Do we live in Middle-earth?

[Bêthberry]

Grateful thanks to Child of the 7th Age and Gandalf the Grey for their interesting sources.

"I became aware that he was looking fixedly at me. Suddenly he said, 'Of course, you don't suppose, do you, that you wrote all that book yourself?'....I think I said: 'No, I don't suppose so any longer.' An alarming conclusion for an old philologist to draw concerning his private amusement. But not one that should puff any one up who considers the imperfections of "chosen instruments", and indeed what sometimes seems their lamentable unfitness for the purpose." (Letter 328 written in 1971)

Child, I have often had the sense that Tolkien was inspired in a particular way. I have found this to be true for several other writers and so am very interested to see this quotation from the Letters, which I don't know. This fits in with Tolkien's comments about sub-creation and one, true myth, I think.

Gandalf , that link provides a focus for many questions and directions to extend discussion. Thank you for it. I particularly liked the acknowledgement that Tolkien used the fictional voice of the translator.Yet even here, I think, there are two meanings to his act of translating


Bethberry