No, really. Are (or were) there courses or degrees in "philology?"
Or is it a broader term that encompasses other disciplines?
I remember that even Shippey, in his Road to Middle Earth, had a hard
time giving an exact definition of the term. It was more than
linguistics, more than literature, and properly inclusive of both, as best I
could tell.
I also recall Shippey writing about the development of the study of ancient
languages and literature, how it blossomed in the mid-19th century but had
overreached and was already in decline by the early 20th century, even as
Tolkien came to the field, and has largely withered since; thus Shippey's own
sorrowful admission that he presided over the dismantling of a course of study
that Tolkien had created. The fading of this discipline, Shippey seems to
feel, has contributed to much misunderstanding of Tolkien.
Elsewhere on this board someone wrote, on the possibility of publishing the
Reading Room discussions, that the material here isn’t up to scholarly
standards. I have no experience on that subject, but I’d guess that it’s
true, in terms of thoroughness or organization. However, in terms of
sheer quantity of insight, I find more to be impressed by in any two weeks’
worth of posts here than I did in two days of “scholarly” presentation at the
Blackwelder Conference in Marquette. (Don’t misunderstand me: the
conference was wonderful, but at least as orally presented, a few of the papers
said nothing new to me (I expect there’ll be some revisions and expansion in
the published proceedings). Some others were confusingly arranged, or
just poorly read. And there were mistakes of fact and
pronunciation. Nevertheless, I think all of them had enough
potential--some much more than that--to make for good material for
further consideration here. I don’t want to quash the Secondary
Discussion series with my comments.) I don’t know if that says anything
about the level of Tolkien scholarship in general—can any single author sustain
a conference’s worth of masterful new scholarship?—but I do think that Tolkien
continues not to be taken seriously by much of the modern literary
establishment. And two of the major charges against Tolkien have been
(very broadly) the apparent triteness of his themes and of his language.
Shippey’s efforts, as a philologist, have mostly aimed at thwarting these
arguments, by showing the literature and language that Tolkien knew
professionally and how he responded to them, borrowed from them, and developed
them in his fiction. This can lead to defensiveness, as Shippey sometimes
seems exasperated by critics who don’t know the language or legends that form,
in part, the imaginative of Tolkien’s creation.* And that’s not entirely
fair: unless Tolkien was writing the LotR exclusively for an audience of
philologists, then as you note, he must be judged on broader standards.
Fortunately there are, of course, other serious approaches to Tolkien, but
philology is Shippey’s field, the area where in which he can contribute the
most to Tolkien studies, and, I think, at least one of the most
important aspects underpinning the LotR. (Shippey’s analysis of Tolkien
is not exclusively philological, however: especially in Author of the
Century, he takes pains to consider the modernity of some of Tolkien’s
themes.) But I think Shippey is also concerned, as was Tolkien, that 20th
century literature has taken a wrong, or at least foolishly narrow, course, and
that philology ought to be more widely understood. Thus his very valuable
books, and also the specifics examples in his paper at Marquette: what
was Tolkien working from when he deliberately chose the two words “dwimmerlaik”
and “ninnyhammer?”
I actually think Shippey’s message and yours largely overlap. He would
have agreed that Tolkien wanted more from philology than Anglo-Saxon grocery
lists--thus the comment about working from “dead leaf to tree,” and the reading
of Gollum’s failed search for secrets at the roots of the mountains--and also
that Tolkien was concerned he’d strayed too far from his proper scholarly duty,
as hinted at in “Niggle.” Tolkien’s fiction, Shippey seems to feel, was
directed both at the “lit.” crowd who didn’t appreciate philology, and the
“lang.” crowd, who through their single-mindedness were in danger of killing it
off.
*I think I know how he feels—right now I’m exasperated because the three
most prominent local newspaper drama critics have, in my view, totally
misinterpreted the play we recently opened, in which I think I see,
coincidentally, the influence of Tolkien, or at least some very interesting
parallels. But more on that
later.
