Narn i Chîn Húrin 3: The End of the Narn

[Findegil]

Posted by Aaront596:

Do we have access to this draft?

No. All we have is given in my posting no 14 above. But my speaking was only theoretical. If this passages contains some unclear events than that is not our fault but Tolkiens we should leave it at that.

But for my understanding there is just an implicit movement and nothing more. To make my point clear I will give a sequence of events as I see it:

- Túrin and Hunthor cross the Taeglin.
- They climb halfe way up the cliff.
- They decied to stay were they are and cling to the trees of the cliff over night.
- Túrin dreams of clinging to a tree.
- When Glaurung moves in the morning they have to climb down first. This movement is implicit, since
- Túrin 'clambered along the water-edge to come beneath him [Glaurung]')
- Hunthor is slain by a stone, when they come under Glaurung
- Túrin climbs the cliff and slaughters Glaurung

This is very near to the draft as Christopher Tolkien describes it. Only that in the draft Túrin and Hunthor go all the way up to the edge of the cliff.

Now Christopher Tolkien does say to this:

It seems then that the final story carries an unneeded trait from the previous draft.

He thinks that:

... in the revised story there was no need for them to cling: they could and surely would have descended to the bottom and waited there.

Up to this point he is right but I am not sure that his next interpretation is the only possible one:

In fact, this is what they did: it is said in the final text (Unfinished Tales, p. 134) that they were not standing in Glaurung's path and that Túrin 'clambered along the water-edge to come beneath him'.

For me this is an contradiction: Either the final story 'carries an unneeded trait' since Túrin clings to the cliff through the night with out need or 'in fact,' 'descended to the bottom and waited there' 'is what they did'.
Christopher Tolkien takes the decision 'to give it [the text] coherence' by skipping the implicit movement down the cliff in the morning. Therefore Túrin and Hunthor are not 'standing' but 'were' in Glaurungs pass and they do not 'clambered along the water-edge' but 'along the cliff'.

Thus Christopher Tolkien does change the sequence of events to:
- Túrin and Hunthor cross the Taeglin.
- They climb half way up the cliff.
- They decide to stay were they are and cling to the trees of the cliff over night.
- Túrin dreams of clinging to a tree.
- When Glaurung moves in the morning they 'clambered along the cliff to come beneath him [Glaurung]')
- Hunthor is slain by a stone, when they come under Glaurung
- Túrin climbs to the cliffs edge and slaughters Glaurung

The question is now for me: Do we follow Christhopher Tolkiens lead here or do we take JRR Tolkiens text as he left it?

Respectfully
Findegil