LotR - Foreword - The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum

Fordim Hedgethistle · 06-07-2004, 09:32 AM

davem - the "high allegory" you speak of here is, methinks, Romance in the original and fullest sense: that is, the dramatisation through a narrative, of an idealised exploration of the human condition/human self (human experience in the world). All of the really enduring Romances of the Middle Ages aspire to do much 'more' than tell a story: La Romaunt de la Rose, Roland and Gawain all spring to mind.

I think that what Tolkien is doing in the Foreward is perhaps more semantic than anything else: defining "allegory" as something simplistic (Ring=Bomb) and using a term of his own "applicability" to describe what he is doing, which is what Romances used to do. I guess the difference is that his book is happy to use allegory as a strategy (i.e. Frodo becomes an allegorical representation of the soul in torment? Sam becomes an allegorical representation of Everyman? I'm not saying that these are right -- only that the book can be read according to such allegories without doing it wrong or violence), while not being completely apprehended according to some total allegorical vision (Frodo and Sam are soldiers in World War II and everything else must fall into place around that).

06-07-2004, 09:32 AM	#13
Fordim Hedgethistle Gibbering Gibbet Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Beyond cloud nine Posts: 1,844	davem - the "high allegory" you speak of here is, methinks, Romance in the original and fullest sense: that is, the dramatisation through a narrative, of an idealised exploration of the human condition/human self (human experience in the world). All of the really enduring Romances of the Middle Ages aspire to do much 'more' than tell a story: La Romaunt de la Rose, Roland and Gawain all spring to mind. I think that what Tolkien is doing in the Foreward is perhaps more semantic than anything else: defining "allegory" as something simplistic (Ring=Bomb) and using a term of his own "applicability" to describe what he is doing, which is what Romances used to do. I guess the difference is that his book is happy to use allegory as a strategy (i.e. Frodo becomes an allegorical representation of the soul in torment? Sam becomes an allegorical representation of Everyman? I'm not saying that these are right -- only that the book can be read according to such allegories without doing it wrong or violence), while not being completely apprehended according to some total allegorical vision (Frodo and Sam are soldiers in World War II and everything else must fall into place around that).