Read The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien Online
Authors: Humphrey Carpenter
The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien (5 page)
No reviewer (that I have seen), although all have carefully used the correct
dwarfs
themselves, has commented on the fact (which I only became conscious of through reviews) that I use throughout the âincorrect' plural
dwarves.
I am afraid it is just a piece of private bad grammar, rather shocking in a philologist; but I shall have to go on with it. Perhaps my
dwarf
â since he and the
Gnome
2
are only translations into approximate equivalents of creatures with different names and rather different functions in their own world â may be allowed a peculiar plural. The real âhistorical' plural of
dwarf
(like
teeth
of
tooth
) is
dwarrows
, anyway: rather a nice word, but a bit too archaic. Still I rather wish I had used the word
dwarrow
.
My heart warms to your son. To read the faint and close typescript was noble: to read the whole thing again so soon was a magnificent compliment.
I have received one postcard, alluding I suppose to the Times' review: containing just the words:
sic hobbitur ad astra.
3
All the same I am a little perturbed. I cannot think of anything more to say about
hobbits.
Mr Baggins seems to have exhibited so fully both the Took and the Baggins side of their nature. But I have only too much to say, and much already written, about the world into which the hobbit intruded. You can, of course, see any of it, and say what you like about it, if and when you wish. I should rather like an opinion, other than that of Mr C. S. Lewis and my children, whether it has any value in itself, or as a marketable commodity, apart from hobbits. But if it is true that
The Hobbit
has come to stay and more will be wanted, I will start the process of thought, and try to get some idea of a theme drawn from this material for treatment in a similar style and for a similar audience â possibly including actual hobbits. My daughter would like something on the Took family. One reader wants fuller details about Gandalf and the Necromancer. But that is too dark â much too much for Richard Hughes' snag. I am afraid that snag appears in everything; though actually the presence (even if only on the borders) of the terrible is, I believe, what gives this imagined world its verisimilitude. A safe fairyland is untrue to all worlds. At the moment I am suffering like Mr Baggins from a touch of âstaggerment', and I hope I am not taking myself too seriously. But I must confess that your letter has aroused in me a faint hope. I mean, I begin to wonder whether duty and desire may not (perhaps) in future go more closely together. I have spent nearly all the vacation-times of seventeen years examining, and doing things of that sort, driven by immediate financial necessity (mainly medical and educational). Writing stories in prose or verse has been stolen, often guiltily, from time already mortgaged, and has been broken and ineffective. I may perhaps now do what I much desire to do, and not fail of financial duty. Perhaps!
fn2
I think âOxford' interest is mildly aroused. I am constantly asked how my hobbit is. The attitude is (as I foresaw) not unmixed with surprise and a little pity. My own college is I think good for about six copies, if only in order to find material for teasing me. Appearance in The Times
convinced one or two of my more sedate colleagues that they could admit knowledge of my âfantasy' (i.e. indiscretion) without loss of academic dignity. The professor of Byzantine Greek
4
bought a copy, âbecause first editions of “Alice” are now very valuable'. I did hear that the Regius Professor of Modern History was recently seen reading âThe Hobbit'. It is displayed by Parkers
5
but not elsewhere (I think).
I am probably coming to town, to hear Professor Joseph Vendryes at the Academy on Wednesday Oct. 27th. I wonder would that be a suitable day for the luncheon you kindly asked me to last summer? And in any case, I could bring
Mr Bliss
to the office so as to get the definite advice on what is needed to make it reproducible promised by Mr Furth?
Yours sincerely
J. R. R. Tolkien.
PS. I acknowledge safe receipt of the specimen âpictures' sent to America.
23 October 1937
[On 19 October, Unwin wrote to Tolkien: âI think there is cause for your faint hope. . . . . It is seldom that a children's writer gets firmly established with one book, but that you will do so very rapidly I have not the slightest doubt. . . . . You are one of those rare people with genius, and, unlike some publishers, it is a word I have not used half a dozen times in thirty years of publishing.']
Thank you in return for your encouraging letter. I will start something soon, & submit it to your boy at the earliest opportunity.
[Tolkien lunched with Unwin in London on 15 November, and told him about a number of his writings which already existed in manuscript: the series of
Father Christmas Letters
, which he had addressed to his children each Christmas since 1920; various short tales and poems; and
The Silmarillion
. Following this meeting, he handed to Allen & Unwin the âQuenta Silmarillion', a prose formulation of the latter book, together with the long unfinished poem âThe Gest of Beren and Lúthien'. These were shown to one of the firm's outside readers, Edward Crankshaw, who reported unfavourably on the poem, but praised the prose narrative for its âbrevity and dignity', though he said he disliked its âeye-splitting Celtic names'. His report continued: âIt has something of that mad, bright-eyed beauty that perplexes all Anglo-Saxons in face of Celtic art.' These comments were passed on to Tolkien.]
16 December 1937
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Dear Mr Unwin,
I have been ill and am still rather tottery, and have had others of the common human troubles, so that time has slipped out of my hands: I have accomplished next to nothing of any kind since I saw you. Father Christmas' 1937 letter is unwritten yet. . . . .
My chief joy comes from learning that the Silmarillion is not rejected with scorn. I have suffered a sense of fear and bereavement, quite ridiculous, since I let this private and beloved nonsense out; and I think if it had seemed to you to be nonsense I should have felt really crushed. I do not mind about the verse-form, which in spite of certain virtuous passages has grave defects, for it is only for me the rough material. But I shall certainly now hope one day to be able, or to be able to afford, to publish the Silmarillion! Your reader's comment affords me delight. I am sorry the names split his eyes â personally I believe (and here believe I am a good judge) they are good, and a large part of the effect. They are coherent and consistent and made upon two related linguistic formulae, so that they achieve a reality not fully achieved to my feeling by other name-inventors (say Swift or Dunsany!). Needless to say they are not Celtic! Neither are the tales. I do know Celtic things (many in their original languages Irish and Welsh), and feel for them a certain distaste: largely for their fundamental unreason. They have bright colour, but are like a broken stained glass window reassembled without design. They are in fact âmad' as your reader says â but I don't believe I am. Still I am very grateful for his words, and particularly encouraged that the style is good for the purpose and even gets over the nomenclature.
I did not think any of the stuff I dropped on you filled the bill. But I did want to know whether any of the stuff had any exterior non-personal value. I think it is plain that quite apart from it, a sequel or successor to The Hobbit is called for. I promise to give this thought and attention. But I am sure you will sympathize when I say that the construction of elaborate and consistent mythology (and two languages) rather occupies the mind, and the Silmarils are in my heart. So that goodness knows what will happen. Mr Baggins began as a comic tale among conventional and inconsistent Grimm's fairy-tale dwarves, and got drawn into the edge of it â so that even Sauron the terrible peeped over the edge. And what more can hobbits do? They can be comic, but their comedy is suburban unless it is set against things more elemental. But the real fun about ores and dragons (to my mind) was before their time. Perhaps a new (if similar) line? Do you think Tom Bombadil, the spirit of the (vanishing) Oxford and Berkshire countryside, could be made into the hero of a story? Or is he, as I suspect, fully enshrined in the enclosed verses?
1
Still I could enlarge the portrait.
Which are the four coloured illustrations you are using?
2
Have the five originals yet returned? Is there a spare one available of the dragon on his hoard? I have to give a lecture on
dragons
, (at the Natural History Museum!!!) and they want a picture to make a slide of.
3
Could I have four more copies of
the Hobbit
at author's rates, to use as Christmas presents?
May I wish you bon voyage â and a safe return.
4
I am supposed to be broadcasting from BBC on Jan 14th, but that will I suppose be after your return.
5
I shall look forward to seeing you again.
Yours sincerely
J. R. R. Tolkien
P.S. I have received several queries, on behalf of children and adults, concerning the
runes
and whether they are real and can be read. Some children have tried to puzzle them out. Would it be a good thing to provide a runic alphabet? I have had to write one out for several people. Please excuse scrawling and rambling nature of this letter. I feel only half-alive. JRRT.
I have received safely by a later post the
Geste
(in verse) and the
Silmarillion
and related fragments.
[On 17 December, Furth wrote to Tolkien: âThe demand for
The Hobbit
became so acute with the beginning of the Christmas orders that we had to rush the reprint though. . . . . At the last minute the crisis was so acute that we fetched part of the reprint from our printers at Woking in a private car.']
19 December 1937
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Dear Mr Furth,
Thank you for the account of recent events with regard to âthe Hobbit'. It sounds quite exciting.
I have received
four
copies of the new impression charged to me, as ordered in my letter to Mr Unwin. I think the coloured pictures have come out well ⦠I am sorry that the Eagle picture (to face p. 118) is not included â merely because I should have liked to see it reproduced. I marvel that four can have been included without raising the price. Perhaps the Americans will use it? Odd folk . . .
I have written the first chapter of a new story about Hobbits â âA long expected party'.
1
A merry Christmas.
Yrs sincerely
J. R. R. Tolkien.
[P.S.]. . . . Mr Arthur Ransome
2
objects to
man
on p. 27 (line 7 from end). Read
fellow
as in earlier recension? He also objects to
more men
on p. 294 1. 11. Read
more of us? Men
with a capital is, I think, used in text when âhuman kind' are specifically intended; and
man, men
with a minuscule are occasionally and loosely used as âadult male' and âpeople'. But perhaps, although this can be mythologically defended (and is according to Anglo-Saxon usage!), it may be as well to avoid raising mythological issues outside the story. Mr Ransome also seems not to like Gandalf's use of
boys
on p. 112 (lines 11, 13). But, though I agree that his insult was rather silly and not quite up to form, I do not think anything can be done about it now. Unless
oaves
would do? JRRT.
1 February 1938
Would you ask Mr Unwin whether his son, a very reliable critic, would care to read the first chapter of the sequel to
The Hobbit
? I have typed it. I have no confidence in it, but if he thought it a promising beginning, could add to it the tale that is brewing.
4 February 1938
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Dear Mr Furth,
I enclose copy of Chapter I âA Long-expected Party' of possible sequel to
The Hobbit
. . . . .
I received a letter from a young reader in Boston (Lincs) enclosing a list of
errata
[in
The Hobbit
]. I then put my youngest son, lying in bed with a bad heart,
1
to find any more at twopence a time. He did. I enclose the results â which added to those already submitted should (I hope) make an exhaustive list. I also hope they may one day be required.
Yours sincerely,
J. R. R. Tolkien.
[The publishers had again been considering the possibility of publishing
Mr Bliss
, for which see the introductory note to no. 10.]
17 February 1938
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Dear Mr Furth,
âMr Bliss' returned safely. I am sorry you have had so much trouble with him. I wish you could find someone to redraw the pictures
properly. I don't believe I am capable of it. I have at any rate no time now â it is easier to write a story at odd moments than draw (though neither are easy). . . . .
They say it is the first step that costs the effort. I do not find it so. I am sure I could write unlimited âfirst chapters'. I have indeed written many. The Hobbit sequel is still where it was, and I have only the vaguest notions of how to proceed. Not ever intending any sequel, I fear I squandered all my favourite âmotifs' and characters on the original âHobbit'.
I will write and get your advice on âMr Bliss' before I do anything. It will hardly be before the Long Vacation, or the end of my âresearch fellowship'.
1
