Was Middle Earth Created or Discovered?

[Jessica Jade]

The following is the intro to my IB Extended Essay:

J.R.R. Tolkien has characterized fantasy as “the making or glimpsing of Other-worlds.” (Fuller, The Lord of the Hobbits: J.R.R. Tolkien). His achievement is astounding—-not as a maker, but as a discoverer. His world of Middle-Earth was not a mere creation.Instead, the fantastic realm was discovered and brought to life through the archetypical quest exploited in The Lord of the Rings. The issues that arose in the epic trilogy mirror Tolkien’s own passion, concern, and opinion for the issues prevalent during his time; questions which the human race will continually be confronted with as long as the world remains in existence. Themes such as life and death, love, war, heroism, and good versus evil touch on many different levels of the human psyche because they are thus insightfully realistic. The chief appeal of The Lord of the Rings lies in its causal and omnipresent construction of the basic struggles of mankind—-matters already inherently present in the world, but pieced together, or “discovered” by Tolkien in a creative new light.

I hope that made sense, since that definitely wasn't one of my top-notch writing samples (much revision needs to be done on my part). Maybe i'll post more of my 3000-4000 word essay when it's complete, but I'm interested in knowing your thoughts. Created or discovered, and why?

[ April 24, 2003: Message edited by: Jessica Jade ]

[MLD-Grounds-Keeper-Willie]

It sort of depends on what level we're talking about here.

[doug*platypus]

I'm not too sure about the terminology you're using... I think that Middle-Earth was created by JRR Tolkien, and not discovered by Bilbo Baggins. But that's just me.

I definitely know what you're getting at though, when comparing JRR Tolkien with other fantasy or science fiction, and also with real myths and legends. The Lord of the Rings might take place in another world, but the story concentrates on what happens within this world. We discover Middle-Earth through the eyes of the hobbits, and not through the voice of a narrator (even in The Hobbit, the narrator concentrates more on characters than locations).

Almost without exception, other sci-fi/fantasy works make up a fantastic world that is so different from our own, it needs to be explained at great (sometimes exhausting) length. The authors are too busy saying something like, "Wow! Look at this - talking dragons!" or "Flat world - how fun!", that the story usually ends up being reduced to, "By the way, there's also some characters and they do fairly predictable stuff."

[MLD-Grounds-Keeper-Willie]

I think that Tolkien created Middle-earth. It was his world. It spawned from him. He designed every detail in Middle-earth that we know of. He made the stories, the myths in Middle-earth. He made the history of it all. The lands, the peoples, they all were created by him.

He may have used elves, which were thought of as the little creatures that helped Santa before Tolkien came out with his creation. But those elves he made into his own race, very different and separate from those other elves. And so with any other race in ME (dwarves, trolls, to name a few), he may have borrowed the name, but the race inside ME, those were his creations. A perfect example of what I'm trying to say is the goblins. At first, when he first created ME, he published the Hobbit, and one of the creatures in it were goblins. Now goblins were known before Tolkien. They were little monsters or whatever. He just borrowed the name. When he came out with LotR, he changed goblins to orcs, and they were completely his creation, name and all. He crafted goblins to his own race, which are orcs.

ME was never existed before Tolkien. Maybe he did discover it in his mind. But before it was discovered, it was made, and it was made by Tolkien.

I hope that made sense, since that definitely wasn't one of my top-notch writing samples

I know how you feel. I don't think this is my writing at its best, it seems very crude and I'm very tired. I'll try explaining further tomorrow. Sorry if I didn't get my point across very well (and that's if I even got it across).

But one more thing. Why do people think that Tolkien discoevered ME? Where was it before?

[Child of the 7th Age]

Jessica,

I'm so glad to see that you've made progress on this project. I remember how we talked about it almost a year ago.

Doug, Willie,

I think there's one more point here worthy of consideration. This is definitely how JRRT came to think of Middle-earth. He saw himself discovering something already in existence. No, I don't mean that he was claiming this as the literal history of our planet. He was not that loopy! But he did mean that the basic truths and characters of Middle-earth were somehow part of a lost mythological past or meaning which he was rediscovering.

I will always remember that famous incident from the letters when a distingished and well-known visitor came to see Tolkien. The visitor pointed out that some of Tolkien's ilustrations were very similar to other drawings that he himself had found, only these were artists Tolkien had never looked at or studied. The visitor chided Tolkien saying:

"Of course, you don't suppose do you, that you wrote all that book yourself?"

"Pure Gandalf! I was too well acquainted with G. to expose myself rashly, or to ask what he meant. I think I said: "No I don't suppose so any longer! I have never been able to suppose so. An alarming conclusion for an old philologist to draw concerning his private amusement. But not one that should puff any one up who considers the impefections of 'chosen instruments,' and indeed what sometimes seems their lamentable unfitness for the purpose.

In other words, Tolkien felt that there was an underlying truth to be discovered, a truth placed there by something/someone far greater than himself. He viewed himself as merely the instrument chosen for the rediscovery of these pre-existing truths. No so much literal truths, or historical truths, but a way for us to get hold of that core of meaning that lies at the center of existence.

I love that quote above. It is one of my favorites. So, Jessica, I will have to plead guilty and say that I agree with your thesis statement, at least if interpreted in that way!

[MLD-Grounds-Keeper-Willie]

I guess what I was really needed to ask was what did Tolkien discover. Sometimes I take things too literal, and by this I did not mean I thought this thread was based on a literal sense [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] . By saying Middle-earth I was wondering whether you meant Tolkien discovered/created this fantasy known as Middle-earth that does not really exist but we have in our minds and our hearts and we enter when we read it, or, he discovered/created this world called ME with its values, and morals, and themes, and plenty of other stuff too. But now I just confused myself and I have no clue on what I mean, or am trying to say, or what this all means. So I'll wait a little and let my thoughts settle.

But what you said Child of the 7th Age caught me:

Tolkien felt that there was an underlying truth to be discovered...but a way for us to get hold of that core of meaning that lies at the center of existence.

So, if ME is a truth, discovered by Tolkien, then what is that truth? Does this mean that the world we know as Middle-earth is way to find the center of our existence? This is confusing, but intruiging none the less.

[Jessica Jade]

No real time to respond right now, seeing that it's past 4 am, but here's an email from an online friend of mine about the topic. Interesting food for thought.

"it might be easier to view tolkien in two seperate entities. his mind
and his creative being. his mind is something that has developed since
birth. perhaps he first saw a picture of a dragon when he was three years
old and filed it away in his mind. then later in high school, perhaps he
developed a keen fascination for languages, particularly the constructional
and grammatic aspects of it. then maybe later he fell in love with someone
with beautifully dark hair and sharp ears.

then as he grew and became inspired to write, his creative mind drew upon
his past experiences (his mind) and translated them into the what we now
know as middle earth. that dark haired girl he fell in love with became
arwen. his fascination for languages translated in the elvish tongue, etc.
it could be argued that his creation of a fictitous world came from memories
of his own world.

there's a distinction between creation and experience. i believe one cannot
exist without the other. in order to create (ie. something like
middle-earth) you need to be able to have experienced the same
transcendental qualities sometime in your life. how can you write about
something if you don't know about it or acknowledge it's existence?

so yeah...middle earth was discovered because it already existed in
tolkien's mind. it was simply his strong creative being that allowed it to
take form."

thanks everyone, for posting! Your comments are greatly appreciated [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[davem]

I think, originally, Tolkien's intention was to 're-create' England's lost mythology, taking the scraps he he could find scattered through the Eddas, Ango-saxon poems (chiefly Beowulf), folklore, etc, as well as the sources from other 'northern' cultures that appealed to him, like the Welsh Mabinogion & the Finnish Kalevala. Clearly, the intent was to sub create a world which would bring together those themes in a coherent way, but as he wrote 'the Tale grew in the telling', & became something else. Tolkien's Elves are not the Elves of Norse myth - as I said in another thread, he 'christianised' the Elves - gave them an individual soul & a moral conscience, which gave them the chance of 'salvation'.
In other words, I think the 'roots' of his 'Tree' are in the soil of the original Northern European mythology that he loved, but it grew & branched into its own form.

[drigel]

I may be getting too deep but this is the essence of creativity.

I always consider JRRT discovered it. Or at least what he did was to relay his tiny splinter of what he could actually "see", which was based primarily on languages.

Who was it that wrote that nothing is original, what is "created" is merely a reflection of an echo from somewhere else in time/space...?

[MLD-Grounds-Keeper-Willie]

Just two things here, Jessica Jade:

how can you write about
something if you don't know about it or acknowledge it's existence?

When I say that Tolkien created ME, I do not mean that the creation began on the paper. No, nothing does unless it is spontaneus and unintentional. The creation begins in the mind. It starts when the person thinks it, and where does it end? Well, maybe on the paper, and maybe it hasn't even ended yet, but that's not the point.

You can always create something even if it has never existed. If you think it, and it's never been around before you've thought it, then it's been created, by you. You can always think of something new, however, it can be hard when you are trying to create something. You'll see what I mean in a little bit.

middle earth was discovered because it already existed in
tolkien's mind.

You could say it was discovered, but first it had to be created. And that's where you've discovered something that you've created, when you created something over time but was not aware of it, and when it takes form and binds together and get's big enough, you notice it, and that's when you discover it. You can discover your own creations when you were not trying to create that particular creation.

When you are trying however, there is no discovery. You construct it from scratch. You build a foundation and model it to look what you want it to look like *(see bottom)*. You may take bits and pieces from other places sometimes to help build your creation, but they are shaped and molded by you to fit your building, and then they are your creation and a part of your creation. I see what you're saying about memories of other things building up, yes, that's where he's borrowing bits and pieces, but he's making them his, and shaping them so they are no longer what they used to be. He is creating, when he knows he is completely aware of what he is doing, then he cannot discover it, he already knows.

You build a foundation and model it to look what you want it to look like *(see bottom)*

This was really getting off topic so I decided to put it down here.

davem said:

but it grew & branched into its own form.

*Some time you build and build just for the sake of building, and it will turn out by itself. Or you might try to make it look a certain way, but it doesn't in the end. I'm not sure if Tolkien had an idea of what he wanted his final model of ME to look like, but it did turn out the way it is, and he left us something to look at in our own way. Your creation might not always look the way you want it to look. I do think that davem is right about it forming into its own thing, and not the way Tolkien intended. It may not have come out like he intended, but I think that he liked it. He could change somethings to his likings, and maybe he did. There are something that he couldn't change, I'm sure. Those things might be a part of the foundation, and they would require too much remodeling.

And the finishing touches are left to Tolkien. The building has been built. Whether it came out like that on it's own or if Tolkien intended it that way, it's been built. The finishing touches however, are left to Tolkien. He gets to make these little chages that may be so critical to whether other's like it. If they like it, they'll buy the building or the house, just as we have bought the book. And there are other things that Tolkien has left. he did not finish everything. Somethings our left for our speculation. Take Tome Bombadil. Tolkien never finished him, whether it was on purpose or not. But we are free to specualte and imagine. And who's to say everything is finished. It might not be so. A house may be built, but when it is sold, the owner is free to make any changes he or she wishes, like adding things. In which he/she does add somthing, then it shows that the house was not finished when it was done being built. Just as when we buy the book, we can interpet things our own way, or imagine what would have happened, and in that case, it is not yet finished.*

[Burzdol]

I personally agree with doug*platypus. That's just my opinion.

[doug*platypus]

Excellent - well done, Burzdol, finally a contender for best post of the millennium!

Willy, I think you're exactly right when you credit Tolkien for bringing all of these mythical elements together into one world. Yes, Dwarves and Elves existed (in various forms) before Middle-Earth was created. So did stirrups, and coffee, and gardening. But it took the incredible mind of Professor Tolkien to create an alternative world, parallel to our own, with occupants that consistently amaze us, most of all with their vivid realism.

The parts that make up Middle-Earth were not created by Tolkien, but he definitely crafted the overall picture, in the same way you might make a house out of timber, nails, glass, etc., or in the way that a god like Aule would shape the world from iron and rock. Quite an achievement.