Fordim wrote:
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....then to pretend that we can somehow make the leap from our own individual responses to some sort of universal application to all people (“I am enchanted by the text’s access to Faerie, so that’s what enchants everyone else”; “I am enchanted by the beautiful story, so that’s what enchants everyone else”; “I enchant myself by accepting the text, so that’s what everyone else must do to be enchanted as well”).
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There is a fourth option, and that is to take the eucatastrophe and run. Perhaps in some cases that is the wisest choice.
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So, what, from this perspective, would constitute 'canon'? If both Smith & Roverandom are windows onto Faerie (& the 'Little Kingdom' of Giles, we must also suppose), & if the inhabitants of Faerie even speak to us, & show us visions of their world, then the precise limits & definitions fade & vanish, & we are left with enchantment.
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Sounds good to me.
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Would Tolkien have thought 'canon' more important than this enchantment - probably not by the time he came to write Smith.
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I doubt he would have abandoned the cohesiveness that he was seeking for Middle-Earth (a magnificent road into Faerie) just because he had found and described two other roads (Roverandom, Smith.) I think he still pressed towards Eucatastrophe, that moment of truth shining through his myth(s) to the one true myth.
Note that this application of myth presupposes the truth of the One True Myth. If one cannot assume that truth, then what point does eucatastrophe have according to Tolkien?
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Perhaps in Smith Tolkien was dismantling his 'canon' & throwing open a 'window' to let in the air of another world, having realised that his 'Tree', the Legendarium which he had worked on all his life was just one tree in the forest of Faerie that Smith wandered in.
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To extend your metaphor, I don't think he had to destroy or even neglect his Legendarium-Tree before he could point to the next tree and describe that too. He simply had to shift his focus.
I don't see that he dismantled his M-E Legendarium (or canon) at all.