by J. R. R. Tolkien; Christopher Tolkien; Humphrey Carpenter
90 See III p. 245.1
91 Actually, since the events at the Cracks of Doom would obviously be vital to the Tale, I made several sketches or trial versions at various stages in the narrative — but none of them were used, and none of them much resembled what is actually reported in the finished story.
92 We frequently see this double scale used by the saints in their judgements upon themselves when suffering great hardships or temptations, and upon others in like trials.
93 No account is here taken of 'grace' or the enhancement of our powers as instruments of Providence. Frodo was given 'grace': first to answer the call (at the end of the Council) after long resisting a complete surrender; and later in his resistance to the temptation of the Ring (at times when to claim and so reveal it would have been fatal), and in his endurance of fear and suffering. But grace is not infinite, and for the most pan seems in the Divine economy limited to what is sufficient for the accomplishment of the task appointed to one instrument in a pattern of circumstances and other instruments.
94 It is not made explicit how she could arrange this. She could not of course just transfer her ticket on the boat like that! For any except those of Elvish race 'sailing West' was not permitted, and any exception required 'authority', and she was not in direct communication with the Valar, especially not since her choice to become 'mortal'. What is meant is that it was Arwen who first thought of sending Frodo into the West, and put in a plea for him to Gandalf (direct or through Galadriel, or both), and she used her own renunciation of the right to go West as an argument. Her renunciation and suffering were related to and enmeshed with Frodo's : both were parts of a plan for the regeneration of the state of Men. Her prayer might therefore be specially effective, and her plan have a certain equity of exchange. No doubt it was Gandalf who was the authority that accepted her plea. The Appendices show clearly that he was an emissary of the Valar, and virtually their plenipotentiary in accomplishing the plan against Sauron. He was also in special accord with Cirdan the Ship-master, who had surrendered to him his ring and so placed himself under Gandalf's command. Since Gandalf himself went on the Ship there would be so to speak no trouble either at embarking or at the landing.
95 In the sense that 'pity' to be a true virtue must be directed to the good of its object. It is empty if it is exercised only to keep oneself 'clean', free from hate or the actual doing of injustice, though this is also a good motive.
96 The Witch-king had been reduced to impotence.
97 Tasarinan, Ossiriand, Neldoreth, Dorthonion were all regions of Beleriand, famous in tales of the War.
98 Or even the legitimate need of money.
99 At least they were certainly once necessary. And if we are pained or at times scandalized by those we see close to, I think we should remember the enormous debt we owe to the Benedictines, and also remember that (like the Church) they have always been in a state of succumbing to mammon and the world, and never finally overwhelmed. The inner fire has never been extinguished.
100 The unseemly cobwebs & dust, and the stained label, are not always signs of impaired contents, for those who can draw old corks.
101 Not that one should forget the wise words of Charles Williams, that it is our duty to tend the accredited and established altar, though the Holy Spirit may send the fire down somewhere else. God cannot be limited (even by his own Foundations) – of which St Paul is the first & prime example – and may use any channel for His grace. Even to love Our Lord, and certainly to call him Lord, and God, is a grace, and may bring more grace. Nonetheless, speaking institutionally and not of individual souls the channel must eventually run back into the ordained course, or run into the sands and perish. Besides the Sun there may be moonlight (even bright enough to read by); but if the Sun were removed there would be no Moon to see. What would Christianity now be if the Roman Church has in fact been destroyed?
102 It is a curious chance that the stem √talat used in Q[uenya] for 'slipping, sliding, falling down', of which atalantie is a normal (in Q) noun-formation, should so much resemble Atlantis.
103 In Time and Tide of this July 15, in a symposium of publishers telling readers what to take on holiday, he only mentioned The Lord of the Rings from all his list, and foretold a long life for it.
104 an error probably for þizōs bōkōs, 'of this book', sg.
105 an error probably for bōka meina, 'my book', sg.
106 Yes, even up to £15,000! Or more!
107 That is, one in which inventing a language for pleasure was the main motive. I am not concerned with slangs, cants, thieves' argot, Notwelsch, and things of that sort.
108 My hobbit is a case. Showing how peculiar to an individual this attribution may be (often obscure to the perpetrator of the 'noise' and not discoverable by others). If I attributed meaning to boo-hoo I should not in this case be influenced by the words containing bū in many other European languages, but by a story by Lord Dunsany (read many years ago) about two idols enshrined in the same temple: Chu-Bu and Sheemish. If I used boo-hoo at all it would be as the name of some ridiculous, fat, self-important character, mythological or human.
109 except in geometry which I was taught by her sister. That was the aunt whose last years I cheered and amused by composing and selecting The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, and consulting her about the book, which she had asked for. She died in her 92nd year soon after it was published.4
110 There are exceptions. I have read all that E. R. Eddison wrote, in spite of his peculiarly bad nomenclature and personal philosophy. I was greatly taken by the book that was (I believe) the runner-up when The L. R. was given the Fantasy Award:5Death of Grass.6I enjoy the S.F. of Isaac Azimov. Above these, I was recently deeply engaged in the books of Mary Renault; especially the two about Theseus, The King Must Die, and The Bull from the Sea. A few days ago I actually received a card of appreciation from her; perhaps the piece of 'Fan-mail' that gives me most pleasure.
111 E.g. in a nonsensical article by J. S. Ryan.
112 With the possible exception of the name (of a king) Gram. This is, of course, a genuine A-S word, but not in recorded A-S used (as it is in Old Norse) as a noun = "warrior or king'. But some influence of the Northern language upon that of the Eorlingas after their removal northward is not unlikely. It is in fact paralleled by clear traces of the influence upon one another of the (poetic) language of Old Norse and A-S.
113 The only (but a major) exception is Eärendil. See below.
114 The word Warg used in The Hobbit and the L.R. for an evil breed of (demonic) wolves is not supposed to be A-S specifically, and is given prim. Germanic form as representing the noun common to the Northmen of these creatures. It seems to have 'caught on' – it appears in Orbit 2 p. 119, not as a word in [a] strange country, but in an official communication from Earth to a space-explorer. The story is by a reader of the L.R.
115 Already well advanced 20 years before The Hobbit was written. The legends of the past before the time of The Hobbit and The L.R. were also largely composed before 1935.
116 Its earliest recorded A-S form is earendil (oer-), later earendel, eorendel. Mostly in glosses on jubar=leoma; also on aurora. But also in Blick[ling] Hom[ilies] 163, se níwa éorendel appl. to St John the Baptist; and most notably Crist 104, éala! éarendel engla beorhtast ofer middangeard monnum sended. Often supposed to refer to Christ (or Mary), but comparison with Bl. Homs, suggests that it refers to the Baptist. The lines refer to a herald, and divine messenger, clearly not the soðfæsta sunnan leoma=Christ.
117 Q. ëar S. aear (see I 250).
118 This provides the key to a large number of other Elvish Q. names, such as Elendil 'Elf-friend' (eled+ndil), Valandil, Mardil the Good Steward (devoted to the House, sc. of the Kings) Meneldil 'astronomer' etc. Of similar significance in names is -(n)dur, though properly this means 'to serve', as one serves a legitimate master: cf. Q. arandil king's friend, royalist, beside arandur 'king's servant, minister'. But these often coincide: e.g. Sam's relation to F
rodo can be viewed either as in status -ndur, in spirit -ndil. Compare among the variant names: Eärendur '(professional) mariner'.
119 At the time of her lament in Lórien she believed this to be perennial, as long as Earth endured. Hence she concludes her lament with a wish or prayer that Frodo may as a special grace be granted a purgatorial (but not penal) sojourn in Eressea, the Solitary Isle in sight of Aman, though for her the way is closed. (The Land of Aman after the downfall of Númenor, was no longer in physical existence 'within the circles of the world'.) Her prayer was granted – but also her personal ban was lifted, in reward for her services against Sauron, and above all for her rejection of the temptation to take the Ring when offered to her. So at the end we see her taking ship.
120 Though the episode of the 'wargs' (I believe) is in part derived from a scene in S. R. Crockett's The Black Douglas, probably his best romance and anyway one that deeply impressed me in school-days, though I have never looked at it again. It includes Gil de Rez as a Satanist.
121 Which I remember, since (omen again) the OTCs2 of that day were specially privileged and I was one of 12 sent down from K[ing] E[dward's] S[chool] to help 'line the route'. We were camped for a wettish night in Lambeth Palace and marched to our stations early on a dull morning that soon cleared up. I was actually standing outside Buck. Palace great gates to the right, facing the palace. We had a good view of the cavalcades, and I have always remembered one little scene (unnoticed by my companions): as the coach containing the royal children swept in on return the P[rince] of W[ales] (a pretty boy) poked his head out and knocked his coronet askew. He was jerked back and smartly rebuked by his sister.
122 A nice singular which I feel hobbits must have used, with a distinctive pl[ural] 'youbodies'.
123 This willingness usually connotes some degree of humility. In Yorkshire its first impulse was the desire to 'get on'. But that does not remain the sole objective. Cupboard-love is a frequent preliminary to actual love.
124 Not to mention 'drugs'.
125 Not 'vintage'. But I like port (v. much) as a mid-mom, drink: warming, digestible, and v. good for my throat, when taken (as I think it should be) by itself or with a dry biscuit, and NOT after a full meal, nor (above all) with desert!
126 I have now! Probably more than most other folk; and find myself in a v. tangled wood – the clue to which is, however, the belief in incubi and 'changelings'. Alas! one conclusion is that the statement that hobgoblins were 'a larger kind' is the reverse of the original truth. (The statement occurs in the preliminary note on Runes devised for the paperback edition, but now included by A & U in all edns.)
127 This meaning was understood by other peoples ignorant of Sindarin: cf. Stoningland (1 vol. edn. 882), and in particular the conversation of Theoden and Ghân 864f. In fact it is probable within the historical fiction that the Númenóreans of the Southern kingdom adopted this name from the primitive inhabitants of Gondor and gave it a suitable version in Sindarin.
128 The remark in the foreword to the 1 vol. paper-back p. 7 that the whole thing was 'primarily linguistic in inspiration' is strictly true.
129 Possibly the reason why my surname is now usually misspelt TOLKEIN in spite of all my efforts to correct this – even by my college-, bank-, and lawyer's clerks! My name is Tolkien, anglicized from To(l)kiehn = tollkühn, and came from Saxony in the 18th century. It is not Jewish in origin, though I should consider it an honour if it were.
130 He was actually of almost exactly the same age as my real father would have been: both were born in 1857, Francis at the end of January, and my father in the middle of February.
131 She knew the earliest form of the legend (written in hospital), and also the poem eventually printed as Aragorn's song in LR.
132 Owing to Christopher — when I was looking in vain for somewhere to live he wrote 'off his own bat' to the Warden of Merton College and said that his father was wandering looking in vain for a home, & could the College help? So I was amazed to receive a letter from the Warden saying that he had called a special meeting of the Governing Body, and it had unanimously voted that I should be invited to be a residential Fellow!
133 Sc. a closely formed body of enemy soldiers.
134 The Silvan Elves of Thranduil's realm did not speak S. but a related language or dialect.
135 The difference between this and S. Ithil is due to a change of þ (th) >s in Q. of the Exiles. But there was a stem √SIL as in Silmarilli. Cf. also síla lúmenna omentielvo.
136 Note: 2 ancient words in Elvish for 'tree': (1) *galadā <√GAL 'grow' intr[ansitive]; and (2) *ornē from the v[ery] f[requently] used √OR/RO rise up, go high (cf. ortani 'raised'). (1) > Q. alda, S. galadh. (2) > Q. orne, S. orn.
(1) is not connected in origin with the name Galadriel, but it does [occur] in Calas Galadhon, Galadhrim. Before I discovered that many readers like you wd. be interested in language-details, I thought people would feel dh uncouth, and so wrote d (for ð & dh) in names. But galadhon, -dhrim is now in text.
137 If indeed all were so; some may have been merely coinages in the general style; or alterations of old names arising domestically. As in our Robert > Robin, Dobbin, Hob, Bob etc.
138 Your use of lenited indicates that you know these, so I need not say any more; except to observe that though of phonetic origin, they are used grammatically, and so may occur or be absent in cases where this is not phonetically justified by descent.
139 e.g. Periannath the Hobbit-folk, as distinguished from periain hobbits, an indefinite number of 'halflings'.
140 Original[ly] the Q. duals were (a) purely numerative (element ata) and pairs (element ū as seen in Aldūya); but they were normally in later Q. only usual with reference to natural pairs, and the choice of t or u [was] decided by euphony (e.g. ū was preferred after d/t in stem.
141 from arn(a)gon -ath.
142 This we certainly never meant to be.
Table of Contents
The letters of J. R. R. Tolkien
Introduction
LETTERS
1 To Edith Bratt
2 From a letter to Edith Bratt 27 November 1914
3 From a letter to Edith Bratt 26 November 1915
4 From a letter to Edith Bratt 2 March 1916
5 To G. B. Smith
6 To Mrs E. M. Wright
7 To the Electors of the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professorship of Anglo-Saxon, University of Oxford
8 From a letter to the Vice Chancellor of Leeds University
9 To Susan Dagnall, George Allen & Unwin Ltd.
10 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin
11 From a letter to Allen & Unwin 5 February 1937
12 To Allen & Unwin
13 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin
14 To Allen & Unwin
15 To Allen & Unwin
16 To Michael Tolkien
17 To Stanley Unwin, Chairman of Allen & Unwin
18 From a letter to Stanley Unwin 23 October 1937
19 To Stanley Unwin
20 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin
21 From a letter to Allen & Unwin 1 February 1938
22 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin 20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
23 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin
24 To Stanley Unwin
25 To the editor of the 'Observer'
26 To Stanley Unwin
27 To the Houghton Mifflin Company
28 To Stanley Unwin
29 From a letter to Stanley Unwin 25 July 1938
30 To Rütten & Loening Verlag
31 To C.A.Furth, Allen & Unwin
32 To John Masefield
33 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin
34 To Stanley Unwin
35 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin 20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
36 To C. A. Furth, Allen & Unwin
37 To Stanley Unwin
38 To Stanley Unwin
39 From a letter to Michael Tolkien 29 September 1940
40 From a letter to Michael Tolkien 6 October 1940
41 From a letter to Michael Tolkien 2 January 1941
42 To Michael Tolkien
43 From a letter to Michael Tolkien 6-8 March 1941
44 From a letter to Michael Tolkien 18 March 1941
45 To Michael Tolkien
46 From a draft to R. W. Chapman 26 November 1941
47 To Stanley Unwin
48 To C. S. Lewis
49 To C. S. Lewis (draft)
50 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien 25 October 1943
51 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien 27 October 1943
52 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien 29 November 1943
53 To Christopher Tolkien
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
54 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien
55 To Christopher Tolkien
56 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien
57 From an airgraph to Christopher Tolkien
58 To Christopher Tolkien
59 From an airgraph to Christopher Tolkien
60 To Christopher Tolkien (airgraph)
61 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien
62 From an airgraph to Christopher Tolkien
63 To Christopher Tolkien
64 To Christopher Tolkien
65 From an airgraph to Christopher Tolkien
66 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien
67 From an airgraph to Christopher Tolkien