Why do you read HoME? - The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum

Faramir Jones · 06-02-2015, 05:32 AM

You started a good thread, Mithadan. I certainly agree with your reasons that HoME is 'difficult. Some of it is archaic. It is certainly highly redundant. It is long. Many would argue that it is overly scholarly and inaccessible'. But I agree with Kuruharan in that they are part of the reason why I read it. I'm one of the people who has bought all 13 volumes, the last being the general index.

I understand you, Inziladun, when you say you are uneasy in knowing 'too much about how the sausage is made', although I would agree with Pitchwife when the latter says 'For me, a poem or novel doesn't lose its appeal by studying how it does its job, I'd rather say I learn to appreciate it on an additional level'.

I agree with you, Aiwendil, in that I also have at times picked out the parts that are 'great writing', and have ignored Christopher Tolkien's excellent commentaries.

The volumes I bought in the order of 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 12, 10, 9, 11, 2, 6, 8 and 13.

I didn't, however, read them in that order. I read Volume 1 much later, after I began to read the others. I was particularly entranced with the verses in Volume 3, and laughed at C. S. Lewis' 'criticism' of The Lay of Leithien.

Also, I wanted to know about the story of the Appendices in LotR, as well as the dropped last chapter, all revealed in Volumes 12 and 9. There were also the issues in Volume 10 of the evil of Morgoth, the laws of marriage among the Elves (which had political implications), and Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth, which was very moving. There was then The Wanderings of Húrin, in Volume 11, followed by filling in the corners.

Looking back, I first wanted to read the books to find out some of the background to what I had already read, particuarly in The Silmarillion. Christopher Tolkien had made me aware of the work his father had left unfinished, of which I had had a taste in Unfinished Tales; so I wanted to know the unfinished pieces themselves, and the context of the life of their author from which they emerged, then the efforts by his heir to produce a coherent narrative.

I then realised, before I got to the end, and before Christopher Tolkien mentioned it, that my going through the volumes (in my own particular order) was a disorderly reading of a biography of Tolkien himself. It made me appreciate how he was able to produce (and in certain cases publish) so much work against a background of a career and raising a family.

In the last number of years, I've been writing on Tolkien, so have been using HoME as a source of research materials, both the pieces inside themselves and CT's commentaries on them. I've also been rereading some pieces for the sheer enjoyment of doing so.

jallanite · 06-02-2015, 08:32 PM

HoME was for me a must-read. I didn’t like The Silmarillion much when it first came out, but the Book of Lost Tales, the first two volumes of the HoME series, gave me much of what I then felt I was missing in The Silmarillion.

The writing was fuller and more detailed and more poetic, with even bits of real poetry, at least more than in the published Silmarillion. That it was more archaic in style did not bother me at all. I was used to reading archaic prose, such as Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte Darthur, the fantasy novels of William Morris, the fantasy novels of William Hope Hodgson, and various other works, so that archaic English hardly registered with me as being archaic.

I felt that Christopher Tolkien ought to have merged the text of the Book of Lost Tales into the published Silmarillion.

Years later I realized why this was impossible, at least for someone so fixed on putting out the work of his father and only the work of his father with no additions or changes. The very names no longer fitted. The Gnomish language used for the seven names of the city of Gondolin no longer fitted with Sindarin as revised. True, readers would mostly not pick up on such apparent ephemera, but much of the charm of Tolkien’s work is the feeling that came through that Tolkien had cared deeply about such apparent ephemera. That it did matter.

So what we have is what is possible: the record of what Tolkien thought years before The Silmarillion was published, somethling that Christopher Tolkien himself did not think was possible, until he found himself forced to defend the position that the published Silmarillion was indeed mainly his father’s work and not mainly something quickly cobbled together by himself and an assistant, really their invention.

And HoME was an immense publishing success. Originally published only in hard-cover only for hoped-for specialists, it proved popular enough to unexpectedly jump into paperback and to reach twelve volumes, to stay in print and stay in print. In 2000–01, the twelve volumes were republished in three limited edition omnibus volumes. Non-deluxe editions of the three volumes were published in 2002.

The HoME series seems to me to have been possibly more of a publishing success than most fantasy books.

Kuruharan · 06-03-2015, 01:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jallanite

The HoME series seems to me to have been possibly more of a publishing success than most fantasy books.

This is either high praise for the quality of Tolkien's early work and ruminations or a stinging condemnation of the fantasy out there.

Or maybe it says more about us the fans...

mark12_30 · 06-04-2015, 05:18 AM

In the early seventies I had the psychedelically-bordered map of Middle-Earth on my wall, and I used to gaze with great longing at the Ered Luin. There was an elvish air about them, sketched, hinted at, remote and unknown and wreathed in mystery.

I've collected most if not all of HoME, and have opened each book, and read a fair amount if not all of most of them. But the tale (and poem) I return to again and again is The Cottage of Lost Play. There is an innocence and mystery about it, and about Kortirion; a dreamy longing, sensucht, what could be, like the misty Ered Luin on the far western edge of the map. It is that that I love the most about Tolkien. And when LOTR feels too finished and packaged and done, and I want the mystery and the desire again, I can go to the cottage by the shore, or to Kortirion, for the hint of something ancient and filled with longing

Bêthberry · 06-04-2015, 09:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mark12_30

In the early seventies I had the psychedelically-bordered map of Middle-Earth on my wall, and I used to gaze with great longing at the Ered Luin. There was an elvish air about them, sketched, hinted at, remote and unknown and wreathed in mystery.

I've collected most if not all of HoME, and have opened each book, and read a fair amount if not all of most of them. But the tale (and poem) I return to again and again is The Cottage of Lost Play. There is an innocence and mystery about it, and about Kortirion; a dreamy longing, sensucht, what could be, like the misty Ered Luin on the far western edge of the map. It is that that I love the most about Tolkien. And when LOTR feels too finished and packaged and done, and I want the mystery and the desire again, I can go to the cottage by the shore, or to Kortirion, for the hint of something ancient and filled with longing

Mark's comment here hits it right for me as well. BoLT 1 and 2 are fascinating reads for me. Although I've read the scholarly apparatus, I usually just skip it to enjoy Tolkien Sr's storytelling.

I've dipped in and out of the other volumes, some I haven't read yet, but largely the attraction of HoMe to me is either the enjoyment of Tolkien's early writing or the acquisition of context/information to help understand the other texts. It really is a privilege and a joy to be able to see how Tolkien's writing was created.

Inziladun · 06-04-2015, 10:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

I've dipped in and out of the other volumes, some I haven't read yet, but largely the attraction of HoMe to me is either the enjoyment of Tolkien's early writing or the acquisition of context/information to help understand the other texts. It really is a privilege and a joy to be able to see how Tolkien's writing was created.

I don't want to leave the impression that I'm totally opposed to reading HOME.

Like Bêth, what I have read (mostly regarding, as I said before, the writing of LOTR), has shed some light on that work, and allowed me to see some parts of the finished product in a new light.

Perhaps my fear of falling prey to Gandalf's warning about not "breaking a thing to find out what it is" is groundless, and one day I'll delve into the writing histories more deeply.

jallanite · 06-04-2015, 04:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kuruharan

This is either high praise for the quality of Tolkien's early work and ruminations or a stinging condemnation of the fantasy out there.

Or maybe it says more about us the fans...

It was not intended to say any of those things. I don’t know how to find out exactly how much volumes of the HoME series have sold compared to other books. But indication of high sales alone would not impress me. I am not much impressed by such statistics.

I have read many best-sellers and many obscure items and have not found myself pushed to read more best-sellers because they were, to my taste, generally superior to the other works. I read what I think will please me, which is not necessarily what will please others.

I liked the HoME series, and that was sufficient reason to read them, regardless of what others might think. I do not particularly like, as examples, writing by Terry Pratchett and Robert Jordan. I do like, mostly, writing by Neil Gaiman and the new novel by Eowyn Ivey, to name some popular works. I loathed Star Trek. I loved Doctor Who and Babylon 5. I loved Planet Toilex, not mentioned now anywhere on the Web, save in this post. I also loved the non-mentioned television series “The River Margin” and the barely remembered series “It’s A Man’s World” (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_...28TV_series%29 ).

In short, I like what I like, and think it fortunate for me when a forum turns up devoted to one of my interests and when a series of books that I happen to like has proved as popular as the HoME series has. It does not surprise me that most of my individual other likes are not shared, or that most individual other likes and dislikes of others on this forums are likewise mostly not shared with others.

Kuruharan · 06-04-2015, 07:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jallanite

It was not intended to say any of those things. I don’t know how to find out exactly how much volumes of the HoME series have sold compared to other books. But indication of high sales alone would not impress me. I am not much impressed by such statistics.

I have read many best-sellers and many obscure items and have not found myself pushed to read more best-sellers because they were, to my taste, generally superior to the other works. I read what I think will please me, which is not necessarily what will please others.

I was being semi-facetious and hold to similar principles myself.

However, just to explore the idea, if something is valuable intrinsically but nobody knows about it...is it valuable? Tree in the forest type of question I suppose.

I am reminded of the part in Candide where during his stay in Paris Candide dined with The Man of Taste who had written a play that had never been outside of the bookseller's shop but Candide was quite taken with him.

William Cloud Hicklin · 06-10-2015, 09:45 AM

In my case it was simple, although I would have snapped up the BoLT anyway, being enamored of Sil and UT: I had had, for years, a burning desire to read the original Fall of Gondolin. The news that it would see print was a frubjous day.

Orphalesion · 07-08-2015, 06:39 AM

My favourite part is the Shibboleth of Feanor, with all it's little tidbits about the various members of house Finwe.

And I absolutely adore the "Round World" version of the mythology. I wish Tolkien would have been able to come up with some solution to the problems it would cause with the rest of the Mythology and properly implement it.

06-02-2015, 05:32 AM	#1
Faramir Jones Ghost Prince of Cardolan Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: Lonely Isle Posts: 706	My own views You started a good thread, Mithadan. I certainly agree with your reasons that HoME is 'difficult. Some of it is archaic. It is certainly highly redundant. It is long. Many would argue that it is overly scholarly and inaccessible'. But I agree with Kuruharan in that they are part of the reason why I read it. I'm one of the people who has bought all 13 volumes, the last being the general index. I understand you, Inziladun, when you say you are uneasy in knowing 'too much about how the sausage is made', although I would agree with Pitchwife when the latter says 'For me, a poem or novel doesn't lose its appeal by studying how it does its job, I'd rather say I learn to appreciate it on an additional level'. I agree with you, Aiwendil, in that I also have at times picked out the parts that are 'great writing', and have ignored Christopher Tolkien's excellent commentaries. The volumes I bought in the order of 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 12, 10, 9, 11, 2, 6, 8 and 13. I didn't, however, read them in that order. I read Volume 1 much later, after I began to read the others. I was particularly entranced with the verses in Volume 3, and laughed at C. S. Lewis' 'criticism' of The Lay of Leithien. Also, I wanted to know about the story of the Appendices in LotR, as well as the dropped last chapter, all revealed in Volumes 12 and 9. There were also the issues in Volume 10 of the evil of Morgoth, the laws of marriage among the Elves (which had political implications), and Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth, which was very moving. There was then The Wanderings of Húrin, in Volume 11, followed by filling in the corners. Looking back, I first wanted to read the books to find out some of the background to what I had already read, particuarly in The Silmarillion. Christopher Tolkien had made me aware of the work his father had left unfinished, of which I had had a taste in Unfinished Tales; so I wanted to know the unfinished pieces themselves, and the context of the life of their author from which they emerged, then the efforts by his heir to produce a coherent narrative. I then realised, before I got to the end, and before Christopher Tolkien mentioned it, that my going through the volumes (in my own particular order) was a disorderly reading of a biography of Tolkien himself. It made me appreciate how he was able to produce (and in certain cases publish) so much work against a background of a career and raising a family. In the last number of years, I've been writing on Tolkien, so have been using HoME as a source of research materials, both the pieces inside themselves and CT's commentaries on them. I've also been rereading some pieces for the sheer enjoyment of doing so.

06-04-2015, 05:18 AM	#4
mark12_30 Stormdancer of Doom Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Elvish singing is not a thing to miss, in June under the stars Posts: 4,349	In the early seventies I had the psychedelically-bordered map of Middle-Earth on my wall, and I used to gaze with great longing at the Ered Luin. There was an elvish air about them, sketched, hinted at, remote and unknown and wreathed in mystery. I've collected most if not all of HoME, and have opened each book, and read a fair amount if not all of most of them. But the tale (and poem) I return to again and again is The Cottage of Lost Play. There is an innocence and mystery about it, and about Kortirion; a dreamy longing, sensucht, what could be, like the misty Ered Luin on the far western edge of the map. It is that that I love the most about Tolkien. And when LOTR feels too finished and packaged and done, and I want the mystery and the desire again, I can go to the cottage by the shore, or to Kortirion, for the hint of something ancient and filled with longing __________________ ...down to the water to see the elves dance and sing upon the midsummer's eve. Last edited by mark12_30; 06-04-2015 at 05:25 AM.

06-10-2015, 09:45 AM	#9
William Cloud Hicklin Loremaster of Annúminas Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 2,330	In my case it was simple, although I would have snapped up the BoLT anyway, being enamored of Sil and UT: I had had, for years, a burning desire to read the original Fall of Gondolin. The news that it would see print was a frubjous day. __________________ The entire plot of The Lord of the Rings could be said to turn on what Sauron didn’t know, and when he didn’t know it.

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06-02-2015, 08:32 PM	#2
jallanite Shade of Carn Dûm Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: Toronto Posts: 479	HoME was for me a must-read. I didn’t like The Silmarillion much when it first came out, but the Book of Lost Tales, the first two volumes of the HoME series, gave me much of what I then felt I was missing in The Silmarillion. The writing was fuller and more detailed and more poetic, with even bits of real poetry, at least more than in the published Silmarillion. That it was more archaic in style did not bother me at all. I was used to reading archaic prose, such as Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte Darthur, the fantasy novels of William Morris, the fantasy novels of William Hope Hodgson, and various other works, so that archaic English hardly registered with me as being archaic. I felt that Christopher Tolkien ought to have merged the text of the Book of Lost Tales into the published Silmarillion. Years later I realized why this was impossible, at least for someone so fixed on putting out the work of his father and only the work of his father with no additions or changes. The very names no longer fitted. The Gnomish language used for the seven names of the city of Gondolin no longer fitted with Sindarin as revised. True, readers would mostly not pick up on such apparent ephemera, but much of the charm of Tolkien’s work is the feeling that came through that Tolkien had cared deeply about such apparent ephemera. That it did matter. So what we have is what is possible: the record of what Tolkien thought years before The Silmarillion was published, somethling that Christopher Tolkien himself did not think was possible, until he found himself forced to defend the position that the published Silmarillion was indeed mainly his father’s work and not mainly something quickly cobbled together by himself and an assistant, really their invention. And HoME was an immense publishing success. Originally published only in hard-cover only for hoped-for specialists, it proved popular enough to unexpectedly jump into paperback and to reach twelve volumes, to stay in print and stay in print. In 2000–01, the twelve volumes were republished in three limited edition omnibus volumes. Non-deluxe editions of the three volumes were published in 2002. The HoME series seems to me to have been possibly more of a publishing success than most fantasy books.

07-08-2015, 06:39 AM	#10
Orphalesion Animated Skeleton Join Date: Mar 2014 Posts: 50	My favourite part is the Shibboleth of Feanor, with all it's little tidbits about the various members of house Finwe. And I absolutely adore the "Round World" version of the mythology. I wish Tolkien would have been able to come up with some solution to the problems it would cause with the rest of the Mythology and properly implement it.