John D. Rateliff's Blog, page 128

Norrell and Strange: The Miniseries ("Amadeus meets Lord of the Rings")

So, Saturday while taking a break from putting together my presentation for the Christopher Tolkien roundtable (that is, a roundtable at the Medieval Congress in honor of C.T.), I found out that the BBC has made a seven-part adaptation of Susanne Clarke's JONATHAN STRANGE & MR. NORRELL [2004]. Here's the link:

http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/may/09/jonathan-strange-mr-norrell-susanna-clarke

This is interesting to see, because I don't think there's any question that Clarke's book is the most important work of fantasy of its decade, yet it's surprisingly unreadable. That is to say, I found myself getting bogged down when reading it, and in the end could only get through the story by borrowing an audiotape version from a friend (thanks, Bill).* Upon which I discovered that it's the main story, with Mr. Norrell and Mr. Strange, that's the problem. The worldbuilding is superb, and the writing v. well-done, but this is a novel in which the footnotes are better than the main ongoing story. Just going through the audio cd, in which each footnote has its own track, and listening to the embedded stories of magicians of olden days and past encounters with magical folk is like reading Child's Ballads or a really good collection of short stories that really capture an elusive something (the best novel version of which is Mirrlees' LUD-IN-THE-MIST). This is reinforced by the excellent of her short story collection, LADIES OF GRACE ADIEU, which is a marvellous read: well-written, evocative, and engrossing (and, again, better as an audiobook).

Jo Walton, whose collection of blogposts I recently read,  WHAT MAKES THIS BOOK SO GREAT, at one point asks the question of why Clarke's book [2004] hasn't been widely imitated. I think it has, but badly: there's a slew (or perhaps it shd be slough) of Jane-Austen-meets-fantasy books out there (Kowal, Becker**), which all fall apart on the grounds that their authors aren't, in fact, Jane Austen. Austen makes what she does look easy, but it's not (reading through her juvenalia is one way to see that). And the best way to see it's not is to read her imitators, from the dire DEATH COMES TO PEMBERLEY to Kowal, Becker, et al.

So soon we'll see if they were able to pull off a worthwhile adaptation -- one better than 'Amadeus meets Lord of the Rings' (the tag-line of their pitch to the BBC) would indicate.

And here's hoping that Clarke is working on another book that plays to her strengths.

--John R.
--still on the road, about to head over to the Amtrak station.


*the audiobook version, by the way, is extremely well done; highly recommended

**the one attempt I've seen at this kind of thing that pulled it off was Wrede & Stevermer's epistolary pastiche SORCERY & CECELIA, and even they faltered on the sequel

Off to Kalamazoo!

So, I'm on the road, on my way to Kalamazoo. Today was the plane ride (less terrifying than usual*) followed by some time in Milwaukee. Got to spend a few hours in the Marquette Archives, where I started a new project that's good for an on-again, off-again rhythm of spurts of work during visits separated by months at a time. Also got to catch up some with my friend Jim (hi, Jim), who I don't get to see nearly often enough.

I'm now in the hotel, having made some tea and read through my piece for the roundtable but finding three hour's sleep last night means I'd be better off waiting until tomorrow to go over my Tolkien as editor and translator piece -- if not here in the room in the morning then on the train ride east.

And so it's off for an early night. More later.

--John R.
current reading: GRETTIR'S SAGA (about a Viking afraid of the dark)
current viewing: R.W.B.Y.






*as in, things went well, or as well as they can go for an acrophobiac miles high off the ground

"Chasing Rabbits in a Nice Way": the Art of Rabbit Jumping

So, here's a light-hearted piece to offset the rather grim previous post about Warnie Lewis's alcoholism.

I've been reading the English news lately, following the twists and turns of the recent English election,* when I came across a light piece on the new sport of rabbit jumping. Here's the link.

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/may/08/rabbit-show-jumping-london-pet-show

my favorite quotes out of this:

"What a bad mood would look like is anybody’s guess."

"they learn extremely fast, but it turns out that means two years. They don’t understand commands."

"This sounds a lot like chasing the rabbit, though given the rules, obviously they are chasing their rabbits in a nice way."


Meanwhile, the countdown for Kalamazoo has started: time to get my papers in presentable form, sort out what I'll need for the trip, and (in some ways hardest of all) what to take to read while I'm away.

--John R.
today's song: "Bullets for Brains" by Roland Orbzabal


  *turns out I shd have been following the Canadian news out of Alberta, but so it goes.

A Distressing Letter (CSL to OB)

So, the newest issue of THE JOURNAL OF INKLINGS STUDIES has arrived, and this time the story that caught my eye is the printing of a previously unpublished letter* from C. S. Lewis to Owen Barfield, dated July 5th 1949. According to the accompanying article by Walter Hooper which sets the letter in context, this particular letter was held back by Barfield when he sold the rest of his C. S. Lewis correspondence to Wheaton back in 1972, because it dealt with Warnie Lewis's alcoholism (Warnie was still alive at the time, dying early the next year, in April 1973).**

It makes for distressing reading, all the more so in that CSL was struggling with sickness (a strep infection) and exhaustion at the time as well as taking care of Janie Moore, who was suffering from alzheimer's, while trying to deal with Warnie's binge drinking. The usual pattern seems to have been for Warnie to check himself into a private hospital for detox, then sneak out each night to visit a nearby  pub for an evening's drinking. We've known for a long time that this was his pattern during vacations to Ireland, but it was news to me that he did the same in Oxford, at least during this particular (July 1949) episode.

All this is simply one man's personal difficulty, shared with his immediate family, but reading this makes me wonder: were Warnie's troubles a contributing factor to the break-up of the (Thursday evening) Inklings? We know that the Inklings ceased to meet on Thursday evenings just a few months later (in October 1949).  Presumably not, given that they continued to meet thereafter in a pub, unless Warnie's problem was not set off by beer but only by stronger drink (e.g., gin, whiskey) of a sort less likely to be served at a convivial luncheon.

All in all, a sad account*** of a good man's fatal flaw, and the misery it caused himself and others.

--John R.


*at least I'd certainly not seen it before, and it's not included in COLLECTED LETTERS, though several letters for CSL to Arthur Greeves discussing Warnie's condition dating from about the same time made their way into that collection.

**the original letter is now in the Wade; thanks to Laura for confirming its location for me.

***the main account of Warnie's alcoholism is to be found in the introduction to THEY STAND TOGETHER, the collected CSL/Arthur Greeves correspondence [1979];  I think this new account supplements rather than supersedes that older one.

Tolkien Estate's New Website (quick guide)

So, finding that the new Tolkien Estate website* is chock-full of good things, I thought a little cheat sheet might help folks see just how much is already up on the site. Accordingly, I've taken their sitemap** that comes at the bottom of their list of links and expanded it out by adding the author's names, where I knew them, next to the titles of individual pieces on specific works. Here's the result. Hope it's helpful.




I. WRITINGSTales of Middle-earthThe Hobbit— John D. RateliffThe Lord of the Rings—???The Silmarillion—Christopher Tolkien (1977)Unfinished Tales—Christopher Tolkien (from introduction)The History of Middle-earth—David BratmanThe Children of Hurin—???
Other Tales and PoetryFarmer Giles of Ham—Wayne G. Hammond & Christina ScullThe Adventures of Tom Bombadil—Daniel LauzonLeaf, by Niggle—Priscilla Tolkien; also Vincent Ferre and Nadia Drici [to come]Smith of Wootton Major—Verlyn FliegerThe Homecoming of Beorhtnoth—Thomas HoneggerThe Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun—Christopher Tolkien (website special)The Fall of Arthur—Christopher Tolkien (from Foreword)Beowulf: Translation & Commentary— [to come]
Tales for ChildrenLetters from Father Christmas—Baillie TolkienRoverandom—Christina Scull & Wayne G. HammondMr. Bliss—Christina Scull & Wayne G. HammondThe Hobbit—John D. Rateliff
Translations, EssaysThe Monsters and the Critics—T. A. ShippeyOn Fairy Stories—Verlyn FliegerTranslations and Editions of Medieval Texts*—T. A. ShippeyJ. R. R. Tolkien in Translation—JRRT, ed. CT
*covers Sir Gawain & the Green Knight, Pearl, Sir Orfeo, Ancrene Wisse, The Old English Exodus, and Finn & Hengest

The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien[section contains six major letters by JRRT]Timeline
II. LEARNINGLanguage and Writing SystemsWriting Systems—Arden SmithTolkien's Invented Languages—Carl Hostetter
Tolkien and Visual ArtsTolkien's Art—Christina Scull & Wayne G. Hammond
Thoughts and StudiesStudies on Tolkien: English—David BratmanStudies on Tolkien: French—???Translating Tolkien‑Vincent FerreDiscussion with Christian BourgeoisTolkien and Nature—Patrick CurryTolkien and Philology—T. A. ShippeyReading J. R. R. Tolkien—Maxim Hortense Pascal
On Specific WorksLeaf by Niggle: Hidden Nucleus—Vincent FerreLeaf by Niggle: Peculiar Tale—Nadia Drici [to come]The Lord of the Rings: How to Survive Fear and Despair—Dr. Nicole Guedeney [to come]Lord of the Rings, Book of the Century—T. A. ShippeyThe Lord of the Rings: Adventure Story?—Vincent FerreUnderstanding Beowulf—Leo Carruthers (Sorbonne)The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun—Christopher Tolkien (website original)
III. PAINTINGThe Book of IshnessPictures from Father ChristmasTreesLandscapesCalligraphyMapsWebsite illustrationsPhotographs
IV. PATHSF.A.Q.—Biographical informationJ. R. R. Tolkien and FantasyLiterary QuestionsInvented Languages and NamesPermissions and RequestsGlossary: Terms and Definitions
LinksPublishers and PeriodicalsLibrariesMedieval TextsModern TextsSigurd and GudrunArt and ArtistsBiographical linksContributors Other
Downloads  [to come]Using Our WebsiteSitemapCredits and Contact


--I've already found a lot that looks v. interesting, and wish I weren't in the middle of a deadline and so had time to give it the close look it deserves. But then I suspect I'll be coming back to this website a lot in the years to come.

--John R.


*http://www.tolkienestate.com/en/home.html
**http://www.tolkienestate.com/en/paths/sitemap.html

The Cat Report (W. May 6th 2015)

Still at six cats, and the same six as last week and the week before: EMMA, SALEM, sweet LILLIAN, Mr. MUNRO, and bonded pair DAFFODIL and TULIP.

Things are settling down in the cat room, as everybody knows everybody, and what sets them off, and how to avoid it.  
We started out the morning with three walks, for EMMA, and MUNRO, and LILLIAN. Emma, who was quite insistent that she needed a walk, and Right Now, valued it more as one-on-one time than wee-I'm-outside. Munro was nervous but gained confidence as he went along. Lillian did well as well: she wants people to come up and give her lovin', and i they don't she'll go up to them and ask. 
SALEM doesn't like walks, and she spends too much time in her cage, but I've found that she likes the fenced off area just outside the room (the 'catio'), especially if I carry a small cat-stand out there (placing it in the middle so no lone uses it to jump over the fence) and put her atop it;. It's even better, she says, if I cover her with a blanket. When the catio's not available, she's perfectly will to accept as a good substitute the top of the basket, again with a blanket covering all but her head. 
EMMA has decided to ignore all the other cats, to explore all their cages, and to get as much attention and as many walks as possible. She's no longer bullying the other cats -- she'll hiss if they get too close or into her space, but there's no follow-up. She was adorable week before last: out on the cat-stand in the catio area, mewing at people who passed by asking them to pet her. 
LILLIAN is a sweetie who loves petting (especially when it's deep enough to get that loose fur off), loves walks, loves attention, and doesn't mind the other cats. She's the calmest cat in the room. That said, she does love feathers, and the laser pointer (she made little I-want-it, I-want-it mews when it disappears). A lot of visitors admire her sweet disposition and say she's a beautiful cat, but still no adoption yet.
Mr. MUNRO is the most active of all the current cats: always exploring, always looking for games, always curious to see what I'm up to, or what some other cat is doing. Be warned that, while he likes the catio, he's quite capable of jumping the fencing. My solution are (1) to keep checking on him, which he likes, (2) to make sure any cat-stand out there is poorly positioned for a take-off spot, and (3) to have a few things scattered about on the catio that get in the way of him using the floor as a launch pad (a blanket for the other cats to stretch out on, the live catnip and live cat-grass, and the like.
The Bonded Pair, DAFF and TULIP, are starting to overcome their shyness. Both tend to avoid the other cats and so stay towards the back part of the room, but both wanted out as soon as I arrived and started exploring at once. I put them both up on the cage-tops, which worked out very well: they had a fine time exploring, crawling under things, and being where they could watch the other cats without being seen.
In short, the cats like walks (well, half of them anyway), the laser pointer, fresh grass, dried catnip, feathers, the catio (four out of six), and visits from both visitors and off-cuty volunteers (they were all v. happy to see Katrina come by and give them all a good petting).
I'll be out the next two weeks, so odds are some of these will be adopted while I'm away. If so I'll miss them but be v. glad to think of that cat in a well-deserved home of her or his own.
--John R. 

And The Answer Is: Oysters Served With Lemon

And the question?



"What was J. R. R. Tolkien's favorite food?"


source: The Tolkien Estate website, 'Paths' section, F.A.Q., Biographical Information.


Which just goes to show: in thirty-three years of reading Tolkien, and reading about Tolkien, I don't believe I've ever come across a mention of any character of his eating an oyster. Mushrooms and potatoes and fresh bread, yes: shellfish, no.


--JDR

today's songs: Love Changes Everything (Clime Fisher), Secondhand Love (Pete Townsend), Johnny & Mary (Rbt Palmer)
currently reading: ANGRY OPTIMIST, the biography of Jon Stewart.

Tolkien Estate Website

So, I was happy to learn from a friend* that the Tolkien Estate website is now up.  Here's the link:

http://www.tolkienestate.com/en/home.html

There's been a placeholder site here since 2007 which featured some beautiful artwork (by JRRT himself, mostly early, lesser-known work) and a feature on THE CHILDREN OF HURIN but little else: By contrast, there are so many good things here that it'll take me a while just to sort them out. I'll be making another post once I've explored a bit.

--John R.


*thanks Wayne

First Peoples exihibtt at the museum

So, last Sunday Janice and I took a break and headed uptown via the light rail for another of our all-too-rare visits to the Seattle Art Museum.

The special exhibit we'd come to see was INDIGENOUS BEAUTY: MASTERWORKS OF AMERICAN INDIAN ART FROM THE DIKER COLLECTION (which is due to run for two more weeks, ending May 17th). We were lucky to have picked a slow day when the rooms weren't crowded and we got to spend as much time as we liked looking at the displays.

There were a lot of interesting items on exhibit, divided by region and cultural groupings: arctic, subarctic, California + Great Basin (prob. the group I knew the least about), Southwest (pueblos), 'plateau and plains' (e.g. Sioux et al*), 'woodlands and southeast' (which covered everything from Creek to Seneca). Last of all came Northwest Coast, which got about as much space as all the rest put together.  I was sorry not to see a single Caddo artifact in the whole exhibit (that being the native people from my part of the country, the ArkLaTex) and surprised to see only a single Duwamish item.  Since the Duwamish were the people who lived where Seattle is now(Chief Seattle himself was Duwamish),  I'd have thought they'd be more to the fore.


My favorite items in the exhibit were four:

1 & 2. evil dead masks. These were meant to represent the spirits of evil dead people. Their eyes were just slits, perhaps indicating that they were closed. One's mouth was a similar slit, which was sinister enough, but the other was puckered to whistle, which was worse. The signage said that these evil dead could not talk but communicated through whistles instead -- which reminded me of the cries of the Nazgul, and even more so of the famine spirits in HIAWATHA, one of the few genuinely creepy passages in that once-famous and now almost unreadable work.

3. the spooky dagger. This had a face on the handle. The dagger itself looked fairly normal, but if you looked at the shadow cast by the bright lighting on the wall behind it, you could see a silhouette with pinpoint eyes and a jagged mouth. The shadow looked v. like something Gorey wd have put on the cover of a John Bellairs book.

4. the Duwamish drum. As I said, this was the only item I saw in the whole exhibit that came from the local culture, the people who lived where Seattle is now, and it was a striking one: a drum hanging high up on the wall, decorated with a spirit figure unique to the drum.



One thing that I really liked was seeing a beautiful woven basket in one case while not far away was an old black-and-white photo of the weaver, with that same pot by her side.  Janice's favorite piece was a beaver bowl made by somebody with a deft hand and a sense of humor. But the thing she found most moving was a short film clip of a someone showing native masks created centuries ago by members of his tribe: that his people had ever made masks had been completely forgotten, thanks to the efforts of missionaries and teachers and government officials over the years. When those beautiful, sophisticated art pieces that'd once held so much significance were uncovered in an excavation, it was a startling revelation to them of a lost tradition: they'd not just forgotten about the masks, and what each represented, but forgotten that their people ever practiced such an art form -- all lost, all taken away.




One unusual feature of this exhibit is that it had a fair number of recent works in it. I had mixed feelings about the inclusion of modern pieces by native artists (potters, jewelry makers, totem-pole carvers, even a manga artist, et al) intermixed with pieces decades if not centuries old. Janice felt it was appropriate, a way to show that these cultures had survived concerted efforts to eradicate them and thus celebrate their continuance in the modern day. I get that, but felt that while the point was worthwhile it diminished the impact of the exhibition for me.

--John R.



*the depiction of the Battle of Little Big Horn by one of the survivors made me feel sorry for the horses!

I Am Reviewed (in Dutch)

So, thanks to McFarland (thanks Lori) I've now seen the interview of the Shippey festschrift (AUTHOR OF THE NEW CENTURY) that appeared in LEMBAS (vol. 35, whole number 168, March 2015, pages 32-25), the journal of the Dutch Tolkien society, Unquendor.

In addition to being one of the five editors of this collection, I am myself one of contributors as well, so I was curious what they thought of my piece as well as the book as a whole.

As it happens, I cannot read Dutch, beyond recognizing that a passage is (probably) Dutch and not, say, German or Danish.

In any case, not having a Dutch dictionary handy, I decided to see what Google translation would make of it.

Here's the original Dutch text, as transcribed by me from a pdf of the review



Auteur: John D. Rateliff   Titel: Inside Literature. Tolkien's Explo-    rations of Medieval Genres    Inhoud: Overzicht van allerlei manieren waaropTolkien vootborduurde op Middeleeuwse teksten,en dan met name buiten zijn bekende legendariumom.   Kerncitaat: "Door de kunst te leren nieuwe ste-nen te maken in de vorm en stijl van de oude exem-plaren, was Tolkien in staat zijn eigen Toren te bou-wen" (145, paragrase). 3   Mening: Heel verfrissend om eens in kort bestekte lezen hoe Tolkien allerlei Middeleeuwse voorbeel-den vormgaf, om dat later in zijn beste werk succosvolte gebruiken. Een extra woord van lof voor de noten,die alleen al fascinerend leesvoer vormen.
3) Uiteraard gemodelleerd naar Tolkien's befaamde allegorie van de Toren die op zee uitkijkt, uit zijn Beowulf-lezing..

And here's an English translation, as provided by an online translation site:


Contents:Overview of all the ways Tolkien voot embroidered on medieval texts, and especially outside its known legendarium to.
Key Quote:"By learning the art to make new bricks in the shape and style of the old ones, Tolkien was able to build its own tower" (145 paragrase).
Opinion: Very refreshing to once briefly read how Tolkien vormgaf kinds medieval examples, so later in his best work succosvol to use. An additional word of praise for the nuts, which alone make fascinating reading.
3) Of course, modeled on Tolkien's famous allegory of the Tower overlooking the sea, from his Beowulf lecture ..

--it's nice to see that they liked it.

I will observe that the 'nuts' they particularly liked were probably the 'notes' (noten) -- wh. pleases me, since I always put a lot into the notes of each of my pieces (one in this essay shows how we know C. S. Lewis wrote JRRT's obituary)

--JDR.
current reading: TOLKIEN'S BEOWULF, WHAT MAKES THIS BOOK SO GREAT

today's song: Shooting Shark by Blue Oyster Cult