Incanus or Outcanus… canon who?

[Tar Elenion]

Everything Tolkien wrote is canon. Anything Tolkien did not write is not canon.

[Mithadan]

I would temper Tar Elenion's position a bit. What Tolkien published during his lifetime and did not later correct in a subsequent or corrected edition is absolutely "canon." What Tolkien wrote but did not publish? Personally, for such materials canon is in the eye of the beholder. Everyone must agree that Tolkien's mythos encompassed tales from the First and Second Ages that were never finished. What ultimately became the 1977 Silmarillion is, at best, a version of what Tolkien wrote based upon Christopher's best guess at that time. The stories were in a constant state of flux up to the time that the author passed away. From those DRAFTS we can discern the contours of what Tolkien generally intended. But not the specifics. Beren and Luthien may have reached a point where it was maybe 65% final. The Hurin/Turin stories may have reached 85% completion or more. But they were never finalized. Names might have changed. Events may have changed. The basic threads of the stories may have been set, but are they "canon?" I don't know.

In my image of Middle Earth, the world was not round at its outset (that sounds really strange to say it), there were no Domes of Varda, Orcs are corrupted Elves not Men or beasts. Yet Tolkien "wrote" versions of his tales, or at least musings about them, that differ from my preferred views. Who is to say what is "canon?" Not I. Not Peter Jackson and not Jeff Bezos.

RoP was "licensed" by the Estate. I will not bore you with anything resembling a formal legal definition of the word. To me, "licensed", as in you can use place names, characters, concepts to build your own story that you can publish as being "based upon...," is not the same as "canon." That being said, my own view of canon has shifted over the years. RoP is an interpretation, as others have suggested, a fan fiction of sorts. If you like it, watch it and enjoy. If you do not, don't watch it. I don't even mind if you want to watch it in order to point out where it deviates from your version of "canon" so long as you (not directed at anyone in particular) accept that others might disagree and choose to watch it (and discuss it) because they enjoy it and want to do so.

Otherwise, I invite anyone who would like to do so to use our (semi-functional) search function and seek references to "canon." You will get voluminous results.

EDIT: To be clear, feel free to discuss "canon" to your hearts' content. I do not mean to suggest that my post is the final word on the subject.

[Huinesoron]

I think there can be multiple canons! What is a canon? It's a self-consistent set of works, intended by the creator to fit together. I would usually add "complete enough to reasonably write fanfic of", because that's how I think.

So Tolkien published a set of books: LotR, Hobbit, Adventures of Tom Bombadil. That's a canon. Christopher added to that, with the Silm, UT, and maybe Children of Hurin. That's another canon, an extension of the first, and (aside from Galadriel and Celeborn) internally consistent.

There's at least two versions of "the canon" which build off that: one which tries to reconstruct the absolute latest ideas Tolkien had, and one which tries to work in his latest ideas that fit the published Silm. Both are very individualised; no two people are going to agree on exactly what's in each.

But there are other canons! The Book of Lost Tales is a nearly-complete, mostly-internally-consistent canon. The Lost Road presents a different canon for Numenor, with different timelines and characters, complete enough that you could easily write fanfic in it.

And yes, there are the movie canons. The Jacksonverse, which may or may not include Rings of Power. The Rankin-Bass-verse, which may or may not include the Bakshi movie. Heck, the full script of the Boorman movie is available; that's a canon, too.

From a fanfic perspective, and even from a discussion perspective, all you have to do is specify which canon you're thinking of. "This is a Movieverse fanfic, including Rings of Power." "In the Lost Road era, was Elendil an effective leader?" "If Gil-Galad is Fingon's son, why did Turgon become High King?" Just try not to cross your canons over without realising you're doing it: "I think the Stranger is Fionwe, son of Manwe!"

The difficulty, of course, lies in those two individualised canons: the ones that ask what 'really happened'. For fanfic, you can cite the specific text - "I'm going with the version where Galadriel meets Celeborn in Aman". For discussions... well, that's why their discussions: you bring your preferred "canon" texts and make a case for why they're the most like what 'really happened'. You can forge agreement, but never a definitive answer.

hS