The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum - View Single Post - Will a "definitive" version of The Silmarillion ever be released?

**lindil** · 03-02-2012, 08:20 AM

Galin I will respectfully disagree.

IF JRRT was involved in Sub-creation [see On Faery Stories] then his 'experiments' in various drafts can [on at least one level] be seen as a the universe trying to understand itself, this is vastly deeper and more significant than a fiction writer sitting down and using cliche formula coming up with a collection of cliche events.

This too me is why JRRT is so important and deep, he writing, living and breathing from a deep space and I put his writings [and many drafts] in the same category of relevance as Jung, Gurdjieff and a hand-full of others. Of more modern writers, J.Crowley's 'little, big' and T. Williams Otherland and War of the Flowers approach, and even the Potter series, approach the level of truth whereby their internal fabric can usefully mirror to us TRUTH on amny levels. As above - so below.

Now that being said, studying it all from the external fictional, he wrote this stuff in the 1910's-70's is ALSO a way of understanding it - just a limited and to me comparitvely shallow mine to look for jewels and ore, compared to the mythological and even spiritual levels he attained. This to me is the key as to why JRRT was author of the century, he tapped something far deeper than himself, and like a true Christian followed where he was led.

03-02-2012, 08:20 AM	#16
lindil Seeker of the Straight Path Join Date: Jul 2000 Location: a hidden fastness in Big Valley nor cal Posts: 1,680	Galin I will respectfully disagree. IF JRRT was involved in Sub-creation [see On Faery Stories] then his 'experiments' in various drafts can [on at least one level] be seen as a the universe trying to understand itself, this is vastly deeper and more significant than a fiction writer sitting down and using cliche formula coming up with a collection of cliche events. This too me is why JRRT is so important and deep, he writing, living and breathing from a deep space and I put his writings [and many drafts] in the same category of relevance as Jung, Gurdjieff and a hand-full of others. Of more modern writers, J.Crowley's 'little, big' and T. Williams Otherland and War of the Flowers approach, and even the Potter series, approach the level of truth whereby their internal fabric can usefully mirror to us TRUTH on amny levels. As above - so below. Now that being said, studying it all from the external fictional, he wrote this stuff in the 1910's-70's is ALSO a way of understanding it - just a limited and to me comparitvely shallow mine to look for jewels and ore, compared to the mythological and even spiritual levels he attained. This to me is the key as to why JRRT was author of the century, he tapped something far deeper than himself, and like a true Christian followed where he was led. __________________ The dwindling Men of the West would often sit up late into the night exchanging lore & wisdom such as they still possessed that they should not fall back into the mean estate of those who never knew or indeed rebelled against the Light.