Talk:Influences on Tolkien

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BetacommandBot (talk) 20:44, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Merge?

All the cited content is already found in the The Lord of the Rings article, and the rest is either speculative, or actually about the Silmarillion, which isn't really appropriate here. Is a separate article really required at the moment? I think it should be merged with the LotR and Sil. articles, then allowed to grow as part of the parent, then split off when it becomes worthwhile? Or perhaps the page could be renamed to "Tolkiens Literary Influences" so the Sil. content can still stand, and encourage the expansion of this article? Davémon (talk) 13:38, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

I concur there are original research issues in this article. Some of it is verifiable, but much is not. The text is interesting, and may be correct, but we need reliable sources to support the content.

I also concur that there is lack of clarity about what are influences of LOTR and what apply to the Silmarillion. It might be hard to do a merge to one or the other articles though, since the two works share common influences.

I prefer the solution suggested by Davémon, that the influences from both other articles be focused in one article - or perhaps it could be moved into the article at Tolkien's legendarium as a main influences section. The lead paragraphs of the influences article could be used in a modified form as a small section in the LOTR and Silmarillion articles, with links to the main influences article or "Tolkien's legendarium" - influences section.

There's also a discussion of this at Talk:The Lord of the Rings#Problems with the Influence section; I suggest focusing the discussion here since it involves several articles. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 06:17, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Follow-up - I've looked around some more, considering the best place for the influences info. It seems it would fit well in Middle-earth, since that article summarizes the entire cosmology, history, geography and peoples that were influenced by the influences. That's already a long article though, so maybe it's better to keep the influences as a separate article. The other article I mentioned above, Tolkien's legendarium is not so long, there is room there for a section with the influences content, and it's a good centralized article title since it's in the title bar of the nav-box footers. Or perhaps this article could be renamed to Middle-earth influences or Tolkien's legendarium influences.

I'm not proposing a specific one of those solutions at this time, but the way it is now has a lot of overlap. If we centralize the influences topic into one place it would be easier to do effective referencing and avoid duplicating work. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 06:49, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

As Jack-A-Roe suggests a general article covering "J.R.R. Tolkiens influences" would reduce a lot of repetitious content, overlap and duplicate effort. There is also the influences section at J.R.R. Tolkien to be included. I have noted several problems with the Tolkien's legendarium article on it's talk page - the main crux of the issue is that the scope of the term isn't well defined the literature (and the only formal, sourced, declaration of it does not include anything that contains hobbits). Until those problems are resolved, I'd stay away from lending the concept more weight in Wikipedia than it is given in the external literature. J.R.R. only borrowed the term "Middle-earth" part-way through writing the Lord of the Rings, and it doesn't appear in the early Silmarillion, or the Hobbit, so its relation to the process of writing these is negligible. Even in tracing something as simple as the influence (or perhaps reference) to The Man in the Moon nursery rhyme, sees it appear in The Book of Lost Tales-> Silmarillion, Father Christmas Letters, Roverandom and The Lord of the Rings, taking the influence far beyond the scope of Middle-earth, perhaps an article J.R.R. Tolkien's influences with subsections dealing with each of his writings gives us the broadest scope for collating the subject-matter? --Davémon (talk) 12:37, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

So I will just explain as the creator of this article: I think the majority of it is horrible. I simply cut it out of the main article because the length there is far too long for FA and the content is not FA-standard. That was before I conceded the battle of bringing the article back to the standard on which I got it promoted to FA. My suggestion would be to leave this article, verify what you can, and cut the main article section to about three paragraphs. SorryGuy  Talk  17:10, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

So far it seems we're on the same wavelength about centralizing the influences section out of the other articles because of duplication and excessive length. I was not aware of some of the facts brought up by Davémon, so in light of that information, I'd agree with renaming this article to J.R.R. Tolkien's influences, with subsections, along with SorryGuy's idea of cutting the sections to a few paragraphs in the LOTR article (and wherever else they are, ie Silmarillion, and anywhere else we find them), with links to this one as the "main article" for influences.

Once the material is collected into one article, it will be easier to identify where it is sourced or unsourced, to clear out the original research, and bring it up to good standards using good referencing. It would be fine with me to proceed on this without delay, because it does not seem controversial; I wonder how much time we should allow for others to enter comments. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 19:36, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

J. R. R. Tolkien's influences for consistent spacing. Uthanc (talk) 02:27, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Aside from the spacing in the title, do you concur with the merge proposal to combine the various influences into one article? Thanks... --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 02:31, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok, but how about something like Harry Potter influences and analogues? Influences and analogues in J. R. R. Tolkien's fiction or something like that... Awkward? Uthanc (talk) 02:38, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what value "Analogues" may have - can you give one or two (cited) examples in relation to Tolkien (there may be some in articles already)? Incidently I think that Harry Potter article needs to be careful of taking the authors self-publicity statements at face value and reporting them as fact. Thankfully 60 years of Tolkien analysis and research probably means we can avoid that kind of thing! --Davémon (talk) 08:20, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

I think J. R. R. Tolkien's influences is sufficient - "Analogues" is not needed. If verifiable information about analogues is found at some point, the title could be adjusted then. For now, the topic is "influences", according to the text in the articles so that's what the title should reflect. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 04:30, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

←Since no-one has disagreed about this merge with summary-style paragraphs in the main articles, I've completed the merge as follows:

• merged in the info from LOTR influences section into this article
• shortened LOTR influences section and added "main" link to this article
• adjusted merge tags to omit the already merged section
• changed the name of this article to J. R. R. Tolkien's influences
• created sections in this article for the various Tolkien works
• merged the Silmarillion influences section into this one - the new J. R. R. Tolkien's influences article
• shortened the Silmarillion influences section and added "main" link to this article
• removed the merge tags

Remaining to be done:

• improve the newly merged article by removing original research and tightening up the info based on reliable sources.
• copyedit influences sections remaining in both the LOTR and Silmarillion articles
• check other Tolkein-related pages for influences sections that can be merged and linked to this page.

All are welcome to contribute! --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 05:51, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Wagner

An article used to support the weight of his influence actually posits the opposite. http://tolkienonline.de/etep/1ring5.html That has been corrected with proper representation. IMO it's all overblown. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.86.194.8 (talk) 02:48, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

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Fair use rationale template linked to this article has been added. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 04:26, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Arthur mythos influence

A large and interesting article on how Arthurian archetypes influenced The Lord of the Rings. [1]. Would be nice to write a Welsh paragraph in LOTR section.Garret Beaumain (talk) 18:57, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

And yet Tolkien disliked Arthurian mythology and denied influence. A lot of that seems like a lot of old poppycock and draw too many parrallels. Gandalf is influenced by Merlin? Unlikely. Other than the fact that both use magic, their isn't much parallels. Gandalf is obviously inspired by Woden in look and mannerism. The Mummy (talk) 14:44, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

The only Welsh influence on Tolkien's work was that the phonology of Sindarin, one of his Elvish languages, was based on the phonology of the Welsh language (which he loved). 192.91.147.34 (talk) 05:52, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Given the recent researches made about the matter, I'd think that saying that the only influences of Welsh upon Tolkien's work are restricted to the use of Welsh as a template to Sindarin is an outdated /misinformed position.

Cf: http://csus-dspace.calstate.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10211.9/965/MYTHIC_ARCHETYPES_PERLONGO.pdf?sequence=1--PauloIapetus (talk) 14:02, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

The connection seems very tenuous. Arthur and Frodo???--Jack Upland (talk) 02:27, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Jack Upland...It was Tolkien himself that mentioned the parallel between Frodo and Arthur when he commented that his (and Sam's) departing to Tol Erëssea, also called Avallon in the early writings of Tolkien, and, later, possessing a city and haven called Avalónnë, was "an Arthurian ending" in the letter to Milton Waldman in an excerpt included in Morgoth's Ring. "To Bilbo and Frodo the special grace is granted to go with the Elves they loved - an Arthurian ending, in which it is, of course, not made explicit whether this is an 'allegory' of death, or a mode of healing and restoration leading to a return" Furthermore,take a look in Verlyn Flieger's chapter about the subject in her book before deleting entire sections without reading the sources and their respective references.http://books.google.com.br/books?id=Q6zgmCf_kY4C&pg=PA32&dq=tolkien+arthur+flieger+the+literary+model+tolkien+and+arthur&hl=pt-BR&sa=X&ei=zD83U-31L-mnsAT5-YGgBw&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=tolkien%20arthur%20flieger%20the%20literary%20model%20tolkien%20and%20arthur&f=false§ — Preceding unsigned comment added by PauloIapetus (talk • contribs) 22:39, 29 March 2014 (UTC)<

Well, the information in the article is tenuous. This is more substantial. However, the problem was the Arthurian section was under Silmarillion, but dealt with LOTR. Arthurian influences on LOTR are dealt with under "Other...".--Jack Upland (talk) 10:04, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Jack Upland, in spite of the division of sections in "Tolkien influences" the Arthurian Material is not exclusively pertaining to the Lord of the Rings because Avalónnë and Erëssea were introduced in The Silmarillion. It's because of this, by the way, that The Fall of Arthur edited by Christopher Tolkien included an entire section to the connection with The Silmarillion ,. Due to the intrinsic interpenetration and intertextuality between the works such a rigid separation as alluded by you was not incorporated in the design and structure of the article. Pay more attention to it before editing next time. Furthermore, your editing has shown quite clearly that you have not acquainted yourself with the sources cited and linked before editing.By the way, the information textualy included in the Wiki article properly said is always "tenuous" as observing the norms of "fair use" and Wikipedia's guidelines about lenght and excess of details and/or exclusion of original research. If you want more information take the time to read the entire lenght of the articles linked and their respective cited sources before deleting sections.PauloIapetus (talk) 14:57, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

Greek mythology section

The Greek mythology section seems to greatly be original research and speculation and should be removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.183.214.150 (talk) 00:52, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

As it stands currently it does have citations, but only makes 2 points of connection: the Valar and the Olympians (who are similar to the Norse gods anyway), and Atlantis and Numemor. It seems to have only minor significance.--Jack Upland (talk) 02:32, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Wagner? Really?

I have to believe the cites exist, even though one of them supporting the claim is a dead link, but any commentator who thinks the Wagner operas had any influence on Tolkien is an ignoramus. Tolkien was not a particular Wagner fan, and he never mentioned or analyzed opera in any of his work. He was, however, an expert on Wagner's sources, and himself wrote a reconstructed lay of the whole Volusung/Nibelung cycle. If there was any influence there (which Tolkien himself denied) it was certainly the source legends and NOT Wagner. 192.91.147.34 (talk) 05:51, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

There are, nowadays, excellent sources ( linked and cited in the article) proving that, although Tolkien and Wagner, indeed, have used the same sources, JRRT is indebted to Wagner's improvements and developments introduced in the Ring's mythos. T.A. Shippey himself has recognized this simple truth in his most recent article about the matter. Please, at least, try to read the sources cited and linked before stating dogmatic assertions about the issue--

Cf: Shippey's quoted words from The Problem of the Rings: 'Yet there is another feature of the opera-cycle which may at least have given Tolkien a hint, and a most important hint: this is Wagner's concentration on. and original conception of, the Ring itself. None of the ancient sources gives the ring Andvaranaut the central place that Wagner does. (...) It was Wagner who - one has to concede, in very Tolkienian fashion - noted the gaps of the ancient sources and wrote his version of the story determinedly into them. He follows the Ring from the Rhinemaidens to Alberich, to Loge and Wotan, to Fafner, to Siegfried, to Brunnhilde, and back to Siegfried, to Brunnhilde, to the Rhinemaidens. It is a continuing presence in the story. In much the same way, at some time between The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien devised a chain of transmission from Sauron to Isildur, to Gollum, to Bilbo,to Frodo, with a final destruction by fire which parallels the return of Wagner's Ring to the Rhinemaidens and its drowning in the flood. '

PauloIapetus (talk) 14:09, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

I do think, though, that Wagner is being given too much importance here. It might be better to have a section on the Ring legends and include Wagner there. The quotation from Shippey refers only to a "hint". In any case, the ring is only one thread of Tolkien's story. Much of the material of LOTR is prefigured in The Hobbit, and the ring in The Hobbit is not very Wagnerian, and in fact appears to be a just (!) a ring of invisibility. The section on Wagner as it stands is little more than a list of people who claim the influence exists and and list of people who deny it. Anyone reading it would think that the story of the operas and the story of LOTR are similar which is far from the case, but very little specific information is given.--Jack Upland (talk) 01:27, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

The "hint" commented by Shippey, the "most important hint", dont forget the qualified tone, however, is one of the main leitmotifs of the two sagas. The inherent malevolence of the cursed object, the Two Rings of Power, pervades the entire narratives and dictates the general direction of the plots. Furthermore... the storylines ARE similar...Both of them used the same sources It's all a question of how much someone abstract their component parts to their fundamental essence in symbolic terms. One excelent article that does just that can be found here:http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Two+rings+to+rule+them+all%3A+a+comparative+study+of+Tolkien+and+Wagner.-a0256864486 The fact that the Ring was not The Ring of Power and didn't possessed so blatant Wagnerian undertones in the Hobbit does not preclude the influence.The Hobbit was not originaly intended as part of Middle-Earth's mythology. Therefore, Sauron and Gandalf have become "Odinic" in Lord of the Rings (cf Tolkien's comments about Gandalf and the Red Eye of Sauron ( article in the link right below: http://forum.valinor.com.br/attachments/odin-pdf.25358/ the Hobbit's sequel and, consequently, the Ring was, retroactively, transformed into one analogue of the cursed Ring coveted by Odin/Wotan in the Wagnerian Tetralogy 23:03, 29 March 2014 (UTC)PauloIapetus (talk).

The storylines are not similar!--Jack Upland (talk) 10:11, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Similar, they are. Not identical, of course, but for using the same sources and incorporating the focus upon the Cursed Object, the broken sword, the desinherited hero and the passing out of a magical age that is replaced by a new age dominated by men after the departure of immortal siblings of the human race ( some of these elements added and developed upon by Wagner) they are sufficiently akin to be qualified as "similar". I'll not debate semantics with you if you are not interested in understanding the manner with which the comparisons were made and I think that the point was sufficiently explained here to facilitate your comprehensionPauloIapetus (talk) 14:51, 31 March 2014 (UTC).

Just in case. Hopefully this quoted paragraphy of the article of Prof Edwary Haymes in one link that you have deleted without reading the content, can further ilustrate the point to you: http://de-vagaesemhybrazil.blogspot.com.br/2008/12/two-rings-tolkien-and-wagner-dc-before.html:

I’d like to begin by telling a little story.

A greedy, smaller-than-human creature finds a treasure in the depths of a river. He carries it to his underground retreat where he retains it until it is stolen by a visitor from the upper world. He swears eternal hate to the thief. The treasure is, of course, a ring of great power. The ring exerts strange influences on its owners including giving them the ability to disappear. The ring becomes the object of a fatal struggle between close friends or brothers, in fact it seems always to bring danger or death to its owners. A hero enters the fray armed with a reforged sword that had been broken. Various races of humanoid beings attempt to gain control of the ring by magic and by heroism until it is finally brought at great cost and sacrifice back to its origin where it is purified by fire. The last pursuer perishes along with the ring.

Is this the retelling of Richard Wagner’s four-part cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen or is it a summary of Tolkien’s prose epic The Lord of the Rings? Actually it’s both. I have arranged things carefully so that they fit either work, but the similarities and connections between the two “Ring Cycles” go far beyond the superficial plot summarized above. There are also important differences, beyond the obvious one of artistic form: prose narrative versus music drama. Here I would like to look at some of the similarities and differences in hopes of understanding the relationship.''PauloIapetus (talk) 16:16, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

That is not the plot of LOTR. If the LOTR did concentrate on the story of Isildur and Smeagol, it would be much more "Wagnerian". But it doesn't. Bilbo and Frodo do not struggle over possession of the Ring. And for most of the book Frodo is faithfully carrying the ring to its destruction and his companions in the Fellowship are faithfully doing their best to help him. In parallel with this quest is the war against the forces of Sauron and Saruman. I do not believe there is a counterpart to this is Wagner's operas.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:24, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

Even so, the storylines are still quite similar as being, both of them, developments made upon the same raw matter, the same sources, the same symbols, the same mythology... If you are insisting in not understanding how and why then can be considered similar, though not identical, in the same way that Flieger for example commented the similarity between Fëanor and Prometheus or Tolkien himself has said that Gandalf is "Odinic" in spite of the imense differences between the characters, is because you do not want to understand. Fine by me. As I have said the discussion has become a question of semantics. However, such a disagreement is not a pretext to delete links with sourced and reliable information. Good to know that at least this you seem to be comprehending now.PauloIapetus (talk) 17:27, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

Furthermore, some rewriting pertaining, for example, to the Volsunga saga and its relation to the Nibelungelied and Der Ring des Nibelungen has made the article FULL of mistakes. I'm not certain about who was responsible but I'll made some corrections about the subject. The main source to Richard Wagner WAS NOT The Nibelungelied though he has used the names used in that text (with some notable exceptions such as Gutrune instead of Kriemhild) and The Nibelungelied was not derived from The Volsunga Saga. The Volsunga Saga and the Eddas were far more influential to the plot of Wagner's work. They( Volsunga and Nibelungelied) are independent texts dealing with the same tradition made almost at the same time. Cf in the following link: http://vsnrweb-publications.org.uk/ "Árni Björnsson: Wagner and the Volsungs" PauloIapetus (talk) 18:04, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

"The sources mentioned here, the Poetic and Prose Eddas and Volsunga saga, all belong to Old Icelandic literature. It has long been known to scholars that Wagner made extensive use of the poems in the Poetic Edda along with Icelandic Heroic Sagas, and indeed he said so himself on various occasions (see p. 99 below). The name of his work as a whole — The Ring of the Nibelung — has, however, carried the unconscious implication that most of its material is derived from the well-known medieval German poem, Das Nibelungenlied. There is therefore a need to emphasise that Wagner’s main sources were originally written in Iceland in the thirteenth century, and preserved in Icelandic manuscripts until they were printed in mostly Swedish and Danish editions of the seventeenth century and later".PauloIapetus (talk) 18:10, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

J.F. Cooper

I'm surprised not to see mention of J.F. Cooper's works anywhere in Tolkien's influences. To me it seems pretty obvious that inparticular the descriptions of the fading of Elvish race and culture parallels quite closely the similar themes in novels like The Last of the Mohicans and others by Cooper, and I vaguely remember reading somewhere (Carpenter?) that Tolkien explicitly mentioned this influence himself. Unfortunately I don't have any specific citations at hand, nor the time to search for them at the moment, which is why I'm posting this here.

--BerislavLopac (talk) 09:14, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

This article is lacking in the area of modern literary influences. Cooper is in the same league as Buchan and Haggard who are mentioned here. Hawkeye/Pathfinder could be paralleled to Strider.--Jack Upland (talk) 07:35, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Jack Upland, quite frankly, for someone that just accused other people of writing articles linking Tolkien to their prefered sources without citing the data that proved Tolkien's acquaintace wit them (a fact that shows that you, simply, didn't read the sourced articles otherwise you 'd have found that your complaint was unfounded) you have shown a remarkable level of lack of research and intelectual bias. James Fenimore Cooper was never cited by JRRT as a source of his and the influence of Hawkeye upon Aragorn's characterization in the Lord of the Rings was an assumption, educated guess, made by Tom Shippey in The Road to Middle-Earth. It's quite probable but is not an established fact. However, the Arthurian ending given to Bilbo and Frodo ( and later to Sam as well) was commented by Tolkien himself in one of his letters and your deletion of the Arthurian section simply disregarded an entire body of work already well researched in the field with which you don't seem very much familiarized. Take more care next time.PauloIapetus (talk) 00:42, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

As discussed above, the Arthurian discussion is misplaced. Making a comment on the Talk page is different from inserting it into the article. It would be good to have a solidly referenced paragraph about modern literary influences. I don't think JRRT has to be cited for everything. Clearly LOTR is a modern adventure novel and is remote from medieval legend, but I wouldn't expect JRRT to necessarily make this point in writing.--Jack Upland (talk) 10:17, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

As I have already posted in another section right above: the article is about influences in Tolkien's entire literary production in regards to Middle-Earth's Legendarium.Though didacticaly divided in sections pertaining to the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit and the Silmarillion, since that the works are part of the same subcreated reality, such division was not intended as a so rigid category as you have assumed. The "Arthurian" elements of Lord of the Rings were created and developed as parts of the Silmarillion and its world building and used to give an Arthurian ending to the characters of Lord of the Rings. They were included in Silmarillion's section because the "Arthurian" names and their creation ocurred in that work rather than in the Lord of the Rings. In spite of your disdain for the opinions of other people about the respective importance of the sources analysed in comparison with the others such diference reflects the behavior of Tolkien himself in regards to "sources hunting" ( specificaly he was very laconic and contradictory, when not absolutely silent, while commenting about literary influences of contemporary authors or even writers of the previous century such as Cooper or Walter Scott. The other sources with which you are not familarized were not included and detailed with more links and citations due to personal preferences of the writers but because, in these cases, John Bucham and Rider Haggard for example, there are biographical information or entire comments of the author aknownledging the influence and that is the parameter defining "sourced content" established in published research in Wikipedia (cf reliable source . If you'd be more acquainted with research about the sources of Tolkien as a whole i/e and not specificaly about Lord of the Rings's sources as a separated work you'd know that already. Walter Scott, James Fenimore Cooper and even Robert E. Howard and H.P. Lovecraft, IMO, are probable influences in Tolkien's work but they will not be included and mentioned in the article because there is not virtualy any proof stablishing the conection without any shadow of doubt generating a lack of published reliable data about the subject.PauloIapetus (talk) 14:34, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

From "On Fairy Stories", FWIW (emphasis mine): "I had no desire to have either dreams or adventures like Alice, and the amount of them merely amused me. I had very little desire to look for buried treasure or fight pirates, and Treasure Island left me cool. Red Indians were better: there were bows and arrows (I had and have a wholly unsatisfied desire to shoot well with a bow), and strange languages, and glimpses of an archaic mode of life, and, above all, forests in such stories." BerislavLopac (talk) 00:32, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Yes Berislav. I'm well aware of this passage from On Fairy Stories. It was also included or paraphrased in Humphrey Carpenter's biography and, though there are a consensus that it might possibly refer to James Fenimore Cooper and other authors of the genre, alas, his name was never directly mentioned by J.R.R.Tolkien, then it must be considered a feasible, even probable, speculation but not an established fact. Exacly as I've told you.(talk)PauloIapetus (talk) 17:53, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

So, according to you, we have 3 sources which suggest that Cooper and his like were an influence: Shippey, Carpenter, and Tolkien himself!!! This is not the mines of Moria, so stop acting like a troll and let us pass!!!--Jack Upland (talk) 09:57, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Shippey is a reliable source; in The Road to Middle-earth he mentions Cooper specifically as a possible influence (p. 127, 348) as more generally adumbrating Tolkien's interest in primeval America. (Carpenter is just parroting Tolkien and adds nothing.) I think it's fair to include Shippey's observation, but clearly identified as his analysis. Shippey does not compare the fading of the Mohicans with the Elves; without a better reference that would be OR. -- Elphion (talk) 13:38, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Carpenter adds something in that he is a secondary source, and obviously as a biographer he considers Tolkien's comment as significant.--Jack Upland (talk) 02:28, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

A secondary source adds nothing unless it explains why something is significant -- which Carpenter does not. Carpenter is essentially a pot-boiler; his value is that he was early and brought together several biographical sources. His analysis is less than skin deep. -- Elphion (talk) 04:04, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

John Bauer

I have just today ran into the Wikipedia entry about the Swedish artist John Bauer, and some of his works seem like quite a direct inspiration for numerous drawings and descriptions by Tolkien -- especially the drawings of trolls and forests.

• 
  Princess Tuvstarr gazing down into the dark waters of the forest tarn
• 
  The Princess and the Trolls
• 
  Trolls and Princess Tuvstarr
• 
  Tyr and Fenrir
• 
  Winter tales about the Yule Goat
• 
  Good evening, mister!
• 
  An old mountain troll
• 
  Freja

--BerislavLopac (talk) 09:37, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Obviously Tolkien was influenced by Nordic mythology and the modern revival of it, but is this more than that?--Jack Upland (talk) 09:12, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Criteria Too Loose

The criteria for considering something an influence needs to be tighter. Citations are not enough. Because LOTR is one of the best-selling novels in English, a lot of people have produced research into influences, and staked a claim for their favourite subject or research interest. We need: (1) evidence Tolkien knew about the supposed influence, (2) significance of the influence in his writings, (3) specificity of the influence.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:11, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

In this spirit, I have removed the Persian and Slavic mythology sections.--Jack Upland (talk) 02:28, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Ironicaly enough all these three elements were dealt with and included successfully in the articles, books or citations in the links included in the sections deleted by you, Jack Upland. This information must per force be included and detailed in the reliable sources used by Wiki but need not be always included in the article itself because it tends to increase too much its lenght and diminishes its usefullness, difficulting reading and comprehension. Extense transcriptions of letters and biographical articles or books don't attend Wiki's criteria about the matterPauloIapetus (talk) 17:31, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

Restructure

I have combined the Hobbit and LOTR sections because as a sequel LOTR shares in the influences of the Hobbit. As it stood, the Hobbit section only had one subsection, Nordic influences, which was largely applicable to LOTR too. The two sections had been unconsciously merging anyway, with a lot of references to the Hobbit in the LOTR section.

I'm not sure about the Silmarillion. Perhaps it is sufficiently different to have its own section, but there's a fair amount of overlap. Scholarly sources don't necessarily make much of a distinction which makes it difficult. On the other hand, combining the 3 books would threaten to drown out the two popular novels with obscure references to the Silmarillion which isn't popular with most readers or critics.--Jack Upland (talk) 01:36, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Your negative opinion about the Silmarillion and its performance and image with critics and readers is a broad generalization and I think that you refer to its content and influence upon The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings as "obscure" because, obviously, you are not very well acquainted or interested in that part of JRRT's work. Don't let this bias direct and influence your editing work here. That bias was the cause for your deletion spree that included the elimination of links with valuable information to the public interested. The same "overlapping" between the works, a fact recognized by you, should have precluded this. If you have not sourced citations and links to provide the basis for your opinions and assumptions please refrain from editing the article. PauloIapetus (talk) 16:03, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps the Silmarillion should not have a separate section. What's your view? Prior to my editing, this article was a mess. The overall structure was being destroyed.

There's nothing wrong with deleting material. We cannot include every possible reference. The article should concentrate on major, well-supported influences, unlike (for example) Persian mythology. If there's important material you think should be restored, there's nothing to stop you restoring it. But we can't have an article which consists of a random series of citations: X says that brief mention of Y in Tolkien's work is reminiscent of Z.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:45, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

The Arthurian Legend section has been restored. And the article was far from being a mess though, perhaps, still retaining some of the original writing from the time in which it was still different parts in separated articles...Anyways, your editing has created more problems intead of truly helping with the old flaws, IMO. BTW... Untill now you have simply deleted content, without producing new links and quotations. Instead of deleting content try to find reliable data pertaining to what you think that should be here. About the deletions... the first thing that a conscious editor have to do, IMO, is try to search available data to give support to the sections such as Slavonic mythology instead of deleting it due to, personaly, disregarding its relevance. For some people, perhaps, the fact that Radagast is the name of a Slavonic god can be far more interesting than the assumed influence from the Last of the Mohicans over the Lord of the Rings.At least it was studied by a proeminent Tolkien scholar and has being the theme of one reliable article http://lingwe.blogspot.com.br/2007/12/thinking-about-radagast.htmlPauloIapetus (talk) 19:26, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

OK, Radagast is a good example. He is a minor character in LOTR and The Hobbit. He is mentioned a few times but never actually appears. The name could be drawn from a Slavic god "Radegast", or it could be from a Gothic warlord (closer to Tolkien's interests). However, there is no suggestion that the name of the character has any bearing on the character himself. I don't think that this is a valid reason for having a separate section on Slavic mythology. By contrast, Strider is a major character. I think this illustrates what I said below. Drawing a speculative and obscure link with mythology is considered more scholarly than the Hawkeye connection. Given that LOTR is one of the most popular novels of the last century, I am sure there are many suggestions of sources for many minor characters etc. I don't think we should include them all, less so create a new section for each one. And then try to find more examples to fill out this new section. The article should deal with major influences. Major on both sides. That's where Radagast falls down. He is a minor character, and the Slavic influence is a minor too.--Jack Upland (talk) 08:59, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

The Wikipedia article does not differentiate between major or minor sources and influences. Since that the bulk of the respective influence's section was transfered to this article it's assumed that it must be as inclusive as possible. The motive that precluded The Last of Mohicans being included as a reference is because there is not virtualy any reliable source treating the subject with any kind of methodical or serious attention, due to Tolkien's own laconism and personal distaste toward sources's hunting. The name Radagast, however, contains a hint of an influence in the name itself that is the one of the main motivations of Tolkien's mythopoeic work ( the creation of languages). And BTW, there are other probable Slavic influences. http://lingwe.blogspot.com.br/2009/10/slavic-echoes-in-tolkien-response.html. What I think positively annoying is your tendence of deleting things without doing any research by yourself before doing so. IMO, it's you that are doing these types of things based in your personal preferences and bias towards such characters or parts of Tolkien's work, precisely the kind of acusation that you directed to the previous editors of the article.PauloIapetus (talk) 13:28, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

"The Wikipedia article does not differentiate between major or minor sources and influences." Thank you. That sums up a big part of the dispute we had. What do other editors think of this statement?--Jack Upland (talk) 02:36, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Folklore

There should be some mention of folklore, such as fairytales (Goldilocks) and even nursery rhymes ("The Cat and the Fiddle") and proverbs ("All that is gold does not glitter"). But I don't know if any source has delved into this.--Jack Upland (talk) 03:52, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

It's funny the fact that you are complaining about this since that yourself deleted the Welsh section of the Celtic influence that included the mention to the folktales The Devil With the Three Golden Hairs and The Griffin that have a clear structural (and documented) resemblance to Kullwych and Olwen and, consequently, to Beren and Lúthien.http://books.google.com.br/books?id=eEgC3bS4dOwC&pg=PA141&lpg=PA141&dq=the+three+golden+hairs+of+the+devil+beren+and+l%C3%BAthien&source=bl&ots=LIDk9KGZOU&sig=RqSa12BdUV69o17XUT4QLyHlFSM&hl=pt-BR&sa=X&ei=ZJw5U6z8CdTQsQTCzIDQCA&ved=0CEMQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=the%20three%20golden%20hairs%20of%20the%20devil%20beren%20and%20l%C3%BAthien&f=false If the reference is to the Silmarillion is deemed as irrelevant and worthy of deletion, if it is to The Lord of the Rings, in spite of lack of sources, you think that it should receive its proper section. I think that this is a double standard that is causing damage to the article and its usefullness and comprehensibility. I'd suggest more care, attention and research. Later I'll edit the article to correct this mistake of yours. Take care and please give more value to the weight given to reliable source in Wikipedia. Don't delete things due to bias and preconceived notions.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sourcesPauloIapetus (talk) 16:45, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

Obviously I meant modern English folklore. There is a bias here towards mythology because it is academically valued. We end up getting a discussion that is very little to do with Tolkien's texts.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:32, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

It has everything to do with Tolkien texts , since that we have reliable sources comparing them with Tolkien's mythology. They seem to be, however, far out of the scope of your interest. BTW... Goldlocks is every bit as folklorical as The Devil with the Three Golden Hairs. Tolkien used mythology and fairy-tales from, virtualy, all the Indo-Germanic countries. There is not a motive that should made "English" folktales being more valued in this kind of research. And if you are so interested in seeing English Folktales analysed as sources of Tolkien try to find reliable data treating the matter instead of deleting similar material just because it deals with folklore from other countries with mythologies that have influenced Tolkien but are not EnglishPauloIapetus (talk) 17:35, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting non-English sources be excluded at all. But there is a kind of distancing from Tolkien's texts when focussing on folktales that resemble Kullwych and Olwen, who resemble Beren and Lúthien (who were barely mentioned by the novels that Tolkien published in his lifetime).--Jack Upland (talk) 09:03, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

Again...The article is not limited to the novels published during Tolkien's lifetime. Just because they seem to be the sole focus of your interest this fact should not preclude the insertion of other sources pertaining to the works posthumosly published. Refrain from deleting material referenced with reliable sources as you have already done just due to your preference for the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings in an article devoted to the literary work of Tolkien as a whole. Thank you PauloIapetus (talk) 13:33, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

I never tried to delete the Silmarillion section. I just think we need balance.--Jack Upland (talk) 21:04, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

$.02's worth: Mythology is critically important, not because it is "academically valued" but because it was one of Tolkien's primary interests. He valued mythology especially because of what could be gleaned from it through philology. He used this approach in his professional work, it was a primary motivation of his fictional universe, and it spills over into The Lord of the Rings in many places. Likewise, The Silmarillion is important because it was his primary interest in Middle-earth, and much of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings took inspiration from it. The legend of Beren and Luthien was an important pillar of his entire life, and that story resurfaces in the story of Aragorn and Arwen. So yes, the Welsh sources for the former are important for the latter as well. It is all connected and properly understood cannot be separated. -- Elphion (talk) 04:35, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Go and read the 1st page of the 1st chapter of LOTR, and then come back and argue the point.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:55, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Sorry, I was not clear enough. I am not arguing against folklore, but for, e.g., the Celtic influence and the importance of The Silmarillion. For Tolkien it was all grist for the mill. The prototype of the kind of work he was doing is Grimm's Deutsche Mythologie, which covers the whole gamut that we artificially divide into mythology and folklore. For philology, it is all one and the same, and Grimm's methods are a primary pillar of Middle-earth. Tolkien was influenced not so much by proverbs as by the analysis of them: how did such and such a saying come about, and what underlying history can we infer from it? Why did such and such a legend or myth take that turn, and what underlying history can we infer from it? Similarly, the problem of separating The Silmarillion from the Third Age stories is that the one was a significant -- I would say primary -- influence on the other: the Third Age was a "modern" period in which older traditions had survived. Tolkien borrowed freely from the older material to set the stage for the The Hobbit; and faced with his publisher's reluctance to deal with The Silmarillion, he deliberately involved much of the older material in a mythological and philological manner. -- Elphion (talk) 14:11, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

I apologise for the length of this post, but shortcuts make long delays, and it is better to explain something once properly than to add to a thicket of fruitless verbiage. So here goes:

(1) Originally (I mean before I started editing), this article was divided by novel, which is desirable. The reason why I amalgamated LOTR and The Hobbitt was that there was so much repetition that it was unworkable. As discussed above, it was confusing to readers - and even editors. Undoubtably The Silmarillion (TS) is set in the same world (misleadingly called "Middle Earth"), and hence shares its influences. However, it remains different enough to have its own section. As I tried to explain previously, I was not trying to eliminate material related to TS but place it in the appropriate place. While TS fleshes out some of the history mentioned in the other two books, it is not inextricably intertwined as they are. The Hobbit is not just the seed of the LOTR; it is also the unignorable back story; it is essentially retold in LOTR and its story is mentioned in LOTR several times.

(2) TS is a lesser work. It was not published by Tolkien himself in his lifetime, it was published by his son Christopher in an attempt to cash in on his fame, and has not received the popular or critical acclaim of the other 2 novels. We must not give it undue weight. Furthermore, I don't think it's been reliably established what form it had at the time of the writing of LOTR (or at the time of his death). I certainly don't think you're right to imply that it influenced the writing of The Hobbit (which I think began as a yarn for his kids). I think Tolkien was engaged in a bit of myth-making about himself in the preface to LOTR when he implied that he had worked out the mythology etc first before writing LOTR. It is certainly impossible for a number of reasons to believe TS in its published form was written before LOTR. (For one thing, it contains a summary of LOTR's plot.) Again, I am not and I have never been trying to get rid of TS.

(3) @Elphion:, I did not think you were "arguing against folklore". But I am arguing that academic mythology (if you know what I mean) is being given undue weight.

(4) Rather than assume that I don't understand or that I am imposing my views on others, I would suggest that other editors first consider that it is they who do not understand and it is they who are imposing their views on the article and on other editors. What I am attempting to do is improve the article, both in form and content.

(5) And please do reread the first page(s) of "A Long-Expected Party". It's interesting if nothing else.--Jack Upland (talk) 18:57, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Just an aside: Tolkien began the Sil before the other works, and even submitted it to his editors before LOTR was written. Not in its current form, obviously, but much of it. It isn't as canonical as LOTR and Hobbit, but calling it a 'lesser work' somehow seems wrong. Also curious of the source of Christopher trying to cash in on his dad's fame. It was still mostly JRR's work, and is considered an extremely important one by and large by Tolkien enthusiasts. --Stevehim (talk) 09:12, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

Well, yes, "A Long-Expected Party" is interesting, but I have reread it (and most of the rest) almost every year for over half a century, so I'm not quite sure why you are urging this repeatedly. I agree that folklore is an important source because it is an important component of mythology -- the issue of "balance" is a red herring. I don't know what you mean by "academic mythology" -- Grimm is as academic as any, but his volumes include the minutest scraps of folklore along with the great tales, and his approach is also Tolkien's. I don't agree with your assertion that separating the influences by novel (a category Tolkien vociferously contested) is desirable, since the works are all of a piece; each influenced the next, and the earliest (The Silmarillion) with all its influences permeates all. The work of Rateliff, Scull, and Hammond makes this quite clear. The Hobbit may have begun as a yarn for kids -- even that's debatable, though it certainly ended as one -- but it was quickly pulled into the context of Sil, and without that it would never have taken off. (The Hobbit without the infusion of Sil would have been about as memorable as Mr. Bliss.) Your judgment that Sil is a lesser work is immaterial; Tolkien valued it more and would have published it eagerly if his publisher had been interested, as his letters indicate at several points. He began work on LotR reluctantly as a less desirable alternative, and until he could tie it into Sil he had little idea how to proceed. Even so he wanted far more of Sil to appear in the Appendices. (And your judgment of CRRT is uncharitable and wide of the mark; fans were clamouring for Sil to be published, and given the state of the texts Christopher's effort verges on the heroic. We are much the richer for having it -- and UT and HoME.) And yes, Tolkien did develop much of the mythology before The Hobbit was written; much of it was on paper before LotR. Certainly the shape of the tales was in place, and much of the text as well. (HoME shows that most of the text was in fact JRRT's, and much of it quite early.) Finally, your point (4) above is ironic, given that you are arguing positions at variance with the critical literature on Tolkien. We are pushing back not to advance our own POV, but because that is what the scholarship says. I appreciate that you are trying to improve the article -- and I agree it is in better shape than it was after the merger of various articles -- but kindly accord us the same consideration. -- Elphion (talk) 20:51, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Sure. So do you want to merge the separate Sil section? I have no objections. I will let the other issues rest.--Jack Upland (talk) 01:52, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

This page

Not gonna change anything on it, and I know the wiki is more for collecting sources than accuracy, but most of this page seems like speculation to me. Just wanted to get that off my chest. --Stevehim (talk) 08:56, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

Most of it has sources. The new "Iranian" section doesn't, and probably should be removed.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:07, 21 January 2016 (UTC)