England's Mythology?

[Lalwendë]

I've been considering Tolkien's famous (and often mis-quoted) quote, from the Letter to Milton Waldman, 1951.

Do not laugh! But once upon a time (my crest has long since fallen) I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of fairy story - the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the large backcloths - which I could dedicate simply to: to England; to my country. It should possess the tone and quality that I desired, somewhat cool and clear, be redolent of our 'air' (the clime and soil of the North West, meaning Britain and the hither parts of Europe: not Italy or the Aegean, still less the East), and, while possessing (if I could achieve it) the fair elusive beauty that some call Celtic (though it is rarely found in genuine ancient Celtic things), it should be 'high', purged of the gross, and fit for the more adult mind of a land now steeped in poetry. I would draw some of the great tales in fullness, and leave many only placed in the scheme, and sketched. The cycles should be linked to a majestic whole, and yet leave scope for other minds and hands, wielding paint and music and drama. Absurd.

Tolkien did not say that he wanted to create a mythology for England, but that at one time, he wished to create a mythology he could dedicate to England, which is a very different thing. That's the often misquoted part! I think that if we look at what he said about the content and structure of that 'Mythology', he more than acheived what he set out to do. Do his words above correctly describe what the Legendarium looks like? With different types of tale and scope for readers to develop it further?

Did he achieve the 'tone' he desired to convey? "Somewhat cool and clear"? A friend of mine has described Lord of the Rings as 'glacial' and I think he's correct.

Now about that whole idea of creating a mythology...

Tolkien's desire to create this mythology stemed from his early years, being an Englishman who loved myth and yet had no national myth cycle of his own; he admired the Kalevala, but England had nothing like that. The Kalevala stirred a Nationalistic fervour in Finland, Tolkien wished an English myth cycle might stir a moral revival. It's a high ideal. Perhaps not surprisingly as Tolkien grew older, his aims changed, as he says in his letter to Milton Waldman.

I have to pose the question whether England needed that anyway? England was still a global superpower up to WWII, under threat of invasion only for a short time; it was neither dominated nor occupied by any other country. It may have been a changing society, modernising day by day, but did Tolkien think a fictional mythology would change or halt any of that?

Tolkien made some attempts to 'tie' his mythology to the real England, for example through the Notion Club Papers, but ultimately, he left his published work as a secondary world. It is a vivd world and seems all too real, as we all know only too well! But would anyone seriously think that it really was England's true past? Does anyone think that?

England might not have a myth cycle like the Kalevala, but it certainly is not lacking in folk tales, legends and echoes of ancient history. Tolkien made use of some of these, adapting them to fit into the secondary world he created, but they are exactly that, adapted to fit. They are not preserved - some things would go unnoticed unless you knew the original stories and ideas. Other writers have done that though. Should he have preserved these folk tales if he truly wished to dedicate his work to England?

What does Tolkien use anyway? Where does he begin? Does he concentrate only on England since the Anglo-Saxon culture, which was cut down before it had chance to fully flower? If we go further back than that are we just speculating on what the stories might have been? England is also a country with a lot of influences - it would be a big mistake to think that the English are all Anglo-Saxons as even today there are distinct regional cultures, the Marches influenced by Wales, Northumbria influenced by Scotland, Liverpool very Irish, Cornwall still very Celtic. If Tolkien hoped that his work would represent England's past, did it capture the diversity that has always been part of our culture?

Tolkien has, like any other writer, a voice of his own. He is conservative, educated, Catholic. Is that the only voice of England? Much, even most, of our folklore has been preserved by uneducated people, by gypsies, farmers and folk singers. A lot of it is quite different to what we find in Tolkien's work, with violence, crime and sex, and it's not half so grand, more about the people at the bottom of the pile than about Kings.

When Tolkien wished to dedicate this work to England he did do something very important. It was not his work in and of itself that represented England's past, but it did create an incredible magic, and an urge to seek out those real stories for ourselves.

Or do we put far too much 'store' in what Tolkien said in his letter?

What do you think?

Some useful light reading:

The Single Greatest (Publishing) Tragedy in Tolkien's Life (yet another rant)

The Nazis & a Mytholgy for England

[lindil]

I was out walking my hound in the rain, I walked through orchards, through the rain, taking backways and old dirt footpaths, going to the only all night establishment in this backward town of 12,ooo mostly sleeping souls. And as I walked I pondered my lens through which I perceived my world. THere were teachers I knew w/ Osanwe-esque powers, there was my Aldarion and Erendis-like marriage awaiting my return from the latest journey, there was my coming gig as an acoustic minstrel at a wine and chocolate fete', there was my rebellion in taxation against king george II [or is it IV ?] and wondering how best to respond when it seems like a Saruman-type has taken over the country and has gone from white to ... ... anyway... I was thinking and feeling that my strange life was indeed part of a bizzare 'furtherance' of the 'myth' of M-E.

In many respects I think JRRT was the mythological muse for the seeking 'masses' from the 60's upto the present. A stepping stone and touchstone for hundreds of thousands millions of artists, spiritual seekers. I will admit that it has been eclipsed by Harry Potter for many children these days, just as Star Wars was the seminal artistic and indeed cultural experience for many in the late 70's and 80's. A very good case can be made for saying that SW and HP are the fruits of the M-E myth in their creators? The effects of that will perhaps show as the current generation of children become our authors, filmakers, teachers and muscians, etc..Just as the effects of the 70's/80's gen making movies now...Matrix/SW/LotR/HP/Narnia... Fantasy/Sci-Fi is a huge part of mainstream movie-going and has been since SW.

Tolkien did I believe participate deeply, essentially - I would say in the moulding of the 'western mind'. He gave to all who could find there way to it a mythology I never had as a young child. For many he was a near biblical indictment of the curren trends of modernism. Did he hope to hold back the tide of it? Of course not, but he did hope to be true to the myths that had nurtured him as a teenage orphan-linguistic prodigy. And to his very well-informed Catholic Christian ideals.

Do I think it is true? More so than the history I learned a a child!

How so? because it spoke to all of my being, my mind, heart and even changed the way I experienced walking in the forests around my suburban tract mini-mansion. It gave me some template of how people with healthy and vital souls would walk, talk and in various crises involving forces from other levels of reality and wisdom both higher and lower than my own. In short it gave hope as I would now say, that the ideal of Elves was organically 'true' and that therefore there must be a way to that.

I know for a fact that this happened to many of my friends in our teenage years.
The Downs has been proof indeed that it has happened large and small all over the world [except ,maybe the muslim world?!].

So for people like suburban Americans, who had little to no mythical figures [Paul Bunyan, Johnny Appleseed, Lincoln and Washington, Paul Revere], LotR and co was soaked up like a sponge, and it went deep!!! Just like myths are supposed to.

Of course in everybody, how we absorb, understand and live out our myths is different, but to me M-E IS the 'real' mythological history for me...

[narfforc]

Having a great love of all things mythological, I see many different themes within Tolkiens world. If we equate thus:

The Elves=Celtic ie Tuatha de Dannan/ CuCulainn
The Rohirrim=Anglo-Saxon/Norse/Tales from the Meadhall
The Gondorians=Norman/Ordered and Feudalistic.

I think that Tolkien melded all these differing themes quite well with the religious story of Good opposed to Evil. That story is one that is in most, if not all myth/religions. The problem of regionalisation is one of history, as Lalwende points out, how many parts of England are wholly English. Taking aside our Celtic cousins, in how many places would Arthur be hero or villain, remembering that he was a Briton and not an Anglo-Saxon. We are still a diverse people, listen to how many accents there are in such a small place. I dont think Tolkien could have wrote his English Myth Cycle and pleased as many people as he has done by what is basically a British Myth Cycle. In the LotR we get all of the above, and it doesn't matter how many generations have gone by here, or in our old colonies, we still dream and love tales of the old days, when Odin walked the Earth.

[davem]

I think its clear that Tolkien felt a need to tie his mythology into the modern world - hence the Translator conceit - that these stories have come down to us from ancient times & are not Tolkien's own 'invention'. Hence the original of the Legendarium stories is the Red Book.

Right from the beginning transmission is an essential element in the mythology - so it is as much history as myth. The first link in the chain is Eriol/Aelfwine, an Anglo-Saxon. In one of the latest developments we have the Notion Club Papers. The interesting thing there is the change from transmission via a book to transmission via dream & vision. The Legendarium comes down to modern Englishmen not simply through a book but through their very DNA. They are connected with the living past through their dreams & visions.

Of course, what's important here is not that it is Englishmen per se who have this connection with the mythic-historical Legendarium, but that the past is alive in modern men (cf Merry's dream in the Barrow of being slain by the Men of Carn Dum). The past is not a series of 'dead' events, but is in some way still 'happening' in some eternal 'now'.

Yet, the attempt to tie the Legendarium into England & its inhabitants is still there. It is not that he is attempting to re-create a 'lost' mythology - though he does take the fragments of Northern lore/myth/legend & attempt to explain them or account for them - why are there references in the Eddas to 'Light' & 'Dark' Elves, what is the difference, why are they different? Tolkien 'invents' the idea of the Calaquendi & the Moriquendi in response to this puzzle (see Shippey's essay in Tolkien Studies vol 1).

So, Tolkien believes there was once a more or less coherent Northern mythology, one which he sets out to 'reconstruct' (as he does with language itself in his professional life). Language, words, names are 'living' things - they evolve, & it is possible to work backwards & find their earlier forms, meanings & references.

There was once another way of explaining the world, a mythological account. It survives in words & names of course, but it also lives on in the minds, the blood, the DNA of our cells.

So, was he attempting to give us England's 'lost' mythology? I think he was - in a way: he wanted to explain the aspects of myth & legend that survived & fit them into a coherent, overarching myth (or worldview).

The question is whether there ever was such a single, coherent worldview, or whether there were actually lots of diferent, competing, myths, bits of all of which survived. Language itself perhaps provides a possible answer. Most modern languages can be traced back to a single Indo-European original. Did Tolkien believe the speakers of that language had a single mythology which, as the language itself fragmented, followed that fragmentation. Work back to the original language & find the original myth - how come, for instance, so many cultures have stories of races equivalent to Elves (Naiads, Dryads, Sidhe, Alfar, etc).

In Tolkien's Legendarium we are still linked through time to that mythic past, & that link is passed on through language (both written & spoken) & inherited in our genetic makeup. 'Blood' is central, not in the way it was misused by the Nazis, but in that it is like a 'river' which carries, transmits, the living past down to the present.

It seems that Tolkien wanted to emphasise the central importance of the past in the present, that we moderns are not a new, seperate, thing, but rather part of a story stretching from a lost mythic past & on beyond us into an unknown future.

So I'd say the Legendarium both is, & is not, a 'mythology for England'.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by davem

So I'd say the Legendarium both is, & is not, a 'mythology for England'.

Originally Posted by narfforc

In the LotR we get all of the above, and it doesn't matter how many generations have gone by here, or in our old colonies, we still dream and love tales of the old days, when Odin walked the Earth.

Originally Posted by lindil

Of course in everybody, how we absorb, understand and live out our myths is different, but to me M-E IS the 'real' mythological history for me...

It's clear that Tolkien's work awakened something within many people, or perhaps even reawakened what was already there. What interests me is that his story is his own, his own 'take' on the myths which already existed. Any references to England's existing myths are altered and presented in a very different way. If we wanted to read those myths and folktales, Tolkien would be the wrong place to go to for them (Elves and Hobbits are very different to witches and boggarts), but it would be the right place to start. Maybe we wouldn't start at all until we had read Tolkien.

It interests me that he may have written his story as a way of making us aware of the 'truth', much in the same way that Lewis wrote Narnia to make young readers 'aware' of the Christian story.

Does Tolkien's work gather together myth and folklore and present it in a new way? And for what reason?

Is what he did a new mythology, based on the old tales, but developing something new and remarkable out of them?

[Gothmog]

I will, on Lalwendë's recommendation post the following extract from a PM I wrote earlier today:

In one of the notes in BoLT, CT mentions a connection between Elfwine (=later Eärendil, right?) and the legend of Hengest and Horsa. Now, according to the mixture of history and myth that this story concerns, they were two Anglosaxan brothers that came to England to aid the celtic king Vortigern (Wyrtgeorn) against the Picts. Later they attacked their employee and began the Anglosaxan conquering of Britain. (You probably knew all this but anyway...)

Wouldn't this suggest that Tolkien begins his story in the earliest Anglosaxan-English time? With the inspiration of Celtic and other cultures, but with a foundation in Anglosaxan history?

I don't know enough of the English mythology/history to make any real conclusions from this, but I would be happy if anyone with more knowledge would comment on this. Is the Anglosaxan history important for the basis of the ME-history or was it just a stepstone that Tolkien used to get his own mythology/history on it's way to every Englishmen's heart?

Lalwendë:

It interests me that he may have written his story as a way of making us aware of the 'truth', much in the same way that Lewis wrote Narnia to make young readers 'aware' of the Christian story.

I don't know what you mean by the "truth", but it's obvious that Tolkien has inspired a lot of people to read more about the old English history and the language itself. The recent Public Researches concerning "Fields of Study" proves that many of the BD:ers have studied both literature, the English language and history more than they would have if the works of Tolkien didn't exist. Apparently it makes people think and the curious mind want to know more about the things that created the foundation for this wonderful world. So if that is what you mean by the "truth", then yes. It has inspired readers to learn more about the old myths. I'm one of those, but unfortunately I haven't given myself the time to study these things more careful.

Personally, I don't think that many people actually thought Tolkien's world to be the truth about England's history. But it made people think, didn't it? Maybe that was the point of everything? Not to make people believe in the Tolkien-mythology, but to make people interested in their own history and myths. Maybe it was supposed to make people of English inheritance think about their past and create their own personal view of their origin? A way of activating peoples fantasy and interest? I know it worked that way for me, even if I'm not English. I feel, as Scandinavian, that this story concerns me too, and that I want to be a part of it. Maybe that's what it was supposed to be, a source of inspiration rather than a complete answer to every question regarding English history. If it was, it's a success...

P.S. I hope I will learn more about English Mythology and History in this thread. Don't make me disappointed

[Aiwendil]

Elfwine (=later Eärendil, right?)

An interesting idea, Gothmog, about a connection between Aelfwine and Earendil. I do think that the two figures are rather related in some ways. However, I also must point out that "Earendil" is not equivalent to "Aelfwine" (the Quenya translation of which would be "Elendil").

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Gothmog

I don't know what you mean by the "truth",

The 'truth' that there was so much more to England's hstory and culture than that which came after 1066. Tolkien, like so many people of his class and age, was educated in the public/grammar school tradition of a 'good classical education'. Lots of Latin and Greek, Homer, Virgil and the mythology of the South. I went to an ordinary school and even there any focus on mythology was from the Classical world.

Tolkien instead took his inspiration from the tradition which grew up in the Victorian period, leading from the pre-raphaelites through William Morris and on - an interest in the 'Gothic' and the Northern. England's history and culture before 1066 was predominantly Northern. Even during the Roman occupation British culture remained strong, so much so that that culture is called Romano-British; many of the villas discovered from that time will have been owned by British people who prospered under the Roman occupation.

England is filled with the marks of its past culture, Stonehenge, Avebury, the Cerne Abbas Giant, Silbury Hill - even in the city I live in there are prehistoric remains in one of the woods, and I'm only 30 minutes drive from two major megalithic stone circles, Sherwood Forest, Mam Tor, Odin's Mine and Lughnasadh's Hill, among other things. Most of these places also have stories attached to them, tales of faeries, giants and druids. I think Tolkien hoped to reawaken awareness of this, and for me he certainly did, as it was only after reading his work that I 'discovered' that the seemingly created magic of Middle-earth was actually all around me in the real landscape.

What I'd like to know is if Tolkien really did capture this magic, or if he altered it into something else entirely? In a sense, I think he did recreate some of that magic, but in another sense, he ommitted some of it. His work points the way towards the 'truth', but doesn't tell the whole story.

[davem]

Tolkien clearly couldn't present us with our Pagan myths in their pure form. If his was not a Christian mythology it couldn't deny the Christian worldview. So things get left out or adapted to fit. A 'dubious' figure like Odin gets split, his positive aspects coming out in Gandalf & Manwe, his negative ones in Sauron & Saruman, Ravens make an appearance in TH, but are omitted from LotR - they have too many & too powerful Pagann connotations.

Like Lewis, Tolkien was happy to present us with Pagan things, but only if they were sufficiently Christianised as to make them safe. As Flieger stated in regards to Tolkien's ambivalent attitude to Faerie http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showpos...&postcount=197 (he was both attracted to it & could see the danger in it), Tolkien's relationship to his sources was complex.

[Lalaith]

Fascinating discussion.
Apologies that my own thoughts are not as well-ordered as many on here, but here are some scraps of thought.

I think the lack that Tolkien felt, which drove him to create his own world of myth, can be found in that word he uses, "majestic." The mythology I think of as typically English may be fascinating but it has a certain unsophisticated and rustic atmosphere: Robin Goodfellow, hobbyhorses, welldressing, The Green Man, Robin Hood, and so on. Perhaps it has become that way because it has survived in the hands, as Lalwende says, of the uneducated, or perhaps it was always like that.

Is there a case to argue that the Lord of the Rings starts out in this kind of "English" environment - not just the Shire itself, but most of the ghouls and creatures that the hobbits meet before they get to Rivendell - trolls (of stone), barrow-wights, Tom Bombadil, Old Man Willow - all "fit in" with the bucolic unsophisticated character of English folklore? There are hints of grandeur, both good and bad (Aragorn's stories of the First Age, the Nazgul) but it is only as they approach Rivendell and travel beyond it that this grandeur becomes actuality - Moria, Lorien. A parallel with Tolkien's own journey from English traditions to a grander personal mythology? Or, as davem suggests, a search back to an Indo-European-type ur-mythology?

The other English tradition, the Arthurian mythical cycle certainly has more of the grandeur and majesty that Tolkien was seeking, but perhaps he felt it was too Frenchified?
Another thought. I don't really know the Kalevala, but I do know the Norse mythical epic tradition. It has majesty of sorts, probably more so than English myths, but it is very grim and dark, I certainly wouldn't call it "fair and elusive". And it has just struck me that Tolkien chose to eschew almost completely in his own work one of its defining features, that of blood vengeance. (In the same way that he chose to eschew a vital part, as Lalwende points out, of the English tradition, ie crime and sex...)
And another...

The cycles should be linked to a majestic whole, and yet leave scope for other minds and hands, wielding paint and music and drama

Very interesting. I wonder if Tolkien felt this ever happened? I always thought that the musical equivalent of Tolkien was Vaughan Williams, myself...

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Lalaith

Very interesting. I wonder if Tolkien felt this ever happened? I always thought that the musical equivalent of Tolkien was Vaughan Williams, myself...

I'm certain that this has happened - what with the RPGs, fan fiction, published fiction influenced by Tolkien, artists, music etc.... There is a whole Tolkien industry out there!

That is a very interesting point about Vaughan Williams. I was watching a new series about British folk music - Folk Britannia on BBC4. In this it examined folk music as it developed in the early part of the 20th century. Cecil House and the BBC were engaged in the business of collecting and preserving folk songs, and Vaughan Williams, Britten and others were heavily influenced by this music. However, this was associated with a desire to use the past in a conservative ideal of preserving 'traditional English values' (whatever those might be! ). As Tony Benn pointed out, this folk music was the preserve of those at the bottom of the social pile, miners, fishermen, gypsies etc. and it could be a radical music. And they did not look upon it as something which should never be altered.

I wonder, was Tolkien really the 'conservative'? He made use of our folktales, but he did not preserve them, he rewrote and re-imagined them to fit in to his own Legendarium. Was what he did actually a radical act? Or in his excision of the more Pagan elements, did he take something essential away from those tales? As we've discussed on the Downs before, Tolkien's Faerie isn't that dark, nor does he have a true Trickster. And his Valar which were originally very Pagan and amoral became more and more angelic.

I think that what he left us with was not a this-is-what-happened, but a this-is-what could-have-happened.

[Lalaith]

All this leads me to wonder - is it in fact possible to draw as many parallels between myth and folk tradition as we are all wont to do? Are they that connected?
Perhaps myth is what Tolkien called " 'high', purged of the gross" - metaphysical questions, the nature of creation, art and knowledge; folk tradition is much more concerned with the basic human requirements: food (lack of or plenty); fidelity (ditto, whether between men and women, brothers-in-arms, or men and beasts), and fighting.
And where do fairy tales fit in? Perhaps most fall into the folk category, although some, like the Cupid & Psyche variants (Beauty and the Beast/East of the Sun West of the Moon etc) might have more mythical elements.
The themes of the Silmarillion tales seem more metaphysical/mythical than folk tradition: Feanor (art and creation) Beren and Luthien (love beyond death) The children of Hurin (fate and despair).

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Lalaith

All this leads me to wonder - is it in fact possible to draw as many parallels between myth and folk tradition as we are all wont to do? Are they that connected?
Perhaps myth is what Tolkien called " 'high', purged of the gross" - metaphysical questions, the nature of creation, art and knowledge; folk tradition is much more concerned with the basic human requirements: food (lack of or plenty); fidelity (ditto, whether between men and women, brothers-in-arms, or men and beasts), and fighting.
And where do fairy tales fit in? Perhaps most fall into the folk category, although some, like the Cupid & Psyche variants (Beauty and the Beast/East of the Sun West of the Moon etc) might have more mythical elements.
The themes of the Silmarillion tales seem more metaphysical/mythical than folk tradition: Feanor (art and creation) Beren and Luthien (love beyond death) The children of Hurin (fate and despair).

I think ultimately they are all leaves on the same tree. Mythology could be said to be concerned mostly with 'creation', the cosmology of a world and it's Gods while folklore is concerned more with the everyday, or else putting the 'high' into an everyday context. But the problem is where does one end and the other begin?

The other problem is that all mythology and folklore has once been the belief or religion, the 'truth' of its day or society. So if I include the Bible in this I am not deliberately setting out to offend.

If we consider the Bible, it includes not only Genesis, but also The Song of Solomon which is much more 'earthy'; we also have the Gospels which consider the metaphysical questions of Christianity alongside everyday concerns and life. Both high myths and low folktales contain lessons and truths, and all can work on many levels. We can see this today in our own culture - the film Troy talkes the 'high' myth of Achilles and brings it to the level of entertainment and action; we could even say that about the film versions of LotR (though many also get this pleasure from the books)!

Even 'high' creation myth can be 'gross', Cronos castrates his own father, Uranus, and then goes on to eat his own children.

If we look at Tolkien's work, even here it is hard to discern between what is myth and folklore, if there is such a big difference; both are melded together in one whole. If the tales of the Silmarillion seem to work more on the level of myth, then I would think it is the style in which they are written as opposed to the themes; Frodo's story alone is more than worthy of 'mythical' status, and yet it seems at face value to be much more intimate and contemporary.

[davem]

Myth blurs into legend, legend into folktale. We see this in the Legendarium. The Sil begins as high myth, becomes legend after the return of the Noldor, LotR mixes legend & folktale in its styles & subject matter. The BoLT is more earthy than the later Quenta. But we see this in ancient mythologies. Homer is 'higher' than Ovid. The Illiad & the Odyssey were taken as 'sacred' texts by the ancient Greeks, along with Hesiod & the 'Homeric Hymns'. The Metamorphoses were taken by the Romans as entertainment, yet the subject matter was the same. Norse myth has the Thrimskvida http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trymskvida at one extreme & the Voluspa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluspa at the other

Tolkien never decends to the level of 'crudity' we find in ancient Myths, so it is lacking to some degree, but then many modern readers would find the cruder side of the ancient tales distasteful - maybe that's why his work speaks to us.

[A_Brandybuck]

I do not think, that Tolkien really wanted to attach his work as the 'mythology' of England, that he wanted to write the past of 'real' England.
I rather think, that he wanted to write a mythology, how a mythology 'could' have been in the past. A mythology, which fits in the whole context of Germanic mythologies.
The main reason, which let me think, that he didn't want to attach the mythology to 'our' world, is his Christian belief.
Although he excluded the religious aspect in his works, there is a God in it, Eru, and it is not the Christian God. Attaching this mythology would mean, that he agrees in the existance of another God in the world. And this would mean 'Blasphemy'. We all know, that Tolkien was very religious, and my personally meaning (or rather interpretation) is, that he would not dare to it.

Tolkien was sad, that there aren't a mythology for England, because he loves the other Germanic mythologies. But he knew, that these mythologies were grown over ages and include the culture of a people. I would say, that he would never arrogate, that he is the one, who gave England a mythology, because of his knowledge, how the other mythologies come into existance.

Consequently he tried to write a mythology for England, how this could have been, but not is.

Just like Frodo failed on his quest to destroy the ring himself, so has Tolkien failed to make Middle Earth a mythology for England, or of England itself. The limitation of mixed cultures (unless it was an evil mix) was it's downfall. He failed to realize that human beings have been intermixing and migrating for over 100,000 years. He failed to realize that not all original settlers of Europe or regions of Middle Earth to include Britain were blonde, blue eyed folks. Too much purism in his races, though I would not go so far to call him a racist. He failed to identify the history of Middle Earth with the real people of the Shire, the Yeomen Farmers. He gave the once lowly longbow of the Yeoman to every "good" race or culture in Middle Earth. I don't think the Romans used Longbows, very not Atlantean like either. Tolkien fell into the trap of writing epic stories of elitists because he had "borrowed" from Beowulf, which he did a great job of. He failed to follow the lines of Chaucer however as he was the first to identify the everyday ordinary person in literature. Not some superhero out on a conquest or to save the world and make a name for himself. Too much of the LoTR focuses on heroic cultures, and heroic men, rather than the 'ordinary' heroes. With a lot of borrowing of different mythologies and languages it is perhaps the downfall for his objective did come with the fact he did not intermix races and culture. Though he was a pluralists in terms of the objective of the quest, but very singular on culture. He made us forget about our reality and great events, and real heroes and legends, this is perhaps the saddest part of one of the greatest pieces of literature ever written. Someday somebody will fill that void and create an en mass frenzy like what happened in Finland. A mythology for Britain, rooted in reality itself and perhaps not copyrighted

[littlemanpoet]

Okay, I'll bite. :P

Welcome to the Downs, yeomanrycavalry. I hope to see more of you around, and I hope you enjoy being Dead.

Did Tolkien really intend to do all you have claimed he failed at? One can only fail at a thing if one was reaching for the goal. As Tolkien said, "my crest has long since fallen". So by the time he wrote LotR, he was trying to write a good ripping yarn and succeeded in doing a whole lot more than that. You can't fault a man for the culture to which he belonged.

[davem]

Of course, as has been pointed out previously, Tolkien did not say he wished to create a mythology for England. What he actually said was that he wished to create a mythology which he could dedicate to England - a very different thing.

[Selmo]

Tolkien's last word on this topic: "Absurd".

.

[Saurreg]

According to Bulfinch's Mythology there were at least three origins to the start of mythical England. Two of them were associated with the the classical era and one has its source from Judaism.

Of the two classical myths, the first proposed that the island derived its name from Albion, the son of Neptune (Poisedon) who ruled over the island and was slain by Hercules (Herackles). The second myth had a Trojan refugee by the name of Brutus who sailed all the way from Anatolia to the island and became the founding father of the British (if that is even possible). That leaves us with the third variant which, stated that Japhet, son of Noah had an offspring called Histion (history) who beget four children and one of them was named Britto (Britain) who was the great progenitor of a people that would bear his name. How original!

So it would seem that England is deprived of a root for myths that are exclusive to it and it alone. Can't fault Tolkien for wanting to find something somewhat more "original".

[Lalwendë]

Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the glen...

Anyway, back to this thread. I've been looking at one of the books we got at Oxonmoot - Tolkien's Mythology for England by Edmund Wainwright, and read an interesting passage about Robin Hood. He points out a striking similarity between Robin Hood and Faramir.

They are both expert bowmen - Robin stories occurring of course at the height of English archery skills as demonstrated to devastating effect at Agincourt. In On Fairy Stories Tolkien speaks of his particular desire to become a bowman (and he has lots of other experts in his work, including the woodsy Legolas)And both also use 'guerilla tactics' in the course of their days in the woods - Faramir to defend Gondor and Robin to rob from the rich. Wainwright also points out that Ithilien is a beautiful land which has suffered "under the depredations of a merciless foreign invader, just as England was under Norman rule." Thinking about the old tales i note that just as England's fortunes are once again revived by the return of King Richard the Lionheart, Gondor's are by Aragorn. Faramir is also something of an 'outsider' in terms of not being his father's favourite, and he looks back to the past of Numenor as Robin looks back to his Saxon roots. Allegedly, if he was indeed Robin of Leocsley (Loxley). Eowyn could indeed be his Lady Marian.

As Wainwright points out, the story of Robin Hood is incredibly strong to the English, and its one of the few stories that has passed down the ages and is still being made into dramas, comedies and films to this day. Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire are still fighting over 'ownership' of Robin. If Tolkien was hoping to capture some of the Northern spirit and create something he could dedicate to England how could he miss out Robin Hood?

But this isn't a simple analogy. There are also elements of Robin to be found in Tom Bombadil, and Marian in Goldberry - this side I think is the more 'mystical' aspect of Robin Hood where he is seen as the Lord of the Greenwood in English folklore, taking on aspects of the Green Man. We also have Bard the Bowman, and as previously mentioned, Legolas the Woodland Prince.

Tolkien holds both trees and woodsmen in great regard; and in England we have such odd things as Tree Preservation Orders and documentaries about trees (one of which I saw earlier - which included a look inside the great bole of the Major Oak, one of our legendary trees - we have many of 'em). We regard eco-activists such as Swampy with affection, and have a great love of hiking, camping and being outdoorsy. The love of the lost wildwood is still strong and its fitting that possibly our greatest English myth, Robin Hood (Arthur is slightly too British, as Tolkien himself thought), is about a woodsy man, a lover of the trees, and also of course a mythical bowman such as those legendary figures of Agincourt.

Tolkien said of Faramir that he just appeared to him as if out of nowhere; he said:

"I am sure i did not invent him, i did not even want him, though i like him, but there he came just walking through the woods of ithilien"he just walked out of the woods".

So where earlier in the thread I was wondering where exactly and how did Tolkien hope to create something 'English' to dedicate to England, this is an example of how he used something clearly recognisable to the English as part of their own past and present. Yet seemingly without seeking out a 'source', simply by being in tune with the stories we all grew up with. Robin looms large in the English psyche, so I'm not surprised there is possibly a lot of Robin to be found in Tolkien, woven into the fabric of the story.

Does this add to the 'Englishness' of this mythology?

What does the following mean in the context of the interweaving of English legends/folklore into the legendarium?

the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth

[mark12_30]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the glen...

They are both expert bowmen - Robin stories occurring of course at the height of English archery skills as demonstrated to devastating effect at Agincourt. In On Fairy Stories Tolkien speaks of his particular desire to become a bowman (and he has lots of other experts in his work, including the woodsy Legolas)...There are also elements of Robin to be found in Tom Bombadil, and Marian in Goldberry - this side I think is the more 'mystical' aspect of Robin Hood where he is seen as the Lord of the Greenwood in English folklore, taking on aspects of the Green Man. We also have Bard the Bowman, and as previously mentioned, Legolas the Woodland Prince.

....Thus intensifieth my craving to rent and watch the Errol Flynn classic...

Who would win an archery contest, Legolas or Robin Hood...?

[Saurreg]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

Does this add to the 'Englishness' of this mythology?

What does the following mean in the context of the interweaving of English legends/folklore into the legendarium?

How would you define 'Englishness' in this context? Norman English with a touch of Frankish culture or Anglo-Saxon English? Robin Hood was after all an English tale set in the High Medieval Era where Christianity has already established strong roots in those lands and the culture of the island was increasingly, if not continental European in nature.

I am of the opinion that mythical folklore arose from pre-civilizational (i.e. bloc cultural identification we use today) times and existed before, during and after the great attributes that group people into said civilizations come into effect. As such these folklores have a very localized and distinct favor pertaining to the place they originate from. That is what makes these myths so enjoyable - its exoticness that is quite unlike anything they exists today or from near history.

Robin Hood was an English product, but was it really distinctive enough in nature to be considered an England only myth? If we were to substitute Robin with say an Otto, Philippe or Leon, skill with the bow to unparalled swordsmanship and a corrupted king and his sheriff into emperor and his senechal, the tale of Robin Hood would fit well into any other parts of Europe and indeed the rest of the world.

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by mark12_30

Who would win an archery contest, Legolas or Robin Hood...?

Legolas, of course. Superior vision and hand-eye coordination belonging to Elves. No-brainer.

[davem]

Originally Posted by Saurreg

Robin Hood was an English product, but was it really distinctive enough in nature to be considered an England only myth? If we were to substitute Robin with say an Otto, Philippe or Leon, skill with the bow to unparalled swordsmanship and a corrupted king and his sheriff into emperor and his senechal, the tale of Robin Hood would fit well into any other parts of Europe and indeed the rest of the world.

If we strip the flesh off any human being we would find the same skeletal structure. Archetypes in themselves are uninteresting. Stories are unteresting. And stories are set in a certain time & certain place, because they come from the minds & hearts of certain people. If you replace Robin with Otto, or William Tell, you've got a different story.

A point I was making to someone yesterday is that while Robin probably did provide inspiration for some aspects of Faramir (& Tom), Odin for Gandalf, & Mount Sinai for the Meneltarma (though mountains & hills, real & artificial, were always seen as sacred places), once taken up into a secondary world they become wholly & simply themselves - if they are taken up successfully that is.

[mark12_30]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the glen...
What does the following mean in the context of the interweaving of English legends/folklore into the legendarium?

Lal, I actually put up a post (now deleted!!!) asking you for the reference-- which you crystal-clearly stated in, erm, your opening post. Now I'm SO embarassed.

Anyway-- despite my embarassment, I think this is a very good statement to ponder and I'm glad you brought it up. Reading it first out of context, what came to my mind was that many 'lesser' things-- fairy stories, myths, and &c which are "lesser" in the sense of "shorter" than Tolkien's life work-- were the 'compost' in the 'soil' that produced the legendarium in all of its magnificence. Out of context! But also true, for what its worth.

Nor for the context:

I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of fairy story - the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the large backcloths

"Lesser drawing splendour from the large backcloths" to me says "Hobbit" and "LOTR", which draw splendour from Gondolin (Hobbit) & Elrond's wisdom, &c, more thinly; and LOTR, which by the time we get past Elrond's house rests squarely on the legendarium whether the reader is particularly aware of that or not.

But then, we've also discussed (in various threads) such things as, "Smith of Wootton Major"-- does it draw from the Legendarium? Or does it draw from the same Faerie sources that the Legendarium drew from? It is "lesser" in size, but what exactly does it rest on?

What does "Leaf by Niggle" rest on?

What does "Farmer Giles" rest on?

Are we asking in terms of content-- which is how I initiallly answered a paragraph or three above-- or are we asking in terms of the compost, in which case everything drew on what came before? I often get these two ideas crossed in my own mind.

Even within LOTR, thinking back to the "It Feels Different Near the Shire" thread-- does the Old Forest, and Tom Bombadil, rest on the same thing as, say, Gondolin and Numenor?

lmp...?

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by Lal

Should [Tolkien] have preserved these folk tales if he truly wished to dedicate his work to England?

Basically it seems that you're asking if Tolkien should have behaved more like a librarian than the artist he was. So I say 'no'.

Just for the record, I agree with Lal and davem and not with Saurreg.

Originally Posted by Lal

What does the following mean in the context of the interweaving of English legends/folklore into the legendarium?

It seems to me that what Tolkien is saying is: larger = cosmogonic while lesser = fairy story. I think 'fairy tale' includes Robin Hood. I can imagine that Faramir has analogies to Robin Hood that might have been instinctively present in the mind of Tolkien. It's also interesting to me that Gondor would be Norman and Rohan Saxon, whereas Faramir is the Gondorian Robin Hood to the Haradrim/Sauronish "Sherriff of Nottingham", by analogy. So it's not clean, but doesn't have to be.

Originally Posted by mark12_30

"Lesser drawing splendour from the large backcloths" to me says "Hobbit" and "LOTR", which draw splendour from Gondolin (Hobbit) & Elrond's wisdom, &c, more thinly; and LOTR, which by the time we get past Elrond's house rests squarely on the legendarium whether the reader is particularly aware of that or not.

I agree with this.

Originally Posted by mark

But then, we've also discussed (in various threads) such things as, "Smith of Wootton Major"-- does it draw from the Legendarium? Or does it draw from the same Faerie sources that the Legendarium drew from? It is "lesser" in size, but what exactly does it rest on? What does "Leaf by Niggle" rest on? What does "Farmer Giles" rest on?

I think this is a different discussion altogether because those stories had a different purpose than the Legendarium. That said, the three short stories feel just as English and written by Tolkien as The Hobbit and LotR.

Originally Posted by mark

Are we asking in terms of content-- which is how I initiallly answered a paragraph or three above-- or are we asking in terms of the compost, in which case everything drew on what came before? I often get these two ideas crossed in my own mind.

Both, I think.

Originally Posted by mark

Even within LOTR, thinking back to the "It Feels Different Near the Shire" thread-- does the Old Forest, and Tom Bombadil, rest on the same thing as, say, Gondolin and Numenor? lmp...?

Perhaps that I'm not English myself renders my opinion inexpert. Still, I've read enough of the literature, background, and even had a visit, which does NOT make me an expert but gives knowledge. Gondolin and Numenor come from Tolkien dreams, but seem to have their sources as much in myth and legend. The Old Forest comes from folklore and Tom Bombadil has a mix of sources to say the least.

But all that seems rather unclear to me. I think it's important to distinguish between what in the legendarium (& LotR) is cosmogonic and what is fairy tale..... if that's even possible.

[davem]

If the Shire is the 'contemporary' England Tolkien grew up in, Buckland & the Old Forest are 'Faerie' England. Both 'worlds' are self-contained when we first encounter them, but there is a sense in which Buckland & the Old Forest remain untouched. Effectively the Hobbits wander into the world of the Bombadil poems & wander out again, leaving the inhabiants untouched (apart from the Barrow Wight - yet there may be more than one wight, so that world is left with the same cast of characters as it began with).

And yet Buckland & the Old Forest are part of Middle-earth, & if the inspiration for them is the English Faerie world, they are what they are.

[Lalwendë]

Is Robin Hood typically English? Well the only other country that I'm aware of which has a similar figure is Scotland with Rob Roy, and he was very much real, though many tales have been built upon his legend since then. I wouldn't be surprised if Germany or the regions around the old Black Forest have similar figures though.

I think Robin is in some ways an echo back to an older England. We also have other rebel figures such as Hereward The Wake (only sketchy information is available about him, but he is from the fens of Lincolnshire, next door to Notts & Yorkshire) and Wat Tyler (a real figure). What is special about Robin is how he retreats to the woods, maybe the wild woods or what remained of them. Its funny to think but even now, almost 1,000 years on, there is a feeling of regret about what the Normans did to the English, cutting dead a culture and really being responsible for 1,000 years of class conflict (though they gave us some great Kings and all their tales ). So I can imagine how easily a figure such as Robin would quickly become magnified into a legend, a myth in fact.

Robin also changes with time - he is currently linked to Green Man figures and we also make a big deal out of the rebel aspects of him. So i can't think of a more appropriate archetype for Tolkien to weave into his own legendarium and use in his own way to create something entirely new. What's also quite interesting is that if Tolkien inadvertently called up the folk memory of Robin when Faramir appeared to him, this might be that 'sidelined nobleman' aspect of Robin, whereas the more odd, woodsy aspects are called uo by Tom Bombadil, and he even calls up a princely aspect in Legolas. Maybe Ghan-buri-ghan calls up the ancient aspect of Robin, tricksy and linked to the wild man of the wildwood.

I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of fairy story - the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the large backcloths

I thought I'd bring up this quote as it does obviously relate to the construction of Tolkien's own mythology, but it also reflects real mythology, big ideas based on local follktales, and in a way, this is what Robin Hood has become, an entire concept which has grown from simple, local tales.

The continuing influence of Robin Hood is to be underestimated at our peril, because tales and ideas of him are sunk really deeply into people's hearts and minds here. I think in many ways Robin grew up as a legend as he symbolised resistance to the Normans and their overwhelming new ways of life; the ordinary people remained English and did not become 'continental', kept that way by being reduced to being peasants in the feudal system, so maybe this is how the legends have lasted. I think that would be in sympathy with what Tolkien thought about the regret that England had lost its mythology (or a chance of one), and I think that maybe the idea of Robin would be in complete sympathy with his notions for this 'mythology' he was creating?

[Saurreg]

Originally Posted by davem

If we strip the flesh off any human being we would find the same skeletal structure. Archetypes in themselves are uninteresting. Stories are unteresting. And stories are set in a certain time & certain place, because they come from the minds & hearts of certain people. If you replace Robin with Otto, or William Tell, you've got a different story.

You can scrutinize and strip apart every story to look for the human behaviour and they will be there, all your common love, hate, anger, pride and whatnots. After all story and indeed myths were connocted by human beings in the first place.

But nevertheless, in different cultures and at different times, there were characteristics that would have be very distinctive and different, and these two factors would have shaped the nature of the myth including the basic expressions of the human behaviour also, in addition to whatever indigenous identity pertaining to the myth creators. Hence when one reads of a myth from say China or Japan from 23 AD and 578 AD respectively, it would hardly make sense to him that it could apply to say England of the same era. The cutural favors that gave the myth its setting and gist would be distinctively Sinic for that example.

As I have mentioned the tale of Robin Hood was set in a time when the common nature of England was closely interwined with that of the rest of Europe. The orders of those days were religious piety to the Catholic Church and regional feudalism. So instead of thinking of Robin Hood and the characteristics of that tale as solely English in nature, I think of it more of European in nature. Reasons have been stated as before.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Saurreg

As I have mentioned the tale of Robin Hood was set in a time when the common nature of England was closely interwined with that of the rest of Europe. The orders of those days were religious piety to the Catholic Church and regional feudalism. So instead of thinking of Robin Hood and the characteristics of that tale as solely English in nature, I think of it more of European in nature. Reasons have been stated as before.

Robin Hood is a folk tale, and the ordinary people of England at that time wouldn't have been European in any way. In fact tales like Robin Hood ran contra to the European aristocracy and church that had been imported to the island; they are closely linked to faerie and ideas of belonging to the land. Feudalism is key to understanding this as the ordinary people simply through survival instinct would have had to do whatever they were told to do, including attending church, there was no option; but storytelling, in the relative safety of the home, retained their older memories, passed on through generations.

As I've said, there are probably similar tales from other countries in Europe, but folk tales take on a local aspect by their nature, especially ones which grow up on an island. I'd argue that England (and indeed Britain) is even today not really 'European' in terms of cultural outlook. If we look at roots of archetypes and legends then we must go quite far back to the races which managed to get here over thousands of years, and even then there is archaeological evidence that incursions didn't really begin until the Romans came - the latest evidence suggests that the so-called Celts were just native Britons, who'd probably come here when we were still joined to France. And that's probably how far back we'd need to go to get to common pre-Roman ancestors.

Then you need to add to the mixture the incoming Vikings and Saxons (Germans, Danes, Norwegians, Swedes etc as they are today) and how they may have added to folk tales. For Scots the Irish are also important as they gradually took over from the Picts.

Anyway, where am I going with this? Just I suppose to make the point that as Britain is an island, its folklore is quite special, we can identify when different peoples came here and we can still identify where they exactly went, as place names are still either British, Viking, Saxon or French (actually quite rare ). I think you can even identify this in Tolkien. lmp makes a guess at which middle-earth cultures might correspond to the various distinct cultures which came to Britain, and I think there's something in that, that Tolkien may have attempted in some way to deal with those distinct groups and how they made a new identity.

[littlemanpoet]

Just by way of seconding what Lalwendë is saying in terms of linguistics: England alone experienced a "great vowel shift", rendering the language so different in sound from its Continental cousins.

What difference does that make, you may ask? It underlines the literal eccentricity (outside the circle) of England, its folk tales and its ways of life vis a vie Continental Europe. Robin Hood and Guilliaume Tell are not the same.

[Saurreg]

Any more discussion on Robin Hood and this thread would be completely derailed and I have myself to blame for that, being one of the main debaters of said side topic.

Since we cannot come to a consensus. Let us all move on.

Sorry Lalwendë. This won't happen again.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Saurreg

Any more discussion on Robin Hood and this thread would be completely derailed and I have myself to blame for that, being one of the main debaters of said side topic.

Since we cannot come to a consensus. Let us all move on.

Sorry Lalwendë. This won't happen again.

No, don't worry about that. It's the side conversations that branch off a topic that can be the most interesting!