We like a defiant Tolkien. How could we not? He defied the
expectations of philologists who wanted him to produce more scholarly editions
and language studies than he did. He defied the literature professors and
critics who had a very different idea from his about what modern literature
should look like. Good thing Tolkien was defiant of these expectations or
we wouldn’t have had LotR or anything else from him.
But where do you see the defensiveness in what Tolkien says about his
work? Where is he currying favour with other philologists? I can
certainly think of lots of examples in the letters where he is apologetic for
missing deadlines or for just not getting work done at all (I love him for
that; it makes him seem so human and ordinary), but in general he doesn’t seem
to me to be defensive about how he – in defiance of all expectations – chose to
spend a good part of his time in writing fantasy.
And why must you divide vocation from avocation, job from hobby when Tolkien
specifically says that there is no division for him? In Letter 165
he states quite plainly: “But it is not a ‘hobby,’ in the sense of something
quite different from one’s work, taken up as a relief-outlet.” This is part of
Tolkien’s elaboration on what he had written in response to a New York Times
Book Review interviewer: “I am a philologist, and all my work is
philological. I avoid hobbies because I am a very serious person and
cannot distinguish between private amusement and duty.” I don’t see
anything “weak” in these explanations; he is trying to state (with a little bit
of humour, I think), and then later to elaborate on, for people who want to
know something about him, what he sees as a fundamental fact about himself and
what he does. In my reading of these statements, Tolkien is saying that
his philological imagination and knowledge seamlessly pervade both his “hobby”
and his “job.”
Your comments raise for me an interesting question about why we like certain
authors and the images we form of them. I suppose we all have our
preferences in how we would want to see our favourites. You insist that
you prefer to see Tolkien’s fantasy as his hobby, not his job, and that makes
me wonder why it is so important to you to see him in this way? Or, to
put it another way, why do you want to separate the fantasy writer from the
philologist? In this regard, my position is probably obvious – I’ve been
trained to read some of the medieval literature that Tolkien taught, so you
could say that it’s my personal bias that makes me like the fact that this
person I know as a medieval scholar is also a great fantasy writer. But I
could hold other preferences as well: I could say that I would prefer to
see Tolkien as a left-wing feminist – and I could find evidence here and there
to support parts of those preferences – but if I were to look honestly at the
things Tolkien wrote and what he stated about his beliefs, I wouldn’t think I’d
have the evidence to stick to those particular preferences of mine. So, I
guess what I am asking you, Curious, is this: when you say you prefer to see
Tolkien's fantasy as his hobby, not his job, are you talking about a
personal preference that says something about your personal values and
interests, or are you looking at some evidence that I don't know about or that
I'm reading completely differently that supports this point of
view?
