Certainly Lewis did not go to the extents that Tolkien did in the invention of a language and complex history, however, we can not understate the extent to which he did go for his children’s novel. For a text specifically directed to children (comparable to the Hobbit) I would say that Lewis’ history and development is far more expansive.

In “Surprised by Joy,” Lewis’ autobiography, we learn that the land of Narnia had found its creation early in the life of Lewis, not late, as one would assume. Lewis as a young boy spent hours locked away in his attic imagining and mapping a world inhabited by talking animals. He shares that he went as far as to record trade winds in this new world.

Though the “stuffier dons of Oxford” may well have thought him shell shocked, and Lewis and Tolkien may have had their disagreements as to the use of allegory, I believe that these two were far more than simply friends but were kindred spirits, drawn together by a life long obsession with their myths.

What they thought: “Shell-shocked in the Great War. Poor chap.”

Several of us have found ourselves in the midst of Tolkien mania once again because of the recent release of Children of Hurin. That has led to me pulling out my unread Tom Shippey books and enjoying all the details I can get about the Master himself.

Your thoughts on Middle-earth and specifically Unfinished Tales makes me want to ignore my self-imposed sanctions against buying the book until I’m done with some of my other reading and rush out and devour it NOW!

Wonderful post, I really enjoyed reading your thoughts and look forward to getting into the minutae of Middle-earth once again with Unfinished Tales.

I have to add a data point which, being anecdotal, is otherwise useless, but I’m one of those weird people who drew closed myself into the attic and drew maps and etc. I would have to agree that it’s not a gender axis thing but rather would guess that many women/girls were - one way or another - made to understand it was not acceptable for them. I’m sure many men/boys were told the same, but I suspect not to the same degree. Just my opinion, though. And worth what you paid for it!

Everyone always says you should “write what you know.” JRRT knew linguistics, mythology, and Anglo-Saxon history, so there you have it.

Btw, the “Not another f—– elf!” comment was widely misattributed to C.S. Lewis, even by his biographer. The actual utterer of the comment was a dude named Hugo Dyson. (I know that because I found this article on Google.)

Oh, and you can say “fucking” on my blog. I don’t mind.

My experience:
It’s an OCD thing. We have the reverse dynamic in my household. I’m the “male” who closets herself in the study and works on her big L.O.T.R. project until all hours of the night. However, this may be because I grew up in a male-dominated household and was treated like the first-born son. Over the course of my life, I’ve found that most of my female friends were socially conditioned out of that behavior (whether you view this behavior as good or bad is up to you naturally). I’d never been informed as a young woman that this sort of behavior ‘is wrong,’ whereas my friends were steered clear from it. You should see the plethora of women’s magazine articles which are now teaching women in my age group and older to “carve out time for yourself” and “get a hobby and make time for it,” etc etc. It is actually a current theme in sociology study.

The review:
I loved your discussion of how Tolkien was working. I just picked up Children of Hurin but at present, I’m far more interested in works like The Company They Keep By Diana Pavloc Glyer and The Gift of Friendship; two books centering on the Inklings — a group of scholars and writers who were meeting with Tolkien and Lewis regularly for seventeen years. I have pasted a small snippet of Glyer’s argument for her thesis here: http://fionagh.livejournal.com/367950.html

I’ve been going through the legendary source material Tolkien was living on at the time: The Poetic Eddas, the Volsung Saga etc etc. These are not just Myth 101 Creation stories and a dry accounting of the Norse Gods. The stories of heroes within the early Norse days bring up things like The Ring of Power. Yes, a Ring of Power is in there. So is the name Gandalf, though in Tolkien’s story he appears to be more fo an Odin figure. There are many other aspects that you can see Tolkien drew inspiration from as well.

My theory is — because Tolkien made his work so much like his Work, as in the stuff he loved to do at Oxford, he treated it just like he was required to treat the stuff at Oxford. After a while, he became the legend keeper or Bard of his own creation, based so well on the source materials at Oxford. I’m not saying he pilfered, or regurgitated — but the source archetypes are all still there in Middle Earth and they resonate with us deeply. So, I’m saying Tolkien became the Snorri Sturluson of Middle Earth.

Snorri Sturluson was the man we can thank for most of the literature we have on ancient Norse myths and legends. Ancient Bards aren’t much different than we storytellers today. They knew when to keep things a secret and when to reveal their hand for the benefit of the good story. Back then it was pretty much crucial to their survival, unlike today where we can bag groceries if our novels don’t make it on the stands. (Snorri on the other hand was ultimately murdered in a court intrigue…)

So it was brilliant really. Middle Earth was bound to be as addictive as crack because it was based so heavily on archetypes that pop up all over the world in mythology. But you can see people reusing the archetypes in fantasies today without the same shattering effect. LOTR is good, not necessarily because Tolkien lived his life as Middle Earth’s bard, but because he was good at living his life as Middle Earth’s bard. I believe that this is due to his work at Oxford. As keeper of all the Norse records at Oxford through the language department, and subsequently learning about the ancient bards who kept them before he did — it made him feel an extension of that legacy. His life was lived as the safeguard of ancient treasures. And this made him a great bard to his own stories in the end.

P.S. As for what people thought of him in this role, you can see some of those comments appear in the Inklings circle. They were not all fond of the Middle Earth fanatic. I forget which one it was now, but at a reading of some Middle Earth rough draft, he threw up his hands and growled, “Not another f—— elf!” He was not invited back to another reading, by the way.