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Does Barliman Have a Beard? And Other Important Fannish Issues - Page 5

© Michael Martinez

On the other hand, I've been told that Beleg's pointy red shoes prove that Elves have pointy ears. Go figure. How does one come by such a conclusion? I think it had something to do with the fact that Thorondor housed his eyries in the Echoriath (the encircling mountains). But don't ask me to explain that because I'm still trying to figure why lembas was a wafer in the First Age and a cake in the Third Age (or was it a wafer and a cake in the Third Age? -- Does it matter that Tolkien waffled on the wafers, trying to have his cake and eat it, too?). Was Galadriel slipping a little something extra into the recipe years down the road? No wonder the guys in the Fellowship felt so good after eating a cake or two. And that could explain the strange turnaround in Legolas' and Gimli's relationship. Speaking of lembas, people often ask what it was made of. The safest answer seems to be "some sort of ground up meal stuff" ("meal" as in a grain which has been milled, not some poor Elvenking's venison). Tolkien never actually provided a recipe, but he did decide that a special corn was required. Waitaminnit, the purists say, how can there be corn in Middle-earth? Well, that leads to all sorts of questions. For example, is Middle-earth really just Europe? (No, Tolkien said it was the entire Earth, although some people insist it's really just Europe, Asia, and Africa -- so what would that make the Americas, Back-Earth? West-Earth? Opposite-Earth? Earth Prime?) Sometimes a historically minded person will point out (bravely, in my opinion) that "corn" was often used to describe grains in ancient Europe (Caesar, in fact, was constantly securing his corn supply in his Gallic campaigns -- what a corn oil commercial that would make!). On the other hand, Tolkien said the Elves picked the corn by hand and wove baskets from the husks, so I'm afraid we're stuck with a special variety of maize (intended only for the Elves) in Europe (never mind what Middle-earth actually is). And once you point out the husks, someone inevitably asks where the corn went after the Elves left (they took it with them?). Eventually the discussion gets around to Sam's Taters (another New World food) and Pipeweed (tobacco, also from the New World). Oh, the Pipeweed discussions! Some people have argued it must be cannabis (I can never tell if they are serious) even though Tolkien said it came from the nicotiana family (tobacco). I once saw someone half-seriously suggest that The Lord of the Rings was heavily influenced by "Reefer Madness". At least, I think they were only half-serious. I was laughing too hard to take the idea seriously. One must ask if Huckleberry Finn was really smoking something other than tobacco. After all, Sam Clemens (Mark Twain) doesn't ever say that he wasn't smoking anything other than tobacco.

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