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Post by Sparrow on Aug 31, 2004 19:18:49 GMT -6
The company's departure from Beorn's home marked the beginning of a new phase of danger. Single file, Bilbo and the dwarves follow a narrow path into a forest in which "the trees leaned over them and listened." Did the trees do, or seem to do, these things? Is Tolkien using personification to set the mood for this chapter, or is he telling us that these trees are different from other trees? What, if anything, do we know about this forest?
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Post by Andorinha on Aug 31, 2004 21:43:44 GMT -6
A very intriguing topic, Sparrow! This is one I'll do some fact-finding homework on, and then approach it a bit more seriously...
I think the key to this set of questions will be "what did Tolkien know, and when did he know it!?"
Are we -- with the text of The Hobbit -- already in a Middle-earth that supports sentient/ sapient/ volitional trees? Are there Ents, and Old Man Willows in this world, this early, 1937 "prequel" narrative? Does Bilbo offer us any tales of The Old Forest and its wandering trees?
I think not, (another argument for the original, "independent" nature of this saga -- it shows no hint of Yavana and the Olvar* enspirtment of The Silmarillion that will be used to explain the post 1954 LotR episodes of "walking-talking" trees).
The trees of Mirkwood are "merely" trees, aren't they? They are given an anthropomorphic gloss -- "the trees leaned over them and listened." (Flies and Spiders, first page) in the 1937 text, but I think this is plainly no more than "setting the mood." In his later works, JRRT does enthuse a "knowing spirit" into his forests, but do the trees of Mirkwood, in The Hobbit, ever "act" in a deliberate attempt to force their wills upon their environment in anything like the animal/ human sense of an Old Man Willow, or the hyper-active groves of Fangorn? I think the entire concept of sapient, gracile vegetation is foreign to The Hobbit as originally written and intented, but it still can fit into the LotR world, if we "backread" with half-closed eyes, and place such spirited trees into the 1937 narrative, after the fact.
Read in isolation, and trying to blank out all evidence from LotR and the "mythologies," I conclude that the trees of Mirkwood in The Hobbit are simply trees. The gloomy aspect of the forest is real enough (as a reflection of the Dwarves realization that the woods harbor many dangers and their aesthetic dislike of the place), but I recall no instance in The Hobbit of the trees acting with "willful" intent to alter the events of the story.
I suppose it could be argued that in so vast a forest, many different biomes might exist, some with more lively trees? Would the Necromancer (not yet made into a Sauron) have influenced the trees around Dol Guldur into taking up a more threating posture? Does being on/ near the Elven Path and its magics keep these trees more subdued and "treeish" than otherwise they might be?
Small Grin...
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*Tolkien made the same distinction between "rooted" life forms, the Olvar (vegetation) and the "quick", moving life forms, the Kelvar (animals) that we find in Biblical and Classical sources.
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Post by Lanhail on Sept 1, 2004 6:08:05 GMT -6
Andorinha, to help you with your fact-finding homework: One for my side: "Tree-men" are mentioned in Lost Tales II in two spots which which contain basic outlines for the story of Earendel which C. Tolkien dated in the 1910's. The unfortunate part is that there is nothing to define what "tree-men" are or what part they were to play. They could be lumberjacks. However, I would like to think that this is the origin for Ents, since Sam uses the term "tree-men" in The Shadow of the Past chapter of FotR.
And one for your side: There is a poem called "Bagme Bloma" "Flower of the Trees", published in "Songs for Philologists" printed in 1936, in which the tree is given some anthropomorphic qualities. I found it in Road to Middle Earth. I'd love to share even a small piece of it...but, I don't want to infringe on copyright. This poem does not "seem" to have anything to do with the legendarium. Mirkwood could be in the similar vein.
Lanhail
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Post by Stormrider on Sept 1, 2004 6:40:32 GMT -6
I always felt a confining closeness as the Dwarves and Bilbo walked through the forest of Mirkwood. It was dark, brooding, and evil-feeling but I never thought that the trees themselves would move or harm Thorin and Company. I felt it was the eyes of the creatures blinking at them and the darkness that was frightening. It was just a forest, but a dark one at that!
I think the influence of the Necromancer (one who tells the future or prophesy by communicating with the dead-Webster's New World Dictionary) could have been influencing the forest which was originally Greenwood the Great in The Silmarillion.
But as Andorinha is trying to picture The Hobbit as it was originally written without being linked to The Sil and LOTR, The Necromancer was not Sauron and perhaps it was not intended to be Greenwood.
But still a Necromancer could have had a dark and eerie influence over the forest for his divination purposes and communication with the dead.
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Post by Andorinha on Sept 1, 2004 15:36:24 GMT -6
Lanhail: Excellent work in snooping out the "Tree-men" passages in one of the accessory volumes! The following essay (ok, rant) is my quick take on this matter and can be amended if either of us, or any other participant here, comes up with better citations!
The brief mention of "Treemen" in two places in Lost Tales 2 (pp 257 and 265) lacks, as you point out, Lanhail, the sort of definitional information we require to make a positive connection between these creatures and the later Ents (Tree Shepherds) of LotR:
1) "Voronwe and Earendel set sail in Wingilot. Driven south. Dark regions. Fire mountains. Tree-men. Pygmies. Sarqindi* or cannibal-ogres." (p. 257)
2) "Earendel's boat goes through North. Iceland. ... Greenland, and the wild islands: a mighty wind and crest of great wave carry him to hotter climes, to back of the West Wind. Land of strange men, land of magic. The home of Night The Spider. He escapes from the meshes of Night with a few comrades, sees a great mountain island and a golden city [added in margin: Kor] -- wind blows him southward. Tree-men, Sun-dwellers, spices, fire-mountains, red sea: Mediterranean (loses his boat [travels afoot through the wilds of Europe?] or Atlantic."
The actual context of both these passages (brief notes listing the marvels that Earendel might find during his travels over uncharted seas) seem directly related to the Classical fables of heroic voyagers who touch upon exotic shores to find "monopods" shading themselves from tropic suns by lying on their backs beneath the umbrella spread of their single, giant foot. Or their encounters with the fabulous race of "men" whose headless bodies carry faces on their stomachs.
At this point in his writing, JRRT still uses a more modern 4th age (or even later) geography that has little to connect it with the seas and continents of the Elder Age in Arda. Iceland, Greenland, Mediterranean and Red Seas? This is not the Hobbits' "Middle-earth," nor even that of the First Age Elves before the rising of the Sun -- and I notice that Tolkien boldly names the "powers" of this cosmos "Gods," with a capital "G" (p. 256). JRRT has not yet, seemingly, introduced his Christian-based monotheism (found in The Silmarillion).
So this particular, early version of the "Tale of Earendel" is not (I think) yet a part of the Middle-earth corpus -- at least as it is presented in Lost Tales 2, although it is later revised and subsumed into Middle-earth and appears as such in its various Silmarillion contexts).
Rather, we have here a tale set within the limits of our own "modern" earth (Iceland! Greenland! Mediterranean Sea!) though chronologically its episodes take place some thousands of years in our past, in the golden age of heroes. The major source of Tolkien's inspiration for The Tale of Earendel (chpt V in LT 2) is, I believe, strictly the Classical, pagan fables of Rome, Greece, and the Nordic traditions intermingled. It stands, I will aver, as another example of his creation of "independent" stories that were originally only very loosely connected by similarities of character, mood, style of writing (adventures and fantasies!). At some later date, as he was systematizing his hodge-podge collection of poetries and prose narratives, he did try to work the mass into a more coherent, unified history. But, at the early date of the composition of this piece on Earendel,* it is not likely that elements found in it are always going to be direct progenitors of similarly named elements found 30 - 40 years later in LotR.
Interpreted in this fashion, the "Tree-men" are more likely to be fabulous monsters, half human/ half whatever, and probably would be foes against whom the heroes contend, rather than the Elf-friendly Tree herders developed much later for LotR.
The Ents seem first to have evolved in Tolkien's thought as simple Giants, made up specifically for The Hobbit, as I do not recall the occurrence of giants in earlier tales, especially in The Silmarillion. Certainly the term "Ent" has only this original connotation in its Old English roots, (enta = giant) and in the beginning even Tolkien did not compound the Ents with vegetation. The Stone Giants of The Hobbit are, I think -- correct me please if I am mistaken here! -- his first essays in gigantism, and from the early versions of the LotR we know Fangorn was at first conceived as a simple giant, and an antagonist of Gandalf's. Somewhere in his revisions of the early LotR, JRRT married the concepts of Giant and Tree-herder to surpass the Shakespearean tale of the Great Birnam Woods "marching" off to war.***
So, I find the early notes for The Tale of Earendel, and the incidental mention of an undefined species of "Tree-men" to be largely irrelevant to this discussion (unless we can find a more descriptive account of these "Tree-men" than that taken from the simple sketch-notes of Earendel's Tale). And I think the term "Tree-men" is likely to be mere coincidence rather than an indication of an organic bond between the Tree-man of the North Farthing (Hal says he saw one!), and these early fable-creatures of the southern jungles encountered by Earendel in his originally separate/ independent saga.
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*A Tolkien linguist like Iarwain might be able to confirm or deny that Sarqindi is a compound of Greek "sar" = flesh plus the Elvish root for themselves, Quendi? So these ogres would be "Flesh of Elf" eaters? lol...
**Regarding chronology.
Lanhail, I thought that the Old English verses Tolkien found mentioning Earendel (which acted as his inspiration for several early poems) came in 1910 or such, but that most of The Tale of Earendel was jotted down as disconnected notes and bits of short narration a good while later, 1920s - 1930s? I do not think the bulk of the Tale could be any later than 1930 (though it was being constantly reworked) because it shows, to my eyes, little of the increasingly heavy RC - Christian influence that informs the material of the mythology after The Hobbit was finished (1933 -1935) but before its actual 1937 publication.
Christopher Tolkien warns us that a good deal of the Earendel material is contradictory, and remains undated (undatable). "There are also many isolated notes; and there are the very early Earendel poems. While the poems can be precisely dated, the notes and outlines can not; and it does not seem possible to arrange them in order so as to provide a clear line of development." (LT 2, p. 254)
Does your date of circa 1910 refer to the poems only, or to the main body of his Earendel sketches as found in chpt V of LT 2?
***See the "curious" remarks JRRT made to W.H. Auden regarding the invention of the Ents, Letter #163, footnote, pp 211-212. I am not sure how to interpret this statement: "Take the Ents for instance. I did not consciously invent them at all. The chapter called 'Treebeard', from first remark on p. 66, was written off more or less as it stands ... almost like reading some one else's work. And I like Ents now because they do not seem to have anything to do with me."
Does this mean that Tolkien never had a clear idea of wedding the giants to the vegetal world (despite some subconscious rumblings he obliquely suggests) until the 1940s when he wrote this chapter? If this construction holds water, it would be further evidence, I think, that the "Tree-men" of the early "Tale of Earendel" were not related to, or forerunners of the LotR, plant-life derived giants we know as the Ents of Fangorn Wood.
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Post by Lanhail on Sept 3, 2004 5:04:17 GMT -6
Stormrider wrote: "But as Andorinha is trying to picture The Hobbit as it was originally written without being linked to The Sil and LOTR, The Necromancer was not Sauron and perhaps it was not intended to be Greenwood." Actually, the Necromancer was one of the "no doubt about it" links to the pre-LotR legendarium. Greenwood as it stands as Mirkwood, though, could be either pre, during or post Hobbit. It was present in The Quenta Silmarillion that was sent as a possible "sequel" to the Hobbit. I found this information in HoMe volume V, though am having trouble dating it precicely.
Andorinha wrote: "So, I find the early notes for The Tale of Earendel, and the incidental mention of an undefined species of "Tree-men" to be largely irrelevant to this discussion (unless we can find a more descriptive account of these "Tree-men" than that taken from the simple sketch-notes of Earendel's Tale). And I think the term "Tree-men" is likely to be mere coincidence rather than an indication of an organic bond between the Tree-man of the North Farthing (Hal says he saw one!), and these early fable-creatures of the southern jungles encountered by Earendel in his originally separate/ independent saga."
I am much more lenient in my interpertation of "tree-men". Tree-men remained 'in the leaf mould' of Tolkien's mind from the 1910's (the years spanning somewhere between the beginning of 1910 and the end of 1919, since I am too lazy to look up the precice date). The way I look at it, Tolkien stored "Tree-men" in the back of his mind until he could discover what they were. Lanhail
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Post by Andorinha on Sept 3, 2004 15:06:59 GMT -6
This is becoming a ramified discussion indeed!
I'll isolate a few of the many topics we have already touched on here for special consideration to keep from dashing all about the Middle-earth landscape.
1. "Tree-men" -- We are at another impasse here... I find your reasons for accepting the LT 2 passages regarding "Tree-men" as "nascent Ents" unconvincing, but must hurry to agree that in the absence of "definitive" statements from Tolkien, your interpretation is one of many possibilities -- too speculative for my personal tastes, but, a possibility.
Lanhail, I am a little surprised, regarding this issue of the invention of the Ents, that you did not find and deploy the most, potentially damaging passage (to my "cause") that I know of in all of Tolkien's works. In the 1977 Silmarillion there is a chapter that would at least convince me that I am on the wrong track, IF the chronology of its composition, and the precise time of its inclusion in The Silmarillion could be firmly fixed.
"Of Aule and Yavanna" is a peculiar thing, and it deserves some deep, critical treatment of its own. It is one of the shorter chapters of The Silmarillion and I think a legally trained mind would see it as almost a codicil to the rest of the narrative found in the section titled "Quenta Silmarillion." Its purpose is primarily to explain the existence of the Dwarves in Arda, and to outline their fundamental "race" characteristics.
In this sense the chapter could, (should?) more correctly be "Of Aule and the Dwarves."
Why then does Yavanna get almost equal billing in this 5 1/2 page composition? Her appearance in this brief chapter is a minimalist thing in itself, a codicil to a codicil, but because she is used here as the foundation mechanism for an entire, new people, her actions do indeed assume equal importance with those of Aule, creator of the Dwarven Race, and do earn her "equal billing" in the chapter title. For Yavanna, in her zeal to protect sedentary plant life, has approached a startled Manwe and asked him to allow the Ents, the Onodrim to come into existence. She has effectually conceived and activated the principle of sapient vegetation, the walking-talking trees.
So, when did this particular passage (the Yavanna part of this chapter) find its first composition, and when was it included in the body of the 1977 "Quenta Silmarillion"? If it can be proven that this "creation of the Ents" occurred BEFORE the substantial writing of The Hobbit (1933 - 1935 to produce the "loanout" manuscript copy), then I must surely back-pedal with considerable energy to keep from tumbling completely from my seat!
But we already know that The Silmarillion of 1977 is a highly contended document, and wildly unreliable as a fount of absolute Tolkien knowledge. It was put together after JRRT's death by his son, and underwent vast revisions, editings, elisions, and re-positionings in Christopher's attempt to create a smooth, readable, logical narrative. Chris himself has, since that day, repented of his heavy editorial hand, and the production of the accessory HOME series is (partially) his attempt to repair the damages done in 1977.
In searching through these accessory volumes (and I do not possess them all) I have been unable to find the original material (whether titled "Of Aule and Yavanna" or not) that pertains to the creation of the Ents, and I suppose the tree spirits in general. I am unable to even date roughly the time of composition of pp 40 -45 of the 1977 version.
What I do suspect here, remembering the surprise of Manwe, is that the Yavanna-Ent material is a late interpolation, added to the text that originally did no more than detail Aule's presumptious creation of the Dwarves. Tolkien, in order to explain the almost constant alterations he made to his Arda/ Legendarium/ Backstory Mythologies hit upon a simple, but satisfying scheme. The Song of Eru and his Ainur would necessarily include ALL the things of Arda, but no one Ainur would ever know the entire story fully, and many things would suddenly spring into existence unknown and unexpected even by the Gods.
"The Illuvatar Knows All" Clause
"Yet some things there are that they [the Ainur] cannot see, neither alone nor taking counsel together; for to none but himself has Iluvatar revealed all that he has in store, and in every age there come forth things that are new and have no foretelling, for they do not proceed from the past." (The Silmarillion, "Ainulindale, p. 7, emphasis mine).
Now this "mechanism" allowed Tolkien to smack himself on the forehead, sometime after 1938, and exclaim "Gadszooks! Talking Trees! Walking Trees! Fantastic story potential! I'll slip them into my LotR material and really rock my readers!" But then he remembered, he was getting old, and his dream of creating a single, unified mythology must be furthered, and the original independence, or semi-independence of so many of his tales must be reduced to conform with this overarching scheme of unification. "Can't just invent these Ents without somehow 'back-tying' them into my overall mythology... Aha! I'll invoke the 'Illuvatar alone knows all' clause, and in my revisions of The Silmarillion materials I'll just add a note (where it seems to best fit) about the creation of these 'tree-spirits' and hmmm, I'll call 'em, 'Tree-men'! Ents! Yes, I can take the story of my 'humanoid' giant, Treebeard, and just add a few leaves and barkish skin, and make him a Tree-man Giant! Bingo!"
So, in my reconstruction, JRRT was able to use a really kool, really NEW element in his LotR -- Ents, talking-walking vegetation -- and yet, with a brief added note to the palimpsestic "Quenta Silmarillion," this innovation could be artfully subsumed into the backstory mythology! Great!
Show me, Lanhail, or anyone, where the Ent-creation tale provably pre-existed The Hobbit, and I'll dine on my own words (and there are a lot of them) for a long, long time to come.
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2. Just when does The Necromancer become Sauron?
Today, Lanhail, you seem, like me, to be working under some time/ energy constraints ("since I am too lazy to look up the precice date"), an understandable situation since there is indeed "life outside of Tolkien."
But it would be helpful for our mutual understanding of this issue if you could support your statement ("Actually, the Necromancer was one of the 'no doubt about it' links to the pre-LotR legendarium.") with some citations or at least an explanation of how you come to approach this matter with so high a degree of certainty.
My own reading, especially of The Letters, has led me to an equally demonstrative surety that the Necromancer was not originally Sauron, but was fit secondarily into that mold, and that backstory, sometime during the composition of LotR. Just as, originally, Bilbo's magic ring had nothing or very little to do with the rings forged by the Elves, and absolutely was NOT the One Ring forged by Sauron.
But, at this juncture, I will myself plead "verbal exhaustion," and approach this matter later -- with suitable citations and all the steps in my logic laid out for public review and correction by those interested enough to work up some countering citations and interpretations of their own.
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Post by Lanhail on Sept 3, 2004 19:16:44 GMT -6
Andorinha wrote: Lanhail, I am a little surprised, regarding this issue of the invention of the Ents, that you did not find and deploy the most, potentially damaging passage (to my "cause") that I know of in all of Tolkien's works. In the 1977 Silmarillion there is a chapter that would at least convince me that I am on the wrong track, IF the chronology of its composition, and the precise time of its inclusion in The Silmarillion could be firmly fixed.
Don't be surprised that I didn't use it. The section of the chapter you are speaking of was written in 1958 or later according to C. Tolkien in HoMe XI on page 340. There is no mention of Ents in the earlier vol. 1-5 of HoMe. Ent as the Shepherd of Trees is a LotR discovery. I am "working" on helping you with your "homework" on Mirkwood. Which ones do you have of the HoMe series? Taur-na-Fuin also Taur-nu-Fuin are other names for Mirkwood. I'm starting to make my way through the references....but, I'm quite tired tonight. Lanhail PS. Good thoughts about The Of Aule and Yavanna chapter. It was written at different times and cobbled together by C. Tolkien. I'll summarize it for you tomorrow.
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Post by Andorinha on Sept 3, 2004 22:37:40 GMT -6
OH! EXCELLENT NEWS!!! Yavanna and the Ents is a 1958 addition!!!
Sigh, I shall not be forced to sit in some dark corner and glower outward at the cruel world as I choke down all my words on this particular subject! Before I read your latest piece here I detailed my thoughts on this matter more fully under the Silmarillion topic, as it seemed to better fit there.
I do not have volume XI! I am working toward my conclusions by "logical" deduction and some imperfectly learned techniques of source criticism left over from an ancient college course -- using the 1977 Silmarillion, and HOME V The Lost Road.
I do also possess both volumes of The Unfinished Tales, The Lost Tales, and The Return of the Shadow quartet. Any assistance is greatly appreciated, and someday, after the bugs and kinks are worked out of these trial essays we'll have to get a final, revised, corrected version of "established truths" together!
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Post by Stormrider on Sept 9, 2012 8:30:27 GMT -6
It is interesting to see how Tolkien transitioned the early 1937 Hobbit into the one linking The Sil and LOTR. Confusing in many ways but interesting and necessary to make those connections and changes.
I was wondering how many of us did read the early 1937 Hobbit story when we first grabbed it off the book store shelf? I didn't read it until the 1970's so to me, the story has always been tied with The Sil and LOTR.
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Post by Andorinha on Sept 9, 2012 9:39:08 GMT -6
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Post by Stormrider on Sept 9, 2012 19:03:58 GMT -6
Listening to the Gothic reading was cool.
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