From "JRR Tolkien: Architect of Middle Earth"

[Poppy]

Grotta, Daniel. 1992. J.R.R.Tolkien: Architect of Middle Earth. Running Press, London.

[me: hmm... We need to codify Medea's Minas Tirith Manual of Style.]

From the preface:
"J.R.R.Tolkien appears to be a much more prolific author posthumously than he ever was in life."

Me: [Thinks of all the Histories of Middle Earth, and then wonders, does fanfic count?]

Etc etc, "There were two other important, inhibiting factors, both products of his singular personality. One was his inability to concentrate on the work at hand. A notorious procrastinator, Tolkien was easily put off stride by interruptions."

Me: "So, I might not be just scatterbrained? I might be a geni--- ooo, squirrel!"

"He thought that the critics who had tried to unravel the allegory of his greatest work had missed the point entirely, for he insisted that LoTR was not an allegory. Tolkien, in fact, loathed allegory; he preferred instead a cracking good story or a straightforward saga."
P. 11
Me: [thinks deep thoughts about our recent discussion on the nature of literature, Ava's prelims struggles with too many quotes and not enough argument, and the story of the boy who wanted the pony: "Mit soviel Mist, denn muß ein Pferd da sein."]

[Wheelrider]

May 14, 2017 10:05:20 GMT -5 Poppy said:

Etc etc, "There were two other important, inhibiting factors, both products of his singular personality. One was his inability to concentrate on the work at hand. A notorious procrastinator, Tolkien was easily put off stride by interruptions."

Me: "So, I might not be just scatterbrained? I might be a geni--- ooo, squirrel!"

 
(Though I have no idea about your German quote...?)

One could say that Tolkien was a procrastinator, though from his letters, one could also get the impression that he was simply too busy grading papers for extra money and had to squeeze in writing when he could... sounds familiar.

I love the bits in Tolkien biographies and histories about his relationship to his editors. (Having been on both sides I have sympathy for both parties.)

"Oh, a sequel to The Hobbit, hmm... How about this other thing that is related but in a completely different style (and probably largely unpalatable to modern readers) and has no hobbits? Will that do? No? How disappointing...OK, I'll write something else."

*waits a few years*

"How about now? No? OK, I'll keep working on that something else."

*more years go by*

"Well, this other thing is taking a while... you sure you don't want that giant history thing?"

*still more years go by*

"OK, here is the manuscript you asked for!"

*one day later*

"So how is it? Do you like it? Huh? Huh? Please let me know ASAP!"

[Poppy]

Wheelrider, the German quote is from a joke my German teacher told us when I was 16. The English translation goes like this: (you've probably heard this before)
A boy wanted a pony more than anything. He asked his parents for one, he asked Saint Nicholas for one. His parents were not well off, so they couldn't afford it. They didn't want to hurt his feelings, but decided perhaps they could at least come close. On Christmas morning, they took him down to the stable, where there was a stall filled with a pile of horse manure. Instead of being disappointed, the boy was very happy and started digging into it with a shovel. When his parents asked him what he was doing, he replied, "With so much manure, there must be a pony in here somewhere."

To me it was the refrain of my grad school- so much data, but I could never get a dissertation project approved. Surely there had to be a PhD in there somewhere? Now it is all the plot bunnies- surely there has to be a story in here somewhere?

More quotes:
On advice from a fellow don: "It's not only interruptions, my boy; it's the fear of interruptions." p. 11
Me: that is completely true. I waste so many evenings because I am afraid to get started on my quilting and get distracted- taking everything out is a lot of work.

The book, while thin, is rather epic in form. It starts with a genealogy of the Tolkien family back to the German Reformation and Thirty Years' War, reminding me of the opening of Look Homeward, Angel and the history of the Gant family.

On JRR's mother: "She and her two sisters had been missionaries in Africa before returning to England. For a time, Mabel Suffield had tried to teach Christianity to the Sultan of Zanzibar's harem." p. 18

The spiders in LoTR stemmed from being stung by a tarantula as a child. p. 19
Me: Yikes! I can see how that would be a formative experience.

Apparently Mrs. Tolkien dressed her sons in Little Lord Fauntleroy outfits and kept their hair in ringlets, poor things! p. 21

On the transience of the past way of life, Tolkien said: "behind all this hobbit stuff lay a sense of insecurity. I always knew it would go away, and it did." p. 25
Me: This really emphasizes a sense of wistfulness and poignance. To me, a lot of Tolkien is about the end of a way of life, and the people choosing to pick up the pieces and carry on and make something new. I think this is why I love resilience theory so much, and my research interests are around how people react to the upheavals- Protohistoric/Colonial period of the American Southwest, the American Civil War, the Fin de Siecle of the Austro-Hungarian empire.

For some reason, the author seems to follow in the tradition of Thomas Wolfe- he goes into a divergence of several pages on the history of Oxford University, which easily could have been left out. I wonder if he was trying to pad his manuscript, since it was not done in cooperation of the Tolkien family?

[adaneth]

May 21, 2017 10:34:32 GMT -5 Poppy said:

On the transience of the past way of life, Tolkien said: "behind all this hobbit stuff lay a sense of insecurity. I always knew it would go away, and it did." p. 25
Me: This really emphasizes a sense of wistfulness and poignance.

I was reminding some colleagues at the social on Friday that, while I didn't expect the new world order to collapse, such things had happened, and it was important to have some people around who remembered how things worked before, in case you had to go back to those systems. Things really are changing shockingly fast. Until the Industrial Revolution, it took nine families of farmers to support one family that did something else, so all agrarian complex societies were 90% rural and 10% urban. In 1945--decades after JRR's boyhood "Shire" had disappeared--27% of the world's population was urban and there were two megacities (> 10 million people: New York and Tokyo). Now it's 53% urban and there are 25 megacities. Very few of those people know how to find, grow, or raise food. That's what makes me nervous, and that's why if society really starts rocking and reeling, I'm off to an islet in the saltwater marsh until the gasoline runs out and ammunition supplies drop significantly.

Efficiency and resilience are negatively correlated.

[thanwen]

I suppose that apart from the "sense of insecurity" what one might call "Hobbit stuff" gives you a sense of security if you know how to toil the earth and cultivate your garden, how to make your own food, clothes and buildings. At least for me it works like that.

And to add to your plans about the salt marshes, Adaneth: One of my colleagues (a teacher of politics) once said that should a severe crisis occur and society breakdown should come, he would come to live in my cellar at Langewerth for that was the only place he knew were there always would be a food supply, no matter what catastrophe would happen. But that also was the bloke who told the students that for me there were only two categories to judge the world: "I can eat it - it might eat me." So singing "I will survive" gets a quite different meaning.

[adaneth]

What is it about the end of the academic year that brings on these doomsday reflections?

Mom just called to see if I'd be late, because there are apparently lamb chops for dinner. Bye!