Quote:
|
Originally Posted by The Saucepan Man
Davem, I think that most of us would agree that Tolkien did not intend LotR to be an allegory of WW2. Does that assist us (either individually or as an 'intepretive community') in our understanding of LotR? Well, yes. But only to the extent that we take account of authorial intention. And whether or not we do so is down to us (individually or collectively) as readers.
|
I'm focussing on the specific example of 'LotR as an allegory of WW2' in order to explore the idea of seeing it as an allegory generally. Too many people seem to take the approach 'Well, ok, I accept its not an allegory of 'X' (WW2) but I'm pretty sure its an allegory of 'Y' (fill in the blank).
You seem to be suggesting that this 'authorial intention' is something that can be divorced from the work itself - which is another way of denying the author's presence in the work. The work only exists because of the 'Author's intention' that it should. It is not an objective collection of statements but a work of
Art. And so it must be taken. The 'Tower' of the Beowulf essay analogy/allegory was not a pile of stones which people who came upon it could take for what they wanted. It was a
Tower, built with the express intention on the builder's part that he could look out on the Sea. Of course, others could come along, climb it & look at other things, or even (as in the analogy/allegory) demolish it to find out where the stones of which it was built originated.
If they climb it & look at other things they are not using it for the purpose for which it was built. And however vociferous (& honest) they may be in their claims that it was built to 'look at the stars' or so the builder could have a quiet spot to read in, or that it was a castle (& thence to proceed to invent a 'history' for the local area in which there were assaults by a powerful enemy), etc, they would be
wrong. No if, buts, or two ways about it. All the 'explanations' they come up with would be cases of 'applicability', not allegory, & they certainly wouldn't be 'equally valid' alongside the reason explicitly stated by the man who built the thing. If he says 'I built that Tower in order to look out on the Sea' (& if, climbing that tower one
could see the Sea from its top) then I think we have to accept that it was built for the reason the man gives, & not try & impute other, more 'nefarious' reasons to him, accuse him of trying to cover up his real motives, or of changing his mind about its purpose after he had built it.
'Its a Tower I built in order that I could look out on the Sea, not a defensive structure.' is a clear enough statement, provable by experiment, & I think we should take his word for it unless we can prove him wrong. If the Tower can be made to serve another purpose by someone else, fine, but they would not be using the Tower for the purpose for which it was built - & they should admit that, & not claim that they know the 'real' intention behind it.
The reader's interpretation is merely what they do with the book. All you seem to be doing is restating Tolkien's own position. It isn't an allegory of WW2 (or anything else) but the reader is free to find whatever meaning or relevance they can, or wish to, in it. The thing about your approach though is that it makes the later use of the 'Tower' by someone using it (or seeing it) as a castle equal to to that of the builder - it says that the builder (or writer) is no more important than the user (or reader). This, to my mind is wrong, if for no other reason than it doesn't show sufficient respect to the builder/writer. We are not
equal creators of Middle earth with Tolkien. He gives, we recieve. Gratitude & respect, if nothing else, should
require us to take account of 'authorial intention', & to give that greater weight than we give to our own interpretation - even put aside our own interpretation infavour of his stated intention.