Fantasy

[davem]

From an account by Army surgeon Richard Wiseman at the Siege of Taunton in 1645, during the English Civil War. Horrible & graphic, but please read to the end..

One of Colonel Arundel's men, in storming the works, was shot in the face by case shot. He fell down and, in the retreat, was carried off among the dead; and laid in an empty house by the way till the next day; when, in the morning early, the colonel marching by that house heard a knocking within against the door.

Some of the officers, desiring to know what it was, looked in & saw this man standing by the door without eye, face, nose or mouth. The colonel sent to me....to dress the man. I went, but was somewhat troubled where to begin. The door consisted of two hatches: the uppeermost was open& the man stood leaning upon the other part of the door, which was shut. His face, with its eyes, nose. mouth & foremost part of the jaw with the chin, was shot away & the remaining parts of them driven in. One part of the jaw hung down by his throat & the other part pushed into it. I saw the brain working out underneath the lacerated scalp on both sides between his ears & brows.....

I could not see any advantage he could have by my dressing, but I helped him to clear his throat, ehere was remaining the root of his tongue. He seemed to approve of my endeavours & implored my help by the signs he made with his hands.

I asked him if he would drink. making a sign by the holding up of a finger. He presently did the like & immediately after held up both his hands, expressing his thirst. A soldier fetched some milk & brought a little wooden dish to pour some of it down his throat; but part of it running on both sides, he reached out his hands to take the dish. They gave it him full of milk. He held the root of his tongue down with one hand & with the other poured it down his throat (carrying his head backwards) & so got down more than a quart. After that I bound his wounds up

Yes, its horrible & graphic, but its also heartbreaking & brings home the true horror & pain of war in a way that nothing in Tolkien does.

Does that make my point any clearer?

[LadyBrooke]

*Looks at thread* Meep! I suggest that everybody takes a few deep breaths, back away for a moment, and try to calm down before people learn the reality of war from this thread. This is not a life or death situation, nobody is going to die because we can’t agree, and we do not want to become known as ‘the group of Tolkien fans that tried to bludgeon each other over the internet.’ As one of the youngest on the thread I think I can safely say that it is possible to keep one’s head cool, and not descend to the level of orcs. Note the description for the Books forum

In-depth discussions of Middle-earth for the learned and the curious. Everyone is welcome.

Learned implies a certain degree of maturity, and those who are curious have to be careful to not overstep the bounds of civility

Now on to my thoughts.

Originally Posted by Hookbill the Goomba

Something that has struck me about The Lord of the Rings and, indeed, most of the Legendarium, has been the fact that, as you say, davem, violence is not depicted in grotesque or detailed terms. There are glimpses here and there, but nothing to the extent of the heroic deeds and so on. What strikes me as the possible reason is that Tolkien simply did not want to do this. When reading his essay On Fairy Stories as well as the forward to The Lord of the Rings (I vaguely remember something from the letters, but it's been so long since I read them-) that Tolkien was writing what he wanted.

Tolkien wrote he wanted, just like most other writers in this day and age who are not constrained to writing what a rich patron wanted them to write. Jane Austen wrote what she wanted, so did George MacDonald, C.S.Lewis, and many other writers still do today. After all, the best books to do seem to come from people who had the freedom to write what they wanted - not what the person dangling the money bag wanted

Originally Posted by Hookbill the Goomba

With The Silmarillion, Children of Hurin and so on, we have much broader strokes of the stories; details are left out because the vastness of the tail, you might say, thrusts it aside. Had the detail been the same in The Silmarillion as it was in The Lord of the Rings, could it be contained within the bounds of a paperback? Probably not; it would probably collapse in on itself and create a black hole.

If The Silmarillion had as much detail as LotR does, it would need it’s own zipcode, and would most likely have been broken up into a series of 50 books. Which I wouldn’t have minded.

Originally Posted by Hookbill the Goomba

Tolkien seems to relish and toughly enjoy telling us about the heroic deeds as well as the tragic tales. There we find some of his best writing. We enjoy it. We relish it. We are here discussing it. After all, what was Tolkien's duty other than to tell the story? Indeed, even that was not a duty, as such, but a need within him.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. As a writer myself, this is one of the things I’ve been trying to express in my posts. For some writers, we don’t think about duty or anything like that. It is a need to tell a story that drives us to stay up to 3am to finish just one more line or derive complex genealogies for characters that are mentioned once.

Originally Posted by Hookbill the Goomba

Besides all this, to my mind, Middle Earth was, for so long, a place beset with evil and horror. The seemingly endless war with Melkor and the battles with Sauron must have plagued their minds. Therefore, any act of heroism, I should think, would be savored and remembered. It would not surprise me if the same was true of heroic tales of our own world were born from the same mindset. Places racked with war seeking any way to think of better things. Who knows?

The idea of seeking any way to think of better things is one I am frequently seeing in my own area recently. I don’t know if anybody outside of Kentucky and Indiana has even noticed our recent problem, but in a 6 month period we have had two severe power outages lasting for over a week in some places due to hurricane winds and snow. And people have sought escape from thoughts of snow. In fact the week of the snow all of the radio stations were playing such songs as Sunshine and Summertime by Faith Hill.

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

Who is responsible for how readers use literature--or gamers, games--the users or the creators?

I feel extremely uncomfortable that this is even necessary to ask. Is nobody going to be held responsible for their own actions, these days? Even if you read a book titled 1,000,000 Ways to Destroy Earth, if you blow up the Earth it was your own decision. Not the book’s writer, not video games’ designer , not your dog’s. Yours.

Originally Posted by davem

Is that not intriguing? What would a psychologist make of a victim's account of a traumatic event which deliberately onitted the most horrific dimension.

While I am not a trained psychologist, I am (A.) Currently taking psychology for school credit and (B.) Somebody who has had an anxiety disorder, and has chosen to study all sorts of mental disorders and traumas. Therefore I feel I am in somewhat of a position to comment on this.

It is very intriguing, which is why I chose to start a thread on the psychological affects in the books and on Tolkien. A psychologist would likely make something along the lines of what I have already mentioned in this thread, and backed up with one of Tolkien’s own quotes from a letter. That is that Tolkien used his writings as a form of escapism, which is a frequent mode of coping with disaster - separating oneself from the actual event.

Originally Posted by Ibrînidilpathânezel

Fictional depiction of unpleasant truths can be educational -- but only up to a point, I believe. Beyond that threshold, it can undercut, distort, or even obliterate the message, because the audience stops listening, or listens out of fear.

Something like this happened in one of my history classes once. We had to watch this very realistic movie on the Holocaust. Brilliant movie and absolutely true to what happened. And yet myself and many of my classmates would be unable to tell you anything about what happened or even what it was called. Why? Because by the time we had seen a little of the movie, many of us were so desperate to just get these images out of our head, that we had all stopped watching. I myself just grabbed my arm and dug my nails in to have something else to focus on. It was too traumatizing, too realistic - we couldn’t deal with it. This was 15 and 16 year olds by the way. Sometimes it can be more damaging to show the complete truth, than it is to describe the basics and let the rest go. I sincerely believe we would have gotten more if they had just described the camps and the number of people - not just Jews - that died there.

Originally Posted by Hookbill the Goomba

That's not to say there aren't the tragic and less desirable parts of the Legendarium. But plot is dependent on these things. The battle of Pelenor field would not have hit me so hard and remained in my memory if not for the passing of Théoden.

The tragic parts, such as the Scouring of the Shire and others, serve a much deeper purpose than simply balancing out good and evil. They effect the reader in a more emotional way than the blood and spilled entrails ever could. It is these events that hit hardest, that stay in the mind. Tolkien, I think, wanted his story to have these effects. The same things he had felt when reading myths and legends.

Touching briefly on Theoden’s death, I don’t think it would have affected me as hard if Tolkien had described what the actual death would have been like. It would have taken something away from Theoden’s speech and forgiveness of Merry for disobeying orders because the entire time I would have been like “He’s talking this much with a horse lying on top of him - WHAT?????”, but without that speech Theoden would have been less of a hero to me. If that makes sense.

Sometimes things have to be traded for other things. In this case I think the realistic part of war was put lower on the list of priorities to give Tolkien a chance to create characters that stand for hope to so many around the world.

That excerpt gave nothing to me except to make me feel a sense of hopelessness. What’s the point of living if there is no hope?

[davem]

Originally Posted by LadyBrooke

That excerpt gave nothing to me except to make me feel a sense of hopelessness. What’s the point of living if there is no hope?

Don't know if you're referring there to the excerpt I gave in my last post, but if you are then I'd have to argue with you. It depicts the reality of war, & to omit it from a tale of war is actually to turn a blind eye to what men like that unnamed soldier suffered & pretend he didn't suffer at all. It would have been nicer all round if the original shot had killed him quickly & cleanly, but it didn't.

[LadyBrooke]

Yes, that is indeed the excerpt I am referring to. Yes, it depicts the reality of war, but I feel that instead of people learning the reality of war from literature they should learn it in real life. I can sit a kid a kid down, and read him the excerpt and half of them will think that it is ‘cool’. Guts and blood and brains splattered everywhere are ‘cool’ to many of my of peers because they see it on t.v. and movies - that doesn’t mean that they consider it reality. In fact, as long a book or movie or t.v. show is labeled fiction, it won’t matter how realistic the subject is portrayed, because it is in the same category as Twilight, Shakespeare, Nancy Drew and Jane Austin - all fiction. It can be ignored because it is not real.

People will not learn unless they see real people who have been hurt in real wars and have suffered real consequences. It is unfair to demand that Tolkien and other authors dealing in fictional worlds should have to carry a burden that isn’t demanded of our real world leaders and workers. Why not demand that our lawmakers, our teachers, and our newspaper writers teach the same? Our lawmakers can speak of heroic sacrifice without having to detail the grim reality of death many people suffer in war - and not just our soldiers' deaths but the civilians on the ground and that is acceptable. Nobody speaking of the nuclear bombings spoke of the reality of suffering for many years. It is a struggle to get benefits for soldiers unless one got national news coverage - just ask my great-uncle, who only got his benefits for his Vietnam injuries this past October.

People need to face issues in the real world, and stop blaming our literature, video games, movies, and television for what is in fact a failure to acknowledge reality in the real world. I am currently in High School and just finished taking World History last year. And never once was the real horror of war talked about. We managed to do a whole chapter on WWI without once talking about death beyond the obligatory so-and-so million people died in this war. The rest was on the political issues behind and during the war. That is why so many people can’t understand the reality of war - because unless you or a close friend or family member is fighting in it or lives in the country where it is taking place war isn’t real.

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by davem

From an account by Army surgeon Richard Wiseman at the Siege of Taunton in 1645, during the English Civil War. Horrible & graphic, but please read to the end..

I quote only your source, davem, because it is its genre which is significant: an historical account, an eye witness. Would such extensive details be given in literary epics of war from the time--the Civil War? Did Cromwell's bloody assaults in Ireland make it into the poetry books? They certainly aren't collected in the usual anthologies of the time.

Compare these literary battle epics with Tolkien and consider how different or similar is his use of graphic detail to what they enlist:

The Battle of Maldon (Modern translation)

Selections from Sheamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf This link is particularly interesting as it is devoted to translations of the ancient poem from 1805/1826 to the present. I haven't read them all as I think Heaney's translation gives a good general sense of the epic style.

The point you are harping on, in a different context, would be well worth thinking about, the difference between historical war accounts and literary genres, or the difference between twentieth century attitudes towards war and those of earlier centuries. However, your bloody insistence that Tolkien's personal experience of war must necessarily trump his literary experience of war is a travesty of imaginative creativity as well as of psychology. We might well ask why Tolkien did not indulge in the modern style as the other war poets did (Sassoon etc), but that only shows again how his work is not "modern." Tolkien hated modern literature for its language style and loved old literature, for its language's sake. We can read his own acknowledgement that he sought a release from the personal imperative in the old epics.

But you haven't simply asked about the difference. You have couched it in a demand that Tolkien's work follow a different drummer, one whose beat you have measured. I suppose you think that's what makes this thread interesting, but like the straw man in The Wizard of Oz, it lacks real fibre--a spark or tinder ends it all.

But since you enjoy smoking so much--or at least defend it so often, here's some to enjoy

[davem]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

But you haven't simply asked about the difference. You have couched it in a demand that Tolkien's work follow a different drummer, one whose beat you have measured. I suppose you think that's what makes this thread interesting, but like the straw man in The Wizard of Oz, it lacks real fibre--a spark or tinder ends it all. :

No - I'm following the argument I linked to way back in the article by Poul Anderson & asking whether when a modern writer knows the historical reality, the facts of how people die in battle, how far a horse can actually gallop without collapsing, how long a man can swing a heavy sword without needing a rest he should take that into account in his fiction. In short how much of the primary world has to be brought in to a secondary world if the reader it to accept that secondary world.

Its also, interestingly, an issue Tolkien himself addressed in The Homecoming of Brythnoth, in the characters of Tida & Totta the old man who has seen the horrors of war at first hand & will not put up with the young poet's romantic approach to battle. For the poet, even as they trek through the corpses to find the body of their lord, death in battle is a glorious thing. For the old man that's a silly, juvenile attitude, & the poet needs to wake up & smell the excrement & hear the screams of the dying - because that's what war is really all about.

I don't know whether the writers of Maldon or Beowulf had experienced battle, but I do know, (as Tolkien himslelf did - read his 'Ofermod') that Tolkien had no time for Brythnoth's 'chivalry'. I do know that Tolkien had experienced war at first hand, & thus if he refuses to acknowledge what really happened that is his freely made choice. Not talking about war because of the horrors one has seen is one thing. Writing about war in a way that presents it sans all the horror that traumatised one is an odd response - to me.

Finally, if Tolkien can, in Sam, choose to honour the humble batman who was always there to help his officer, why would he not also choose to honour the poor bllody infantryman (probably conscripted after a deal of social pressure http://www.diggerhistory.info/pages-...te-feather.htm) who left the field like the soldier Richard Wisman records? A writer makes choices for a reason. One, surely, can ask what that reason was.

I'm not asking about "the difference between historical war accounts and literary genres," - but you can if you want. And going back to your question about whether Cromwell's bloody assaults in Ireland should have made it into the poetry books (or historical novels, which is the point here) I would say that, if a modern novelist, who knew what really happened there, was to write a historical novel about that event without mentioning the real horrors that took place, then that writer would be failing in his or her responsibility to their reader.

[Morthoron]

Trees. One would think a man like Tolkien, a professed lover of trees, would describe them more realistically. But no! His trees walk about and grumble and eat people! It's preposterous! I think Tolkien was barking up the wrong tree on this one, and gives the reader a stilted view in his depictions that in no way mirror real life. Some readers may get an altogether wrong impression about trees, and the way Tolkien glorifies trees going to war. They may cringe whenever they pass a malevolent maple or bellicose beech, eventually contracting dendrophobia, and flee in terror from a sullen spruce, irrationally fearing that it will engorge the family dog.

In an age when environmentalism and ecology are crucial subjects and the effects of global warming are more pronounced every day, it is evident we need more trees; unfortunately, frightened people, having been been fooled by the nefarious machinations of Tolkien, will eschew the planting of trees and may suggest at their local city council meetings that trees be banned altogether due to their insidious encroachment on eaves, awnings and underground water pipes and sewage lines, as well as the negative effects barbarous trees may have on impressionable youths. It only takes one bad apple tree to spoil the whole bunch.

Was Tolkien aware of the damage he wrought? Wouldn't it have been far more responsible to portray trees as noncombatative and less curmudgeonly? Arborism may not been Tolkien's branch of study, but he knew enough about trees from personal experience to know better. I am shocked and appalled!

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by davem

. In short how much of the primary world has to be brought in to a secondary world if the reader it to accept that secondary world.

This short takes us back to the readers as having the final say on what successfully constitutes an achieved secondary world.

Based on the legions of Tolkien fans, the answer seems to be that Tolkien's readers accept the secondary world he has created. And not only do they accept that secondary world, they go to some effort to attempt to enter it themselves, to imaginatively recreating it, whether it is the costume dinners at Tolkien events or simply painting their homes in a Middle-earth style or designing sub-divisions to ressemble Middle-earth, or searching for replicas of the weapons.

There are many readers who don't take to Tolkien's Middle-earth and possibly they are the ones who object to his depiction of war, although they'd have to read far into LotR to become disenchanted with his battles. From my experience, these readers don't cotton much to the genre of fantasy itself.

Originally Posted by davem

I do know that Tolkien had experienced war at first hand, & thus if he refuses to acknowledge what really happened that is his freely made choice.

But he did acknowledge it, just not where you want it. That's what his Homecoming of Brythnoth is about, as you have ably stated.

Originally Posted by davem

(or historical novels, which is the point here)

Ah but perhaps the difficulty lies with this definition of LotR's genre. While clearly there is a strong impetus to presenting it as if it were history, it lies uneasily in this category. LotR is not a novel within the tradition of realistic novel. Many characters do not have the kind of development seen in, say, E. M. Forrester's novels or Viriginia Woolf's novels (whose work for that matter isn't historical novel either). They fall within the style and type of Dickens' Mr. Gradgrind. Their style of speech changes; Legolas and Gimli lose their distinctively different speech patterns later in LotR and come both to speak in heroic measure. In fact, the style of language in LotR changes, an inconsistency often brought out by those who want LotR to be within this novelistic tradition. And as Morthoron has so humorously pointed out--forum hardware's not letting me rep you, Morth-- Tokien's trees aren't biologically accurate either. Nor are his flying taxis, the eagles, nor his talking foxes. The significance and presence granted to verse in LotR also differentiates it from historical novels. In fact, some might even argue that LoR is not a novel at all. It is . . . fantasy. I sort of think that's what Morthoron's getting at too.

Yet, as I say, legions of fans accept his secondary world as if it were real. Why, I could even quote our illustrious Legate to that, from another thread.

gotta run. ta ta.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

save for a brief mention of Imrahil's pauldrons

Er, that would be vambraces, and plate forearm-guards go back at least as far as the Greeks.

Still, the point is quite well taken. For whatever reason Tolkien chose to freeze military technology at about the time of Hastings. Probably because he was concerned with *decline*- the weapons of the Elder Days were, by authorial fiat, better than those of the decadent Third Age. Of course, that's pretty much exactly the way his beloved Old English viewed things: Roman ruins were 'eald enta gweorc,' ancient works of giants.

[alatar]

Despite the fact that this thread has changed tracks, changed trains, gone back to the stations a few times, resisted various attempts of hijacking and demolition, it remains an interesting read.

But let's skip warfare for a moment, as that's too removed from many people's lives. Or at least let's look at the ravages of another war, a war we all fight and lose, the war against time. Throw into the mix disease, and you have yourself a pretty picture of the primary world we call life.

Visit a care facility where people - real people - are biding their last few days of life. See how many, once noble, are reduced to the kind of care of that of an infant. Look in their eyes and see that divine spark missing - the body is there, but the mind, the spirit, has already left. Smell the underlying scent of disease and decay and death and offal, and hear the moanings of the lost and suffering, and beeps and hummings of the life-sustaining machines that continue on long after the person has been declared dead.

If a loved one is in such a place, would this be how we would want to remember him/her? Or do we remember that warm but not yet hazy day on the ball field, with the early sun casting shadowed trees long across the field, when we helped the 'Old Man' get ready for his softball game by playing some catch?

So can we blame Tolkien for not wanting to write a perfectly accurate description of life? Don't we all want to leave this world and all of its ugliness behind for a while? Not only did Tolkien created characters without feet of clay, but also kept their semi-angelic feet out of the muck as well.

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by alatar

So can we blame Tolkien for not wanting to write a perfectly accurate description of life? Don't we all want to leave this world and all of its ugliness behind for a while? Not only did Tolkien created characters without feet of clay, but also kept their semi-angelic feet out of the muck as well.

Recently upon perusing an ealier history of travels, which included some events of warfare and war like acrimony, and many other things as well which don't pertain to LotR, I came upon a passage which upon reflection seemed to suit this comment, so I offer it in the kindness that alatar may feel he need not double post, not withstanding the latter comments by several other Downers , although for what specific reason I cannot specifically ascertain, whether as Ornament to our Discussion or as Truth.

Originally Posted by Gulliver's Travels, Bk IV, chap 12

Thus, gentle reader, I have given thee a faithful history of my travels for sixteen years and above seven months: wherein I have not been so studious of ornament as of truth. I could, perhaps, like others, have astonished thee with strange improbable tales; but I rather chose to relate plain matter of fact, in the simplest manner and style; because my principal design was to inform, and not to amuse thee.

It is easy for us who travel into remote countries, which are seldom visited by Englishmen or other Europeans, to form descriptions of wonderful animals both at sea and land. Whereas a traveller's chief aim should be to make men wiser and better, and to improve their minds by the bad, as well as good, example of what they deliver concerning foreign places.

I could heartily wish a law was enacted, that every traveller, before he were permitted to publish his voyages, should be obliged to make oath before the Lord High Chancellor, that all he intended to print was absolutely true to the best of his knowledge; for then the world would no longer be deceived, as it usually is, while some writers, to make their works pass the better upon the public, impose the grossest falsities on the unwary reader. I have perused several books of travels with great delight in my younger days; but having since gone over most parts of the globe, and been able to contradict many fabulous accounts from my own observation, it has given me a great disgust against this part of reading, and some indignation to see the credulity of mankind so impudently abused. Therefore, since my acquaintance were pleased to think my poor endeavours might not be unacceptable to my country, I imposed on myself, as a maxim never to be swerved from, that I would strictly adhere to truth; neither indeed can I be ever under the least temptation to vary from it, while I retain in my mind the lectures and example of my noble master and the other illustrious Houyhnhnms of whom I had so long the honour to be an humble hearer.

- Nec si miserum Fortuna Sinonem Finxit, vanum etiam, mendacemque improba finget.

I know very well, how little reputation is to be got by writings which require neither genius nor learning, nor indeed any other talent, except a good memory, or an exact journal. I know likewise, that writers of travels, like dictionary-makers, are sunk into oblivion by the weight and bulk of those who come last, and therefore lie uppermost. And it is highly probable, that such travellers, who shall hereafter visit the countries described in this work of mine, may, by detecting my errors (if there be any), and adding many new discoveries of their own, justle me out of vogue, and stand in my place, making the world forget that ever I was an author. This indeed would be too great a mortification, if I wrote for fame: but as my sole intention was the public good, I cannot be altogether disappointed. For who can read of the virtues I have mentioned in the glorious Houyhnhnms, without being ashamed of his own vices, when he considers himself as the reasoning, governing animal of his country? I shall say nothing of those remote nations where Yahoos preside; among which the least corrupted are the Brobdingnagians; whose wise maxims in morality and government it would be our happiness to observe. But I forbear descanting further, and rather leave the judicious reader to his own remarks and application.

I am not a little pleased that this work of mine can possibly meet with no censurers: for what objections can be made against a writer, who relates only plain facts, that happened in such distant countries, where we have not the least interest, with respect either to trade or negotiations? I have carefully avoided every fault with which common writers of travels are often too justly charged. Besides, I meddle not the least with any party, but write without passion, prejudice, or ill-will against any man, or number of men, whatsoever. I write for the noblest end, to inform and instruct mankind; over whom I may, without breach of modesty, pretend to some superiority, from the advantages I received by conversing so long among the most accomplished Houyhnhnms. I write without any view to profit or praise. I never suffer a word to pass that may look like reflection, or possibly give the least offence, even to those who are most ready to take it. So that I hope I may with justice pronounce myself an author perfectly blameless; against whom the tribes of Answerers, Considerers, Observers, Reflectors, Detectors, Remarkers, will never be able to find matter for exercising their talents.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hicklin

Er, that would be vambraces, and plate forearm-guards go back at least as far as the Greeks.

Still, the point is quite well taken. For whatever reason Tolkien chose to freeze military technology at about the time of Hastings. Probably because he was concerned with *decline*- the weapons of the Elder Days were, by authorial fiat, better than those of the decadent Third Age. Of course, that's pretty much exactly the way his beloved Old English viewed things: Roman ruins were 'eald enta gweorc,' ancient works of giants.

Or perhaps he does not see the advent of automatic or more advanced weapons / armor and such as being 'progress'.

Originally Posted by davem

I do know that Tolkien had experienced war at first hand, & thus if he refuses to acknowledge what really happened that is his freely made choice.

I agree that this is indeed strange. As I mentioned, you have to keep in mind that The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit were written for Tolkien's "own satisfaction" more than anything. While nowadays writers are encouraged to face up to realities and deal with horrors, I'm not sure Tolkien was, or if he was, it was probably by people that annoyed him. And you know what academics can be like with people that annoy them.

I'm speculating, of course.

We can say what Tolkien should have done until the end of days. A different writer may have focussed on the gore, but Tolkien did not. My feeling is that the horrors of war were well known to his audience, the first two World Wars still a raw memory.

Originally Posted by davem

Yes, its horrible & graphic, but its also heartbreaking & brings home the true horror & pain of war in a way that nothing in Tolkien does.

Here, I fear, we must agree to disagree. Without the knowledge of characters the section loses much of its effect. The loss in itself of a favored or enjoyed character is often enough, for me anyway. The details can add something, but a lack of them does not take anything away. For example, had Tolkien gone to great lengths to talk about the blood pouring from Boromir's arrow wounds or how it had pierced his lungs and so forth, I do not think it would make the scene any more powerful than it is. Not to me, anyway. But then, perhaps I am a little squeamish.

More than torn skin and bleeding faces, what brings the horror of war home, from my own view, was the souring of the Shire. Indeed, the Hobbits comment on how "it really brings it home to you because it is home".

Not that there isn't something to be said for graphic detail having a power. But I think it is of a different sort. I actually admire Tolkien for taking a different look at the realities and affects of war; destroyed homes and lives, things never being the same again. These are the long lasting, even generation-spanning effects.

Or something like that.

[Gwathagor]

Perhaps graphic violence would have been considered out of place in the fantasy genre as it existed at the time? That is as legitimate a reason as any.

[davem]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

But he did acknowledge it, just not where you want it. That's what his Homecoming of Bryhtnoth is about, as you have ably stated.

I'd see HoB differently, & this is why I brought it up. Tida, the old man, specifically attacks Totta's (the young poet) romantic/heroic take on warfare. Tida mocks Totta's idealism, telling him that if he is unfortunate enough to find himself in a battle he will realise that its not like the poems & songs he makes so much of. This conversation takes place while the two search for their fallen lord's body, picking their way through the corpses at night, while the 'masterless men' rob the dead. This is Tolkien himself speaking through the old warrior of the harsh reality of war, stating in no uncertain terms that he is wrong to view war as the playground of heroes. That the battlefield is a place where people get cut down, die painfully, & their corpses are left to scavengers.

Can we see this as in anyway Tolkien's response to certain aspects of his own work? I think so - in the same way as CoH can be seen almost as the inverted image of LotR. Its too simplistic to claim that Tolkien was seeking in his fiction to escape his own experiences - which is why (at the risk of repeating myself!) I have kept on rejecting that overly simplistic explanation. He gave us a novel, in LotR, in which warfare is reduced to heroic fantasy, but he knows very well (& tells us very clearly in HoB/CoH) that its not like that. In some of his works he is Totta, in others, he is Tida. Therefore, because he doesn't adopt a single approach to warfare in all his works its valid to ask why in LotR he glamourises war.

Originally Posted by Hookbill

Here, I fear, we must agree to disagree. Without the knowledge of characters the section loses much of its effect.

Well, the point is Wiseman & the wounded soldier were real people. We may not know even the soldier's name, but what we do know is that he was once a baby in his mother's arms, that he ran around & played with other children, that he grew up to manhood, joined the army & ended as we saw. The horror of his fate, so graphically (but not gratuitously) described brings home the true horror of his fate. He was a man like us, & his fate could be ours, or our children's.