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Originally Posted by davem
This consequence of this would have been that his Elves & Faeries would be 'Christianised'
This, I suppose, really means that Tolkien didn't write about 'real' (ie genuine - in a 'folkloric' sense) Elves & Faeries at all. But the question I originally asked remains - why change traditional Elves & Faeries so much - to the point where they bear little or no resemblance to the original figures of folklore?
Was his intention to use Faerie for his own ends - make it safe & Christian, remove the 'dangerous' pagan elements & make Faerie a means to 'evangelise' his own people
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I do not think that Tolkien
intentionally had his Elves follow a more Christian moral pattern, but I do think that there is something in the fact that his Elves are somewhat 'bowdlerised' in comparison to folkloric Faeries. I think that they were not intentionally created in that way as this would be too much of an imposition of the Primary World onto his Secondary World creation; the Elves are somewhat exalted beings in Arda, and to have them symbolic of Christian morality would be dangerously close to allegory. But I do think that Tolkien's
own sense of morality, which was itself influenced by his Catholicism (amongst other things), had a strong bearing on how he created the race of the Elves; what he saw as perfection in moral terms would surely have an influence on how this 'high' race lived and behaved.
Faery and Faeries are altogether too tricksy to be subject to any kind of moral code; in Faerie 'right' and 'wrong' as we see them do not exist, and these ideas are even
more clear in Arda, so it is at yet another remove from the traditional Faerie.
It brings to mind the discussion on whether there was a Trickster figure in Middle-earth; it is a world with a clear (or more clear than we have at any rate) moral code, and it would be difficult to fit a morally ambiguous, even
amoral character into that world. Anyway, back to the thorny question of what Tolkien meant here:
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The love of Faery is the love of love: a relationship towards all things. animate and inanimate, which includes love and respect, and removes or modifies a spirit of possession and domination. Without it even plain 'Utility' will in fact become less useful; or will turn to ruthlessness and lead only to mere power, ultimately destructive.
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There is one aspect of Faerie and indeed of love that has not been mentioned and that is sensuality. If the traditional Faerie is
amoral, then there would be no censures surrounding love in all its forms and expressions, and traditional views of Faerie have shown this. The ballad Tam Lin is very dark in tone, describing amoral behaviour; even in the more modern view of Faerie painted by Shakespeare the pleasant atmosphere is still centred on love with a certain amount of trickery and mischief. While the former is sinister, the latter is more playful.
It seems that Tolkien was aiming for neither of these things in his own version of Faerie. Certainly the more sensual elements of Faerie were altogether too dark and unpredicatable for the Elves, at least for the majority of them. Can we imagine Galadriel cavorting with wild drunken abandon with the other Elves in Lothlorien? No. Could we see Elrond with a string of lovers? No. Not if we are sticking to what Tolkien wrote anyway.
I do wonder if something of that wildness still lingers in ideas such as 'dark elves' though? Certainly Eol has little regard for the 'morals' of the Noldor; he only seeks pleasure, and I have to admit I feel quite shaken when he is killed, me being the product of a more morally ambiguous world. It might be fun to try and find these elements in his work.