“TOLKIEN’S POETRY”, Ed. Eilmann & Turner, Book project by Walking Tree Publishers

[Aldarik]

“TOLKIEN’S POETRY”

Call for paper

Fortunately for the field of Tolkien studies, the quality and quantity of academic monographs and papers on Tolkien have noticeably intensified over the last decade. However, next to other aspects of Tolkien’s work that deserve more attention, one aspect that is of central importance for our understanding of Tolkien as author and literary mythmaker has only marginally been the subject of scholarly interest: Tolkien’s poetry.

Although the few published essays on the topic have provided us with important insights into some of Tolkien’s verse, we lack a broad study of Tolkien’s poetry that can give us a far-reaching understanding of this author, who wrote more than a hundred poems, many of them specifically as cultural artefacts to add depth to his narrative works.

This barely covered topic thus offers excellent opportunities for academic exploration of the many different poems and songs that are included in Tolkien’s narrative works (The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings), or that have been published separately or in another context (The Adventures of Tom Bombadil). Furthermore Tolkien’s poetic versions of some of the tales of his legendarium deserve a closer look to assess his qualities as a narrative poet (The Lay of Leithian, The Lay of the Children of Húrin).

This book, edited by Julian Eilmann and Allan Turner, intends to bring together Tolkien scholars who are interested in exploring the fascinating topic of Tolkien’s poetry and thus establish the basis for future studies to build upon.

The book will be published at the beginning of 2012 by Walking Tree Publishers. Authors are invited to contribute on topics of their choice. Possible research areas could be:

- Tolkien and his anchorage in the lyrical tradition (e. g. English poetry of the 19th century)

- An in-depth analysis of a single or a group of Tolkien poems in view of a leading aspect (e. g. speaker, recurrent/special lyrical motives, the function of the poem(s) in a narrative text like LotR, Hobbit etc.)

- From poetry to ‘prose with chunks of poetry in between’: Tolkien’s development as poet and narrator

- Tolkien’s ‘book of poetry: The Adventures of Tom Bombadil

- Poetic ‘narratives’: The Lay of Leithian, The Lay of the Children of Húrin and the influence of medieval and medievalising poetry in Tolkien’s work

- “Creative Imagination”: Tolkien’s poetry in context of his concept of sub-creation

- Lyrical lore: Poems and their multiple communicative functions in Middle-earth’s oral culture

Please send an abstract with a brief bio/bibliography by January 15th 2011 to julianeilmann [at] web.de or Julian Eilmann, Lochnerstr. 28, 52064 Aachen, Germany.

Walking Tree Publishers – www.walking-tree.org
Artwork: Anke Eissmann: www.anke.edoras-art.de

[Aldarik]

Dear Tolkien scholars and Forum users,

here I have presented the Call for paper for a book project Allan Turner and I are preparing for publication in 2012.

We already have some reknowned Tolkien scholars on board, but we are looking for more people to contribute.

If you are interested just get in touch!

Looking forward to hear from you.

[Angie G]

I will give some serious thought as to whether to do a paper on this topic. The poetry of both the Tolkien brothers is touched on briefly in "Wheelbarrows at Dawn" - to be launched on 4th December 2010. It seems to me there is more to be said about the poetry written by various Tolkien family members and the influences that helped produce these pieces. Let me get the book out first and I will revisit these thoughts and decide whether there is sufficient material (and interest!) in me pursuing this train of thought.

[Estelyn Telcontar]

Welcome, Aldarik and Angie! New books on Tolkien and anything related are always eagerly welcomed on the Downs. We look forward to reading your projects when they're finished, and perhaps one or more of our members will have something to contribute to the volume on poetry.

[Faramir Jones]

Welcome to the Downs, Aldarik and Angie G!

It was nice to meet you again at Oxonmoot 2010, Angie; and I'll be interested to find out if you decide to do a paper for the advertised book. I myself am also tempted to contribute.

[Aldarik]

Dear all!

Thank you for welcoming me.

So far the response to my Call for Paper (CFP) for "Tolkien's Poetry" has been great.

Before publication of the CFP we already had five scholars on board, but hope to get more people interested to this topic that - in my opinion - opens a new dimension to Tolkien studies. Therefore I am looking forward to hear from interested contributors.

So, Faramir and others: If you are interested, you are welcome to get in contact with me via e-mail (see abvove)

[Bêthberry]

Tolkien's Poetry is now in press. It has a very impressive list of contributors, such as Michael Drout and Tom Shippey, and very definitely deserves a reading.

And particular mention must be made that it includes an article by a Barrow Downs member. I will, however, allow him to to comment if he wishes to break his anonymity.

[Mithalwen]

Umm the link doesn't work for me...

[Aganzir]

Here.

I'm seriously considering getting this. It looks awesome.

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Aganzir

Here.

I'm seriously considering getting this. It looks awesome.

I totally think you should.

Mind you, though I have no monetary stake in the matter, I do have a vested interest in seeing the book do well--one of the two Michaels who contributed to the book is me (hint: I'm the less famous one).

Which makes me this person:

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

And particular mention must be made that it includes an article by a Barrow Downs member. I will, however, allow him to to comment if he wishes to break his anonymity.

However, I'm breaking my anonymity not to draw attention to myself (my article isn't all that stunning; in my own biased opinion it makes a somewhat obvious point... but perhaps it only seems obvious because I spent two years thinking about it), but because it was a result of this very thread that I proposed the article to Eilmann and Turner in the first place, and as inevitable as my toe-tipping into professional Tolkien studies may seem, it would likely not have happened without this community. So thank you all.