentions. In a desire to serve Truth, he would put his own perceptions ahead of others and even of Illuvatar's own plan, and that would lead to disaster.

So, let's be careful. "Truth" can be a dangerous, dangerous thing, a fact that JRRT recognized, since it can easily be turned into an instrument for coercion and the substitution of our own will for that of God's. In the end, we are flawed creatures who can understand only a few fleeting notes of the Music of creation.

[mark12_30]

I am more and more puzzled by the aversion to the word "truth". In his essay "On Faery Stories" Tolkien is not the least bit shy about using this word, any more than we should be shy about using the word "joy" (as davem has recommended.) Refer to the epilog of "On Faery Stories."

Or refer to Mythopoeia , the Word In Question is also used.

It has already been quoted in Letters.

C7A states:

So, let's be careful. "Truth" can be a dangerous, dangerous thing, a fact that JRRT recognized, since it can easily be turned into an instrument for coercion and the substitution of our own will for that of God's.

Then it's not Truth anymore, it's domination and subjugation. Substitution of our own will for God's is hardly what I'd call "Truth".

It seems to me that lack of humility and gentleness is a far, far greater danger than the use of the word "Truth"; let's not toss out the proverbial baby with the bathwater.

In the end, we are flawed creatures who can understand only a few fleeting notes of the Music of creation.

But that doesn't mean we should call it dissonance, does it? It is what it is: music-- even if we only hear a tiny peice of it. Calling it dissonance or noise or auditory stimulation makes us no wiser than calling it music.

[Aiwendil]

Apologies in advance for what is bound to be a long post, considering the amount of discussion that has gone on since my last one.

Davem wrote:

I didn't intend to suggest that. I would ask what their standard is, by which they measure such things - isn't it from some innate sense of right & wrong, of false & 'True'? They hold to some 'ideal' of how things should be, & compare things as they are to that 'ideal'.

As I said before, I don't think that this is the best place to launch into a discussion of moral philosophy. If we are simply talking about distinguishing false propositions from true ones - well, we have all manner of techniques for doing this - logic, mathematics, science, analytic philosophy, etc. Yes, I understand that this is not what you mean. But I am not just being deliberately obtuse. I hold that if "false" and "true" are meaningful, then these are the things one must engage in order to learn which propositions are true and which are false. But I don't think that this is the place to discuss the foundations of epistemology either.

I don't think it is possible to define 'Truth' precisely, because we haven't reached the that 'state'.

and later

I still feel that you & Aiwendil are wanting 'Truth' reduced to a set of 'facts' which you can analyse & 'see through', rather than accepting that is the 'source' of 'facts' as well as everything else.

I'm sorry; while I understand that you think that "Truth" can be a meaningful term and yet one that cannot be defined, I simply don't accept that. I don't know how to have a rational argument with someone who uses a term that (they claim) is by its very nature impossible to define. So unless there is something more that you can say about "Truth", the debate simply must stop there.

And here we come perilously close to entering into yet another big discussion for which this thread is not the place - philosophy of meaning. If anyone is actually interested in my views on that subject, and is feeling particularly adventurous, you may want to check out this monstrosity of a thread at The Tolkien Forum. It began innocently enough as a discussion of absolute vs. relative morals, but around page 4 it becomes a rather intense debate between me and someone else. Anyway, I provide the link because I don't want to simply ignore the whole matter of the philosophy of meaning that arises in relation to the term "Truth", but neither do I want to take up pages talking about it.

I don't think I am. For the enchantment to work, the secondary world must be self contained, if it is not to come across as allegory & the spell fail to be cast effectively. Only in that 'enchanted' state can we fully experience eucatastrophe, when as Helen says, our guard is down.

Forgive me; I'm merely trying to narrow in on exactly what your answer to the following question is: was the primary motivation behind Tolkien's work the communication of "Truth" to his readers?

That is a yes or no question. It sounds to me like your answer is "yes". Am I wrong?

I provided some evidence in the opposite direction earlier:

Tolkien's opinion seems likely to have changed - we have statements in the Letters to the effect that he never expected any of his Silmarillion-related work to be enjoyed by anyone but himself (and Lewis); we also have his statement that the mythology grew out of his desire to provide a historical context for the languages he was inventing. And we have his agreement with Lewis that there was not enough fiction of the sort they liked to read, hence they would have to write it.

and

I believe it's in "On Faery Stories" that Tolkien discusses the phrase "the green sun". At first glance, this appears to be nonsensical. But no, Tolkien says; the phrase is a perfectly good one - so long as its user provides a thoroughly consistent context within which the phrase is to be believed. In other words, it's not strictly the realism of a work of fiction that matters; it's the believability; the internal consistency.

If your answer is indeed "yes" as I suppose, how do you account for these things?

So as far as Tolkien is concerned: I won't rule out his opinion just because he happens to be dead, because thats undemocratic. He may not be right, but he has a right not to be ignored, & the same goes for Rob Gilson & GB Smith. Universal Sufferage, guys!

Well, I'll accept a rational argument from anyone, living or dead. But I won't just concede the point to a dead person any more than I will to a living one.

Lyta Underhill wrote:

Every time I return to it, I see beauties and truths reflected through his words, and I know there are more to be seen if I look properly. Some others on this thread have expressed the desire NOT to know everything, so I think they know what I am trying, stumblingly so, to get across in my ramblings.

I agree with you with regard to beauty. That is, each time I re-read LotR or "The Silmarillion" or The Hobbit I discover ways in which it is aesthetically pleasing that I had failed to notice before. But I don't think I agree about the truths; or perhaps I just misunderstand you. It's not that I think there are "Truths" in Davem's sense in LotR which I am for whatever reason not interested in; I think that there are no "Truths" of that sort - moreover, I think that "Truths" of that sort do not exist.

The Saucepan Man wrote:

To follow your argument to its extreme, we could not appreciate Tolkien’s works unless we recognised Eru as our own God and accepted the creation story as laid out in the Silmarillion as fact. At the very least, we would (as Child points out) have to subscribe to Tolkien’s own religious beliefs in order to enjoy his stories. Yet, there are very few who read and enjoy his works (even among Christians) who subscribe to his particular set of beliefs.

This is a very good point. I repeat an earlier, unanswered query to Davem (and to anyone that shares his opinion): if the fundamental reason that a reader likes Tolkien is that the reader, consciously or not, recognizes the "Truth" of Tolkien's work, how is that the same reader can also like other authors with quite different views? If I like Tolkien because I subconsciously recognize the glimpse of Truth that he gives me, why are my other favorite authors Asimov, Clarke, and Adams?

HerenIstarion wrote:

And though Aiwendil admitted being an atheist, but that does not lead to that he fears to believe if argued into it by means of reason

Well, I don't think I actually used the word "atheist" - only because that can imply an equally unreasoned "certainty" that there is no god. As you suggest, I will certainly believe something to be likely if presented with a convincing rational argument to that effect.

Fordim Hedgethistle wrote:

The discussion of Truth/truths is fascinating and I think central to what Tolkien was working through in his subcreation. To belabour a point I first may a while ago on this thread, I think that it is entirely appropriate to see the confrontation between the Nazgûl and the Fellowship as a confrontation between those who wish to defend the right of the Free Peoples to maintain their own sense of truth(s) against the false imposition of a totalitarian Truth by the forces of Mordor.

I'm afraid I must disagree. Within Arda, there is very clearly a single truth about God, for example. Sauron isn't bad because he wished to impose his own beliefs on everyone; he's bad because the things he claimed were wrong (though I think what makes him really evil is that the things he did were wrong). It's not that Melkorism ought not to be forced on those that don't want it. It's that Melkorism is simply false.

Of course, all of that is intra-Legendarium.

Davem wrote:

I'm not talking about a moral philosophy that you have to go along with, so there will never be a situation where everyone is required to believe the same things, & see the world in the same way.

Then what are you talking about? I don't mean to be rude. I just mean that in my usage, "truth", "Tao", and "joy" are three very different terms with very different meanings. If I understand "joy" as it is in my usage, then when you say:

We can say, reducing all the references, & theories, about Tolkien's motivations, all the stuff about moral regeneration, all of it, to a simple statement of what he wanted to do in his work. He wanted to bring as much Joy to as many of us as possible.

I agree. But when I say "joy" I just mean pleasure, enjoyment. Clearly you mean something more. And I fear that either you must spell out precisely what this "more" is or we are at an impasse.

I don't know if this is enough, & whether there will still be demands for Joy to be reduced to a set of facts & figures which we can all debate.

Well . . . as you can see . . .

I'm sorry (I honestly am, because I enjoy this debate and don't want it to end), but no number of synonyms or analogies is going to suffice. I should point out that I understand that you think it means something more than just "the set of true propositions about the world"; I think I even understand how you think it means more. I just don't agree that it can mean more.

Bethberry wrote:

I find it strange that there is this tendency to equate the position of multiple interpretations with a Humpty Dumpty role or total chaos. The reader is in fact under the same kind of injunction which Tolkien made of the writer in "On Fairy Stories", that his understanding must be consistent. It must be consistent with the reader's own experience (and where this can be shown to be inconsistent, new understanding arises) and it must be consistent with the text. In Tolkien's case, that text is, as I said before, implicit rather than explict. As Child astutely observed, Tolkien was not Lewis.

Yes! This is something like what I was trying to say quite a while ago with my talk about what a "reasonable person" would mean, but Bethberry puts it in much better words.

I don't think I have this experience you claim for all of us. What I feel when I finish reading Tolkien is little different than feelings of departures from other extremely well imagined worlds of fiction. It is narrative cessation--a post-reading desire comedown--not a sense that this world somehow fails.

This is more or less my experience as well. I am naturally always just a bit unhappy that the book is over, but no more so than when I read any good book (or when I listen to a good symphony, or watch a good movie, etc.).

Lyta Underhill wrote:

Middle Earth is a created reality, a second reality or sub-creation. It is not materially existent in this world; however, the very fact that it is read by more than one person makes it a shared psychological or mental reality.

This is certainly true. But there is a great deal of difference between ascribing to something a psychological reality and ascribing to it a transcendent Truth.

As a matter of fact, most of the aspects of "Truth" that Davem, Helen, and others put on a transcendent, metaphysical level I put on a psychological one. It is for this reason that I don't think "echantment" is meanigless, for example, and for this reason that I think the notion of Faerie has some value.

This does not negate the logical true/false values, as those are defined based on the “initial conditions” of an experiment, and a definite material end point which can either meet a criterion or fail to meet it according to the test applied. (I thought I’d add that bit before Aiwendil jumps all over me for sounding like a constructivist again…I’m pretty convinced I am not, but I think I often sound like one. Perhaps it is my sloppy expression of concepts that I am always refining without fully forming to begin with…sorry if I sound flaky, but it is my nature!)

Constructivist! Constructivist!

Well, no. And sorry about last time, by the way. At any rate, I agree with you that no truth ought to be elevated to the level of "Truth" and no falsehoold to the level of "False" - though I suspect we come to this conclusion for different reasons.

Child of the Seventh Age wrote:

I do agree that at the heart of Sauron's evil lay his desire to compel others to accept his own personal view of things. Subjegation and domination, the extinction of the individual personality, were simply a way to implement that "Truth". Even his lust for Power presumed that there was an end goal or product that must be achieved at any cost.

Really? I don't think Sauron would have been satisfied if all the free peoples simply declared that they agree with him on all issues. The impression I get from the MT text on Melkor's motivation vs. Sauron's is that Sauron's fundamental desire was to impose his own sort of Order (there! I can capitalize words too) on everyone.

Mark12_30 wrote:

I am more and more puzzled by the aversion to the word "truth". In his essay "On Faery Stories" Tolkien is not the least bit shy about using this word, any more than we should be shy about using the word "joy" (as davem has recommended.) Refer to the epilog of "On Faery Stories."

I don't have the least problem with using "Truth" to refer to the set of all true propositions. I think that "On Faery Stories" can be understood perfectly well with this definition (whether or not it was Tolkien's). Note that "Truth" in my understanding could very well include propositions like "there is a God" or "that cataract is sublime" (though of course it does not have to).

[davem]

Having been justly taken to task by Legolas in a PM for my aside to Aiwendil, I suppose I must explain my accustaion of 'literalism'.

When I said that 'facts' like 'killing is wrong' or 'water is wet', etc are nothing to do with 'Truth' I meant simply that they are facts, which are 'products' of our response to Truth - ie, 'Truth', in the sense in which I am using it, refers not to moral codes or precepts, but to the source of those codes, the thing which inspires them in us. I just considered Aiwendil was conflating the two things. Helen was speaking of the 'consequence' of our experience of 'Truth', the moral values it inspires in us, I was referring to what inspires those values. Hence, in my mind at least, no contradiction.

Aiwendil

My problem in so far as coming to an agreement as to what Truth is, in an attempt to reach some kind of common ground, is that I cannot 'translate' my conceptions of Truth, Joy, etc into terms which would fit your world view, at least not without sacrificing what I mean by them, in order to make them 'fit' - & if I could, we wouldn't really be debating on common ground, we'd be debating on grounds that you had set out, & we would have to remain on that sharply defined ground, if we wanted the debate to continue, & wherever the debate went, it could only go where you allowed it to go. My world view includes the metaphysical as well as the physical, but yours seems limited only to the physical, so I would not be allowed to offer metaphysical 'proofs' - which by their nature can only be expressed through feelings & experiences.

But the point is, Tolkien accepted metaphisics, spirituality, Truth & Joy as 'givens', if you will not allow the term 'facts'. So, how can we discuss the meaning & purpose of Tolkien's writing if the ground of our discussion doesn't include those things as 'realities', given that Tolkien himself saw them so. If we limit ourselves to the physical, material world, that can be encompassed by current psychological & literary theories, whatever conclusions we may come to would not really be relevant, as central issues would have been rejected. We would be limiting the result to what you will accept before we even begin.

Look, Jung had as a patient a woman who believed she had really visited the Moon. Jung took the idea absolutley seriously, & was questioned about it. He responded that if that was what she believed, then the only way to understand her was to accept it as true.

What I'm saying is, whether you believe in such things or not, if you wish to understand Tolkien's works, you have to behave as if they're real. You have to accept the existence of Truth & Joy as facts. Just as you have to accept the Elves & Hobbits of Middle Earth as 'facts' if you are to fully imerse yourself in Middle Earth & be affected by it. For myself, I go further than simply accepting them as facts temporarily, based on my own experiences. Enchantment is a 'real' experience for me - I am in 'different' mental or 'spiritual' state. It is 'real', as all perception is 'real' - subjectively at least. I also experience Eucatastrophe as equally 'real' but more intense. & what I 'glimpse' while in that state seems more 'real', Truer, still. I call it Truth, because its the 'Truest' thing I know, & its that simple. So, how else can I define it, how can I fit it into your worldview? What terms or definitions can I use to make it fit, that you would find acceptable enough for us to have found 'common ground'?

I actually take statements like :

' A fleeting glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the Walls of the World, poignant as grief'....In such stories when the sudden 'turn' comes we get a piercing glimpse of joy, & heart's desire, that for a moment passes outside the frame, rends indeed the very web of story, & lets a gleam come through.'

as being literally True, that there is a such a 'real' True thing as 'Joy beyond the Walls of the World .. that for a moment passes outside the frame, rends indeed the very web of story & lets a gleam through.' And I accept it because I've experienced it, & it won't fit into your theory, so your request for a definition so we can meet on common ground can't be answered, because it won't fit into the ground you're allowing me.

None of that 'invalidates' your own, or anyone else's experience - I even tried to make my position clear yesterday when I said that if you experience 'Joy', are uplifted, moved, inspired, consoled, opened up, whatever, then you've got it, & there's nothing more to look for, no 'secrets' to uncover. Where I have difficulty with your position is your consistent atttempts to reduce all those things to brain function - but I accept it is my difficulty & not yours.

I have to say that you & SpM seem to get het up at claims that you are missing something, almost as if you're 'demanding' that I, or Helen, or H-I should 'reaveal' the 'secret' to you, or stop implying that there is such a 'secret'. Yet you claim to be so confident that you have understood it all in the way that you want, & that anything we could 'reveal' - if we deigned to let you in on the hidden meaning - would not interest you because it can't be True anyway, because there's no such thing as Truth.

So, here we are, us saying Truth exists, you denying it exists, but demanding that we tell you what it is anyway. If you don't feel you're missing out on anything why do you keep asking us to tell you what you're missing out on?

I can't tell you, because you're asking me to tell you in a language which doesn't have the words for me to describe it, & if I use the words that are there, what i tell you will be so limited the description won't describe it. But how can I not speak about things Tolkien accepted as facts, & wrote about, & are at the heart of his stories, & yet expect to get anywhere in understanding the man or his work.

You are demanding too much of me, I'm afraid, & I'm stuck. I can't give up on Truth & expect to get anywhere, because that's where Tolkien, imo, is trying to take me.

[Mister Underhill]

I’ve been following this conversation with interest and rejoin it now, as always, with too little time and too little art.

Be that as it may, I’ll try to limit my focus to this, which jumped at me:

Originally Posted by Aiwendil

As I said before, I think that "On Faery Stories" and the rest of his literary theory can be understood quite well with "truth" meaning simply "the set of true propositions"

I – with respect – quite disagree with this.

Throughout “On Fairy-Stories”, Tolkien refers to “profound truths”, to “permanent and fundamental things”, to “underlying reality or truth”, to “Joy beyond the walls of the world” (capitalization Tolkien’s), to the “notes of the horns of Elfland”, which loudly proclaim certain moral truths. He likens “this fallen world” to a prison, and glorifies “escape” (via Fairy-Story) as a going home. To where? He says that “the maddest castle that ever came out of a giant's bag in a wild Gaelic story is not only much less ugly than a robot-factory, it is also (to use a very modern phrase) ‘in a very real sense’ a great deal more real.”

What does he mean by these things? A castle from a giant’s bag in a story more “real” than a factory?

Surely he means more than “the set of true propositions” about the world: 2+2=4, the earth is round, and so forth. Unless I mistake what you mean by “set of true propositions” – which I take to be limited solely to rational, provable, indisputable, factual propositions – Tolkien is talking about something far more abstract, something which is, indeed, transcendental. Truth beyond mere factual truth.

This sort of truth – Truth – resists pat definitions or pithy catchphrases. Whole lifetimes may be spent in search of its many facets, or in an effort to live in accord with it. It is, to steal Tolkien’s words, “incalculably rich”. There’s a reason for talk of “glimpses” and “windows” and “through a glass darkly”. To trace it back to God and Heaven doesn’t help much, since I think most would agree that these are only other names for great and incomprehensible mysteries which are never to be fully apprehended in this world, even if you believe in such things. Unless I am much mistaken, I think that Helen, davem, H-I, and others on the “spiritual” side of the debate would agree that Truth is something to be sought after with humility, not imposed on others through tyranny.

Yet both science and psychology allow room for the mysterious, and here we, perhaps, may find some common ground, for surely none of us are so naïve as to think that the workings of nature have been plumbed by science, nor all the motives of the human mind and heart charted and explained by psychologists. As Shakespeare put it, “The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”

Aiwendil:
I think that The Lord of the Rings is an immensely powerful and deeply satisfying work of art; I think it's one of the greatest achievements of the human mind.

Bethberry:
I have felt great, overwhelming grief at parts of his work, grief that brought me to my knees (metaphorically speaking)

Whence comes this power? It is there, I think, where we may find the most meaningful common ground.

BTW, davem, I think it was Blaise Pascal who apologized for the long letter, because he had “not had time to make it shorter.” In defiance of Pascal, one last point:

Fordim, I think your Nazgûl/Fellowship analogy has finally worn out its welcome once and for all, because it leaves no middle-ground: neither reader nor author ascendant, but reader and author as accomplices, co-conspirators as it were. I cannot say it better than Tolkien, from “On Fairy-Stories” which I reread this morning for the sake of this thread: “Uncorrupted, it [Fantasy] does not seek delusion nor bewitchment and domination; it seeks shared enrichment, partners in making and delight, not slaves.”

NOTE: Cross-posting with davem has resulted in a bit of redundancy. For that I apologize.

[The Saucepan Man]

Davem

My problem in so far as coming to an agreement as to what Truth is, in an attempt to reach some kind of common ground, is that I cannot 'translate' my conceptions of Truth, Joy, etc into terms which would fit your world view, at least not without sacrificing what I mean by them, in order to make them 'fit' - & if I could, we wouldn't really be debating on common ground

What I was trying to say in my last post was that I do not see it as necessary to reach agreement on whether Truth exists and, if so, what it is, to meaningfully discuss our reactions as readers to Tolkien’s works.

OK, let me adopt H-I’s approach and try out an analogy here. It may not work, but let me try it anyway. Davem, say that you and I are looking at a sheet of opaque glass set in a wall. On the glass there are beautiful, beguiling patterns that shift and change in the light reflected on them from our side of the wall. You believe that the patterns are created by some sort of projector on the other side of the wall. I, on the other hand, believe that there is nothing beyond the wall and that the patterns naturally occur in the sheet of glass. We both accept that we cannot meaningfully discuss the source of the patterns, since we will never agree on the issue. Can we not still discuss the patterns themselves and our personal reactions to them, and perhaps even how they are affected by the light from our side of the wall?

In other words, can we not agree to disagree on the nature and existence of Truth and discuss what you would call glimpses of the Truth and I would call the themes, concepts and values that I derive from Tolkien’s works? It is here that I think that we would find a good deal of common ground.

So, how can we discuss the meaning & purpose of Tolkien's writing if the ground of our discussion doesn't include those things as 'realities', given that Tolkien himself saw them so.

I think that we can discuss the meaning that we each see as readers in Tolkien’s writing without reaching agreement on Truth. I agree that in order to discuss its purpose (ie Tolkien’s intentions), I would have to accept his belief in Truth, even though I may not believe it for myself. But isn’t that what you are saying with your example of Jung’s patient who believed that she had been to the moon? Clearly he could not have believed that she had actually made such a journey, but he accepted her belief that she had for the purposes of the analysis.

What I'm saying is, whether you believe in such things or not, if you wish to understand Tolkien's works, you have to behave as if they're real.

I’m not so sure that me behaving as if Truth is real is much different from my accepting Tolkien’s belief that it is real. Or, indeed, my accepting your belief that it is real. But then again, even if Truth were to exist and we are, as you say, all looking at it “as if through a glass darkly”, then won’t we all see slightly different things? Can any of us ever really fully understand what it was that Tolkien was trying to achieve, regardless of whether we actually believe in the Truth or are simply accepting his belief in it?

I have to say that you & SpM seem to get het up at claims that you are missing something, almost as if you're 'demanding' that I, or Helen, or H-I should 'reveal' the 'secret' to you, or stop implying that there is such a 'secret' … So, here we are, us saying Truth exists, you denying it exists, but demanding that we tell you what it is anyway. If you don't feel you're missing out on anything why do you keep asking us to tell you what you're missing out on?

The only reason that I object to claims that I am missing something is that it suggests that you are without question right and that I am without question wrong. I don’t believe that I am wrong. Nor do I believe that you are wrong. I simply believe that we are both looking at matters differently, and that the way we each approach the issue is right for us. I have explained in my last post why I felt it necessary to try to understand what you meant by Truth. But I think that I have sufficient understanding of what you mean now to be able discuss it (without the need for quote marks ), even though I may not believe it myself.

You are demanding too much of me, I'm afraid, & I'm stuck. I can't give up on Truth & expect to get anywhere, because that's where Tolkien, imo, is trying to take me.

Now, about those patterns …

[davem]

SpM

I can see where you're going with the sheet of glass analogy, but the problem with it is summed up by Tolkien's statement:

'In such stories when the sudden 'turn' comes we get a piercing glimpse of joy, & heart's desire, that for a moment passes outside the frame, rends indeed the very web of story, & lets a gleam come through.'

Its the 'rending the web of story' thing - or breaking the glass - the light comes through. We can't then argue any longer about the cause of the patterns. The light from behind is seen to be the cause.

Its fine just discussing the patterns on the surface, but if they are only the 'effect' of the light behind them, then by limiting ourselves only to what appears on the surface, & in effect denying the existence of the Light that causes them, we will fail to ever truly understand what is happening. This is what I meant by having to 'compress' my conceptions & understandings in order to make them fit into some 'common ground' - we'll never get beyond that common ground. Effectively, we're boxing ourselves in. If we limit everything to what can be explained by brain function, then we'll end up only with an 'explanation' that tells us how our own brains work. We're 'assuming that which is to be proved'.

The patterns on your glass may be beautiful, but the real question is what they mean - is there a reason for them being there, or are they just 'there'. Tolkien is saying that there is a definite reason for them being there, & that that reason is more important, more 'True', more real, & most importantly, more beautiful, than the patterns on the glass, because it is the light behind it, shining through it, that makes it beautiful & meaningful.

[Lyta_Underhill]

SpM's post 273:

But no one will have precisely the same set of values. They will differ (often slightly, sometimes considerably) from person to person. And that’s why I have difficulty in accepting that there is a single, capitalised “Truth”.

Perhaps the capitalization could refer to the magnitude, rather than the universality of said truth. A Truth in one person’s life may be a truth (lowercase) or even a perceived falsehood in another’s.

By definition, Middle-earth is a fictional world, and therefore false, whereas we are confronted every day (often in unpleasant ways) with the reality of our own world.

Perhaps this is where the materialists and the spiritualists (to borrow and misuse a label) differ. Middle Earth is a created reality, a second reality or sub-creation. It is not materially existent in this world; however, the very fact that it is read by more than one person makes it a shared psychological or mental reality. A spiritually centered person will give more weight to what is in the mind and/or “soul” than one who needs a material proof to accept the “reality” of an idea. I do not mean to denigrate the materialist for needing such proof, nor should a spiritually centered person be belittled for accepting something for which there is no objective or material proof; but it seems that this very need redefines what the materialist thinks of as true and what he perceives as false, when compared to a spiritual person’s viewpoint. It appears, to me, to be a discontinuity in commonality of definition of “true” and “false.”

My own view is that everything is true, and many mischaracterize this viewpoint as being necessarily naïve or blind in its acceptance of absolutely everything. I do not, however, give everything equal weight or value when applied to my chosen worldview and goals, and I often reject that which I perceive to be wrong or evil according to my own set of tests, which probably hold a lot in common with others’ tests of same. It is my opinion that, to relegate an idea to the level of False (capital) is to fail to completely consider it from all angles, just as such is so for True (capital). This does not negate the logical true/false values, as those are defined based on the “initial conditions” of an experiment, and a definite material end point which can either meet a criterion or fail to meet it according to the test applied. (I thought I’d add that bit before Aiwendil jumps all over me for sounding like a constructivist again…I’m pretty convinced I am not, but I think I often sound like one. Perhaps it is my sloppy expression of concepts that I am always refining without fully forming to begin with…sorry if I sound flaky, but it is my nature!)

My concern, though, is that if we say that there is a “Truth” in Tolkien’s works and that if you cannot see it then you are not reading it correctly or you are not ready for the “Truth”, then we will engender just such a worry in people.

That is what I was addressing with my notes on applicability to a particular reader. If a great “Truth” has no place in that person’s life, then it ceases to be something that he or she must see, now or eventually. But often, such truths become applicable, and a reader sees things that were hidden before. This does not make the first reading naïve or the reader dense. The meaning, or truth, simply does not apply at the time of reading. No matter how much another person tries to hammer at someone to find a particular “message” in a piece of literature, art, or martial art, it will not become suddenly clear or applicable until that person needs it and recognizes the need for it.

(It may be different for martial arts, as the teachings that they involve have a very specific purpose. Literature, to me, is a very different kettle of fish.)

I don’t really see a difference in the basic aims of martial arts and literature from the “art” standpoint—simply a different medium of expression, and certainly the test of good vs. evil must be VERY well defined against strict tests if one is to practice martial philosophy in the real (material) world, because there is a great responsibility to be borne if one is to wield the power of life and death, even in one’s own defense or in the defense of another who is in need. I can’t say that the specifics are very similar, but, in that both disciplines are “arts,” both strive to a perfect state of expression.

I think I shall stop here, as there is much left to do in the material world, but I am thoroughly enjoying this thread!

Cheers!
Lyta

[mark12_30]

H-I-- I needed that. Thanks.


Regressing to the previous page: Here is a long overdue response to some of Aiwendil's questions.

This is an interesting answer - neither the story itself nor insight into Truth is either the cause or the effect; or perhaps each is both. I think I like this answer, if only because it comes very close to what I've been arguing. As a story becomes very good, it becomes more like an allegory; as an allegory becomes very good it becomes more like a story. So the story itself and insight into Truth are in fact the same thing. But this is not the impression I got from your earlier posts. Perhaps this was just a misunderstanding on my part. It seemed to me that you (and Davem as well) were suggesting that Tolkien's goal was to expose readers to this insight, and that a requirement for achieving this is a fully self-consistent, believable story. I got this impression most of all when you compared Tolkien's works to parables (in connection with self-consistency); for clearly in the case of a parable, the insight is the end and the story is a means. Did you mean to draw a distinction here?

I should clarify that I think the process is cyclical with extended or repeated exposure to the stories and to the insight. Receiving insight clarifies the story internally, bringing it into sharpoer focus; internalizing the story I thnk encourages further insight.

It sounds like what you mean by "Truth" is simply "the set of all true propositions". That's certainly a definition I can live with (it's the one I intend when I say "truth"). But if this is the case, I don't see why there's any need to be at all mystical about it. Why talk gravely about Truth being out beyond the mills (if I understand your millegory correctly), or about transcendent glimpses of Truth; why the capital T? For if Truth is just the set of true propositions, then a "glimpse of Truth" must just be the knowledge of the truth or falsehood of certain propositions. In such a case, there is no reason at all that each person should have to discover Truth for himself or herself. Nor is there any such thing as "discovering Truth", since that would mean omniscience.

So either of two things is true: 1. By "Truth" you do in fact mean "the set of all true propositions", and all the earlier mysticism was unnecessary or 2. you mean something else, in which case I still would like to know what it is.

And a further dichotomy: either 1. The definition of "Truth" does not critically depend on anything like God or religion or 2. it does.

Going with option 1 on both questions agrees with my view; choosing 2 in either case means there is still some disagreement, but one that I cannot identify.

Aiwendil, the beginning of the statement "those three concepts" referred to your provided list of three supernatural things: " God, heaven, and the Divine Plan" . Those things (each of which I consider heavily related, interrelated, and infinite) are included in Truth. So it follows that I hold to #2 in each of the multiple-choice questions above. However in the first question,

So either of two things is true: 1. By "Truth" you do in fact mean "the set of all true propositions", and all the earlier mysticism was unnecessary or 2. you mean something else, in which case I still would like to know what it is.

my answer is this: if I must write down a definition, I will point to the above that I already gave you: Truth includes your three concepts (God, heaven, and the Divine Plan) plus the set of all true propositions.

I've got to admit that I have no idea how the matter of what I am pursuing has anything whatsoever to do with the nature of Tolkien's work.

Perhaps it's a mystical phrase, although I associate it with the Declaration of Independance: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness: we all pursue something in the attempt to be happy. For some, it's Entertainment. For some, it's Truth. For some it's Style. For some, it's something else.

If I'm not looking for something particular, then the odds of me finding that particular thing are the odds of either stumbling over it or of being led to it by someone else. So if I'm reading Tolkien looking for A Good Story, that's one pursuit. If I'm looking for Truth, that's another pursuit. And if I'm looking for justification for my own agenda, that's another pursuit. (The first two, I think Tolkien would not mind, and would indeed be pleased by. The third, he clearly had a problem with.)

The first time I read Tolkien (at age 12) I thought it was a rocking-good story. The second, third, fourth times I read it, it got even better. At what point did I try to be more elvish because I thought elves and elf-friends were beautiful... pure... shining... transcendant... angelic? I'm not sure when that started. But if I hadn't thought it was a good story, I wouldn't have enjoyed it or reread it, and I'd have missed the shining beauty that beckoned me then and beckons me still. The more I go back to it, the more it shines. Hence, circular; actually the mystics refer to a "spiral"-- ostensibly covering the same topics in the X. Y plane but going deeper (or higher) every time.

(I read the Narnia series over and over and over again as a teenager-- and it wasn't til years later I realized what it was "about". By the time the allegory "clicked" it was a whole cascade of "clicks"; the lights went on all over the house, so to speak.)

Well, the ramble is long enough at this point. Aiwendil, it's been a pleasure discussion these things; thanks; although (like davem) I fear that my definitions will be too vague to satisfy, at the same time, I find infinite things very difficult to contain in definitions. Let me know...

~*~*~

EDIT:

Hi, Bilbo. Glad you're enjoying it.

Hi, Child.

The Peacemaker wrote:

Can we not at least agree on a broad statement like this? That most readers see a core of 'enchantment' or 'faerie' which Tolkien depicts or draws upon in his writing. That this may go by different names -- truth, Truth, Joy, or Light-- and that we each differ somewhat in how we define or regard this concept, since we bring our own experiences and backgrounds into the process of definition. But can we not also agree that this core reflects the crucial values and themes that Tolkien delineates in his story: concepts of goodness, self sacrifice, love, and hope?

It's a good starting place, Cami.

(Like neice, like uncle-- wanna bet she's hiding an arkenstone in her pocket?)