tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5746173806126403959.post6305855928114349370..comments2023-11-07T06:20:12.181-08:00Comments on Tolkien: Medieval and Modern: Who Are Fairy Stories Written For? Come, Tom Bombadil, for our need is near us!"Tolkien: Medieval and Modern"http://www.blogger.com/profile/04348913969813157482noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5746173806126403959.post-65082404058925750052014-06-05T02:35:06.926-07:002014-06-05T02:35:06.926-07:00Hi KK,
This is a very interesting post about the ...Hi KK, <br />This is a very interesting post about the purpose of fairy-stories. I’m curious as to why you feel Tolkien is claiming that everyone needs fairy-stories. I would say that he is making a case for the merits of fairy-stories, and also makes a strong case for the merits of a sub-creator who can help readers achieve “literary belief,” (“On Fairy-Stories, p.60). In fact, I think what you bring up about Tom Bombadil highlights this—Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin are enchanted by Bombadil. However, he also admits that fairy-stories are not everyone’s cup of tea: “But in fact only some children, and some adults, have any special taste for them [fairy-stories]…” (p.58). Moreover, are fairy-stories the only gateways into seeing the true primary reality? <br />~ERGG<br />"Tolkien: Medieval and Modern"https://www.blogger.com/profile/04348913969813157482noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5746173806126403959.post-39874020227258808262014-05-14T19:28:57.280-07:002014-05-14T19:28:57.280-07:00Hope, you bring up a good point. It's hard to...Hope, you bring up a good point. It's hard to feel that happily-ever-after fairy stories connect to "real life." I'm not sure if Tolkien thinks there is a difference between myths and fairy stories, but for the sake of argument, let's assume that, just as myths are thought to be based on history long past, so are some fairy stories. Through the words of his characters, Tolkien says that myths are a smoothed-over version of ancient history. We really do tend to see history as a series of discrete events with clear beginnings and ends--a war starts on a certain day, one side wins on a certain day and lives happily ever after, the other side loses and is completely ruined. That is how history is often taught. This is not really so different from the simplicity of happily-ever-after fairy stories. We experience our own lives as far more complex, but we often don't see history that way, so a happily-ever-after ending is really not so disconnected from the primary reality.<br /><br />Anna MAnnahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14014008954990524308noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5746173806126403959.post-53119981120602719422014-04-06T20:01:04.566-07:002014-04-06T20:01:04.566-07:00Hi KK,
Thanks for reviewing the different ways th...Hi KK, <br />Thanks for reviewing the different ways that Tolkien explains fairy stories are necessary. I think it is interesting how Tolkien wrote (and sent the stories to Christopher) in times of war and in great trials, and how, as you wrote, Tolkien found the stories a consolation or an escape in times of great strife. <br /><br />One thing however that has been confusing me a little bit is Tolkien’s idea of eucatastrophe. Sometimes when I reach the end of a fairy story, I am frustrated by how nicely all the loose ends are tied up and how, even if you have a good cry when Frodo isn’t ever really healed, there still is that happiness and general feeling that everything ended up all right. As Tolkien supports, the stories give an escape andh hope. However, I have sometimes found that unsatisfying because life doesn’t get tied up nicely and clearly. Do you think that ending the stories in a clean way can still provide us a satisfying hope for real life? As I read Radegundus/Robert the Green’s comment, one thing that occurred to me, is that possibly reading how the Hobbit’s fit in to the “great story” can be the consolation in our lives. Although we may find our lives messy, we can read fairy stories and know that things do work out (even if the character’s living in the story themselves don’t fully realize that). How do you think that fairy stories can help to address the messiness and non-eucatastrophe feelings of our lives? <br />Hope<br />Hope https://www.blogger.com/profile/01134007388101173854noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5746173806126403959.post-86818506559429220132014-04-04T00:11:43.117-07:002014-04-04T00:11:43.117-07:00KK,
Thanks for your thoughts. You lead us on a pat...KK,<br />Thanks for your thoughts. You lead us on a path, from the idea that Tolkien wrote fairy stories for children, as might be expected, to the idea that such stories are for an audience of adults also, who need ‘recovery, escape, and consolation,’ and finally “for everyone [and] are needed by everyone.” In this, I think you nicely move step by step from the common notion of fairy stories (being only for children, which Tolkien combated) to the universal audience and need for such flights. You wrote:<br />“So perhaps fairy stories are for those who need recovery, escape, and consolation and also for everyone, to help us all see, like the Hobbits, how small we really are in the Great Story.” <br />(Likewise: “Each person battles through tough times at some point, and those people do need escape, recovery, and consolation, but they are not the only ones. We all must at some point see the greater story around beyond our own individual primary reality – we must see the true primary reality!”)<br /><br />But I am curious. How do you think these three benefits of Faërie (recovery, escape, and consolation) relate to the Hobbits’ humble realization of themselves in the ‘Great Story.’ By your phrasing, one might seem that escape, recovery, and consolation are distinct from that realization. Is that so? Or are they related to each other? Do you not also think that recovery, escape, and consolation might be part of how one finds oneself within the Greater Story? If so, how would that work?<br /><br />Finally, I find Carpenter’s quote highly interesting: “Always I had the sense of recording what was already “there,” somewhere: not of “inventing.” How does this ‘recording what was there’ aspect fit with Tolkien’s description of the inventional imagination? How can the fantasy story-teller at once and the same time be an imaginative inventor as well as a ‘recorder of what is already there’?<br /><br />~Radegundus/Robert the GreenUnknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16340002157728895236noreply@blogger.com