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LordofHats wrote:It might have been Tolkien's intention, but once finished the text is its own entity. If something exists within it it exists. An allegory can take form without the author realizing it. Whether that matters will depend on your philosophy of literary criticism.

Clearly Tolkien was not a member of that school of literary criticism. He was trying to create a mythology and a fictional history; not a political or philosophical message or propaganda piece. Like any novelist he was trying to communicate some things about his characters and about the human experience, but people need to be cautious about twisting the meaning of an artistic work to suit themselves, and misrepresenting that work in the process.

While you can find in a work meaning that the author never intended, there is a danger there of making something up and pretending it's present in the work when it's actually not. Of glossing over inconsistencies in one's pet theory. If the author never intended the allegory, it's unlikely to all fit neatly into an exterior framework being imposed on it.

 Testify wrote:

 Mannahnin wrote:

 Testify wrote:

 Mannahnin wrote:
But Tolkien never meant Orcs to be representative of the urban working class

I think it's more or less impossible to have this opinion having a)experienced urban England and b)read the Lord of the Rings.

I don't mean any offense by this, but to me that statement comes off a good deal more racist than anything I've read in Tolkien.

What? How?

I meant by the mannerisms and culture of the orks. We get this most strongly in the chapter where Frodo is captured by the orks and Sam over-hears them talking about "the lads" and having "a fix".
Compare this to the dialogue of the elves, or the hobbits, or the men.

Okay, that makes more sense. Thanks.

I believe Tolkien was attempting to portray the way he experienced (he was in the army) or imagined toughs and ruffians as speaking. He wasn't trying to create a metaphor to sell you a larger point about urban working class people being tools of a fascist state. There are certainly parts of his writing which are drawn from his personal experiences; obviously he romanticizes the countryside and writes with emotion about negative aspects of industrial production/destruction, and those do seem to be in part be based on things he saw and felt in real life. But to the extent that they're in the story, they're drawn on for their emotional resonance and as part of the setting, not as part of a hidden theme or political message.

 Mannahnin wrote:

Okay, that makes more sense. Thanks.

I believe Tolkien was attempting to portray the way he experienced (he was in the army) or imagined toughs and ruffians as speaking. He wasn't trying to create a metaphor to sell you a larger point about urban working class people being tools of a fascist state. There are certainly parts of his writing which are drawn from his personal experiences; obviously he romanticizes the countryside and writes with emotion about negative aspects of industrial production/destruction, and those do seem to be in part be based on things he saw and felt in real life. But to the extent that they're in the story, they're drawn on for their emotional resonance and as part of the setting, not as part of a hidden theme or political message.

I didn't say orcs were portrayed as tools of the fascist state, nor did i say he was making some genocidal point.

You've covered what I was saying fairly well in your post, I just think a lot more has been inferred in this thread than was implied.

Ironic, given the subject matter.

 LordofHats wrote:
That's the difference between overt and non-overt allegory (note I say 'overt' that cause I don't know what the technical term is). One Tolkien and Lewis both rejected, while the other Tolkien seems to call 'applicability.'

One thing to remember about authors is that like all people, they say a bunch of stuff that contradicts other stuff they wrote.

Tolkien said he hated allegory. By all reports people would actually worry that he was going to trap them in a corner and lecture them on how crappy allegory was. But he also wrote "Leaf by Niggle", a quite beautiful little short story that is an allegory for his own creative process.

You can get the story for free on PDF, and I'd really recommend it, because it's a really beautiful little story, and because it becomes clear how Tolkien writes when he is actually using allegory.


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 LordofHats wrote:
It might have been Tolkien's intention, but once finished the text is its own entity. If something exists within it it exists. An allegory can take form without the author realizing it. Whether that matters will depend on your philosophy of literary criticism

I tend not to care about something if its not intended, myself, but like I said.

Sure, it might be there whether intended or not. The issue is whether looking at it as allegory makes it a greater or a lesser work. Animal Farm is a fairly weak story in and of itself with an almost non-functional narrative, it's only when taken as allegory that you get any value out of it. But LotR is a wonderful stand alone work, with a great deal to be drawn from it when taken purely as a story. Taking all these various groups in the novel and making them stand-ins for real life ethnic and social classes makes it a less interesting story, and tells you little of any interest about those ethnic and social groups in the real world.

And as such, LotR really can't be seen as allegory.

I'd propose a story can contain allegories but in its whole not necessarily be allegorical. Stories can contain stories that are more focused or specific than the whole work.

An allegory is an entire work not excerpts from that work.

 Amaya wrote:
An allegory is an entire work not excerpts from that work.

And you claim others don't know what allegory is? An allegory is a literary device. It can form the entirety of a work or just a piece of it.

EDIT: Take Code Geass as an example. A major element in the story, and in the authors subsequent work Guilty Crown, is an allegory for the loss of Japan's national identity following WWII and the struggle to readjust culturally to a new mindset and regain a sense of what was lost. This forms a minor point (and is pretty much irrelevant to the main character's motivations) in both series' but is still an allegory.

That's technically accurate, but I can not think of a single example of that. By default if a story contains allegorical elements the entire story is an allegory. The Orcs are not an allegory. Their speech and mannerisms bear a resemblance to the English working class, but there is no hidden meaning or message behind that. It is simply to give the reader a better since of their character and since it is a fantasy story, having elements obviously connected to modern life can help the reader connect to the story. The same is true for the description of the Shire. It reminds one of the English country not because it is an allegory, but because that image of the countryside is picturesque and readily recalled in the mind of Tolkien's audience.




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Seriously? I have only a passing familiarity and even less of an interest in anime.

There is no real story concerning the Orcs. Their origins are hinted at, but never deeply discussed outside of conjecture. They only exist in the story because the Big Bad requires Mooks.

By default if a story contains allegorical elements the entire story is an allegory. The Orcs are not an allegory. Their speech and mannerisms bear a resemblance to the English working class, but there is no hidden meaning or message behind that. It is simply to give the reader a better since of their character and since it is a fantasy story, having elements obviously connected to modern life can help the reader connect to the story. The same is true for the description of the Shire. It reminds one of the English country not because it is an allegory, but because that image of the countryside is picturesque and readily recalled in the mind of Tolkien's audience.

Again, its not my intention to say they are, I've just been using that as an example for thinking purposes while I try to figure out Tolkien's use of applicability.

EDIT: Yeah, seriously. Its even word of god from the writer himself. He's actually taken some flak from fans and people who disagree with his views on post-WWII Japan. The Gundam series is another that packs a lot of internal allegories that bear little meaning to the work as a whole, especially concerning Cold War politics and human nature. The Japanese have a certain flair for allegory in story telling that would make Medieval Europeans blush with envy.

I meant seriously as you expect people to know about obscure anime shows...

Here is a real gem from Stormfront on Tolkien.

Link removed.
Reds8n

Quote:
Originally Posted by Cleric Preston
I suspect that the Lord of the Rings is a lot closer to the history of our race then many people suspect.

I don't have time to formulate a full response right now as I have to
leave for work, but I'll try to get my thoughts in order.

I think your idea is certainly on the right path though
Not that i'm falling for all that Laurence Gardner stuff or anything like that, but with Professor Tolkien's background and personal connections, possible access to ancient documents, with his inkling friends at Oxford, I think sometimes the 'Notion club papers' have the ring of truth about them-autobiography, with a thin film of fiction to protect identities.

And now we know that there were all kinds of 'human' populations we modern types shared the planet with for thousands of years, including the 'Homo Floriensis', or 'hobbit'....My goodness, Tolkien would be amused and suprised....Or would he?

One thing though. Tolkien was a devout and sincere Roman Catholic, his oldest son becoming a Catholic priest. Considering the discrepancies between the fictional histories and the biblical account (but also taking into consideration that the 'Silmarilion' and other tales of his are 'Elvish Mythology'), perhaps he found ways to reconcile the accounts, as with his 'Valian Year' being 9.5 Solar years...

Maybe too, the Annunaki of Gardner and Sitchin really are the Elves of Tolkien, and there's another side to the story-Tolkien telling and running with the 'Elvish Version', if you will....A romanticized and softened version of one side of a long conflict, with the winners as usual writting what records that remain-myths, legends, and vague historical accounts, and dreams steming from long-lost racial memories. If Tolkien had some kind of real-life "Red Book of Westermark' to work from, it would've been all too easy to pick the side of the ancient narrator, especially if the other side was uncomfortably close to Danny Vendramini's Neanderthal 'Apex Predator'.

 Amaya wrote:
I meant seriously as you expect people to know about obscure anime shows...

I don't think it's that obscure XD But then if you don't watch anime

I can think of several western ones, but I'm not sure if they're any less obscure. Pilgrim's Progress by John Banyan is basically just one successive allegory after another (though the entire story is also an allegory itself for Christian life/spirituality ). Stranger in a Strange Land has a couple of allegories, but like progress is also allegorical as a whole. It is hard now that I think of it to find something well known. So many things are clearly not allegorical or clearly allegorical. I'd have to go through and really look for something. Lots of works have episodic allegorical elements but they are of course, episodic.

Scummy racist gaks have been using Tolkein as a symbol of white/Aryan supremacy for decades, especially among National Socialist black metal musicians like Varg Vikernes, who went by the stage name Count Grishnak for a while. It's stupid and way off mark, but sadly, it's nothing new.


LOL @ Gundam being an "obscure" anime show. Though I guess it's pretty obscure if you don't watch anime, kinda like how, say, I dunno, Bane is somewhat obscure if you don't follow or really care about comics at all. I haven't watched anime in a very long time, but Gundam wasn't bad.

What does Code Geass have to do with Gundam?

Ah ha ha, I meant Code Geass, derped because I had just read the Gundam post and I've been awake for about 21 hours. I guess that's what I get for trying to be smug. Still, it can't be that obscure if I, as someone who actively dislikes and avoids anime, have heard of it and vaguely know the plot.

 LordofHats wrote:
I'd propose a story can contain allegories but in its whole not necessarily be allegorical. Stories can contain stories that are more focused or specific than the whole work.

Sure, but I don't really see how that applies to LotR.

Seriously though, go read Leaf by Niggle. It says more about Tolkien's intent for LotR and the whole creation of Middle Earth than this thread could ever do. That it does so by being an allegory is just nice bit of irony

I do LOVE irony

Ratbot, no one cares if you know who Bane is or not. You made an ignorant comment assuming that Bane as he was portrayed in TKDR was inaccurate.

 LordofHats wrote:
In it's most basic form an allegory is just a metaphor given the form of a character or plot device to symbolize something.

True, but generally a text is only considered an allegory in itself if the author intentionally constructed it as an allegory. Otherwise we're talking about allegorical readings, which is a bit different.

Fountainhead (*shudder*) is an allegory, whereas LoTR can be read allegorically.

Alby and several other people have said they disagreed with my comment, whilst it may have read more like an opinion piece, surely it isn't even up for a debate, its a certifiable fact because there are living artists, be they singers, writers, poets or painters, who have come right out and said "Thats fething gak"

All I said could have been shoved into one sentence, and its utterly irrefutable.

Not every character/major event in fiction is inspired by reality.

Plenty is, plenty isnt, end of discussion surely?

Animal Farm was, Star Wars wasn't. Darth Vadar wasn't supposed to be Oliver Cromwell, Princess Lea wasn't meant to be Joan of Arc.. my point was simply that you might have an opinion on something, you can say that Indiana Jones reminds you of your Dad or Hitler or Harvey Milk, but it doesn't make it right, because the only person who is "right" is the artist. There are only probably 6 or 7 archetypical "hero" types in fiction.. its surely not hard to see that right? So why are they all inspired by real people? I can invent a sullen broody hero, or a charming dashing hero, or a noble but occasionally psychopathic anti-hero, but I can make all 3 and not have been thinking of any actual individual from history.

I read David Gemmells foreword to "The Jerusalem Man" series, and he says "Oh I just wanted to make a man with a mission, in a post apocalypse world, and I was really into cowboy movies at the time" and that's pretty much it. He wrote it, not a critic. You don't get to say "Oh he based John Shannow on Issac Newton" with any conviction if the actual inventor of the IP says "your talking gak" surely?

All I said in my long winded post was "loads of intellectuals talk gak about other peoples works and spout it as if it is fact" and that's absolutely true!

 mattyrm wrote:
Alby and several other people have said they disagreed with my comment, whilst it may have read more like an opinion piece, surely it isn't even up for a debate, its a certifiable fact because there are living artists, be they singers, writers, poets or painters, who have come right out and said "Thats fething gak"

All I said could have been shoved into one sentence, and its utterly irrefutable.

Not every character/major event in fiction is inspired by reality.

Plenty is, plenty isnt, end of discussion surely?

Animal Farm was, Star Wars wasn't. Darth Vadar wasn't supposed to be Oliver Cromwell, Princess Lea wasn't meant to be Joan of Arc.. my point was simply that you might have an opinion on something, you can say that Indiana Jones reminds you of your Dad or Hitler or Harvey Milk, but it doesn't make it right, because the only person who is "right" is the artist. There are only probably 6 or 7 archetypical "hero" types in fiction.. its surely not hard to see that right? So why are they all inspired by real people? I can invent a sullen broody hero, or a charming dashing hero, or a noble but occasionally psychopathic anti-hero, but I can make all 3 and not have been thinking of any actual individual from history.

I read David Gemmells foreword to "The Jerusalem Man" series, and he says "Oh I just wanted to make a man with a mission, in a post apocalypse world, and I was really into cowboy movies at the time" and that's pretty much it. He wrote it, not a critic. You don't get to say "Oh he based John Shannow on Issac Newton" with any conviction if the actual inventor of the IP says "your talking gak" surely?

All I said in my long winded post was "loads of intellectuals talk gak about other peoples works and spout it as if it is fact" and that's absolutely true!

Nah, it's really not. An interpretation of a text is never presented as fact, rather a case is made for a particular reading of certain symbolic components, based on evidence and argument. Here's an example: I've had an idea for a paper on 60s British Psychadelia as a commentary on Empire. I will point to the introduction of eastern elements into pop music as an example of orientalism, and discuss what that says about the national outlook on the decline of Empire at the time. I will look at post-colonial representations in the movie 'Help!' and compare the portrayal of India/ns as superstitious, barbaric and incomprehensible, as opposed to the loyal (if a little backward) redcoated Bahamians.

Now, Paul McCartney would probably say that none of this was The Beatles' intent but frankly, that's irrelevant. Once a text is released out into the world, its link with the author is severed, in terms of meanings derived from it. For example, I know and care little about Tolkein's life - does that make my reading of LoTR 'wrong'? The author's intent is pretty much worthless when discussing art, particularly in the postmodern era. The symptoms of a thing are that thing, which means we don't need the thing, only it's symptoms. It's like Baudrillard on simulated bank robbery - you'd still get nicked even if the gun was fake, because as far as everyone knows (except you), it's a real gun and a real robbery.

So, if you read Star Wars as a wild west story because of certain structural similarities you happen to observe, then for all intents and purposes, that's what it is. It doesn't matter what George Lucas thinks.


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 Melissia wrote:

 Albatross wrote:
Yes, but that doesn't necessarily have any bearing on any potential reading of the text.

1: I was referring to the author.

Yes, which is why your statement was incorrect.

2: Yes, it does, actually. One's interpretation of what they experience is heavily influenced by past experiences.

As a reader, yes.* As an author, yes.* Is that necessarily transmitted between the two? Does it need to be in order to read a text? Do I need to understand the life and times of the author in order to derive meaning from his work?

No. This is something that was recognised by academics long before we were both born.



*But not always, and not necessarily.

 Amaya wrote:


I'm a big fan of Lovecraft. I own all his works and I've read quite a few critiques of his work. I don't think he was exceptionally more racist than was the norm at the time

Lovecraft falls under the category of fantastically racist, even making the caveat that this was turn of the century through post WWI society. His letters make for some very interesting reads, especially the ones between him and his aunts where he seems most relaxed about letting his opinions flow in unreserved language.

Of course, what a lot of people seem to forget in discussions like this is just because he held some truly horrible opinions and views doesn't suddenly mean that his stories are all actually secret metaphors about how awful the Jews are, or cleverly disguised outrage at having to endure the presence of blacks mixed in with the decent white folk when he went to the beach. Lovecraft was a smart guy. If he wanted to write a story about the existential angst of man's insignificance in the universe (he was writing at a time when, amongst other things, technology had advanced to the point that telescopes could clearly show the answer to the long-standing argument of whether our galaxy was the whole of the universe, and it just happened to contain lots of spiral shaped nebula, or were those nebula actually _other_ galaxies?), he wasn't compelled to stick a 'and I hate the darkies,' in there as well.

 Albatross wrote:

Nah, it's really not. An interpretation of a text is never presented as fact, rather a case is made for a particular reading of certain symbolic components, based on evidence and argument.

Yeah see, it is sometimes presented as a fact, as this thread shows!

I agree with most of what you wrote, of course its an almost organic thing, an IP. Indeed, the term meme gives that sorta, biological quality to ideas and thoughts right? "An idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within a culture" according to RD.

Obviously what you are saying is correct (minus the above sentence!) in that once something is in the ether, than it is at the whim of the tens or hundreds of millions of minds that absorb it irrelevant of the authors wishes.

But I'm talking about the black and white facts, not just peoples interpretations and opinions, and people DO present interpretations as facts, which is why we have people here vehemently arguing about what Tolkien meant and its those people I was having a go at! They aren't saying its their opinion are they? They are saying "this is what he meant" and then another guy says "No he didn't because he actually mentioned it in a letter"

Fact is, if I write a book, and I don't base the hero off Winston Churchill, I base him off Abe Lincoln, then twenty years later you say I based the hero off Churchill, you ARE wrong. You think I did, and you can argue why you did and maybe even put forward an extremely convincing case, but that doesn't mean its correct. Its what it means to you, but its not what it meant to me.

Were arguing two different things here anyway mate, because I agree with your premise, I had to write character studies in English class, I wrote about Mercutio and Piggy (you know the books obviously) and who I think they were based on, and where I think the writer drew the traits from, and of course I was free to do that, but all I said in my initial post was that not every character in fiction is based on a real person, and that is undeniable.

Its trivially easy to pin all of the characters of fiction on real people anyway! Humans don't even have that many strong, easily definable traits and emotions, so you could probably shoe-horn every single character from all of fiction ever into about 8-10 different categories couldn't you?

 mattyrm wrote:

 Albatross wrote:

Nah, it's really not. An interpretation of a text is never presented as fact, rather a case is made for a particular reading of certain symbolic components, based on evidence and argument.

Yeah see, it is sometimes presented as a fact, as this thread shows!

Not by anyone who has any sort of background in academic arts criticism.

But I'm talking about the black and white facts, not just peoples interpretations and opinions, and people DO present interpretations as facts, which is why we have people here vehemently arguing about what Tolkien meant and its those people I was having a go at! They aren't saying its their opinion are they? They are saying "this is what he meant" and then another guy says "No he didn't because he actually mentioned it in a letter"

Fact is, if I write a book, and I don't base the hero off Winston Churchill, I base him off Abe Lincoln, then twenty years later you say I based the hero off Churchill, you ARE wrong. You think I did, and you can argue why you did and maybe even put forward an extremely convincing case, but that doesn't mean its correct. Its what it means to you, but its not what it meant to me.

See, by that logic, the Qu'ran is definitely the word of Allah as dictated to Mohammed (or whatever), because the author said so. See the problem with that? You're reliant on human testimony, when humans are complicated creatures. What if you lied? What if you applied character traits to Lincoln that were actually from Churchill, and had merely confused the two? Who were you writing the letter to, and for what purpose? There may have been a motive behind you writing it.

And what does it matter who you based the character off? To me, I mean? Your intent doesn't matter - if structures of meaning are present, then they are present. The encoding of symbols isn't always a conscious process. You could have subconsciously referenced Churchill. He does permeate our national mythology, after all. That's the beauty and mystery of semiotics - you aren't always just saying one thing, to one person. It's a web of codes.

Its trivially easy to pin all of the characters of fiction on real people anyway! Humans don't even have that many strong, easily definable traits and emotions, so you could probably shoe-horn every single character from all of fiction ever into about 8-10 different categories couldn't you?

Well, that's just it - we don't have an unlimited supply of archetypes.

Well, that's just it - we don't have an unlimited supply of archetypes.

In the words of Shakespear there are only 7 types of stories Even if his list can be compiled down into just 5 if you really think about it.

 LordofHats wrote:

Well, that's just it - we don't have an unlimited supply of archetypes.

In the words of Shakespear there are only 7 types of stories Even if his list can be compiled down into just 5 if you really think about it.

Incidentally, have you studied literary theory, LoH? You seem to be on a similar page*, is all.



*Pardon my pun, and 7 more will take their place.

Yes I have. Granted I have not studied it formally. Its just a hobby.

As I said in another thread-- there's nothing new under the sun. The main differences is in how the archetypes are used, rather than the archetypes themselves.

 LordofHats wrote:
Yes I have. Granted I have not studied it formally. Its just a hobby.

Cool. You into Barthes?

I know who he is but I've never read his work. I do have a general understanding of "Death of the Author" which I've spewed a little bit over this thread

Yeah, I got that!


'Mythologies' is a good place to start, definitely worth a look. You might also want to check out Jean Baudrillard's 'Simulations' on this topic also.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
Actually the FOOD is valid criticism that LOTR and Brian Jacques's Redwall books must be saddled with. Goddess forsake that is a lot of delicious grub, and it's rather difficult to read through some of the various feasts in either series without having the urge to do the kind of cooking that involves multiple large water fowl.

Lol Redwall and LOTR actually remind me of each other quite a bit; I found the writing style to be a bit similar. Both authors put in an immense amount of description into just about everything. Redwall and LOTR are definitely way up there in my list of favorite books. I don't even know how it is possible for someone to criticize the writing styles of either of them, other than just simply stating that there was a lot of description, which there was. The songs irritated me a bit though.