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Does Barliman Have a Beard? And Other Important Fannish Issues - Page 11

© Michael Martinez

The same can be said of Tolkien: you can find a precedent for anything in Tolkien. It's even possible to discuss legal issues at great length, because Tolkien discussed them, or portrayed them. For example, did Aragorn rule by the divine right of kings? Well, to figure that out one needs to know whether Finrod's gift of a ring to Barahir somehow altered the line of descent in the Beorian noble family (actually, it doesn't matter -- Barahir's son Beren survived, Barahir's nephews Baragund and Belegund died childless). The nature of kingship in Tolkien is very important as well. It proves there was religion in Middle-earth. How? Tolkien said the Numenorean kings were priest-kings. Is there anything the man didn't discuss? Yes. All those things he didn't have the foresight to deny were a part of Middle-earth. If Tolkien had tried to anticipate every fan "interpretation" or to clarify every "ambiguous" passage he wouldn't have accomplished much. Actually, even when he did answer questions rather directly, he failed to sway everyone to his point of view. For example, on various occasions Tolkien wrote that Middle-earth was "the habitable lands of Men", "our world", "round and inescapable", etc. Put all these passages together and you have what should seem like a very concrete argument for showing that Middle-earth at the end of the Third Age was just a round planet called Earth (in an imaginary time in our past). Nonetheless, I have seen people go on for weeks insisting that Tolkien didn't actually write all that stuff (together) and therefore Middle-earth is not "round and inescapable", "our world", "the habitable lands of Men". That's just "an interpretation". To this day, years later, I still wonder what other possible meaning Tolkien's words could have. Perhaps he was trying to say something about the shape of Elven ears after all. (And before anyone has a heart attack and sends me email telling me that Middle-earth is really Europe, what the Prologue says is "those days, the Third Age of Middle-earth, are now long past, and the shape of all lands has been changed; but the regions in which Hobbits then lived were doubtless the same as those in which they still linger: the North-West of the Old World, east of the Sea" -- emphasis mine.) So, take that for the sophistry it really must be. Some people may feel they know more about Middle-earth than J.R.R. Tolkien, but they surely cannot expect me to agree with them.

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