by J. R. R. Tolkien; Christopher Tolkien; Humphrey Carpenter
J. R. R. Tolkien
The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien
A selection edited by
Humphrey Carpenter
with the assistance of
Christopher Tolkien
Introduction
Towards the end of his life, J. R. R. Tolkien was deprived for a few weeks of the use of his right arm. He told his publisher: 'I found not being able to use a pen or pencil as defeating as the loss of her beak would be to a hen.'
An immense amount of Tolkien's time was taken up with the written word: not just his academic work and the stories of 'Middle-earth', but also letters. Many of these had to be written in the way of business, but in any case letter-writing was on most occasions a favourite activity with him. The consequence is that an immense number of letters by Tolkien survive; and when, with the help of Christopher Tolkien, I began work on this selection, it became obvious that an enormous quantity of material would have to be omitted, and that only passages of particular interest could be included. Naturally, priority has been given to those letters where Tolkien discusses his own books; but the selection has also been made with an eye to demonstrating the huge range of Tolkien's mind and interests, and his idiosyncratic but always clear view of the world.
Among the omissions is the very large body of letters he wrote between 1913 and 1918 to Edith Bratt, who was his fiancée and then his wife; these are highly personal in character, and from them I have chosen only a few passages which refer to writings in which Tolkien was engaged at the time. Between 1918 and 1937 few letters survive, and such as have been preserved record (unfortunately) nothing about Tolkien's work on The Silmarillion and The Hobbit, which he was writing at this time. But from 1937 onwards there is an unbroken series of letters to the end of his life, giving, often in great detail, an account of the writing of The Lord of the Rings, and of later work on The Silmarillion, and often including lengthy discussions of the meaning of his writings.
Within the letters chosen for publication, all passages omitted have been indicated by a row of four dots, thus:.... In cases where three dots appear, this is the usage employed by Tolkien himself in the letter. In almost all cases, omissions have been made simply for reasons of space, and only very rarely has it been necessary to leave a passage out of a letter for reasons of discretion.
Tolkien's original text has been left unaltered except in the case of the address and date, which have been given according to the same system throughout the book. and in the matter of titles of Tolkien's books. He himself employed a number of different systems for giving titles: for instance, the Hobbit, the 'Hobbit', The Hobbit, 'the Hobbit', 'The Hobbit'; so also with The Lord of the Rings. In general, editorial practice has been to regularise these titles according to the usual system, though the original form has been left where it is of interest.
Some letters are printed from carbon copies kept by Tolkien; he only began to make carbons of his letters towards the end of his life, and this explains why there is no trace of earlier letters unless the originals themselves can be discovered. Other letters in the book are printed from a draft or drafts which differ from the text that he actually sent (if he sent one at all), and in certain instances a continuous text has been assembled from several fragments of drafts: in cases where this has been done, the letter is headed 'Drafts'. The frequency of such drafts among his correspondence, and the great length of many of them, was partly explained by Tolkien in a letter to his son Michael:
Words beget words, and thoughts skid off into side-track. .... The 'laconic' is by me only occasionally achieved as an 'art form' by the cutting out of ¾ or more of what I have written and so is, of course, in fact more time-taking and laborious than 'free length'.
Where only a portion of a letter has been printed, the address and opening salutation have been omitted, together with the ending and signature; in such cases the letter is headed 'From a letter to ——.' All footnotes to letters are Tolkien's own.
Where I have thought it necessary, letters are preceded by a headnote giving the context of the correspondence. All other notes will be found at the back of the book; the existence of such a note is indicated by a superior numeral in the text. Notes are numbered consecutively throughout each letter, and are identified letter by letter (rather than page by page) at the back of the book. The notes have been compiled according to the principle of providing such information as is necessary for comprehension, but the aim has been brevity, too, and it is assumed that the reader will have a fairly thorough knowledge of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Bearing in mind the large number of editions of the latter book, with their different paginations, Tolkien's page-references to it in his letters are explained in the notes, with a citation of the passage to which he is referring.
In the editorial notes, four books are cited by brief titles: Pictures, Unfinished Tales, Biography, Inklings. These are, in full: Pictures by J. R. R. Tolkien, with foreword and notes by Christopher Tolkien (1979); J. R. R. Tolkien, Unfinished Tales, edited by Christopher Tolkien (1980); Humphrey Carpenter, J. R. R. Tolkien, a biography (1977); and Humphrey Carpenter, The Inklings (1978). All four books are published in Britain by George Allen & Unwin Ltd., and in America by the Houghton Mifflin Company.
The division of labour between myself and Christopher Tolkien has been as follows. I myself collected and transcribed all the letters, and the initial selection was mine; he commented on the selection and transcription, and made various suggestions for changes, which we discussed further, and adopted with various emendations. We then found it necessary to reduce the text quite severely, for considerations of space; again, I proposed the initial cuts, he made comments on my suggestions, and we agreed on a final procedure. With the notes, too, I wrote the original text, and he again commented on what I had done and supplied certain additional pieces of information. The book as published therefore reflects my own taste and judgement rather more than his, but it is also the product of our joint work; and I am very grateful to him for sparing many hours, and for guiding and encouraging me.
Finally I am, of course, very grateful too to those many people who lent letters. Most of these are acknowledged in the book, in that their names appear as the recipients of the letters; in those few cases where letters were lent but have not been included, I must both thank those concerned and apologise to them for the fact that their letter or letters were omitted for reasons of space. I must also thank the various organisations and individuals who helped me: members of the Tolkien Society of Great Britain, the American Tolkien Society, and the Mythopoeic Society, who publicised our wish to trace letters, and in some cases put us in touch with owners of letters; the BBC Written Archives, the Bodleian Library, the Oxford University Press and its Dictionary Department, the Humanities Research Center of the University of Texas at Austin, and the Wade Collection at Wheaton College, Illinois, all of whom made letters available to us; the various executors (especially the Rev. Walter Hooper) and other people who helped us trace letters to persons now deceased; and finally Douglas Anderson, who helped greatly and generously in a number of ways with the preparation of the book. He and Charles Noad kindly read proofs for us.
Despite the length of this volume, and the great number of letters we have collected, there can be no doubt that much of Tolkien's correspondence still remains untraced. Any reader knowing of further letters which might deserve publication is encouraged to contact the publishers of this book, in the hope that it may be possible to add them to a second edition.
Humphrey Carpenter
LETTERS
1 To Edith Bratt
[Tolkien became engaged to Edi
th Bratt, whom he had met during his adolescence in Birmingham, in January 1913, when he was twenty-one. The following letter was written during his final year as an undergraduate at Oxford, when he was studying English Language & Literature, and at the same time was drilling in the University Officers' Training Corps as a preparation for joining the army.]
[Not dated; October 1914]
Exeter College, Oxford
My Edith darling:
Yes I was rather surprised by your card of Sat. morning and rather sorry because I knew my letter would have to wander after you. You do write splendid letters to me, little one; I am such a pig to you though. It seems age[s] since I wrote. I have had a busy (and very wet!) week end.
Friday was completely uneventful and Sat too though we had a drill all afternoon and got soaked several times and our rifles got all filthy and took ages to clean afterwards.
I spent most of the rest of those days indoors reading: I had an essay, as I told you, but I didn't get it finished as Shakespeare came up and then (Lieutenant) Thompson (very healthy and well in his new uniform) and prevented me doing work on the Sabbath, as I had proposed to do..... I went to St Aloysius for High Mass – and I rather enjoyed it – it is such ages since I heard one for Fr. F. wouldn't let me go when I was at the Oratory last week.
I had to pay a duty call to the Rector in the afternoon which was very boring. His wife really is appalling! I got away as soon as possible and fled back in the rain to my books. Then I went and saw Mr Sisam and told him I could not finish my essay till Wed: and stayed and talked with him for some time, then I went and had an interesting talk with that quaint man Earp I have told you of and introduced him (to his great delight) to the 'Kālevalā' the Finnish ballads.
Amongst other work I am trying to turn one of the stories — which is really a very great story and most tragic – into a short story somewhat on the lines of Morris' romances with chunks of poetry in between.....
I have got to go to the college library now and get filthy amongst dusty books – and then hang about and see the Bursar. .... R.
2 From a letter to Edith Bratt 27 November 1914
I did about 4 hrs. [work] 9.20-1 or so in the morning: drilled all afternoon went to a lecture 5-6 and after dinner (with a man called Earp) had to go to a meeting of the Essay Club – an informal kind of last gasp [?]. There was a bad paper but an interesting discussion. It was also composition meeting and I read 'Earendel' which was well criticised.
3 From a letter to Edith Bratt 26 November 1915
[After graduating at Oxford with a First Class in English, Tolkien was commissioned in the Lancashire Fusiliers. This letter was written from Rugeley Camp in Staffordshire, where he was training. Meanwhile he was working on a poem, 'Kortirion among the Trees', suggested by Warwick, where Edith Bratt was living. The poem describes a 'fading town upon a little hill', where 'linger yet the Lonely Companies .... The holy fairies and immortal elves.' For 'the T.C.B.S.' see no. 5.]
The usual kind of morning standing about and freezing and then trotting to get warmer so as to freeze again. We ended up by an hour's bomb-throwing with dummies. Lunch and a freezing afternoon. All the hot days of summer we doubled about at full speed and perspiration, and now we stand in icy groups in the open being talked at! Tea and another scramble – I fought for a place at the stove and made a piece of toast on the end of a knife: what days! I have written out a pencil copy of 'Kortirion'. I hope you won't mind my sending it to the T.C.B.S. I want to send them something: I owe them all long letters. I will start on a careful ink copy for little you now and send it tomorrow night, as I don't think I shall get more than one copy typed (it is so long). No on second thoughts I am sending you the pencil copy (which is very neat) and shall keep the T.C.B.S. waiting till I can make another.
4 From a letter to Edith Bratt 2 March 1916
This miserable drizzling afternoon I have been reading up old military lecture-notes again:— and getting bored with them after an hour and a half. I have done some touches to my nonsense fairy language – to its improvement.
I often long to work at it and don't let myself 'cause though I love it so it does seem such a mad hobby!
5 To G. B. Smith
[While they were at King Edward's School, Birmingham, in 1911, Tolkien and three friends, Rob Gilson, Geoffrey Smith and Christopher Wiseman, formed themselves into an unofficial and semi-secret society which they called 'the T.C.B.S.', initials standing for 'Tea Club and Barrovian Society', an allusion to their fondness for having tea in the school library, illicitly, and in Barrow's Stores near the school. Since leaving King Edward's, the T.C.B.S. had kept in close touch with each other, and in December 1914 had held a 'Council' at Wiseman's London home, following which Tolkien had begun to devote much energy to writing poetry – the result, he believed, of the shared ideals and mutual encouragement of the T.C.B.S. Wiseman was now serving in the Navy, Gilson and Smith were sent out to the Somme, and Tolkien arrived on that battlefield, as Battalion Signalling Officer to the 11th Lancashire Fusiliers, just as the Allied offensive of 1 July was beginning. On that day, Rob Gilson was killed in action, but news of his death did not reach the other members of the T.C.B.S. for some weeks. Geoffrey Smith sent Tolkien a note about it, and later passed him a letter from Christopher Wiseman.]
12 August 1916
11th Lancashire Fusiliers, B.E.F., France
My dear old Geoffrey,
Thank you indeed for Christopher's letter. I have thought much of things since – most of them incommunicable thoughts until God brings us together again if it be only for a space.
I don't agree with Chris – although of course he does not say much. I agree most heartily of course with the pan you underlined – but strangely enough not in the least now with the part I marked and commented. I went out into the wood – we are out in camp again from our second bout of trenches still in the same old area as when I saw you – last night and also the night before and sat and thought.
I cannot get away from the conclusion that it is wrong to confound the greatness which Rob has won with the greatness which he himself doubted. He himself will know that I am only being perfectly sincere and I am in no way unfaithful to my love for him – which I only realise now, more and more daily, that he has gone from the four — when I say that I now believe that if the greatness which we three certainly meant (and meant as more than holiness or nobility alone) is really the lot of the TCBS, then the death of any of its members is but a bitter winnowing of those who were not meant to be great – at least directly. God grant that this does not sound arrogant – I feel humbler enough in truth and immeasurably weaker and poorer now. The greatness I meant was that of a great instrument in God's hands – a mover, a doer, even an achiever of great things, a beginner at the very least of large things.
The greatness which Rob has found is in no way smaller – for the greatness I meant and tremblingly hoped for as ours is valueless unless steeped with the same holiness of courage suffering and sacrifice – but is of a different kind. His greatness is in other words now a personal matter with us – of a kind to make us keep July 1st as a special day for all the years God may grant to any of us – but only touches the TCBS on that precise side which perhaps – it is possible – was the only one that Rob really felt – 'Friendship to the Nth power'. What I meant, and thought Chris meant, and am almost sure you meant, was that the TCBS had been granted some spark of fire – certainly as a body if not singly – that was destined to kindle a new light, or, what is the same thing, rekindle an old light in the world; that the TCBS was destined to testify for God and Truth in a more direct way even than by laying down its several lives in this war (which is for all the evil of our own side with large view good against evil).
So far my chief impression is that something has gone crack. I feel just the same to both of you — nearer if anything and very much in need of you —I am hungry and lonely of course – but I don't feel a member of a little complete body now. I honestly fe
el that the TCBS has ended – but I am not at all sure that it is not an unreliable feeling that will vanish – like magic perhaps when we come together again. Still I feel a mere individual at present — with intense feelings more than ideas but very powerless.
Of course the TCBS may have been all we dreamt — and its work in the end be done by three or two or one survivor and the part of the others be trusted by God to that of the inspiration which we do know we all got and get from one another. To this I now pin my hopes, and pray God that the people chosen to carry on the TCBS may be no fewer than we three. ....
I do however dread and grieve about it – apart from my own personal longings – because I cannot abandon yet the hope and ambitions (inchoate and cloudy I know) that first became conscious at the Council of London. That Council was as you know followed in my own case with my finding a voice for all kinds of pent up things and a tremendous opening up of everything for me:—1 have always laid that to the credit of the inspiration that even a few hours with the four always brought to all of us.
There you are — I have sat solemnly down and tried to tell you drily just what I think. I have made it sound very cold and distant – and if it is incoherent that is due to its being written at different sittings amongst the noise of a very boring Company mess.
Send it on to Chris if you think it worth while. I do not know what is to be our move next or what is in store. Rumour is as busy as the universal weariness of all this war allows it to be. I wish I could know where you are. I make a guess of course.
I could write a huge letter but I have lots of jobs on. The Bde. Sig. Offr. is after me for a confabulation, and I have two rows 10 have with the QM and a detestable 6.30 parade – 6.30 pm of a sunny Sabbath.