More on round-world vs flat-world

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Just re-listened for the first time in forever to Tolkien's 1966 radio interview. Here it is; the relevant bit starts at the 7 minute mark

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFexwNCYenI (it helps if you slow playback down to 75% speed)

[Galin]

I found this on the web, assuming it's accurate.
_______________________________

D. Gerrolt: Hence the ultimate downfall.

J.R.R. Tolkien: Then became only intellectual. It lived then only in memory, it lived in time but not present time. And of course, if Numenor was drowned then the earthly paradise was moved so then you could then get to South America!

(laughing)

Then the world became round… you see it always had been a vast globe. But people can now sail around it… discovered it’s round… that was my solution to the… I wanted to give a form of Atlantis some universal application. The point is really… as they get to it you suddenly see the real colors of the world being now like a bridge….all lines lead to what was.. of course, I don’t know what your theory of Time is but: what was, what is, whatever had an existence must…still, has that same existence…but it’s a…we won’t go, you can’t go too deeply into those things but they really are sailing back to earlier memory.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

And interesting exercise, at a late date, trying to reconcile RW and FW aspects of his cosmology. I think this represents his "final" word on the matter.

Unfortunately, changing round the early parts of the QS would have required a lot of bulldozing. (Also, he might have been stopped short if he had remembered that, in print, Bombadil talks about the Sun and Moon being created after the Earth.)

[Galin]

Heheh, yes "curvature" sounds more likely than "colours"


Round world mythology had appeared at least twice before this interview, and I see the statements here as a confirmation of an always round earth, while flat-to-round world tales remain part of mannish myths.

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hicklin

( . . . ) Unfortunately, changing round the early parts of the QS would have required a lot of bulldozing.

Couldn't that depend upon the tradition involved? For example, in my opinion, if we have QS being a mostly Mannish account mixed with certain Elvish tales, we could still have Men awakening with the Sun.

(Also, he might have been stopped short if he had remembered that, in print, Bombadil talks about the Sun and Moon being created after the Earth.)

May I ask what line of Tom's you're referring to here?

[William Cloud Hicklin]

May I ask what line of Tom's you're referring to here?

[Tom] had now wandered into strange regions beyond their memory and beyond their waking thought, into times when the world was wider, and the seas flowed straight to the western Shore; and still back and on Tom went singing into ancient starlight, when only the Elf-sires were awake.
[...]
"When the Elves passed westward, Tom was here already, before the seas were bent. He knew the dark under the stars when it was fearless -- before the Dark Lord came from Outside."

__________
While it's certainly true that Tolkien in his last years was looking at "garbled Mannish legends" as his out, that would have been a very difficult solution for several reasons, including the physical presence of Aman during the Journey and the Elves' passing westward at that time (even if the mobile island were written off as myth), and the return of the Exiles after the Silmarils. Somehow the significance of the Trees would have to be maintained in a world where the Sun is already in the sky. The second starkindling would be a serious problem, and the significance of Ursa Major and Orion presented in LR given a completely different historio-mythological background. So, again, it would have taken heavy construction equipment and the digging up of foundations.

But the biggest problem would be this- however misguided the early Numenoreans may have been, and we'll pretend that their visitors from Eressea and their own visits to Lindon didn't set them straight, by the time we're into the Third Age the scholars of Arnor would have been in regular contact with Lindon and especially Rivendell, where the Elves knew better. Heck, Glorfindel personally remembered the Trees and had crossed the Grinding Ice! And then we have the problem of Bilbo, whose Translations from the Elvish was, in the Second Edition, at just the time of this interview (1965-66), being at least heavily hinted as being the Silmarillion. And if Bilbo was translating "from the Elvish" at Rivendell, then surely he would have got the straight scoop, not old Numenorean legends! (On that note, remember that almost no Numenorean writings survived the Downfall)

[Galin]

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hicklin

[Tom] had now wandered into strange regions beyond their memory and beyond their waking thought, into times when the world was wider, and the seas flowed straight to the western Shore; and still back and on Tom went singing into ancient starlight, when only the Elf-sires were awake. [...] "When the Elves passed westward, Tom was here already, before the seas were bent. He knew the dark under the stars when it was fearless -- before the Dark Lord came from Outside."

To my mind, none of that necessarily means Tom told the hobbits that the Sun and Moon were created after the Earth, unless you mentally inject information that Tolkien himself had yet to publish. How many first-time readers would take this to certainly mean that the world was once actually flat, and that the Elves lived on an Earth with no Sun?

A line in The Hobbit however: "In the Wide World the Wood-elves lingered in the twilight before the raising of the Sun and Moon; . . ." was revised by JRRT in the 1960s to: "In the Wide World the Wood-elves lingered in the twilight of our Sun and Moon, but loved best the stars; . . ."


Concerning the rest of your argument, I don't see why the physical presence of Aman is problematic for example, but generally speaking, I would say that garbled traditions allow for certain, externally "older" ideas to remain, rather than be bulldozed. And that's the beauty of it.

But the biggest problem would be this- however misguided the early Numenoreans may have been, and we'll pretend that their visitors from Eressea and their own visits to Lindon didn't set them straight, by the time we're into the Third Age the scholars of Arnor would have been in regular contact with Lindon and especially Rivendell, where the Elves knew better. Heck, Glorfindel personally remembered the Trees and had crossed the Grinding Ice! And then we have the problem of Bilbo, whose Translations from the Elvish was, in the Second Edition, at just the time of this interview (1965-66), being at least heavily hinted as being the Silmarillion. And if Bilbo was translating "from the Elvish" at Rivendell, then surely he would have got the straight scoop, not old Numenorean legends!

We've had this discussion before, especially with respect to the Numenorean-Bilbo transmission. In your thread (from 2016, Barrow Downs) "transmission theory: what the heck was Tolkien thinking" you ultimately posted:

http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=19054

Actually, I think I'm coming around to the "uncritical translation of old legends" view of Bilbo's work especially in light of T's description of Quenta Silmarillion as a compilation made in Numenor, focused around the Great Tales (all of them about Edain). This is especially appealing in that we know that Bilbo was quite fond of Aragorn and very interested in his lineage. The only (minor) problem there is that "Translations from Numenor" or some such might have been a more accurate title, even though the given one isn't inaccurate (presumably the Numenorean QS was written in Sindarin).

I had something of a small epiphany in this regard brought on by analogies made here to classical mythology. We have all read collections of "Greek" mythology-- except that many of those stories and several of the best known in fact come from Ovid, a Roman; further confusing matters is the fact that often these collections, especially the older ones, use the Latin rather than Greek names of deities (even that reflects Roman "garbling;" with the exception of Apollo, the Roman pantheon were native Latin gods who were subsequently syncretized with the Greek and appropriated their legends).

I thought you were edging closer here to (something like): so what if Glorfindel knew differently. No?

(On that note, remember that almost no Numenorean writings survived the Downfall)

At the moment I can't recall, is this in print (as in published by JRRT himself)? In any case, the following is:

"These two pieces [poems 6 and 16], therefore, are only re-handlings of Southern matter, though this may have reached Bilbo by way of Rivendell. No. 14 also depends upon the lore of Rivendell, Elvish and Numenorean, concerning the heroic days of the end of the First Age; it seems to contain echoes of the Numenorean tale of Turin and Mim the Dwarf."

JRRT, Adventures of Tom Bombadil

[Huinesoron]

A transcript which matches Galin's can be found here.

A quick skim shows that the passage in question is one of the least coherent in the whole transcript, and the transcriber clearly had some trouble! I think this bit got tangled the most, and have tried to fix it up:

"I also wanted to give the Fall of Atlantis some universal application. The point is really, I ['m using this [???]] language, as they get to the, you suddenly see the real curvature of the world going down like a bridge. You are on a line that leads to what was."

(I think he also says 'get to sail to America' earlier on, not 'to South America'.)

So: interesting! You can practically hear him skipping mental tracks when he goes from 'the world becomes a vast globe' to 'you see, it always had been'. I think this comes from a time when Tolkien was still transitioning between the two concepts; he initially presents the old Flat-World mythology, but corrects himself mid-thought. That might even be why he gets so incoherent right here.

The whole Time thing is his attempt to retain the Straight Road, which now obviously makes no sense (because it never was a straight path). Now, Valinor is a sort of crystallised memory - a physical incarnation of an earlier point in Time, still accessible but not exactly in the Present. But also not time travel. It's all very mystical.

hS

[Erendis of Numenor]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

"I also wanted to give the Fall of Atlantis some universal application. The point is really, I ['m using this [???]] language, as they get to the, you suddenly see the real curvature of the world going down like a bridge. You are on a line that leads to what was."

A Welsh friend of mine (and her Welsh mother) understood this :

"I also wanted to give them the form that lent it some universal application"

I'm from Brittany, so English is not a natural language for me. :/

What do you think about this possibility ?

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hicklin

Just re-listened for the first time in forever to Tolkien's 1966 radio interview.

And I thought the interview dated of 1964, not 1966 :
http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/1964_BBC_Interview