Losing sight of the basics...... - The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum

HerenIstarion · 07-05-2004, 10:56 AM

Up up it goes
And, maybe, it grows....

Or, before people there reach out of the Shire...

Mithalwen · 07-06-2004, 12:59 PM

Err this is going back a long way in the thread... but I am a Brit who has travelled faily widely and I think that New Zealand was a great choice for MiddleEarth.... it has the geography and parts are very English... but an England of an earlier age... I wasn't alive in the fifties but it is how you imagine it..... a much safer, friendlier place... I mean I know the midlands and Oxford well through family links and education and teh countryside is the shire... and I live near "Mirkwood" but NZ has it all ........

BTW if we are showing off about ancestors ...Shakespeare is my manyx great-uncle by marriage

lol

Lalaith · 07-07-2004, 06:05 AM

I am committing a heinous crime here in my own eyes at least, jumping in here with a post without having thoroughly read all previous posts in the thread. I'm sorry, I will read all later, but I'm very busy at the moment...many of the posts are just terrific, and I want to give them my best attention.

But I wanted to make a couple of points before this thread slipped back down to the second page.
I am not English but I have lived here for most of my life and I love this country. But what is it exactly, I wonder, that I love, and is it also what Tolkien loved? Previous posters who talked about the lack of concrete cultural identity in England are right. In fact, you might almost define English identity by its contradictions and confusions.
Given this, I don't actually agree that Anglo-Saxon England was 'real' England and that subsequent Englands were not. I don't think it is possible to pause the videotape of history at a certain point and say, yes, this is genuine, this is ideal, all that came before and after is not.
And as far as the 'Englishness' of the Shire is concerned, I agree that it is a kind of ideal, a rural idyll - but Tolkien was sharp enough to be very aware of his ideal's limitations. Frodo is often frustrated by the parochial, narrow-minded attitudes he encounters among his fellow hobbits. Perhaps this is true of rural communities everywhere, not just in England.

Araréiel · 07-07-2004, 05:52 PM

Jello has fruit juice now?

One of the times I went to the ER I had with me The Hobbit. The doctor commented that the books help many of Tolkien's opinions of society, and was almost his reaction to it. One holding all the power leads to greed and corruption, no one thinking the little guy can do anything of signifigance. If given the opportunity, many will choose power over common good. If given the chance to get rid of something that can give one power, one has a difficult time getting rid of the power, even if one does not want it.

According to the doctor, England held a major signifigance to Tolkien, aside from it just being where he lived. He felt certain ties to his homeland, as I think many of us do to some extent (btw, in my neck of California, I know of one place that looks exactly like many of the places shown in the films, so much it's earie). (The doctor and I talked quite a while! It was a slow night in the ER and I wasn't dying, so it was enjoyable.)

However, I do feel a certain sacriledge in the movies being filmed in NZ when it was England Tolkien used for inspiration. Of course, it helps that Old England is similar to what most of us imagine in fantasies, helped along by book images and such that taint out subconscious thoughts!

I watched a documentary as well that spoke of how many places were important to Tolkien, and for different reasons. Certain locations of the books reflect those places (it's been a while since I saw the doc). But it did make me wonder how many of the locations of which Tolkien wrote really are real. In Chapter 3, he is so clear about the Hobbits' journey into the wood and the valley and where they were leading up to meeting Tom that I wonder if he was writing about a place he had actually visited. Maybe he was relaxing in a forest and came to something that looked something like what he described. The detail is so incredible that it seems it must be some place real.

I took a paper and pen the last time I read that chapter (two days ago) and drew out what he described, and their path, and the directions. Such as something being left showing they went to far this direction, or the shadows came from that direction. Not a single error could I find, and I'm good at finding errors in such complex narration. This particular forest, and the valley, must be real somewhere.

07-05-2004, 10:56 AM	#1
HerenIstarion Deadnight Chanter Join Date: Sep 2000 Posts: 4,244	Bringing it up for the sake of Book I Chapter 03 thread Up up it goes And, maybe, it grows.... Or, before people there reach out of the Shire... __________________ Egroeg Ihkhsal - Would you believe in the love at first sight? - Yes I'm certain that it happens all the time!

07-06-2004, 12:59 PM	#2
Mithalwen Pilgrim Soul Join Date: May 2004 Location: watching the wonga-wonga birds circle... Posts: 9,461	Err this is going back a long way in the thread... but I am a Brit who has travelled faily widely and I think that New Zealand was a great choice for MiddleEarth.... it has the geography and parts are very English... but an England of an earlier age... I wasn't alive in the fifties but it is how you imagine it..... a much safer, friendlier place... I mean I know the midlands and Oxford well through family links and education and teh countryside is the shire... and I live near "Mirkwood" but NZ has it all ........ BTW if we are showing off about ancestors ...Shakespeare is my manyx great-uncle by marriage lol

07-07-2004, 06:05 AM	#3
Lalaith Blithe Spirit Join Date: Jan 2003 Posts: 2,779	I am committing a heinous crime here in my own eyes at least, jumping in here with a post without having thoroughly read all previous posts in the thread. I'm sorry, I will read all later, but I'm very busy at the moment...many of the posts are just terrific, and I want to give them my best attention. But I wanted to make a couple of points before this thread slipped back down to the second page. I am not English but I have lived here for most of my life and I love this country. But what is it exactly, I wonder, that I love, and is it also what Tolkien loved? Previous posters who talked about the lack of concrete cultural identity in England are right. In fact, you might almost define English identity by its contradictions and confusions. Given this, I don't actually agree that Anglo-Saxon England was 'real' England and that subsequent Englands were not. I don't think it is possible to pause the videotape of history at a certain point and say, yes, this is genuine, this is ideal, all that came before and after is not. And as far as the 'Englishness' of the Shire is concerned, I agree that it is a kind of ideal, a rural idyll - but Tolkien was sharp enough to be very aware of his ideal's limitations. Frodo is often frustrated by the parochial, narrow-minded attitudes he encounters among his fellow hobbits. Perhaps this is true of rural communities everywhere, not just in England.

07-07-2004, 05:52 PM	#4
Araréiel Registered User Join Date: Jun 2004 Posts: 92	Jello has fruit juice now? One of the times I went to the ER I had with me The Hobbit. The doctor commented that the books help many of Tolkien's opinions of society, and was almost his reaction to it. One holding all the power leads to greed and corruption, no one thinking the little guy can do anything of signifigance. If given the opportunity, many will choose power over common good. If given the chance to get rid of something that can give one power, one has a difficult time getting rid of the power, even if one does not want it. According to the doctor, England held a major signifigance to Tolkien, aside from it just being where he lived. He felt certain ties to his homeland, as I think many of us do to some extent (btw, in my neck of California, I know of one place that looks exactly like many of the places shown in the films, so much it's earie). (The doctor and I talked quite a while! It was a slow night in the ER and I wasn't dying, so it was enjoyable.) However, I do feel a certain sacriledge in the movies being filmed in NZ when it was England Tolkien used for inspiration. Of course, it helps that Old England is similar to what most of us imagine in fantasies, helped along by book images and such that taint out subconscious thoughts! I watched a documentary as well that spoke of how many places were important to Tolkien, and for different reasons. Certain locations of the books reflect those places (it's been a while since I saw the doc). But it did make me wonder how many of the locations of which Tolkien wrote really are real. In Chapter 3, he is so clear about the Hobbits' journey into the wood and the valley and where they were leading up to meeting Tom that I wonder if he was writing about a place he had actually visited. Maybe he was relaxing in a forest and came to something that looked something like what he described. The detail is so incredible that it seems it must be some place real. I took a paper and pen the last time I read that chapter (two days ago) and drew out what he described, and their path, and the directions. Such as something being left showing they went to far this direction, or the shadows came from that direction. Not a single error could I find, and I'm good at finding errors in such complex narration. This particular forest, and the valley, must be real somewhere.