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Originally Posted by davem
Of course his personal experiences & beliefs would have shaped his fiction. Moorcock & Pullman miss the essential point that Tolkien could not have written in any other style or about any other subject in any other way. Their comments not only attempt to invalidate his work, but to invalidate his life & experiences as well. In short, what both are saying is that he should have shut the hell up, that if his life & his experiences meant he could only write what he did, he shouldn't have written anything at all.
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I don't think they are saying this, not Moorcock at least. Apparently, he met both Tolkien and Lewis in person and liked them as people.
What I think Moorcock is reacting to--and I agree with
Sauce here that they have a right to express their opinion--is the depiction of fantasy as an escapist form of literature that glories a past. There are others who, when faced with the kind of experiences Tolkien's generation faced, did not look back but envisioned a different future. I don't think Moorcock is invalidating Tolkien's experiences so much as saying something about England.
I note that Moorcock no longer lives in England. He moved to Texas and apparently is thinking of dividing his time in France as well. He clearly has a frustration with what he perceives as the direction of English culture and society and I suspect that he feels Tolkien et al part of this. I really want to read Mervyn Peake now and compare him to Tolkien, to see if there is this juxtapostion which Moorcock suggests.
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Originally Posted by Sauce
They both appear to take the approach that there is a particular way to write a fantasy/SF novel, namely the approach that each of them adopts. That assumes that all readers are looking (or should be looking) for the same thing in a novel, a stance with which I fundamentally disagree.
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This is the point where I also tend to part company with Moorcock. The discussion of what fantasy is or what do readers of fantasy seek is interesting, I think, but like all literary manifestos, can overstate the case or overstep boundaries. I think it is refreshing to have one's sometimes unconscious or unexamined habits questioned and challenged. And even our conscious thoughts. I find absolute adoration of Tolkien--or of any writer--tedious and counterproductive in terms of helping me appreciate the writer.