Did JRRT encourage new ME stories?

[Raynor]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

I have to say there's a deep irony in someone who bangs on about subjectivity all the time basing an argument on something as subjective as the concept that God personally wrote down every single word that is in the Bible/s.

You misunderstood me. I am not saying that it was God who personally wrote, but that some myths/mythologies can be traced back to one individual. As far as the first part of your statement, this is a discussion that ultimately relates to personal tastes, and therefore, subjectivity should take the stage. We are not debating evidences, but artistic preferences.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Raynor

You misunderstood me. I am not saying that it was God who personally wrote, but that some myths/mythologies can be traced back to one individual. As far as the first part of your statement, this is a discussion that ultimately relates to personal tastes, and therefore, subjectivity should take the stage. We are not debating evidences, but artistic preferences.

Which mythologies, exactly, are based on the word of one person? I'm sure the experts would like to know!

[davem]

I think that by its nature no mythology can be the product of a single mind. A mythology is a cultural product. Its what a people do with experiences/events. Its impossible to trace any mythology back to an individual - as Tolkien points out in OFS. In origin all myths were 'religious'. They were what a people believed to be true, stories about the gods they worshipped.

No-one in our world ever believed that the stories of M-e were true. No-one in our world ever worshipped the Valar. We all know that M-e is a fictional creation. It may be that in the far distant future people will have turned M-e into a mythology - but, at the risk of stating the glaringly obvious, that would be a terrible thing, & could only be a result of some kind of disaster. We, thousands of years after Homer wrote, know that The Illiad is 'fiction', & four centuries after Shakespeare we haven't turned MacBeth into a God. Being an optimist (in the long term) as regards the human race, I'm pretty sure that our decendants a thousand years down the line will still have access to some kind of computerised database/library system, & will be reading The Sil & HoM-e on e-books & not sitting round fires in dank caves worshipping Manwe - or believing that we did.

I even have faith that most of them will realise that there are other authors out there, whose works are just as interesting as Tolkien's & actually choose to read some of them, rather than sitting around in despair over the fact that they can't spend their whole existence reading stories about Middle-earth by A.N. Other-Writer.

[Bêthberry]

I really want to thank Child for her post which has so strongly stimulated this most recent aspect of the topic at hand. And I want to thank davem for his insistence on defining the word mythology. Definitions are very helpful in forwarding discussion. They do not, however, necessarily influence human behaviour at the time of the act. (To use an analogy: I suppose there are some people who might stop and refer to their illustrated copy of the Kama Sutra and then return to the activity they were engaged in, but I doubt if many would find that kind of engagement really pleasurable, more an exercise in logistics. )

It is the modern scholars of mythology who davem references who have given us this sense of tribal superstitions and which claim that the religious aspects were paramount the ancient socieities. That is not to say these scholars have an objectively true explanation of what the mythologies meant: what they have is a definition/understanding which satisfies them in their time. They could be wrong--after all, social scientists display the same kind of scepticism which hard scientists claim.

From a narratological point of view, the idea that mythologies derive their power from the representation of religious belief is too limiting. Such an explanation does not really provide, for instance, an explanation of the power of narrative in our culture, which supposedly does not tremble in caves, but climbs in them for sport and leisure. What might be more important in terms of mythologies is not their truth factor (that is, their semantic content) but their psychological value. Mythologies may have derived their power from the importance of story telling to humans. It is the narrative act which gives mythologies their coherence and significance. Anyone who has ever been to a funeral will understand how those left behind use stories to deal with their grief and to celebrate the life that has passed. Story telling is a hugely important aspect of the human mind, both for individuals and for the group, be it familial, local, tribal, national, or world.

So what this could well mean to our exploration of mythology in Tolkien is that mythology may not necessarily have to have this component of belief system. It is the telling of the stories which is important, not whether the speakers actually think that Manwe or Yavanna (or their REB counterparts, as the case may be) will keep watch over them. Ritual is not limited to religion, and increasingly we understand that ritual (as opposed to fetish) has a place even in a modern or post modern world.

So, if it is true that a mythology is not written by one mind, but by many over the telling, (and for the record, I don't think that Tolkien's work was written by one mind, but represents the creative response of one mind to the myriad reading that one mind did.) then what might be going on here is indeed what Child speculated: a coming together over story, with various hands providing aspects of that story. It is entirely possible that mythologies in the cultures of the 21st century need not have religious compoments in order for them to have power in the communities which tell them. It is the very fact that so many hands are engaging in the storytelling of Middle earth that proves Tolkien did create the story components of mythology.

And I do hope I have provided a bit more humour for Raynor. And Fordim, who would have thought your canonicity thread would rise up again in new form?

[Lalwendë]

But they aren't though.

Ther aren't thousands, hundreds or even dozens of minds engaged in telling Tolkien's stories. There is one. Tolkien.

The only way you can start thinking along that track is if you accept the following:

1. That fan-fic is 'telling Tolkien's stories' - no matter how cruddy or how many Princess Tippy Toes characters childish minds chuck at you.

2. You believe post-modern/structuralist/insanity theory that nothing has any meaning apart from what people decide to give to it. And if you do, beware! For the Four Horsemen of Theory Change are saddling up and ready to go in the form of Remodernism (see Stuckism, Tracy Emin, Billy Childish and Franz Ferdinand etc for further info) which reasserts the place of Meaning.

3. There's some vague chance that somewhere along the line, Tolkien fans will ever agree on how many Balrogs it takes to change a lightbulb. News. This will never happen. Why? We are nerds. Nerds by nature do not agree. They love nothing more than pedantry and feed on it like Ungoliant sucks on Light.

4. You must entirely suspend your sanity to think that Tolkien's work was written by davem, by me, by whoever reads it.

Oh yes, and a mythology does not need to be religious either, it can be based on history but the important thing is that it is not written by one mind, and I have not got such need of Lithium yet that I have the delusion that I had any hand in writing Tolkien's stories. I read them, I interpret them, I imagine them. I do not, did not and cannot write them.

Cut to the chase - lots of folk here write fan-fic and stuff like that. Perhaps they are being driven by their own daydreams of one day seeing that stuff in print?

[Sauron the White]

Lalwende - your #3 item put a big smile on my face. That pretty much says it all.

ITs not just this particular site, but often when reading many internet chat sites I find these debates remind me of the great Emo Phillips story about God and religion. For those who may not have heard it before allow me -

The Wisdom Of Emo Phillips
I was walking across a bridge one day, and I saw a man standing on the edge, about to jump off. So I ran over and said "Stop! don't do it!" "Why shouldn't I?" he said. I said, "Well, there's so much to live for!" He said, "Like what?" I said, "Well...are you religious or atheist?" He said, "Religious." I said, "Me too! Are you christian or buddhist?" He said, "Christian." I said, "Me too! Are you catholic or protestant?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me too! Are you episcopalian or baptist?" He said, "Baptist!" I said,"Wow! Me too! Are you baptist church of god or baptist church of the lord?" He said, "Baptist church of god!" I said, "Me too! Are you original baptist church of god, or are you reformed baptist church of god?" He said,"Reformed Baptist church of god!" I said, "Me too! Are you reformed baptist church of god, reformation of 1879, or reformed baptist church of god, reformation of 1915?" He said, "Reformed baptist church of god, reformation of 1915!" I said, "Die, heretic scum", and pushed him off. -- Emo Phillips

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Which mythologies, exactly, are based on the word of one person? I'm sure the experts would like to know!

Ummmm.....The Book of Mormon? Scientology? The Quran?

[Raynor]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

Which mythologies, exactly, are based on the word of one person?

My argument was based on a conjecture, that if some myths are based on various religious beliefs which are in turn related to a one important individual, then these myths can be traced to one person. At least at this moment, I don't have the knowledge to be more specific.

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

And I do hope I have provided a bit more humour for Raynor.

I am much in debt to all the participants on this thread that provide, willingly or not, delightfully amusing arguments .

Originally Posted by davem

Its impossible to trace any mythology back to an individual - as Tolkien points out in OFS.

Where in OFS did he say that?

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

From a narratological point of view, the idea that mythologies derive their power from the representation of religious belief is too limiting. Such an explanation does not really provide, for instance, an explanation of the power of narrative in our culture, which supposedly does not tremble in caves, but climbs in them for sport and leisure. What might be more important in terms of mythologies is not their truth factor (that is, their semantic content) but their psychological value. Mythologies may have derived their power from the importance of story telling to humans. It is the narrative act which gives mythologies their coherence and significance. Anyone who has ever been to a funeral will understand how those left behind use stories to deal with their grief and to celebrate the life that has passed. Story telling is a hugely important aspect of the human mind, both for individuals and for the group, be it familial, local, tribal, national, or world.

I believe yours and Child's approach to the subject is much better than the one I pursued (the parallels with religious myths). To emphasise the "inventive" aspect of the myths, I would say the following passage from the same chapter of the Biography is relevant:

You call a tree a tree, he said, and you think nothing more of the word. But it was not a ‘tree’ until someone gave it that name. You call a star a star, and say it is just a ball of matter moving on a mathematical course. But that is merely how you see it. By so naming things and describing them you are only inventing your own terms about them. And just as speech is invention about objects and ideas, so myth is invention about truth.

In this light, are we, as humans, to apply "literary" rights over formulations of truth? We might have "professional" reasons (or rather excuses) to do that, but that would be missing the point of the works of the "blessed legend-makers" that "kindle the heart with legendary fire". To make another paraphrase of Mythopoeia, in Paradise the eye error will not see, for error lies not in sound but in the tuneless voice.

[Bêthberry]

I can't find that source now where Tolkien says he felt like he was merely recording and not creating. I'm sure you folks with the pulse of the Letters and HoMe at your fingertip can find that passage, particularly if you think you can work it round to your side of things as the context and recipient and date must be pondered like the entrails of sacrificial animals.

For now, here's a very eloquent statement from a letter to Unwin. It's the letter where Tollkien talks about grace appearing "in mythological form"and where "Allegory and Story meet[. . .] somewhere in Truth." (bolding mine)

Originally Posted by Letter 109, 31 July 1947

Well, I have talked quite long enough about my own follies. The thing is to finish the thing as devised and then let it be judged. But forgive me! It is written in my life-blood, such as that is, thick or thin; and I can no other. I fear it must stand or fall as it substantially is. It would be idle to pretend that I do not greatly desire publication, since a solitary art is no art; nor that I have not a pleasure in praise, with as little vanity as fallen man can manage (he has not much more share in his writings than in his children of the body, but it is something to have a function; yet the chief thing is to complete one's work, as far as completion has any real sense.

As for putting "ahead" literary things over "formulations of truth", I'd go with what Tolkien said about the nature of mankind as subcreators in OFS.

[Raynor]

The passage in question appears after the much quoted paragraph about the mythology to be dedicated to England:

Originally Posted by Letter #131

The cycles should be linked to a majestic whole, and yet leave scope for other minds and hands, wielding paint and music and drama. Absurd.

Of course, such an overweening purpose did not develop all at once. The mere stories were the thing. They arose in my mind as 'given' things, and as they came, separately, so too the links grew. An absorbing, though continually interrupted labour (especially since, even apart from the necessities of life, the mind would wing to the other pole and spend itself on the linguistics): yet always I had the sense of recording what was already 'there', somewhere: not of 'inventing'.

[davem]

Where in OFS did he say that?

Let us take what looks like a clear case of Olympian nature-myth: the Norse god Thorr. His name is Thunder, of which Thorr is the Norse form; and it is not difficult to interpret his hammer, Miollnir, as lightning. Yet Thorr has (as far as our late records go) a very marked character, or personality, which cannot be found in thunder or in lightning, even though some details can, as it were, be related to these natural phenomena: for instance, his red beard, his loud voice and violent temper, his blundering and smashing strength. None the less it is asking a question without much meaning, if we inquire: Which came first, nature allegories about personalized thunder in the mountains, splitting rocks and trees; or stories about an irascible, not very clever, redbeard farmer, of a strength beyond common measure, a person (in all but mere stature) very like the Northern farmers, the bœndr by whom Thorr was chiefly beloved? To a picture of such a man Thorr may be held to have “dwindled,” or On Fairy Stories from it the god may be held to have been enlarged. But I doubt whether either view is right—not by itself, not if you insist that one of these things must precede the other. It is more reasonable to suppose that the farmer popped up in the very moment when Thunder got a voice and face; that there was a distant growl of thunder in the hills every time a storyteller heard a farmer in a rage.

As to the 'Not inventing but receiving' thing. I don't think Tolkien ever made that statement publicly - or if he did that it was anything more than a way of referring to his 'muse'. I've lost count of the number of writers who have claimed that once they started writing their story 'wrote itself' & that the characters 'took on a life of their own'.

I don't think there's a one that wouldn't sue for plagiarism anyone who wrote a sequel to one of their books. And why? Because however you dress it up, & whatever clever arguments you use & words you twist, stealing is stealing.

[Raynor]

Davem, the passage you quoted has zero relevance to your claim "its impossible to trace any mythology back to an individual - as Tolkien points out in OFS". As far as I can tell, it discusses the subject of a story, not its authorship.

I don't think there's a one that wouldn't sue for plagiarism anyone who wrote a sequel to one of their books. And why? Because however you dress it up, & whatever clever arguments you use & words you twist, stealing is stealing.

I disagree. If I would write a book, I would definitely be thrilled if someone else picked up on it and write a sequel; I would hold the same to be true for a good deal of my friends. Not all writers are in it for the fame, the money or whatever other perks come with 'intelectual property rights'. Some would be actually pleased to see that their message got across and that it begins to have a life of his own.