Transmission theory: what the heck was Tolkien thinking?

[gondowe]

Originally Posted by Galin

Yes, an Elvish fairy tale; and that, I think, is the beauty of it.

Tolkien not only doesn't begin the text with an obvious statement about the sun already existing, but the source itself is arguably questionable as a "historical" source -- but then again, what does the Sun existing before the Elves awaken have to do with "counting lore", or the way in which the First Elves find each other? "It seems my father had resolved (at least for the purposes of this fairy tale) the problem of the name "Star-folk" of the Elves in a beautifully simple way: the first Elves awoke in the late night of unclouded stars, and the stars were their earliest memory." Christopher Tolkien, War of the Jewels

"At least for the purposes of the fairy tale" is noted, but the information is still there for any reader to find and wonder about, especially given the new characterization of Quenta Silmarillion, along with (as I believe) another example like DA, which challenges the Mannish idea of the shape of the World. Within this Elvish text we read that the Quendi awoke in the early twilight before dawn, for example, which would not be a controversial description from the Western Elvish perspective, and offers a nice pathway for a variant interpretation regarding the Sun.

I agreed, it´s very beautiful. I only wanted to mean that independently of the sun existing previously or not, the "story" of the tale is not "real", the name of the first Elves was not Imin, Tata, Enel etc.

Of course that Tolkien wanted (at least for some years) to change the cosmological myth he developed his whole life. But he couldn't (or at the end wanted). We can assume that the real truth only is known by the Eldar and rediscovered by Men in the Modern Scientific Era.

Greetings