The Scourge of The Dark Side...Tolkien and Modernism

[skip spence]

Originally Posted by Nogrod

Even if it will make myself look like a total ignoramus here as well I must confess I have never heard of this Brin-guy before either until reading this thread. So I definitively have not been listening to him.

Sorry mate, you must have misunderstood me (no wonder, my post was a bit of a mess). The questions was to tumhalad2.

Originally Posted by Nogrod

I don't see the point of this here... I'm all for demanding changes in cultures, like getting the Western culture less individualistic without falling back to religious or nationalistic fundamentalisms etc.

Agreed. Just a thought I had at the time. Never mind that.

Originally Posted by Nogrod

But the question now remains how we should tune ourselves with it? Should we treat is as an original mythology (no!), should we treat it as a piece of the most ingenuine piece of fiction based on traditions (yes!), should we treat it as a way guiding us to a moral and good life in today's society and world (yes/no?).

I think it's the last question - or the interpretation of what it means - that may divide many of us.

Perhaps. My answer is that if you do find a moral guideline in his works, that's great. Tolkien certainly had a lot to say about morals. Personally, although I also appreciate much of his more philosofical and theological stuff, I read his books because I love the stories and the language.

Originally Posted by Nogrod

The things and ideas Tolkien brings forwards in his work are those of the mythological era and thought but he does it in a way that demands a modern reader an effort to think it her/himself - a mark of a purely modernist attitude in itself.

I dunno if the ideas are those of a mythological prehistoric era. I highly doubt that the people in the actual 'mythological' era ever reached the subtlety of Tolkien or of his characters.

As for the debate of how modernistic Tolkien was I'm afraid I can't add much. I was under the impression that 'modernism' was the much akin to positivism, the belief that logical reasoning based on observable facts (the method of the natural sciences) is the best, if not the only way forward into the future. Based on this belief I did not think Tolkien would appriciate a modernistic agenda with scientific progress and rationalisation as a top priority. But I also knew that 'modernism' had other applications in other fields, and some posters have argued that Tolkien indeed was modernistic. To be honest, I find concepts such as modernism, post-modernism, symbolism to be rather silly and restrictive and the people who like to use them often do so in a vain attempt to appear more clever than they really are. But please note that I'm not talking about the people writing on this thread.

[Nogrod]

Originally Posted by skip spence

As for the debate of how modernistic Tolkien was I'm afraid I can't add much. I was under the impression that 'modernism' was the much akin to positivism, the belief that logical reasoning based on observable facts (the method of the natural sciences) is the best, if not the only way forward into the future. Based on this belief I did not think Tolkien would appriciate a modernistic agenda with scientific progress and rationalisation as a top priority. But I also knew that 'modernism' had other applications in other fields, and some posters have argued that Tolkien indeed was modernistic. To be honest, I find concepts such as modernism, post-modernism, symbolism to be rather silly and restrictive and the people who like to use them often do so in a vain attempt to appear more clever than they really are. But please note that I'm not talking about the people writing on this thread.

The terms... the terms... Everyone seems to use it one way or another... But in humanities like philosophy, cultural studies and aesthetics the word 'modern' means the enlightenment and positivism as well as Baudelaire, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche - or Cézanne, Malevitch, Ravel or T.S. Eliot; or Durkheim and de Saussure... as opposed to both classical attitude or romanticism.

The words themselves are not silly. They try to point out to actual differences. They just sadly seem to have a multiple meanings depending on the author who talks about them. But still there is some common ground one could see in all those modernisms in comparison with the classical stance or the romantic way of looking at things.

Originally Posted by Skip Sp.

Tolkien certainly had a lot to say about morals.

Absolutely. And I think he had a crush on past morals of virtue exemplified by the authors of Antiquity and of the old tales of lesser known civilisations. And there's nothing bad in it in itself. To a modern reader the virtue-ethics looks refreshing indeed! It's just a question whether we can avoid taking all the loads of that generally chauvinistic background thinking with them as well when we cherish the ethics of virtue so appealing to the modern man who has lost the sense of purpose in this world we live in.

Originally Posted by SS

Personally, although I also appreciate much of his more philosofical and theological stuff, I read his books because I love the stories and the language

As well as I do, even if I find his philosophical ideas quite common or "basic-romantic" and his theology tied to his age and prejudices as well. But there are those funny modernist things in between his writing that keeps his work from falling down to the oblivion of standard "classical romanticism". And the stories and the language... well there he's the champion with no one to compare him with! Unless our long gone elders make the claim...

[Nogrod]

Originally Posted by skip spence

I was under the impression that 'modernism' was the much akin to positivism, the belief that logical reasoning based on observable facts (the method of the natural sciences) is the best, if not the only way forward into the future.

That's the basic principle of something that is today called 'naturalism' and which has its roots in the enlightenment... but also in the speculation of the 17th century philosophes and earlier "scientists" and even theologians... and the engineers of the Middle-Ages (like Leonardo da Vinci who was first and foremost an engineer and only secondarily a painter at that time)...

The positivists were self-critical enough to cancel their own project during the twenties when they realised that their motto "anything that can not be verified empirically can't be taken as a knowledge" was itself not verifiable empirically...