Fantasy

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

I like that disclaimer, alatar. When it comes to depictions of "realism," I don't need graphic details of word or image to understand the reality. When I hear that a bomb struck a building full of people, for instance, I don't need to be told the details of what happened to the building and their bodies to know the kind of carnage that ensued, and feel horrified by it. Perhaps other people do. In fantasy, I might need to be told what the effects of a magic "blast" may be, since magic can operate under whatever laws the author wants, and have the results the author desires. But Tolkien's battles were not written as magical battles, and thus I can reasonably presume that their brutality and the results would be much the same as similarly fought battles in the real world.

As to the kind of story Tolkien was attempting to tell, in letter 183, he says:

In The Lord of the Rings the conflict is not basically about 'freedom', though that is naturally involved. It is about God, and His sole right to divine honour.

As this letter is a response to W. H. Auden's review of RotK, it is long and has many things to say; in particular, Tolkien writes at some length about good and evil, motivations, and such. But he ends the letter with an interesting observation:

So I feel that the fiddle-faddle in reviews, and correspondence about them, as to whether my 'good people' were kind and merciful and gave quarter (in fact they do), or not, is quite beside the point. Some critics seem determined to represent me as a simple-minded adolescent, inspired with, say, a With-the-flag-to-Pretoria spirit, and willfully distort what is said in my tale. I have not that spirit, and it does not appear in the story. The figure of Denethor alone is enough to show this; but I have not made any of the peoples on the 'right' side, Hobbits, Rohirrim, Men of Dale or Gondor, any better than men have been, or are, or can be. Mine is not an 'imaginary' world, but an imaginary historical moment on 'Middle-earth' -- which is our habitation.