The Book of Lost Tales Part I: A Readthrough

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Galin

This is a different animal I think (not that you said otherwise): with The Lord of the Rings we have the author's version of it, published for a readership at large. With the Silmarillion we do not; and for those of us who do not accept the constructed versions as canonical then external chronology (revsions and so on), no matter how complicated, or natural as far as revision is to be expected, is important for the construction of our personal legendariums.

Absolutely--and I would differentiate things even further. Although I get plenty of enjoyment from the scholarly end of things, I think CT is more than wise to warn away people from the HoME--it isn't for everybody.

In addition to the considerations of fleshing out personal canon, which Galin has gone into, which separates the LotR-centric texts (volumes VI-IX) from the Silm-centric texts ("the rest of them"), but I would shade out even more variation in the series, and I would give different reasons for each of them:

1.) Volumes I, II, & III: The Book of Lost Tales and The Lays of Beleriand
2.) Volumes IV, V, X, XI: The evolution of the Silm texts
3.) Volumes VI-IX: The LotR texts, although I would put an asterisk next to Sauron Defeated
4.) Volume XII: The Peoples of Middle-earth, which is a little bit LotR-centric (it gives the evolution of the Appendices) and a little Silm-centric (some of its texts, especially the Shibboleth of Fëanor influenced the choices CT made in the published Silm). To my mind, XII is a companion volume to Unfinished Tales: the leftover bits, not exactly part of the Silm, from the post-LotR years.

I would not readily recommend the entire series to just anyone, but neither would I say "oh, just read all the non-LotR texts; you don't need those." Someone who doesn't care for the Silm would be well-advised to stay clear of categories 1, 3, & 4, but they might really enjoy looking at how the LotR came about.

As for separating out the first three volumes from the rest of the Silm-history, this is at the heart of why I wanted to do a BoLT read-through: I think the first three volumes are birds of a different feather from the others. Part of this is the textual history: "The Silmarillion" is a redaction of the legends, continuously reworked from "The Sketch of Mythology" (published in Vol. IV) through "The Qenta Noldorinwa" (ditto), through "The Quenta Silmarillion" pre-LotR (Vol. V), through the post-LotR revisions (X & XI), whereas the Book of Lost Tales and the Lays in Vol. III are stand-alone entities, complete works of art in themselves--or they would be complete, had Tolkien but finished them.

Thus, although they may be portraits of the same matter, I see The Book of Lost Tales as a complete story and entity worthy of reading in its own right. It isn't just something that should be mined for history-of-the-textual nuggets (though those abound for the reader who wants them), but a piece of art to be read for its own sake--and likewise the Lays in Vol. III. Is Rog and the House of the Hammer canon in Middle-earth? Maybe... maybe not... possibly... probably not... But there's no denying that their destruction in "The Fall of Gondolin" is a tragic read, regardless.

So I list the first three books as a separate category: the three volumes of the HoME that I would recommend for someone looking for Tolkienesque enjoyment.


(Of course, these categories are hardly without bleedthrough. "The Wanderings of Húrin" in XI, or "The Fall of Númenor"--even considered only as a precursor to the Akallabêth--are not solely to be seen as parts of the Silm, and I would not want to suggest that the BoLT isn't foundational to any real understanding of how the Silm came to be--but I think The Book of Lost Tales can be read much differently from the later HoME volumes and is worth pursuing as such.)