‘Canonicity’: the Book or the Reader?

[The Saucepan Man]

I was implying that all human beings (as well as in Tolkien's world all Free People do - the pin-point quote provided by Helen up there) have built-in standard of Good and Evil (different codes of conduct of different cultures being consequent to one and the same standard), which can not be explained away without drawing in outside nature Consciousnes/Power/God to have such a standard be derived from. (HerenIstarion)

My personal opinion is that this in-built moral code (which itself varies from society to society and within societies over time) can be explained by reference to the evolution of human society (an argument which you anticipated but dismissed, H-I), but I won’t go into that here since it is an issue which I debated at length with Mister Underhill (among others) in the http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=508&page=1&pp=40&highlight=philos ophy) ]Lord of the Rings and Philosophy[/URL] thread.

However, I am not sure it matters that much which rationale one adopts as the basis for morality, since I think that we can all accept that are basic moral values which (exceptions and caveats aside) we can all subscribe to. And, while Tolkien’s tales do affirm and exemplify these values, we do not need to read the texts to be aware of them. For example, I think that we can all agree that killing is wrong, without needing to read LotR to tell us that. So I do not think that it is this moral code that “Faerie” puts us in touch with. Rather, in my view, it is something much deeper and more primordial. That said, I still I haven’t really got a handle on exactly what it is or why it should enchant us so. And perhaps, for reasons already stated, I shouldn’t try.

Tolkien can't have it both ways - he can't claim on the one hand that fantasy (including his own creation, presumably) is about seeing 'in a brief vision that the answer may be greater—it may be a far-off gleam or echo of evangelium in the real world' - ie, claiming that it points us towards something greater, more 'real', 'truer', & at the same time denounce the 'purposed domination of the Author', & leave it all up to individual interpreatation, or 'applicability' … (davem)

That seems to me to be a very pertinent point to raise, davem, since Tolkien does, as you suggest, appear to make both claims in his writings. I haven’t got the Letters to hand, but I was reading them last night and came across two extracts that very much supported the latter view. One was a quick comment to the effect that LotR is about nothing except for itself. The other, in a letter to his Aunt I think, concerned Leaf by Niggle. He set out the ideas that he had in mind when writing it and then went on to comment that (while they might be of interest to his Aunt) they should have no bearing on the reader’s appreciation of the story itself.

If I was to try to reconcile the conflicting views that you have highlighted, davem, then I would speculate that, while he had a settled view (based upon his beliefs) of what it was that he experienced in “Faerie” and hoped that readers of his tales would experience the same, Tolkien nevertheless recognised that he could not impose that experience on his readers, since they will be free to interpret it in whatever manner seems appropriate to them.