What's "real," anyway?

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

I've been reading through the thread "All made up?" (begun by davem, credit where credit etc) and it's got me to thinking about the 'reality' of Middle Earth.

Now, I know that The Lord of the Rings does not chronicle 'real' historical events, but at the same time there is a profound reality to the book. And I'm not just talking about the verisimilitude of the book, the sense that is 'feels' real thanks to the incredible detail and coherence of it all. I'm talking about the reality that all art has (or aspires to).

I mean, no piece of art is real. Hamlet is not a real person, but an actor performing a role. If he is doing a good job in an effective production, then it's more real than a bad actor in an indifferent version of the play. But that's not to say, of course, that Hamlet -- or any fictional character -- is fake or utterly divorced from reality. There is something in art that is real. To quote from Hamlet himself, "the purpose of art is, as it were, to hold a mirror up to nature."

So here's where I'm going with this. How much reality is there in the art of Tolkien's creation? When we put LotR beside something like Hamlet is it as real as Shakespeare's play? Put more accurately, is it real in the same way?

On the one hand, I think it's easy to see Tolkien's art as being less real, or further removed from reality, insofar as the mirror that he gives us does not reflect a nature that we ourselves live in. On the other hand, that seems to me a kind of honesty: it's almost as though Tolkien is admitting that art is not real, and so he's not going to try and fool us into thinking it's real (that's a trick like Sauron would play) and so the most realistic thing he can do is to create an art that is clearly artful. Its ability to announced itself as art makes it more honestly real!

Does this make any sense at all?

I suppose what I am getting at is the question of where and in what ways does the art that brings Middle Earth to life impinge upon, reflect, engage, connect with reality? What is real about Middle Earth? Is it possible to see Frodo, orcs, a magic ring, Ents and all the richness of Tolkien's fabulous world as being real in the same way that Hamlet is real, or a painting of a pond by Degas?

One last thought-fragment, that probably has nothing to do with the above, but something tells me it might -- Oscar Wilde wrote that "There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written." Is the whole question of 'the real' in relation to books a red herring? The Lord of the Rings is just "well written," end of story?

[Imladris]

I will attempt to answer your post (which is a brilliant idea as always).

I suppose that there are many things that make LotR real. I do not believe that Oscar Wilde had it right, though and this is why I think so. Books are like words. Either they are true, or they are not true.

What makes a book real, I believe, is if it speaks truth -- if it tells the truth about the universe. That's why books/stories (think The Sting) that make heroes out of bad guys leave an unsatisfying taste in the mouth. It's because they aren't true. Bad guys can never and will never make good role models.

I think that is why Lord of the Rings feels real. How often have we done a good deed and been repayed with loss or badness? Frodo saved the Shire -- yet he could not enjoy it. How often have we tried to do something and failed? Frodo could not throw the Ring into the Mount Doom. He failed.

In short, LotR tells us the evils of war (and life is a war isn't it? There's always fights between individuals [brother/sister squabbles for instance] and among nations), that even though good will (eventually) triumph we all suffer both on a world wide scale and on an individual scale.

[Encaitare]

It seems to me that it is as "real" as a story of its type can be. Certainly we would not expect to encounter elves and Rings of Power in our own world, but in Middle-earth it all seems to make sense. Tolkien hands these events and information to us and we simply accept it, because in Middle-earth that's just how things work.

This thread made me think of some sections in "On Fairy Stories," which I'm sure many Downers have read.

It is at any rate essential to a gunuine fairy-story, as distinct from the employment of this form for lesser or debased purposes, that it should be presented as "true." The meaning of "true" in this connexion I will condider in a moment. But since the fairy-story deals with "marvels," it cannot tolerate any frame or manchinery suggesting that the whole story in which they occur is a figment or illusion. The tale itself may, of course, be so good that one can ignore the frame.

and

Children are capable, of course, of literary belief, when the story-maker's art is good enough to produce it. That state of mind has been called "willing suspension of disbelief." But this does not seem to me as a good description of what happens. What really happens is that the story-maker proves a successful "sub-creator." He makes a Secondary World which your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is "true": it accords with the laws of that world. You therefore believe it, while you are, as it were, inside. The moment disbelief arises, the spell is broken; the magic, or rather art, has failed.You are then out in the Primary World again, looking at the little abortive Secondary World from outside. If you are obliged, by kindliness or circumstance, to stay, then disbelief must be suspended (or stifled), otherwise listening and looking would become intolerable. But this suspension of disbelief is a substitute for the genuine thing, a subterfuge we use when condescending to games or make-believe, or when trying (more or less willingly) to find what virtue we can in a work of art that has for us failed.

Whew! I think this sums up a lot of what I was going to say, so I won't repeat it. But the last sentence of the second excerpt I find particularly interesting. Oftentimes have I read books which are not as engrossing as the Lord of the Rings, and the whole time I feel like some kind of outsider, looking at these people in their little world and nitpicking, thinking, "Oh, well that could never happen," and being generally doubtful. It's like when you really try to like something you are reading, but simply can't get into it, and then it just isn't real anymore.

Middle-earth is not a perfect world; it is very much unlike our own and yet it holds the same truths of friendship, loyalty, love, despair, and hardship which tie it into our own world.

[davem]

I suppose this sums up the problems I have with the Narnia books (& with most fantasy novels - the only ones that have really drawn me in, apart from Tolkien's - even the 'lesser' works like Niggle & Roverandom - are Hope Mirlee's Lud in the Mist & John Crowley's Little, Big). The 'reality' of Tolkien's works is due to a number of things - principally perhaps the time he took developing them. Tolkien's novels are not 'word processor' novels; they were written out long hand, amended, begun over & over, & we have all the texts, all the failed attempts, & since CT has made them available, all those versions now exist alongside the works published during Tolkien's lifetime. Trotter is a 'real' Tolkien character for me, for instance.

In a sense, all these texts add to the reality, because I think that's how they served Tolkien himself - they provided different angles, & he could explore Middle earth in numerous ways through this approach. Gergely Nagy has shown (The Adapted Text: The Lost Poetry of Beleriand) how in some of the versions of the stories certain poetic phrases have been lifted from the early versions like the Lost Tales or the poetic Lays & placed in the prose versions. This gives a sense of the'final' versions (if we can speak of such things) being constructs put together from earlier 'lost' versions of the stories. Take a passage from the Silmarillion, (ch 13, Of the Return of the Noldor. we have the prose 'version' in the book, but as Nagy points out, it seems to have been constructed from a 'lost' verse original:

and even as the Noldor set foot upon the strand
their cries were taken up into the hills & multiplied,
so that a clamour as of countless mighty voices
filled all the coasts of the North;
and all the noise of the burning of the ships at Losgar
went down the winds of the sea as a tumult of great wrath
and far away [all who heard that sound were filled with wonder]. Nagy, in Tolkien Studies, vol 1

Whether we consciously pick up on this at all, on some level we recognise, with the different styles we encounter even within a single paragraph, that it is a 'construct', & that some other texts, which we don't have, lie behind what we do. This gives an illusion of 'depth', as Nagy points out.

With other writers, who don't have that wealth of background material to draw on, we don't get that sense, so the story, however 'psychologically complex' the characters may seem, is 'one dimensional'.

When Tolkien adds to that fragments of ancient myth (see Shippey in the same volume 'Light Elves, Dark Elves & Others: Tolkien's Elvish Problem), fairy story, folk lore, things we know, or half-know & so recognise on some level, his 'secondary world' takes on a feeling of 'reality'.

As John Crowley states in Aegypt 'There is more than one history of the world' - there is the 'mythic' history, the 'artistic' history, running alongside the 'facts' that we're taught in school - which is the 'real' Arthur? - there's the fifth century Romano British warlord who fought a desperate defensive war against the invading Saxons, with ordinary swords & spears, & there's the Arthur of legend, guided by Merlin, & with his magical blade Excalibur uniting his people, sending off his knights on the Quest of the Holy Grail (another 'variant history', this time of the Church), & falling in battle with his nephew Mordred, embodiment of evil, but who did not truly die &, (like other heroes, including Finn MacCool) is only sleeping, & will awake when his land & people are in need.

Tolkien's 'history' is an alternative to the 'facts', yet both histories contend in our minds (& hearts). Tolkien's creation is speaking the 'language of the heart', & our hearts respond to its 'truth', because there is more than one history of the world.

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Encaitare and davem, thanks for the references to those particular texts, but if I might be allowed to nitpick somewhat. . .they are not really on point, I'm afraid.

In that extract from FT, for example, Tolkien is talking about making the world seem "true" -- that is, believeable and consistent with itself. This is, I would posit, somewhat different from being real. Something can be, to quote the professor, "presented as 'true'" (and the quotation marks he puts around "true" are telling aren' they?) but still be "unreal". Take trolls, for example. . .

davem, those papers you cite are fascinating, in particular the Nagy, which I've not read but suddenly I want to. But I think that perhaps you are moving into the same territory of the text as being "presented as true" rather than the trickier idea of its reality. You say intriguing that Trotter is a "real character for you" -- I would love to know what is so real about him? He is a hobbit and a character that Tolkien decided not to use. He is the perfect example of the difference I see between the idea of the text being "presented as true" and the reality of it for us. A ranger hobbit is something that Tolkien realised would never be "true" in his world, and so he removed him. It would not have been internally consistent, and would have jarred the reader so that the appearance of the tale's reality would have been undone. And yet he "is a 'real' character" for you (and your use of those quotation marks is interesting).

Imladris -- thank you for tackling the truth/real conundrum head on when you write that

What makes a book real, I believe, is if it speaks truth

Sounds good, until I get to the example you cite. I do not share your reservations with The Sting, since I have no problem whatsoever with accepting the 'bad guy' as the 'good guy' in the context of the story. So here we get into the messy part -- is this movie real for me (because it and I share a truth: bad guys can be good guys) and not real for you (because you and it do not share that truth with us)? In this case, aren't we moving into some kind of acknowledgement that the reality of the art (in this case LotR) is entirely dependent upon the reader?

If I am willing to accept the art as true, then I make it real. And then this, ironically, leads us right back to the Wilde quote you dispute, insofar as the only way for the book to get me to accept it as true, is by being well-written!?!?

[Evisse the Blue]

insofar as the only way for the book to get me to accept it as true, is by being well-written!?!?

*nods head in agreement*

I'm sorry, I can't help to throw my three pieces of mithril in the pot:
Good book = true book = well-written book.
If Tolkien hadn't been such a talented writer, we wouldn't be here discussing the moral implications of the story. So everything begins with a well-written book. And a well-written book is a believable one, and it's true in the sense that it's believed to be true.

Another quote that may be more or less applicable here: "A poem must not mean but be" (Archibald MacLeish). For me that quote has come to imply that a good poem , or any work of art for that matter, is understood intuitively to 'exist'. Not in the sense of wishful thinking, in an alternate universe or something ... By accepting that it's true you recognize its 'wholeness', its beauty and the writer's talent in bringing it to life, if you will.
Maybe that is the greatest compliment to be payed to a work of art: that it is.
My apologies for being so incoherent at this time, maybe I'll manage to make more sense after I've slept on it.

[Estelyn Telcontar]

I too thought of Tolkien's essay 'On Fairy Stories' upon reading Fordim's first post on this excellent new discussion. I looked at a different passage than Encaitare though, the one which begins

'"Is it true?" is the great question children ask', Lang said.

I was especially interested in what JRRT says about his reaction to stories as a child.

Fairy-stories were plainly not primarily concerned with possibility, but with desirability. If they awakened desire, satisfying it while often whetting it unbearably, they succeeded.

This seems to me to show what makes a story "true" in the deep sense of the word. Does it awaken emotions in me? If it can touch my heart, show me things about myself that I only vaguely suspected before reading, show me what is lacking in my real life and make me long for it and try to find a way to get it; if it can help me to understand others better; if it can give me insight into what the meaning of my life is and help me accept things that happen to me; if it can show me how to fight the necessary battles - yes, then it is true. There are certainly more aspects to it than that, but to me, emotions are the key to inner truth in literature.

[davem]

I suppose we're starting from a 'logical' position - asking what 'reality' means in this context - of course Middle earth is not 'real' in the sense of having actually existed in the primary world, so its reality must be a secondary reality. In the primary world it cannot be real, so its 'reality' must come down in the end to self consistency. It is fully imagined - even to the extent of including people, places & things which play no part in the main story. It is 'real' within its own dimension, which simply means that it is believable to us when we enter into it, enough that we don't question it. So perhaps that's it - its self consistent enough that we don't ask questions & break the spell - or at least that any questions we ask about it can be answered - it contains sufficient 'redundancy'.

But if we are to accept it - & which is more important, if we are to feel it to be relevant to us, then we must be able to relate the people & events of the story to our own 'primary' world. So, its 'reality' depends not only on its internal self consistency but on its relevance to our world. Its not 'real' to us simply because it is a self contained, logically consistent , world, but because we can relate it to our lives. So, 'reality' depends on applicability - but not on any 'allegorical' aspect it may contain (yet where do the two meet?:http://www.geocities.com/ct70815/my_page.html). Clearly, it isn't simply a matter of relevance alone, though, as an allegory may seem 'relevant' & yet not 'real'.

What I'm trying to say (sorry, but I'm still in shock after reading the article on the above link - thanks (?) to TORN for that, btw!), is that there are two kinds of 'reality' involved here - one is the 'reality', ie the conviction that the secondary world carries that it is 'true' & the other is the 'reality', ie the relevance it has for us in our lives.

For me, Middle earth is 'real' in both ways, & its that that speaks to me so strongly.

If none of that makes sense you'll have to blame that Carole person!

[Imladris]

Originally Posted by Fordim Hedthistle

Sounds good, until I get to the example you cite. I do not share your reservations with The Sting, since I have no problem whatsoever with accepting the 'bad guy' as the 'good guy' in the context of the story. So here we get into the messy part -- is this movie real for me (because it and I share a truth: bad guys can be good guys) and not real for you (because you and it do not share that truth with us)? In this case, aren't we moving into some kind of acknowledgement that the reality of the art (in this case LotR) is entirely dependent upon the reader?

Heh, I probably used a rotten example..but oh well..

But I believe you yourself hit it on the head. That the reality of art is based upon the reader is entirely logical. Why? Because everybody has their own world views, has their own sense of "truth." That's why there are people who love LotR (it speaks truth to them), people who are indifferent to it (it doesn't speak their idea of truth but it doesn't contradict it either) and then there are people who hate it (because it is opposite of their truth -- it is against that which they think is true -- it conflicts with their world view).

This conclusion leads me to Oscar Wilde's quote: "There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written."

And then this is what you said:

If I am willing to accept the art as true, then I make it real. And then this, ironically, leads us right back to the Wilde quote you dispute, insofar as the only way for the book to get me to accept it as true, is by being well-written!?!?

If we accept that truth is relative according to each person's world view, then we must accept they have their own sense morality/immorality. Thus, LotR could be as brilliant as Shakespeare or it could be as poor as [insert example here] but that wouldn't really make a difference in the long run, would it? Naturally books that are well written are more convincing and real, but in the end, their story -- their point-- is still the same. And if that story/point contradicts a person's truth that stems from their world view, then it doesn't matter how well or poorly it is written.

Just to clarify, I do believe that how well a book is written matters tremendously. It is just not the deciding factor.

[Mithalwen]

I have a spooky premonition that I am going to get at least one more gauntlet around the face for what I am going to say, so would all would be challengers please read carefully and inwardly digest the following paragraph before they read what will follow it and try to kill me.

I love the Middle Earth. I love its people, languages, geography and history. I am perpetually grateful to the Prof and Christopher Tolkien for making it available to me. It gave me a refuge during an unhappy adolescence and a major bereavement. The Lord of the Rings is my favourite book and it would be my "Desert Island" Choice.


However, I don't think LOTR is that well written ...... parts are marvellous but others I usually skip in re-reading - the style is all over the place in the early chapters.... and some of the poetry is actively dire..... I usually think of Tolkien as the historian and archivist of the world he created not as a writer of literature. When I read Shakespeare, I do so for the language more than the story I mean most of his stories were taken from Holinshed (?) ..... I read Tolkien for the story and its setting .... not usually for the writing .... although a few passages and poems are dear to me . I get swallowed up into Middle Earth so easily but if I detatch and look objectively , I sometimes yearn for it to be tightened up a bit....

OK shall I shoot myself now and save yourselves the bother?

[Novnarwen]

However, I don't think LOTR is that well written .....

*gasp* (!!)

That sentence came as a real shock! I won't shoot you; just give a few comments before I take my leave.

I do think it's a surprising approach of the book and the author. Tolkien was after all a Professor in English language and literature. Surely, he had his way with words. How could it not be well written?

Comparing Shakespeare and Tolkien is like comparing the Queen and me. Imagine that! :P (Eeek, bad example, but I have no other.) Shakespeare and Tolkien are completely different, as they not only write differently (in style and language), they also lived in two different periods of time. Shakespeare has this old elegant English (I have no other name for it). Yes of course, it seems so romantic, so wonderful, and so incredibly brilliant! But Shakespeare doesn't have these descriptions Tolkien has in, amongst others, Lord of The Rings. The wonderful paragraphs where Tolkien describes to us Middle-earth so clearly, make us think that it's all real! Shakespeare's stories are real. His stories are set in France, in Denmark, Greece etc. . . Tolkien’s world is not real, it's not set in a country we know of. That's why it's so real, because Tolkien actually manages to successfully create a world we are willing to believe in. (So how can Lord of the Rings possbly not have been written that well?) Shakespeare didn't do any of that that; he didn't create France or Denmark. We know where France is, we know that Frenchmen speak French and we know that they have moustaches. (Hehe. Not women.. Men only ) We did not know of Middle-earth before Tolkien described it to us. He described all of it to us; the history of Middle-earth, the people, the languages etc. He gave us a whole world, his descriptions were annoyingly () real. How can that be? Because he writes well! Because Lord of The Rings is amazingly well written!

Yeah, I'm done.

Nova

[Lush]

Good writing can open up awesome depths inside the human heart (or something profound like that). The sensations that arise from that are as real as the reality of, say, eating an orange. That's why we consider great writing to be immortal. That's why I say, for example, "Dante is..." instead of "Dante was..." Of course, there are plenty of people who can't get that from writing, but that's another story.

[Encaitare]

Well, Mithalwen, I think one gauntlet slap is enough, so I won't! But I really do disagree, I think it is very well written. You say there are certain parts you skip or find boring, and I'm thinking maybe this isn't because it's not well written, but because of a simple matter of opinion and preference. It seems some parts just don't "speak" to you like other parts do, and that's fine. The tone can be somewhat dry and if that's not your thing, no problem. At least you have great things to say about it anyway!

davem-- Regarding that article, all I can give is a

[Legolas]

Let's keep the original post in mind - this is not a thread discussing whether or not The Lord of the Rings is well written. We have plenty of those already.

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

davem: in light of recent events on this thread, I shall fight the urge to give you some negative rep for having tempted me with the link to that article. What in the world is there else to say. . .

There's been a lot of interesting responses so far, but I remain intrigued by a certain area of silence; I accept that you all sense or gain a 'reality' from LotR, I do too, but is it real in the same way that other other works of non-fantasy are real? I shall put my neck out there with Mithalwen's and argue that it is not real in the same way, not at all.

I don't think that the reality of Tolkien's art is like the reality of Shakespeare's (to continue the comparison) simply because Tolkien is so much more in control of the reality of his world than was Shakey. The Denmark of Hamlet is not the 'real' Denmark, but the people and situations that inhabit it are real. A hobbit with a magic Ring is simply not real in any place other than in the art of Tolkien. Both works are real, but I have a bigger slice of the reality in a work of art that reimagines the primary world rather than imagining a secondary world.

I'm not trying to argue that this is good or bad, just that there's a different relation between art and reality with Tolkien -- I would almost say with any work of fantasy, but I think that in this regard, Tolkien might actually be unique.

Imladris you wrote (quite disconcertingly for me) that

and then there are people who hate it (because it is opposite of their truth -- it is against that which they think is true -- it conflicts with their world view).

I find this disconcerting, because apparently I am to hate LotR????? I don't say this for rhetorical effect, but simply because, well, Tolkien's views do conflict with my own, in just about every way. (Well, OK, he and I are closer together than I am with, say, the author of the article that davem has cited above, but that's hardly a fair comparison; I have more in common with a turnip than with the author of that article. . .but I digress). I still find the same sort of reality in the book that I find in works with views that are more like my own, but this is natural and to be expected: most of the real people, cultures and practices in the world are not run according to my view of things! That’s the neat thing about truth and reality: we can all have different truths, but we all share the same reality.

And that’s where I come back to Tolkien: do his works share the same reality? Or are they ‘merely’ very pleasing tales, divorced from reality? Or do they create a new or different reality, that in some way is connected to our own?

[Imladris]

Imladris -- thank you for tackling the truth/real conundrum head on when you write that
Quote:
What makes a book real, I believe, is if it speaks truth

Sounds good, until I get to the example you cite.

It sounds as if you agree with me here (What makes a book real, etc). If I am mistaken, please tell me.

Assuming that you agree with me, let me continue.

I find this disconcerting, because apparently I am to hate LotR????? I don't say this for rhetorical effect, but simply because, well, Tolkien's views do conflict with my own, in just about every way. (Well, OK, he and I are closer together than I am with, say, the author of the article that davem has cited above, but that's hardly a fair comparison; I have more in common with a turnip than with the author of that article. . .but I digress). I still find the same sort of reality in the book that I find in works with views that are more like my own, but this is natural and to be expected: most of the real people, cultures and practices in the world are not run according to my view of things! That’s the neat thing about truth and reality: we can all have different truths, but we all share the same reality.

Of course we all share the same reality despite our views-- we live in the same world. But then again, LotR is just a shadow of reality. If it was not, there really would be magic, wouldn't there? It is not real. It could never happen. It never happened. Thus it is not, technically, real. But it feels real. Why? I have already told you my reasons in my first two posts. I suppose that we have a different view of how truth and reality work and if that is the case then we are just going to have to agree to disagree.

I am convinced the universe acts in a certain way (see my first post). Just look at history and I am sure you can be convinced of this fact. Tolkien's works follow the pattern of the world. It is true, thus it feels real (henceforward, I will use "real" for "feels real"). That which is not real, a thing that acts contrary to the designs of this world, can be pleasing to us...but it is not real. For example, how many girls meet their Prince Charming?

I also hold that not everybody thinks that LotR is real (I know several people, and I am sure you do as well). That is where my second post comes into play.

Just a stray thought: either Wilde's statement is true or else there are varying levels of truth.

To go back to your last paragraph:

And that’s where I come back to Tolkien: do his works share the same reality? Or are they ‘merely’ very pleasing tales, divorced from reality? Or do they create a new or different reality, that in some way is connected to our own?

I can answer the last question. His reality is in some way connected with our reality because he created parts of LotR from his own experiences. I think this quote explains it farely well:

Everything you've seen, experienced, read, or heard gets broken down like compost in your head and then your own ideas grow out of that compost.

-- J.K. Rowling

I suppose we could conclude then that Tolkien is real in different ways for different people.

[davem]

I don't think that a sense of 'reality' is dependent on approval. As I said, one major part of the effect is the 'illusion' Tolkien creates of depth & redundancy - all the writings about Middle earth we have are (within the secondary world) 're-tellings' of earlier, usually 'lost' (most never actually written by Tolkien) accounts, so we are constantly being referred back, & further back, to a lost 'original', which itself, even if we could find it, would simply be a report of the actual event, perhaps by an observer of it, but not the event itself. Yet all these layers serve to convince us of the 'reality' of Middle earth, because they're like the layers in an onion, we can keep going back through 'time', getting closer & closer (yet we'll never get to the original event). This creates an illusion that Middle earth is/was a real.

As I pointed out in the Chapter-by-chapter HoME thread, we seem to have the same thing in the early drafts of LotR, where Tolkien seems to have begun with the garbled later accounts (Mad Baggins, Trotter the hobbit ranger who wore wooden shoes, etc), & slowly 'discovered' the 'true' story of the War of the Ring.

The other reason for the sense of 'reality' is the individual reader's response, & that's something which happens within each of us - or doesn't. On some level we respond Yes! or No!, & I don't think that can be explained logically.

Originally Posted by Fordim

And that’s where I come back to Tolkien: do his works share the same reality? Or are they ‘merely’ very pleasing tales, divorced from reality? Or do they create a new or different reality, that in some way is connected to our own?

Well, I suppose 'reality' is a misleading term, because it relies too much on provable 'facts', especially for us post-enlightenment bods. Its probably too misleading a concept, because we tend to set 'reality' up against 'fantasy', & an account of anything must be either one or the other. For me, Middle earth is 'real' within its own dimension; its also 'real' for me, because for all their 'outlandish' forms, the characters who inhabit it speak to me, I understand them & care about them. As to the 'fantastical' nature of Middle earth 'lessening its 'reality':

The heart of man is not compound of lies,
but draws some wisdom from the only Wise,
and still recalls him. Though now long estranged,
man is not wholly lost nor wholly changed.
Dis-graced he may be, yet is not dethroned,
and keeps the rags of lordship once he owned,
his world-dominion by creative act:
not his to worship the great Artefact,
man, sub-creator, the refracted light
through whom is splintered from a single White
to many hues, and endlessly combined
in living shapes that move from mind to mind.
Though all the crannies of the world we filled
with elves and goblins, though we dared to build
gods and their houses out of dark and light,
and sow the seeds of dragons, 'twas our right
(used or misused). The right has not decayed.
We make still by the law in which we're made.

Yes! 'wish-fulfilment dreams' we spin to cheat
our timid hearts and ugly Fact defeat!
Whence came the wish, and whence the power to dream,
or some things fair and others ugly deem?
All wishes are not idle, nor in vain

Mythopoeia

[drigel]

Whence came the wish, and whence the power to dream,
or some things fair and others ugly deem?

There is a lot of threads on this subject, and friends of mine always hound me on it as well. There is an element of truth to every myth, and every successfull book ever published for that matter. Otherwise, it wouldnt be successfull durrrr.. but IMO, there were a few truths identified and deemed important by JRRT, and those were incorporated to his story. These elements comprise the theme, and have remained the same truths always. I think he and other great authors recognize that its the truth, and not the story, thats important.

JRRT was an academic, not a novel writer. The magic for me was, and better stated by previous posters, his use of literary devices and layering that made the reader become immersed in the world. Also, it taps into the oral history tradition that has been long lost. Does that history stop becoming Real if its forgotton? One must jump beyond the world of History because history usually is only from the winners point of view. JRRT gives us the opportunity to look back from a different point of view. As if one was sitting around a fire listening to a shaman describe what the Fathers of old accomplished in the days when the stars were young... For me thats more "real" than anything I see thats projected on a screen.

[Lalwendë]

Not everyone may agree, but I think that one of the reasons why LOTR and Middle Earth give readers a sense of 'reality' or 'coherence' is the way Tolkien constructed the tale. Instead of beginning with Orcs, Elves, Balrogs and grand cities, the book begins in The Shire. The first chapter is centred around familiar things; a party, talk of vegetables, village gossip, fireworks, a pub. Yes, Hobbits aren't exactly realistic, but they remind us of our ordinary selves, concerned more with what the neighbours are up to than with fighting Dark Lords. The book then gradually moves towards the fantastic, taking the reader with it. As we read more, the easier it becomes to accept these fantastical places, creatures and situations.

From reading HoME it's clear that Tolkien did not have a plan for the tale, that he thought of things as he wrote and rewrote, but this would fit in with what I say above. If he himself was discovering more and more about this world and this story, then the fantastical would develop as he went along.

As davem says, Tolkien was not a novelist by 'trade', however, he was incredibly well versed in sagas and myths, tales which rely heavily on plot, and there is absolutely nothing in his use of plot that can be faulted - something that other writers who may be more stylistically accomplished fall down on. The combination of enthralling plot with the sense of taking a journey of discovery in ME ourselves contribute in no small way to the sense of 'reality'.

And davem, that article you posted the link for...be afraid, be very afraid...

[davem]

Originally Posted by Lalwende

And davem, that article you posted the link for...be afraid, be very afraid...

Oh, come on, somebody must agree with Carole!

Saddam Hussain: 'No living man may hinder me!'
Condolesa Rice: 'I am no man!'

George Bush: 'Do not misunderestimate me, Sauron!''

(Well, that's helped Fordim in the reputation stakes, 'cos no Republican on these boards will ever vote for me again!)

[drigel]

I agree with you Lalwendë. For me its the pulling off the feeling that what I am reading is something passed down across time. Aelfwine, et al.

Yea, so I read the website, and ya its to the right - but no more disconcerting than what i see /hear /read from the left. I vote for content not opinions Davem. Engage me and ye shall benefit I know - I know I shouldnt but :

"Elves and Dragons! I says to him. Cabbages and potatoes are better for me and you. Don't go getting mixed up in the business of your betters, or you'll land in trouble too big for you, I says to him." hmmmm who could that be./.?

[Mithalwen]

All I can say is that if Tony Bliar is Theoden ...can I be the Witch King .... or even his steed... .... I draw the line at Snowmane

[tar-ancalime]

That’s the neat thing about truth and reality: we can all have different truths, but we all share the same reality.

And that’s where I come back to Tolkien: do his works share the same reality? Or are they ‘merely’ very pleasing tales, divorced from reality? Or do they create a new or different reality, that in some way is connected to our own?

I'm not so sure I agree with you, Fordim. Do we all share the same reality?

I suppose in a broad sense we do, in that we're all on the same planet orbiting the sun at the same speed, but each of us inhabits a very small slice of that reality. Many, many things that are very important in my life would seem unfathomable to someone else, to the extent that things I spend hours on each day would not ever enter the consciousness of many other people. My life is just as real as everyone else's, but no one else can ever experience it. Even within the same society, there can be completely different realities. One need look no further than the old stereotypical upstairs, downstairs class divide. Does the master of the house really know what the servants are doing all day? Would he even understand if they told him? (The converse is also true, of course.) Two intersecting yet largely dissimilar realities exist within the same house. This is a weak example, I know. Unfortunately the really good and pertinent examples would be impossible to make, because the one side necessarily wouldn't understand enough about the other side's reality even to describe it. (Which, I'm well aware, is a very cheap rhetorical trick and I apologize for it.)

And now to Tolkien--

I don't think that "very pleasing tales" are ever "divorced from reality." Tales, pleasing and otherwise, are attempts to explain (whether overtly, as in myths, or obliquely, as in other types of stories), describe, reject, or have another relationship to reality. One can continue to put more and more verbs into my previous sentence without changing its meaning at all; the point is that every work of art is necessarily reacting to the artist's reality. The artist's reality is all that s/he knows and is therefore the only basis for art. (Of course I'm including imagination and inner life within the umbrella of reality.)

Going back to your original post, then, Hamlet and LoTR are exactly the same in their relationship to reality. Once the work of art exists it stands alone as another commentary on the "actual" world, and that function is the same whether the work is set in Denmark or Dunharrow, England or Eregion.

[davem]

Going completely off topic here, can I just say, in case I somehow get the reputation of being a Godless commie pinko liberal bedwetter (& leave the whole discussion of it right here) that the older I get the more wisdom I see in Tolkien's 'political' position of 'anarchism, philosophically understood'. In short, I'm not altogether on anybody's side, because nobody is altogether on my side.

(Oh, & I don't have any WMD's, either )

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Originally Posted by tar-ancalime

Once the work of art exists it stands alone as another commentary on the "actual" world, and that function is the same whether the work is set in Denmark or Dunharrow, England or Eregion.

Insofar as we are talking about the physical settings of the tales I would agree with this. I can no more visit the Elsinore of Hamlet than I can visit the Shire. I can see the places that inspired these imagined worlds, but that’s about it.

Things are quite a bit different when we turn to the “moral landscape” of the tales, however. The universe that Hamlet addresses is one in which I actually live. Sure, in the play there are ghosts and (probably) a God, and there are kings, and women are regarded in not-exactly the same way they are these days, but all of these things are open to re-interpretation and reconfiguration. The reality of the play refers to the reality of the moral landscape that I live in, so I have a certain authority to tweak the former with reference to the latter.

The reality of LotR, however, refers to the reality of the moral landscape that Tolkien invented. I am free to question the existence of God, or the depiction of women in Hamlet, because it’s a mirror that’s been held up to a nature that I share with Shakespeare (in which he and I get to decide for ourselves if there’s a God and what he – or she – is like). I don’t have that option with Tolkien – in his world, the moral landscape includes Eru, whose actions and nature are a certain way. The reality of Middle-Earth is fixed and beyond my control in a way that the reality of Shakespeare’s Elsinore is not. That reality thus exists in a more difficult relation to the reality I live in.

Perhaps this is why so many people forsake the question of the reality of the tale and leap onto truth – it may not be real (there is no Eru; the world is not governed by a providential hand) but it seems/feels true (we want there to be an Eru; we wish we could believe that the world is governed by a providential hand). But I shudder at the implications of this, since the way I am now describing LotR makes it sound like the kind of deception/sorcery practiced by Sauron!

[davem]

Ok, let me start with my post from the Chapter by Chapter thread on A Knife in the Dark (I know its totally OTT, but I mean every word):

And that's when I fell in love.

It was that moment, looking out across the great desolate expanses of Middle earth that the fairy story spell of the Hobbit was broken for me. I had seen a new world stretched out before me for the first time, & I suddenly loved it absolutely, (& I've never fallen out of love with it). Looking back on my first reading of LotR, 28 years ago, I remember I had drifted through the earlier chapters, enjoying the pleasant escape into a fantasy world, but at this point, like Frodo in Lorien, I seemed to have stepped through a window into another world, a 'real' world.

This scene is, & always will be for me, Middle earth. If for Frodo its the case that:

then when davem, wanderer from this world, has passed back into the outer world, he will still stand on the summit of Weathertop & watch the Old Road winding out of the West towards the Misty Mountains.

& your own comment:

I second davem on the power of this moment: I still catch my breath at the description of the lands about the hill – it really is the first moment at which Middle-Earth fully comes alive in the book).

Why is that scene 'real'? Well, for me it was so 'real' I felt it - it was like someone had grabbed me by the solar plexus & wrenched me into Middle earth. My head spun, & I felt the sudden vertiginous lurch that anyone afraid of heights (as I am) would feel at suddenly finding themselves looking down on a real landscape from a height of a thousand feet. I could feel the cold, the wind in my face. It was REAL.

In other words, I'm not sure the moral dimension is relevant, & the question of whether I agreed or disagreed with Tolkien's own moral & ethical belief system never entered my head. The reality of that moment in that place was also totally divorced from the context of the story. Black Riders & Magic Rings played no part in it. I was in a suddenly intensely REAL place, & I couldn't understand how or why. Yet I was also at home, sitting with a book in my lap. Two places at once (torn in two!), yet both were, in their own way, equally real.

I can't explain that, but I can't explain it away, either. Its not about 'logic' - some things are real, even if you can't explain them.

[tar-ancalime]

I am free to question the existence of God, or the depiction of women in Hamlet, because it’s a mirror that’s been held up to a nature that I share with Shakespeare (in which he and I get to decide for ourselves if there’s a God and what he – or she – is like). I don’t have that option with Tolkien – in his world, the moral landscape includes Eru, whose actions and nature are a certain way. The reality of Middle-Earth is fixed and beyond my control in a way that the reality of Shakespeare’s Elsinore is not.

Again, sorry, but I don't agree.

Shakespeare's Elsinore is just as fixed as Middle-Earth is: you can question God, women, and hosiery fashions till you're blue in the face, but you won't change Elsinore. As I said in my last post (rather obtusely, I fear), once the work of art exists it's fixed. We can interpret, question, and otherwise layer on ideas, but we don't change the art or the world it inhabits. No literary world is entirely the same as the one we inhabit--that's what makes literature different from journalism. And it seems to me that the difference between Shakespeare and Tolkien (not the only difference, of course, but the relevant one) is one of degree. Each author has invented a moral landscape and both moral landscapes are mirrors held up to the world we inhabit. You and Shakespeare are free to believe in God or not, and the inhabitants of Middle-Earth would be free to believe in Eru or not (is there any evidence that most hobbits even know of Eru?). You the reader have to accept Eru as a given, but only insofar as any reader must suspend disbelief in order to get through a work of literature. In other words, when reading Shakespeare you can't question the existence of Hamlet. The two worlds are very similar in that you must accept certain aspects of them at face value--the only difference is which aspects they are.

Thank you for starting this thread, by the way--this is much more fun than working on my dissertation!

I would have to say that I felt the same way when I read the books. I felt like it was real, even though it clearly isn't. I think that lotr could stand next to a Shakespearean play such as Hamlet, someday. I think that it would take time for lotr to be a realistic book/play. If it becomes a classic, like Hamlet then people just might have to think, 'is lotr real or not?'

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Originally Posted by davem

I can't explain that, but I can't explain it away, either. Its not about 'logic' - some things are real, even if you can't explain them.

Aha! I knew it!! All this time you've been masquerading as a moral rationalist when is just knew that you were an existential subjectivist!!

*Fordim begins a taunting chant of. . .* Exis-tential Sub-ject-i-viiiiiist, Exis-tential Sub-ject-i-viiiiiist, Exis-tential Sub-ject-i-viiiiiist, Exis-tential Sub-ject-i-viiiiiist, etc

Hey! I think we may finally have found a title for you!

[mark12_30]

I can't explain that, but I can't explain it away, either. Its not about 'logic' - some things are real, even if you can't explain them.

Aha! I knew it!! All this time you've been masquerading as a moral rationalist when is just knew that you were an existential subjectivist!!

Some things are True, even if you can't explain them.

And unaffected by wind, waves and chanteys, there is a fathomless connection between what is True and what is Real.

[The Elusive Spirit]

Here’s my 2 cents:
I’ve come to think that everyone has their own brand of “reality”. Each person leads a different life with different experiences that causes them to look at the reality of the world around them in a unique way. The way I see the world is different from how Fordim sees it. This creates a problem when discussing the issue of the reality of Tolkien’s works. It seems to me that this is a question best answered by each individual person, but perhaps I am thinking too much.
I do however, think that there are a few general ways that Tolkien’s art seems real. Tolkien choose to write about Middle Earth in a some-what historical format. I kind of think of it as reading a history book written by someone who had a personal connection to the main “characters”. Also, when reading about a place in the books one may get the impression that they have seen that place in a picture or on tv and is really part of our planet. Finally the characters and problems of Middle Earth are often parallel to those in this world. For example there are races that don’t get along well like dwarves and elves (in Middle Earth) and people of color and people who are fair skinned (in our world). I hope I have hit close to the mark. Imladris, I think you put it best, Middle Earth is a “shadow of reality”, but I personally like to think of it as reality. I hope I have not contradicted my self!


Something to chew on: “Poetry and Hums aren’t things which you get, they’re things which get you. And all you can do is to go where they can find you.”
Consider it in the context of the reality of Tolkien’s work. Weather it is reality to you or not, did it “get” you?

[Encaitare]

Some things are True, even if you can't explain them.

And unaffected by wind, waves and chanteys, there is a fathomless connection between what is True and what is Real.

Wow, mark12_30, I can tell I will be lying awake tonight pondering that one!

I believe you are right in your first statement... that's pretty much what religion is. And as for the second statement, I think that a "Truth" is more of an idea than a thing. It is something which cannot be changed. It trandscends everything else, and you can detect its absence even if you do not know what the Truth is. These ideas and ideals exist in our world and are therefore present in a world comparable to our own (or, indeed, supposed to be our own), here meaning Middle-earth.

On the other hand, reality is relative. We consider things to be "Real" as we perceive them, or as we would like to think of them. To keep this from getting into a massive spiritual debate, let's use a little quirk of mine as an example. I believe in fairies. No, really. I do. I don't expect to see any in my backyard, or ever, actually. Perhaps it's just that I'm a romantic at heart, and the idea of these beings is so endearing to me that I have come to consider them Real. They are out there, somewhere, but I just can't see them. Now, whether such beings actually exist can be argued forever, but as I said before, Reality is individual. No two people share the same Reality... so I suppose in my version of Reality, fairies do exist. You can substitute any personal belief into this argument and it should get my point across the same; I just don't want to bring any heavy stuff into this.

So now, the connection between what is True and what is Real, would, I suppose, be Belief. When we take Truths and apply them to any Reality, we get a world, and to believe in that world is to make it Real in your own mind.

Well, whoo'da thunk I'd end up pondering deep spiritual truths, huh? When I turned on the computer I was planning to write an essay... but not on this!

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

[Lhunardawen]

If I see a very realistic painting, I will say that it is well-painted and that it is real. However, I would not necessarily say that the picture is true. It might be too good to be true for me, but if the painter can attest to its being true, then it is true.

But if I see a painting that depicts brutal settings, for example, and looks as if it was created in haste and not very realistically, yet I know that it shows what is really happening, then it is true, regardless of how I see it physically.

(I recall the book "All-American Girl" by Meg Cabot telling something about this. If you have read the book, then I'm sure you understand me. Or maybe not.)

I am probably just repeating what others have been saying all along, but I cannot quote everyone. Reality is defined by how each of us sees it. If we think poverty is not real and then see slum areas, that will teach us that we are wrong. But the truth is there, whether we see it or not.

As for LotR, I can feel myself being sucked into Middle Earth as I read. When I put the book down, for a moment it seems as though I've just been transported from one world to another, with no idea where I really am. After a while, I will remember that I am in the classroom, waiting for my teacher to come...and then I read the book again.

In itself, LotR is real. Tolkien's profound descriptions, powerful dialogues, and intensely emotional characters make it real for me. But I know my limits. There is no Middle Earth. Eowyn is not true-to-life, although I see how much we have in common. Tolkien's experiences may make LotR be "based on true story" or at least inspired by them, but in our world LotR is not real. The most that the books can do for us is make us laugh, make us cry, inspire us, and more, but they cannot tell us that, "Hey, this is what happened sometime in the world. This is historical."