'Spun Candy' anyone?

[davem]

Originally Posted by Bb

I don't think it is quite that easy to dismiss an 'agenda' in Tolkien, although I would call it a perspective.

Perspective is inevitable. But I think Tolkien's perspective is that change is inevitable, yet it is change away from perfection (it is an 'Elvish' perspective as Flieger has pointed out). The implication is that that is a tragic but inevitable situation. Tolkien accepts that change is unavoidable but he doesn't like it. He will not entirely reject the possibility that there is hope, that the future will bring good things, but he won't reject the past as a time of ignorant savagery, or of superstition which we have grown out of & are now free to move on to bigger & better things.

It seems to me that both Moorcock & Pullman do see the past in that light & their message is that the future can be made better than the past, that, in fact there is an 'evolutionary trend' towards things improving – if we can just break free of the past. In this sense, their perspective is 'Mannish' & Tolkien's Elvishness is holding fantasy (& humanity perhaps) back.

I think a conflict is inevitable but I'm not sure Moorcock & Pullman actually understand the true nature of the conflict, that both sides reflect aspects of human state or, most importantly, that Tolkien's work is actually an analysis/exploration of that very conflict within the human psyche.