If he knew..

[Elendur]

I am wondering about smoking in Tolkiens writing.

Smoking pipes is a common thing on Middle Earth and lots of people do it. People were practically encouraged to smoke. It is a fine thing to do and it makes you feel good. Like Gandalf said, "It clears the mind". But maybe what Gandalf didnt know was that he was satisfying his need for nicotine.

When Tolkien wrote LOTR and The Hobbit people didn't know that nicotine was addictive or that smoking caused so many health problems. Tolkien smoked a pipe himself and that is probably the reason he included it in his writing. He might have been reflecting his own experiences of smoking onto Gandalfs thoughts about leaf and its effect on people. But if he knew that so many bad things came with smoking, would he have included it in his books?

I just always thought it was odd that smoking tobacco was so popular in Middle Earth and you never hear old Bilbo coughing because he has emphysema. Maybe the leaf in Middle Earth has no bad side effects.

Just thought Id share my thoughts..

[ September 04, 2002: Message edited by: Elendur ]

[NazgulNumberTen]

(a stoned nn10 wanders into the thread)
dude...you like gotta try some of thiw leaf dude, it's like, tom bombadils private stash man...wow, my fingers are like...wow...
all kidding aside, would you really want a middle earth without leaf and pipes? i know i could never imagine biblo far from his. in older times, many questionable things were accepted. the thing is, they weren't questionable back then. i think coca cola even used to have cocanie in it.

[Eol]

NN10: ( almost like writing NIN{nine inch nails}, Heh)coca cola once had cocaine in it. That is why it was called coca cola.

There are many items that we take for granted during an age of so much knowledge( maybe too much for our own good). The concept of bactria or "the germ" did not come into thought until the later 1800's when there was microscopes and research.

Instead of science to explain sickness, Myths and beliefs were used to explain the unknown. Example: there are bad spirits in the water, that is why people who drink it die.

During Tolkien's time, many things were thought to be good for your health: charcole, Opium in alchohol, known as Laundium, the belief that only "loose" women bathed. Smoking adn drink was a social event. It was fashionable and very acceptable.

Tolkien included this because it was something he knew and added character to his stories. I cannot see Gandolf or Bilbo without their pipes. It would be like taking the pubs out of Great Britain.

[ September 04, 2002: Message edited by: Eol ]

[Tirned Tinnu]

Who didn't have a grandfather or uncle who smoked a pipe, years ago? I did, Grandpa never went anywhere without it. His thumb was stained from years of tamping down tobacco into various lovely wooden pipes, all of which had a magical feel to them, as if they were alive.

Grandpa started smoking a pipe because his doctor said that Cigar smoking would kill him. When one smokes a pipe, one rarely inhales the smoke. If you did, you would get very sick to your stomach! So, it spares your lungs. However, it causes tounge and mouth cancer...but my Grandfather didn't worry about that. He was 83 when he died; and he probably died more from being overweight than from smoking.
The more interesting thing is that in my father's family, the men and women are very gentle. No yelling, no stress, just calm people whatever the situation. Sure, they looked worried and knew how to explain it - that is curious - because...it appears that they have a reward for it. None of my father's family has ever suffered cancer or been in the hospital for anything. They die in their sleep, in comfort, and seemingly, when they desire to. Sometimes I feel that I might be graced with this "gift" of passing on when I choose to die.
I pray that smokers curb their puffing, myself included! And that none of us or our families ever have to suffer the horrors of cancer.
I love pipe smoking...on a winter's day...it is more ritualistic than cigarette smoking. You must choose a pipe, choose your tobacco, tamp it in, and light it. This can take up to an hour if you're being choosy. Unlike ciggs, where you grab one and light it, pipe smoking calms you, even before the first puff. It's one of the things that makes me crazy when Medieval camping. They had no tobacco in Medieval times! I have to wait for an English Civil War encampment to smoke my little clay pipe. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[Jjudvven]

my dad still smokes a pipe, and has suffered no serious side effects from it. but then again, my grandfather smoked all the time, and he died from lung cancer. [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img]

[Frodo Baggins]

Hear Hear Tirned Tinnu!!! My dad say if you're going to smoke, pipe-smoking is the safest way.

[Dimaldaeon]

My next door neighbour is almost 90 and is never seen without a pipe in his mouth. His excuse is that at his age being healthy will not add a great deal to his life. My father smoked for years but thankfully gave it up. Watching my father go through the hell of trying to break the habit convinced me never to smoke.

[Eol]

I personally could never smoke. My grandfather smoked and died when his respirator unplugged when he went down for a nap.

I have even a harder time being around smokers as I have not tolerance to the smoke, and have asthma makes even more a trouble.

Back to the subject, I feel the whole purpose to the pipesmoking was the personalize the characters and give them something relaxing and unwind. There is nothing better then to have a favored drink or food to comfort yourself during a long and hard journey and bring back the fond memories of your home.

[Amarie]

Elendur...
I do not think that what they were smoking was tabacco...correct me if I am wrong but provice your source please?

[lathspell]

I've another question for this thread.

only mortals (and Gandalf) do smoke. Why that? Is it because he imagined elves knew that is was bad (in a time that ppl didn't know it themselves) or because they all! detested the taste of it??

greetings,
lathspell

[Frodo Baggins]

Where does it say Elves don't smoke??? I would rather focus on that. No where does it say they did, but it does not say they didn't either. Besides, if an Elf had spent as much time around hobbits as Gandalf, they probably would have picked up something.

Tirned, I was suprised to find out that you are a 'she' and you pipe smoke. I thought only men did that. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[Tirned Tinnu]

Hallo, Frodo! (RG points to Frodo ---->and I thought you were a boy! *chuckle*)
It's been well documented that women have smoked pipes from The French Revolution thru The American Civil War! It's just that smoking became something for men during the Victorian Era in England, and was frowned upon. That spilled over into the USA.
I learned courtesy of a friend. He was concerned that I would ruin my lungs smoking ciggs. Pipe smoking is a good way to curb yourself. I loved it once I learned how. And YES, people often ask me "What you got in there, weed?! Can I have some???" Because, well, they've never seen a pipe in a woman's mouth unless it was marijuana.
Arg. [img]smilies/tongue.gif[/img]

[ESTEN]

In all honesty people it was not tobacco that they were smoking. Lines like finest weed in the shire, and Gandalf I think all of that halflings leaf has finally gone to your head make me assume that they are filling their pipes with something else. Also it is the hobbits who smoke the most and why do you think that they eat so much. It is becasue all of that weed makes them hungry. that is why they eat, and don't like adventure. because they are high and that makes you hungry and lazy. And as for Gandalf he is one of the few wizards who pay attention to the hobbits and so he always gets good leaf [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] [img]smilies/cool.gif[/img] [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[Makar]

I am more inclined to believe it was something similar to tobacco that they were smoking, at least in the books. In the films, it seems PJ tried his hardest to make it marijuana. I think people like PJ (and me), who were young and smoking pot when they first read LotR are more inclined to imagine it as weed, while Tolkien, who was old, Roman Catholic, and smoked a tobacco pipe, probably intended it to be tobacco. Although I do like Gandalf's "before you knock it, try it first" (to paraphrase) line to Saruman in UT.

[davem]

Well, its clearly stated to be tobacco in The Hobbit, & I suspect Tolkien only changed it to 'pipeweed' in LotR because calling it tobbaco would have sounded too anachronistic, & caused problems of explantion. Of course, Tolkien does state it was a variety of nicotiana, so he clearly intended it to be similar to tobacco rather than cannabis. I suspect that it tasted very similar to the coffee-caramel flavour tobacco currently available (that's a personal feeling based on what I smoke

And for the record, I'm just a bit older than PJ & I've never touched 'weed'. Tobacco, the real stuff, not the chemically laced junk they put in cigarettes, for all its risks, is very calming in its effects & is most conducive to thinking.

[mark12_30]

From the Prologue, part 2, Concerning Pipe-Weed:

There is another astonishing thing about Hobbits of old that must be
mentioned, an astonishing habit: they imbibed or inhaled, through pipes of
clay or wood, the smoke of the burning leaves of a herb, which they called
pipe-weed or leaf, a variety probably of Nicotiana. A great deal of mystery
surrounds the origin of this peculiar custom, or 'art' as the Hobbits
preferred to call it. All that could be discovered about it in antiquity was
put together by Meriadoc Brandybuck (later Master of Buckland), and since he
and the tobacco of the Southfarthing play a part in the history that
follows, his remarks in the introduction to his Herblore of the Shire may be
quoted.

[Lyta_Underhill]

I've rarely felt the inclination to smoke the stuff myself, however, last season, I attempted to grow some in a planter. It didn't do too well, since I started a bit late, but I did get seeds to try again this year! The only bad thing about it is that I can grow no more than five tobacco plants at one time by law. Otherwise I would grow them as a border for my home to keep the bugs off. (Nicotine sulfate is a great pesticide, but don't get it on your skin!) I guess it'll have to be citronella or chrysanthemums....

Cheers!
Lyta (not quite Samwise Gamgee...)

[Eruanna]

I had always assumed that it was merely tobacco that the Hobbits smoked. However,in the prologue's 'Concerning Pipeweed' Tolkien does seem to hint that there is not just the genuine weed but that some Hobbits grew and smoked a variety of herbs some fouler, some sweeter. In my youth 'herbal ciggies' (sometimes called wacky baccy) was a euphemism for cannabis!

I read once that Christopher Tolkien, before he gave up the habit, always smoked Navy Cut and had recollections of there always being empty Navy Cut tins around his childhood homes, used mainly for storing miscellaneous bits and bobs like screws and washers.

[dwarfguard]

i agree with eruanna on this one.I believe tolkien smoked a pipe to relax and think.I highly doubt "weed" ever crossed his mind.Maybe the reason you never here elves smoke is because mortals might of originated the practice.

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by Makar

In the films, it seems PJ tried his hardest to make it marijuana.

What makes you say this? I don't get the sense that the portrayal of pipeweed in the films is much different from its portrayal in the book.

Mind you, one does have to wonder about a race that makes a habit of consuming "weed" and mushrooms in such large quantities.

[Eruanna]

Originally posted by Makar

In the films, it seems PJ tried his hardest to make it marijuana

I too had a sense of this. Mainly in the scene when Merry and Pippin greet the others at Orthanc after the Battle of Helm's Deep ('Flotsam and Jetsam') although it's obvious that they have been drinking they seem to put their rather dizzy behaviour down to pipeweed.
Also, in the scene where Pippin goes off to Minas Tirith with Gandalf, Merry is very concerned that Pip is smoking too much. Surely a sign that smoking too much weed is detrimental to one's health?

[elronds_daughter]

Originally Posted by Eruanna

Surely a sign that smoking too much weed is detrimental to one's health?

As to 'anti-smoking propoganda' in the movies (such as the afore-mentioned scene), there is (in the RotK EE) a scene where Gandalf is smoking and coughing. The same scene, I might add, is in the theatrical version as well, but the cough is absent.

Originally Posted by dwarfguard

Maybe the reason you never here elves smoke is because mortals might of originated the practice.

Hobbits claim to have originated the 'art' of smoking (see Merry's statement to Theoden, LotR, book III, chapter IX).


All right, enough references, now for my opinion. Or do I have an opinion?... I'll have to think that over.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Eruanna

Also, in the scene where Pippin goes off to Minas Tirith with Gandalf, Merry is very concerned that Pip is smoking too much. Surely a sign that smoking too much weed is detrimental to one's health?

Originally Posted by elronds_daughter

As to 'anti-smoking propoganda' in the movies (such as the afore-mentioned scene), there is (in the RotK EE) a scene where Gandalf is smoking and coughing. The same scene, I might add, is in the theatrical version as well, but the cough is absent.

All this time I've been thinking about how pleasantly surprised I was that the references to smoking weren't cut from the films, and it turns out that there were sneaky anti-smoking references in there! I'm genuinely disappointed.

As a smoker, and one who tries to be considerate, I find some refuge in LotR, where there is a world where tobacco can be smoked in peace and comfort, and where it seemingly does no harm (the holy grail of smokers must be non-harmful tobacco ). I suppose it is to be expected that the films had to include something about the harmful effects of smoking, but all the same I'm disappointed.

'Weed' is still a word used for tobacco, though it isn't as common as it once was, possibly due to the drug references. I have never thought the Hobbits smoked anything worse than tobacco, but it's not surprising this got picked up on as LotR grew so strongly in popularity in the late 60's and the fabled (exaggerated?) hippy drug culture. But isn't this a later slang term? I believe it would have gone under the name 'pot' back then.

Originally Posted by Makar

Although I do like Gandalf's "before you knock it, try it first" (to paraphrase) line to Saruman in UT.

But kids, don't take Gandalf's words too literally...

[Eruanna]

Originally posted by Lalwendë

I find some refuge in LotR, where there is a world where tobacco can be smoked in peace and comfort, and where it seemingly does no harm

This is part of the rustic charm of the Hobbits. When we read about pipe smoking now, knowing the risks as we do, we can give a wry smile at it being described as an art. Pipes have always been seen as the choice of the elderly or the less sophisticated. Right up to the 1970s cigarette smoking was seen as the height of sophistication and grown-up glamour. Remember the glamorous film stars who seemed to chain smoke through a film?

I wonder why PJ decided to include those scenes which seem to be against smoking. I have read about some of the film production companies refusing to include smoking scenes in films. Perhaps he had to do so in order to negate any criticism that he was advocating pipe smoking.

[Lobelia]

[QUOTE=Frodo Baggins]Where does it say Elves don't smoke??? I would rather focus on that. No where does it say they did, but it does not say they didn't either. Besides, if an Elf had spent as much time around hobbits as Gandalf, they probably would have picked up something.

Actually, while it doesn't say that Elves don't smoke. there IS one scene that suggests Legolas doesn't. Remember when they've all had a nice meal in the watch-room at Isengard and light up on Longbottom Leaf? The only one not smoking is Legolas - can't remember the exact quote, but as I recall, he does sneer at them for their dumb habit. And if one of the main characters doesn't smoke, and you never see any of the other Elves doing it, they probably don't. Just a thought.

[Estelyn Telcontar]

Proof: They're immortal!

I looked up the passage Lobelia mentioned. Legolas is said to be singing softly to himself while the others smoke, then he says:

...the mists are blowing away, or would if you strange folk did not wreathe yourselves in smoke.

That seems clear enough, as I see it, though it does not prove that all Elves refrained from smoking, of course. Maybe only those with beards smoked!

[Makar]

Originally Posted by Eruanna

I too had a sense of this. Mainly in the scene when Merry and Pippin greet the others at Orthanc after the Battle of Helm's Deep ('Flotsam and Jetsam') although it's obvious that they have been drinking they seem to put their rather dizzy behaviour down to pipeweed.

Not to mention the extended scene in TT with Merry and Pip in the gate house, laughing hysterically, with smoke pouring out of the door and Treebeard "hmmmming". The same is true in the scene where Gandalf is choking off of his pipe. He's laughing and he keeps hitting it while he cough's. And then there's Saruman's line about the clouding of minds.

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

All this time I've been thinking about how pleasantly surprised I was that the references to smoking weren't cut from the films, and it turns out that there were sneaky anti-smoking references in there! I'm genuinely disappointed.

I don't think that these scenes were included as overt "anti-smoking propaganda", but rather as reflections of current attitudes towards smoking.

If the "anti-smoking police" had got their hands on these films, there would have been no pipeweed whatsoever. In the UK, there is a move to take scenes of smoking into account when certifying a film.

Having said that, it may be that it was felt (probably by others than Jackson) that oblique references to the harmful effects of smoking were necessary in a "family" film that otherwise portrays pipe smoking in a positive light (the scene with Gandalf and Bilbo watching over the Party in FotR, for example).

[elronds_daughter]

I don't think that these scenes were included as overt "anti-smoking propaganda", but rather as reflections of current attitudes towards smoking.

I believe one of the LotR cast originally used that phrase.... I was merely quoting.

In the UK, there is a move to take scenes of smoking into account when certifying a film.

There is such a move in the U.S. as well.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by SpM

I don't think that these scenes were included as overt "anti-smoking propaganda", but rather as reflections of current attitudes towards smoking.

If the "anti-smoking police" had got their hands on these films, there would have been no pipeweed whatsoever. In the UK, there is a move to take scenes of smoking into account when certifying a film.

Given this, and some time to calm down from my shock that there actually were some messages against smoking in the films (I was thinking "Oh, is nothing sacred these days in the face of the health police?"), they were actually quite subtle messages. Given that I didn't even notice them, they must have been!

Considering just how much Tolkien seems to advocate the joys of smoking it must have been quite difficult to reconcile this with the very vocal, and often quite hysterical (put into context with the many other health risks we all face) anti-smoking lobby. Of course, Tolkien lived in a different world, and while smoking had been by then identified as risky behaviour, it was not quite as villified as it is today. His works also include rather a lot of eating and drinking, and I wonder whether such things would be excised entirely from a film version 50 years down the line? I can see the Green Dragon being replaced with the Green Gym, the Hobbits meeting to socialise over a bottle of mineral water and an alfalfa salad, while the Gaffer mutters darkly about his BMI in the background.

But just to play devil's advocate, I was interested to note how drinking was portrayed as a joyous pastime in the films. Where were the associated hangovers? Not to mention injuries caused by drunken horse riding or aggressive young Tooks causing fights?

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

I was interested to note how drinking was portrayed as a joyous pastime in the films. Where were the associated hangovers?

Clearly, Pippin's failure to master the Palantir is a direct consequence of his "over-indulgence" during the evening's celebrations.

[Rimbaud]

To answer your question Lal, in part: Tollers was perhaps of an era, or certainly from the background, where a drink was fun, and a few could be very fun, but people, homely respectable people much like Hobbits (even the younger ones), did not feel the contemporary urge to drink as much as possible in order to become paralysingly inebriated, to the point where a kebab seems like a good idea.

One imagines that the beer they are drinking is also fairly natural wholesome stuff, with not much in common with the watery additive-syrups posing as lagers today. A couple of beers from natural ingredients on a full stomach over a few hours of chat, is unlikely to give an adult male a headache.

Add to that that the small folk always drank on exceptionally full stomachs and had plenty of rest and a proper amount of sleep, as well as having healthy outdoor lives much of the time, and you begin to see how they managed to stay pretty sharp.

To be honest, if I had little to do all day but to wake late, rise later and go for walks and plan dinner, I imagine I would become somewhat inured to the 'morning after'.

[Bêthberry]

Well I think it is so typical of Tolkien to turn beer into a philological/mythological thing. Letter no. 75:

I was looking at the Kalevala the other day ... and I came across Runo XX, which I used to like: it deals largely with the origin of beer. When the fermentation was first managed, the beer was only in birch tubs and it foamed all over the place, and of course the heroes came and lapped it up, and got mightily drunk. Drunk was Ahti, drunk was Kauko, drunken was the ruddy rascal, with the ale of Osmo's daughter--Kirby's translation is funnier than the original. It was the bullfinch who then suggested to Osmo's daughter the notion of putting the stuff in oak casks with hoops of copper and storing it in a cellar. Thus was ale at first created... best of drinks for prudent people; Women soon it brings to laughter, Men it warms into good humour, but it brings fools to raving. Sound sentiments. Poor old Finns, and their queer language, they look like being scuppered. I wish I could have visited the Land of Ten Thousand Lakes before this war. Finnish nearly ruined my Hon. Mods, and was the original germ of the Silmarillion.

Now, doesn't that just douse your interest in drink.

[Eruanna]

Now, doesn't that just douse your interest in drink.

Well, I never was very fond of beer. But douse my interest in a nice drop of Australian red? Never

I just wanted to add something to the debate about tobacco or 'weed'. I knew that I had read something, somewhere, about Tolkien and his attitude to drugs. After digging around in my various bits and pieces I came up with an article on Tolkien that I cut from a Sunday paper just before the FotR was released:

' Some conjectured about the hobbits' taste for 'pipe-weed'; Tolkien was outraged by suggestions he had written the books under the influence of drugs; ."He would fizz with fury because, to him, drugs were abhorrent." His assistant Joy Hill recalled. "He would be hard pressed to take an aspirin. "

If that was the case then he would hardly have intended pipe-weed to be anything other than tobacco.

[Morsul the Dark]

Does anyone by chance know if tobaco used increased at the release of the books..kiindof like product placement in movies makes soda more popular?

Did those who reaad Tolkien become more prone to smoking(I mean considering they didnt know it was dangerous)?