[Bêthberry]

Ah, davem, a nice idea, to consider Pauline Bayne's illustrations. Alas I read Smith sans illustrations, although I have been perusing covers for Lewis' Narnia lately. But your idea makes me think of Tolkien's comment (somewhere in the Letters, although I cannot find it now) where he descries drama as a rightful form for presenting LotR. I think his reasoning was that, in creating such a specific representation, drama limits the imagination. Yet paintings he excluded from this. I suppose it had to do with the physicality of the presence in drama. Yet clearly his writing stimulated so many artists and their work, as you argue here, further stimulates readers' enjoyment.

Findegil I think you do well to point out that some readers do not belong to either of the “Canonicity Camps”, and I am very intrigued by the way you apply this notion of “reading beyond the text” as a key form of inspiration, particularly to The Silm in its sparsely detailed landscape and its suggestively undeveloped plotlines.

Frankly, a lack of landscape description has never of itself prompted me to imagine terrain or get more involved in a story. For example, when I read Oedipus, I am not inspired to imagine what the road looked like where he killed his father; I am more intrigued by contemplating this primal act of “road rage” and its implication for the tragic resolution of the play. Perhaps this is what intrigues you about The Silm, that its plots seem to proliferate like rabbits? It certainly has great potential to generate role playing game plots!

I myself am intrigued by, for instance, how the Ainulindalë and the Valaquenta seem to echo the two versions of creation given in Genesis and how the valar ressemble (or not) the ancient gods of the Greek pantheon. This to me is the enjoyment of literary archeology.

But I don’t want to engage in a Silm versus Smith battle of the monster tales, because even if one is bigger than the other, well, hierarchies of size don’t always prove worth. I do, however, want to consider your statement about Smith in some detail.

Smith as a stand-alone work does work on me with the story it reveals - nothing more but also nothing less. The story it self is greatly moving, but it is a closed cycle or better a finished tale. As in any good fiction of that kind a reader can identify with the protagonist at least to some degree. But there is not much going beyond the point when you have read the end of the tale.

Surely Smith is not quite as closed as you imply? This thread demonstrates that there are at least three ways in which the tale is not closed.

First, littlemanpoet has wondered if these mariners Smith meets come out of the tale of the Numenorians, thus providing the kind of ‘going beyond’ which, as I understand it, you say is your prime delight in The Silm.

Second, Smith has been suggested to be almost an allegory of Tolkien’s life as a writer of fantasy. What causes readers to generate from this tale an authorial biography? (And, I would ask, if this biographical imperative does represent Tolkien’s life, what does this tell us about his thoughts of Christopher? Did Tolkien not believe his son, his literary heir and the man responsible for the publishing of The Silm, had entry to Faerie?)

Third, Aiwendil has suggested that Smith provides a treatise on fairey such that it suggests requirements for a fantasy story, requirements that Smith itself does not satisfy. The fact that Aiwendil has not fully articulated what he thinks these requirements are does not disprove his idea that this story generates literary theory.

Oh, and there is a fourth, Helen’s idea of seeking for mystery and transcendence in the character’s trespass. And--five!--Lalwendë suggests that Arda and faerie are different aspects of the same thing—what is this thing?

So, it seems to me that Smith is able to generate thought and idea as well as The Silm does. Perhaps what we need to clarify is what do we mean by a closed text and by going beyond a text?