The Barrow-Downs?

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

I know all this yet I wish so much the Prof had revised and written out the twee-ness...

It seems to me there are two different points of view developing here about Ole Tom and the House of Bombadil. The first is that the entire sequence from Crickhollow to the Barrow Downs to Bree is not essential to the narrative--it's just a major black hole in the plot.

The second concerns frustration with Ole Tom hisself, the much referred to "twee-ness". (And it isn't just Mith who feels this way, so I'm not 'singling' her out.)

But what are the elements of twee-ness? Is it just Tom's nonsense verse? Or is it Tom himself as a character with power who doesn't seem much bothered by his power? Is it depiction of Tom and Goldberry and their habits of dinner partying? Are these places where Tolkien's style--gasp!--is at fault in that it jars a far number of readers? If Tolkien had had a surer hand with nonsense verse, would Ole Tom be better received?

Are the Barrow Downs just too British, too closely linked to the geography of Great Britain to be important to New Zealanders and the Americans in Hollywood? (Hey Nolly, Nolly, the woods are awake!) Are the barrows which dot the British landscape meaningful only for the denizens of that island? Did PJ reject them as being too insular? Or, again, are they a black hole in the plot and thereby easy to eliminate?

Is the British folklore and history which is so dear to Lal something that has not made the leap over the Pond and become the stuff of global English culture? Or, again, is it Tolkien's style which fails here?