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Originally Posted by Beanamir of Gondor
Should I meta-analyze, or should I pretend that the histories are real facts, and that only Tolkien's approach to them is literature?
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Originally Posted by Nogrod
Pick an appropriate "French" theory of literature (Lacan, Deleuze, Derrida, Irigaray) and make it your own...
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A great idea by Nogrod, by why not take it one step further? I too was an English major/History minor (or would that be miner?), but at the time I graduated one did not use Tolkien as material for a thesis (just as there are reasons one can't use him now in many schools, but for completely different reasons; in either case it all boils down to snobbery).
If one were to propose that Tolkien based his literature on actual history (as a bard or chronicler, let's say), would it be presumptuous to systematize his histories based on the theories of a great historian? It would be interesting to see how Tolkien's pseudo-history would compare to the conventions espoused by Burkhardt, Huizinga, Michelet or Pirenne (medieval and renaissance history being my specialization). Perhaps Arnold Toynbee with his ideas concerning the growth and disintegration of Civilizations may be appropriate in this case.
Just a thought that intrigued me.