Tolkien's Imaginary Time and Our Real World

Tolkien, it seems quite clear from multiple statements he made in his letters, thought of his tales as taking place in our world, but in an imaginary, mythical, or mythological time period. These are the words he uses repeatedly across the decades. He first refers to "this imagined world" in a letter to Sir Stanley Unwin on 15 October 1937 (Letters no. 17 p. 30). He first mentions the idea of an imaginary time period in another letter to Sir Stanley Unwin from 24 February 1950, where he calls the Silmarillion "a long legendary* of imaginary times in a ‘high style’" (Letters no. 124 p. 193). The final reference comes in Letter no. 316 to R. W. Burchfield, then editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, on 11 September 1970. There he offers a definition of the word Hobbit for inclusion in the forthcoming supplement to the dictionary:

One of an imaginary people, a small variety of the human race, that gave themselves this name (meaning ‘hole-dweller’) but were called by others halflings, since they were half the height of normal Men. (p. 569)

The present entry in the OED reads: "a member of an imaginary race of small people." It would be quite reasonable at this point to object that "imaginary people" don't necessarily inhabit an imaginary place or time period. True enough. But the others mentioned, those who call Hobbits "halflings," are also imaginary. You could say it's imaginary people all the way down, but it's more pertinent and less impertinent to show further clear evidence that these imaginary people live in an imaginary time period.

In Letter 211 on p. 404 (14 October 1958) Tolkien wrote to Rhona Beare, mentioning among many other things how far in the past the Fall of Barad-dûr was supposed to be, and expanding on the subject in a note at the bottom of the page:

May I say that all this is ‘mythical’, and not any kind of new religion or vision. As far as I know it is merely an imaginative invention, to express, in the only way I can, some of my (dim) apprehensions of the world. All I can say is that, if it were ‘history’, it would be difficult to fit the lands and events (or ‘cultures’) into such evidence as we possess, archaeological or geological, concerning the nearer or remoter part of what is now called Europe.... I hope the, evidently long but undefined, gap* in time between the Fall of Barad-dûr and our Days is sufficient for ‘literary credibility’, even for readers acquainted with what is known or surmised of ‘pre-history’.

* --I imagine the gap to be about 6000 years: that is we are now at the end of the Fifth Age, if the Ages were of about the same length as S.A. and T.A. But they have, I think, quickened; and I imagine we are actually at the end of the Sixth Age, or in the Seventh.

The bold italics are mine. Earlier in this same letter Tolkien had mentioned his "mythical pre-history," a phrase he uses again in the very next letter (no. 211 p. 398; no. 212 p. 406). Let's look at a few more passages, which I think can speak for themselves. At the bottom of the page, I shall attach a list of all the letters in which Tolkien refers to this world as imaginary, mythical, or mythological. 

There is of course a clash between ‘literary’ technique, and the fascination of elaborating in detail an imaginary mythical Age (mythical, not allegorical: my mind does not work allegorically). As a story, I think it is good that there should be a lot of things unexplained (especially if an explanation actually exists); and I have perhaps from this point of view erred in trying to explain too much, and give too much past history. Many readers have, for instance, rather stuck at the Council of Elrond. And even in a mythical Age there must be some enigmas, as there always are. Tom Bombadil is one (intentionally). (Letters no. 144 p. 263)

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The particular ‘myth’ which lies behind this tale, and the mood both of Men and Elves at this time, is the Downfall of Númenor: a special variety of the Atlantis tradition. That seems to me so fundamental to ‘mythical history’ – whether it has any kind of basis in real history... is not relevant – that some version of it would have to come in. (Letters no. 154 p. 293)

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I am historically minded. Middle-earth is not an imaginary world. The name is the modern form (appearing in the 13th century and still in use) of midden-erd > middel-erd, an ancient name for the oikoumenē, the abiding place of Men, the objectively real world, in use specifically opposed to imaginary worlds (as Fairyland) or unseen worlds (as Heaven or Hell). The theatre of my tale is this earth, the one in which we now live, but the historical period is imaginary. The essentials of that abiding place are all there (at any rate for inhabitants of N.W. Europe), so naturally it feels familiar, even if a little glorified by the enchantment of distance in time. (Letters no. 183 p. 345)

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Mine is not an ‘imaginary’ world, but an imaginary historical moment on ‘Middle-earth’ – which is our habitation. (Letters no. 183 p. 351)

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I have, I suppose, constructed an imaginary time, but kept my feet on my own mother-earth for place. (Letters no. 211 p. 404)

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In your paragraph there is a missing link, more important (I think) for the purpose than what I said, or should have said, about ‘invention’. Namely: how did linguistic invention lead to imaginary history? So that I think the passage would be more intelligible if it ran more or less so: ‘The imaginary histories grew out of Tolkien’s predilection for inventing languages. He discovered, as others have who carry out such inventions to any degree of completion, that a language requires a suitable habitation, and a history in which it can develop.’ (Letters no. 294 p. 527)

So what Tolkien presents to us is an imaginary time period in our world, a time period in which many aspects of our world were quite different. Without even getting into the metaphysical differences arising from the mythical aspects of this period, like the immortality and reincarnation of the Elves or the marring of Arda before its creation, the physical differences alone, like a flat earth that becomes a globe with a secret straight path only Elves can find that exists tangentially to the now round earth, complicate fitting this mythical time into the past of our world. Yet if Tolkien's imagination was of such power and generosity of soul that he could convincingly inspire a secondary belief his readers cherish, how can ours be so poor that many of us find the suggestion of a non-white Elf, Dwarf, or Hobbit intolerable?

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Letters no. 124, p. 193; no. 131, p. 202 (twice); no. 142, p. 257; no. 144, p. 263 (twice); no. 153, p. 282, 284; no 163, p. 311, 313; no. 183, p. 345 (three times), 351 (twice); no. 190, p. 359, 360 (twice), 361; no. 211, p. 404; no 247, p. 469; no. 294, p. 527 (twice); no. 297, p. 541; no. 316, p. 569.

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*The noun "legendary" refers here "a collection of stories or legends" (OED). Tolkien more commonly uses the Latin form of the word, legendarium: "A body or system of myths, legends, stories, etc., concerning or relating to a particular fictional world; a work containing this" (OED).

He do the police in different voices -- reading fiction versus listening to it

"For I ain't, you must know," said Betty, "much of a hand at reading writing-hand, though I can read my Bible and most print.  And I do love a newspaper.  You mightn't think it, but Sloppy is a beautiful reader of a newspaper.  He do the Police in different voices."

Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend, Chapter 16.

His voice takes away my voice.

His imagination limits my imagination.

Audio books, for years I've heard people rave about audio books.  Thoughtful, clever people, who love books and read a lot, people whose opinions I can respect even when we disagree, have declared their affection for audio books.  I just don't get it.

I've made several attempts over the years, and every time within a few minutes I have been left so cold and bored that I can continue to pay attention only by the force of will.  This is not a case of what I think of as Great Band Aporia -- you know, when you hear lots of people talk about how great a certain band is, but you can't for the life of you imagine why anyone would believe this.  It's different because in Great Band Aporia you regard the general opinion as something of a delusion to which you are, thankfully, quite superior.  And you think this way because the band itself just doesn't seem that remarkable to you.  The songs, the performances, they're just not that good.

But that's not the case for me with audio books.  I used to have an unabridged version of Derek Jacobi reading The Iliad.  Now I love The Iliad.  It's a titanic work about the consequences of human choices, and the horror and the beauty that arise from them, often side by side.  And Derek Jacobi is one of the great actors of our day, with an absolutely marvelous voice.  His Hamlet for the BBC long ago is amazing, and his performance in Breaking the Code on Broadway was the best thing I've ever seen.  He even played a hilariously bad Shakespearean ham on Frasier. What a perfect match he and Homer seemed.  But not for me.  It wasn't long before I was just as cold and bored as I was listening to some bland heartless drone of a reader reciting contemporary popular fiction.  I was very disappointed, but not in Derek Jacobi.

Currently I am trying again.  I am listening to Christopher Lee reading The Children of Húrin by Tolkien.  Again this is a work of which I am very fond, and a tale with which I am quite familiar. Christopher Lee is also well known to be a great aficionado of Tolkien.  These are the reasons I chose this particular book.  I hoped it might help. And then, too, there's that rich and resonant voice, which it is a pleasure to listen to, mostly.  Some of the characterizations he attempts with it, especially of women, are rather strange and, I think, unsuccessful.  He makes the character of Morwen, a stern, strong, sad woman, sound like Miss Havisham on laudanum.  And he is a little too zealous in his pronunciations of elvish words, with that all too sober glee that proclaims "See, I know how to say this word."  I am reminded of NPR reporters who insist on overdoing the accent when pronouncing a South American dignitary's name, as if saying a Spanish name meant they had stopped speaking English for the space of two or three words.  But these criticisms are of Lee, not the audio book itself. After a minute of two I can barely make myself listen.

A few years back I often worked on Sunday mornings, and on the drive in I would listen to Selected Shorts on NPR.  If you don't know, Selected Shorts is a live recording of short stories, commonly read by actors, to a studio audience.  Though I started listening at first largely because it was there, I kept on listening because I became interested in my own reaction to it.  You see, it didn't matter if the actor read the story well.  It didn't matter if I thought the story was clever or well done or interesting. I reacted to every one just as I did to audio books.

It seems I don't like being read to, even if I think the material is good and being read well.  In fact it may be worse if I do like the material.  But why?  It's a matter of voice and imagination.  When I read, there's a voice somewhere in my head that is a combination of the narrator and myself.  This voice involves my imagination with the story.  I am directly engaged.  But when someone else is reading the book for me, my voice is taken from me.  My voice is no longer telling me the story through my own imagination.  The reader's voice is substituted and the reader's imagination limits mine.

I am shut out.  I am used to getting lost inside a book, so much so that I jump if addressed or if the phone rings.  And it doesn't matter what kind of fiction it is, so long as it's good.  I can get just as lost inside Elizabeth Bowen's The Heat of the Day or A. S. Byatt's Possession, both terrific books, as I can inside Homer or Tolkien. It's only when I can do this that I understand the words of Machiavelli about reading that I quoted in an earlier post -- "I enter ... and there I taste the food that alone is mine, and for which I was born." 

It's that voice that makes this food mine alone, so much so that I was born for it. Without it, I go hungry.  But I'm glad I had the opportunity to figure this out, since it makes me appreciate that voice and my imagination and my love of books all the more.

The Iliad
The Children of Húrin
Breaking The Code
Selected Shorts
Elizabeth Bowen
A. S. Byatt

It's just the wind, right?

It's just the wind, right?  Or maybe not.

Perhaps it's because I was a little boy in the late 1960s.  There was so much going on.  A larger world swirled like The Starry Night upon the limits of my own.  The Beatles, The Stones, Bob Dylan, drugs, young men with long hair, pretty girls in gauzy shirts and peasant skirts, Martin Luther King, Civil Rights marches, peace marches, riots, Vietnam, body counts on Walter Cronkite.  It was all so overwhelming, so impossible to make sense of, so strange and wondrous and daunting for a boy who lived in books.

But there was one thing I did make sense of.  We were going to the moon.  I loved looking up at the stars and puzzling out the constellations.  As dim and pale as they were above the streetlights of the Bronx, they still shone brightly for me.  The sky was more full of worlds than all the books ever written.  And we were going to the moon.

With every Apollo mission we came closer, until one magical night in July 1969 that was even better than Star Trek.  I went outside and looked up, not because I expected to be able to see anything, but because we were there.  We were there.

Even afterwards I watched every mission, still excited.  The tension of Apollo 13 was breathtaking, but my faith then was childlike and perfect: I had no doubt they would return safely.  It was only years later that I realized how close they had come to never coming back at all.  But that was after Challenger, when the boldness of going into space no longer seemed linked to an equal brilliance of leadership.  The glory and vision of Apollo sank into scheduled maintenance on the Hubble.

It wasn't that the astronauts were less brave or less skilled.  They still climbed on top of a rocket and rode fire into the heavens.  It wasn't that experience and routine made their missions less dangerous.  We have the evidence to prove the opposite. It was that the gap between our reach and our grasp became so great that we confined ourselves to what we could do in near orbit and what we could see from afar.  Our one and only spaceship, which was plump and stodgy to begin with, became a delivery van.  

Perhaps it's because I was a little boy in the late 1960s, but even Hubble's images of the far end of the time, and Kepler's detections of hundreds of planets circling distant stars, as magnificent and humbling as they are, will never be as compelling as the Apollo Program.  If I could look up and see the Pillars of Creation in the night sky and pick out Kepler-186f, I would be outside looking up every single night.  Not because they would be beautiful.  No, not merely that.  But because some part of my humanity would want to know what it was like there, would want us to go there, even if I know that such journeys will almost certainly remain forever beyond our ability.  Still the idea of such voyages of discovery would trump the pedestrian impossibility.  That's why the idea of Mars will not die.

Perhaps it's because I was a little boy in the late 1960s, but a night came in early 2005 when the Huygens probe landed on Saturn's largest moon, Titan, and rekindled the wonder I had felt long before.  The simple expedient of attaching a microphone to the outside of the craft allowed me to hear the wind blow on another world.

To hear the wind blow on another world.  

To hear the wind blow on another world.  

We were there.

More on Titan
More on Apollo
The Magic Words
The Other Magic Words