Tolkien opens The Lord of the Rings by discussing his sources—sources which he traces back to the work of Bilbo and Frodo and to the Red Book of Westmarch (Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, page 16). In so doing, Tolkien blurs the line between story and history. This is an altogether unusual move for a fiction writer, so why does he do it?
The short answer is that Tolkien’s overarching purpose in chronicling the history of Middle Earth was to produce “a body of more or less connected legend [...] which [he] could dedicate simply to [...] England, [his] country” (Tolkien, The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, page 144). If the goal from the outset was to create a body of legend for his home country, then it makes sense to connect his legends to the modern world, in this case by implying that written scraps and remnants of the legend were actually discovered in the modern world. Doing so hints at continuity between the stories of Middle Earth and the reality of modern-day England.
But short cuts make long delays, as Pippin points out, and here the short answer only tells half the story (Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, page 98). It’s worth taking the time to investigate more closely, and closely we must, because the search leads us through one of Tolkien’s most obscure works.
Though I suppose we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves. Why is the short answer inadequate in the first place? Really, it only explains why Tolkien might insert continuities between Middle Earth and our world—any continuities. It does not explain why Tolkien chose to use the frame itself of The Lord of the Rings as an instance of continuity, it does not explain why he cast the entire narrative as something pieced together from historical sources.
Though we should not interpret Guildford from The Notion Club Papers as an allegory for Tolkien (how he would bristle at the suggestion!), he does shine a particularly illuminating light on the question.
This quote from The Notion Club Papers comes as Guildford is discussing the story that Ramer, another member of the Notion Club, has just finished reading out to the members assembled. Guildford is expressing his displeasure at the story (163). Though he has little problem with the content itself, he takes issue with the frame: a spaceship (presumably transporting the protagonists to the site of the action). He says:
Now that we understand Tolkien’s requirements for a frame (assuming, for the moment, that he would agree with Guildford), we can return to the original frame that piqued our interest: the frame for The Lord of the Rings. Here follows the chain of logic leading to the conclusion that Tolkein could not have opened The Lord of the Rings any other way.
Proposition A. A narrative’s framing device must be internally consistent: if it is a machine, it must be credible qua machine.
Proposition B. Tolkien’s work pertaining to Middle Earth is framed as a body of legend connected to modern England.
Conclusion 1. The frame of The Lord of the Rings must be credible qua legend.
Proposition C. Legends in our world are rarely published on their own, with only author, date, and copyright material; in other words, their framing device is rarely just “book.” Instead, they tend to have prefaces, where the scholar that collected or transcribed or amalgamated the legend(s) explains how they went about collecting their material, among other things.
Conclusion 2. For Tolkien’s frame to be credible qua “legend of modern England,” it must open with a discussion of sources.
To put it more concretely: Tolkien’s “spaceship” is just “legend.” A legend without a discussion of sources violates the laws of legend almost as grievously as a spaceship inverting gravity defies the laws of physics. So to be internally consistent, credible as a framing device, Tolkien must discuss his sources, even if they are imaginary.
So Tolkien’s framing really serves two purposes. Not only is it an extra point of connection reinforcing the link between Middle Earth and modern England, but it is also essential from a literary standpoint, since every story must have a frame, and the frame must be credible qua frame.
Why does Tolkien feel so strongly that the frame must be internally consistent? This is less clear. Perhaps it is because he believes Secondary Belief, the goal of every Secondary World, is a notoriously challenging thing to produce (Tolkien, “On Fairy Stories,” The Tolkien Reader, page 70). If a story does not even have a credible frame, there might be no hope for it to ever produce Secondary Belief. Regardless, The Lord of the Rings could not have opened any other way than by discussing sources.
The short answer is that Tolkien’s overarching purpose in chronicling the history of Middle Earth was to produce “a body of more or less connected legend [...] which [he] could dedicate simply to [...] England, [his] country” (Tolkien, The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, page 144). If the goal from the outset was to create a body of legend for his home country, then it makes sense to connect his legends to the modern world, in this case by implying that written scraps and remnants of the legend were actually discovered in the modern world. Doing so hints at continuity between the stories of Middle Earth and the reality of modern-day England.
But short cuts make long delays, as Pippin points out, and here the short answer only tells half the story (Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, page 98). It’s worth taking the time to investigate more closely, and closely we must, because the search leads us through one of Tolkien’s most obscure works.
Though I suppose we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves. Why is the short answer inadequate in the first place? Really, it only explains why Tolkien might insert continuities between Middle Earth and our world—any continuities. It does not explain why Tolkien chose to use the frame itself of The Lord of the Rings as an instance of continuity, it does not explain why he cast the entire narrative as something pieced together from historical sources.
Though we should not interpret Guildford from The Notion Club Papers as an allegory for Tolkien (how he would bristle at the suggestion!), he does shine a particularly illuminating light on the question.
An author's way of getting to Mars (say) is part of his story of his Mars; and of his universe, as far as that particular tale goes. It's part of the picture, even if it's only in a marginal position; and it may seriously affect all that's inside. (Tolkien, The Notion Club Papers, page 163.)If we can take this utterance at anything approaching face value, it would appear that Tolkien takes the frame of a story very seriously.
This quote from The Notion Club Papers comes as Guildford is discussing the story that Ramer, another member of the Notion Club, has just finished reading out to the members assembled. Guildford is expressing his displeasure at the story (163). Though he has little problem with the content itself, he takes issue with the frame: a spaceship (presumably transporting the protagonists to the site of the action). He says:
I'm not talking about dislike at the moment [...] I'm talking about credibility. I don't like heroic warriors, but I can bear stories about them. I believe they exist, or could. I don't think space-ships do, or could. (Tolkien, The Notion Club Papers, page 163.)The remark seems nothing more than a comical anachronism when read from our present vantage point, but it hides a much deeper insight. Guildford doesn’t take issue with spaceships in general, but rather spaceships that violate the fundamental laws of science:
A gravitation-insulator won't do. Gravity can't be treated like that. It's fundamental. It's a statement by the Universe of where you are in the Universe, and the Universe can't be tricked by a surname with ite stuck on the end, nor by any such abracadabra. (Tolkien, The Notion Club Papers, page 166.)But how can Guildford refuse to admit gravitation-insulators and faster-than-light travel when he accepts magic itself, the waving of a wizard’s wand, as a framing device (167, 168)? To this question he has a ready answer:
Scientific probability need not be concerned at all. But it has to be, if you make your vehicle mechanical. You cannot make a piece of mechanism even sufficiently credible in a tale, if it seems outrageously incredible as a machine to your contemporaries. [...] But I should prefer an old-fashioned wave of a wizard's wand. Or a word of power in Old Solar from an Eldil. [To get to Faerie, nothing] less would suffice: a miracle. (Tolkien, The Notion Club Papers, page 168.)And this is the key. Any method of travel to Faerie is acceptable, so long as it follows its own rules. A spaceship must be credible qua spaceship, because the rules of science apply. On the other hand, if the device is magic, there can be no inner contradiction, because magic is a miracle, in other words, unexplainable. That makes it an acceptable framing device.
Now that we understand Tolkien’s requirements for a frame (assuming, for the moment, that he would agree with Guildford), we can return to the original frame that piqued our interest: the frame for The Lord of the Rings. Here follows the chain of logic leading to the conclusion that Tolkein could not have opened The Lord of the Rings any other way.
Proposition A. A narrative’s framing device must be internally consistent: if it is a machine, it must be credible qua machine.
Proposition B. Tolkien’s work pertaining to Middle Earth is framed as a body of legend connected to modern England.
Conclusion 1. The frame of The Lord of the Rings must be credible qua legend.
Proposition C. Legends in our world are rarely published on their own, with only author, date, and copyright material; in other words, their framing device is rarely just “book.” Instead, they tend to have prefaces, where the scholar that collected or transcribed or amalgamated the legend(s) explains how they went about collecting their material, among other things.
Conclusion 2. For Tolkien’s frame to be credible qua “legend of modern England,” it must open with a discussion of sources.
To put it more concretely: Tolkien’s “spaceship” is just “legend.” A legend without a discussion of sources violates the laws of legend almost as grievously as a spaceship inverting gravity defies the laws of physics. So to be internally consistent, credible as a framing device, Tolkien must discuss his sources, even if they are imaginary.
So Tolkien’s framing really serves two purposes. Not only is it an extra point of connection reinforcing the link between Middle Earth and modern England, but it is also essential from a literary standpoint, since every story must have a frame, and the frame must be credible qua frame.
Why does Tolkien feel so strongly that the frame must be internally consistent? This is less clear. Perhaps it is because he believes Secondary Belief, the goal of every Secondary World, is a notoriously challenging thing to produce (Tolkien, “On Fairy Stories,” The Tolkien Reader, page 70). If a story does not even have a credible frame, there might be no hope for it to ever produce Secondary Belief. Regardless, The Lord of the Rings could not have opened any other way than by discussing sources.
- JS
2 comments:
Legends require scholarly discussion of sources: I had not thought of it quite this way, but you are right! Tolkien creates the fiction of reality by framing his fictions with a scholarly apparatus which functions *as time machine* thanks to the credibility we as readers give to the scholarly apparatus. Is there anything from this perspective that could guarantee that history itself is not legend, if legends can be supported with the same apparatus as history? (An enduring question for historians, but usually coming from the other direction!) RLFB
A clever and interesting take on the frame! I think you are largely correct, but I’m not yet entirely convinced that “The Lord of the Rings could not have opened any other way than by discussing sources.” Your syllogism seems to be as follows: if LotR is framed as a legend, and if legends have sources, Tolkien must use sources. This is logical, but also tautological. We know that Tolkien uses sources already—that should be a premise, and you should perhaps try to argue (rather than premise) that Tolkien is indeed framing his work as a body of legend (directly or indirectly) connected to modern England. Even though that may have been his stated aim at certain points in time and/or implied in the text itself, it doesn’t seem to be so obviously the end result. The frame certainly has both similarities and differences from modern scholarship on legends, or even history, which could be fruitfully addressed. I think there is a good essay to be found here! -LB
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