John D. Rateliff's Blog, page 182

Valparaiso Tolkien Conference

So, now that it's been officially announced, I can talk about an upcoming Tolkien conference to be held next spring in Valparaiso, Indiana.
The featured speakers will be Verlyn Flieger, Douglas Anderson, and myself, so I'll be in good company as well as among friends.
If you're interested in celebrating the 75th anniversary of THE HOBBIT, this shd be a good way to do it.
Here's the link:
http://conference.valpo.edu/tolkien/
--John R.current Dunsany play: MR. FAITHFUL

Kalamazoo 2012

So, early tomorrow morning I'm off to attend this year's Tolkien track at the Medieval Congress at Kalamazoo.
There's a handy-dandy listing of the Tolkien sessions here:
http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2012/04/21/55218-kalamazoo-and-tolkien-too/
--alhough I must add, sadly, that two of the four people on the 75th Anniversary HOBBIT panel have had to bow out (Jane Beal and Jason Fisher). Too bad; I was looking forward to finding out what 'Hidden War' she meant, while Voluspa always gets my attention (having devoted an entire appendix of my book to just one part of it). Still, there are plenty of other interesting-sounding sessions, and of course there's all the non-Tolkien 99% of the rest of the conference to think about too.
So, if you're there, be sure to drop by and say hello.
If not, think about giving it a try another year: I always learn something new I didn't know each year.
--John R.
current audiobook: SILVER ON THE TREEcurrent Dunsany play: LORD ADRIAN

THE HOBBIT and QWERTY

So, having been to see the One Man LotR last weekend turned my thoughts back to a post I'd been wanting to make for a week.
The latest news about the Peter Jackson HOBBIT movie(s) is interesting, but not altogether reassuring. Recently he showed a ten-minute segment to film buffs at a con, and about two-thirds of those viewing it disliked what they saw.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/25/hobbit-48-fps-footage-divides-audiences_n_1452391.html#s907018
Not the acting, not the story, not the music: the actual film quality. For the better part of a century, films have been shot and shown at 24 frames per second. No doubt in the beginning this was because that represented the upper level of the technology of the time: running nitrate and cellulose through projectors -- just like films tend to have distinct breaks every twenty minutes, that being the size of the reel for the standard projector for decades. Think QWERTY, the odd arrangement of letters on the keyboard most of us never think about, which originated as a way of slowing down typists so they wdn't hit keys faster than the old manual typewriters cd actually process the results: it took time for each stroke to hit the paper.
What those who were lucky enough to be there in the audience for this new footage saw didn't match their expectations. Ironically, the film quality was so good that it looked fake. That is, the resolution was sharp enough that actors didn't look like characters: they looked like actors wearing make-up. Scenery looked like v. obvious sets. As with any shift in quality of resolution (lord know we've gone through enough of them in music formats, from transistor radios on down), in time viewers will adjust. But it's kind of rough for a movie I want to see so badly to be the test case.
However, the following piece (which, be warned, is full of spoilers) ends with an encouraging note: not every theatre will re-tool to the new technology by this December, meaning that those wanting to see it in standard (24 f.p.s.) format will be able to do so; likewise those who want to go for the new (48 f.p.s.) format, just as you can go to (most) movies now in standard or 3-D.

http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2012/04/27/55378-hobbit-footage-review-massive-spoilers-full-coverage-analysis/
I did love one line in this article that deserves to be repeated:
"be prepared to tell your non-Tolkien reading friends what really happened"
--Although I'm still trying to get my head around the idea that this piece's author thought Slyvester McCoy put in a really good performance. That thought calls for greater mental re-adjustment than processing higher-speed images.
--John R.current reading: ALEXANDER AND THREE SMALL PLAYS; "Atalanta in Wimbledon"

The One-Man LORD OF THE RINGS

So, this is something we heard about a month or so ago from an actor-friend who's in our fantasy book discussion group (thanks Allan!): a guy who travels around the country doing a one-man show based on THE LORD OF THE RINGS. We investigated, and found it's not Tolkien's LotR so much as Peter Jackson's he's doing his homage for. Furthermore, he was coming to Tacoma in the not-too-distant future.
Accordingly, yesterday (Saturday the 5th) saw us driving down to Tacoma to see what turned out to be seventy minutes that reproduce a highly abridged but nonetheless incredibly detailed and painstakingly faithful version of the Jackson films, devoting about twenty minutes to each film. The accompanying link gives some clips from his show --
http://www.onemanlotr.com/?page_id=34
--but these really don't give an idea of how kinetic the performance was: Ross was throwing himself about the stage nonstop in a way that wd have done the ever-stalwart Andy Serkis proud, filling in all the voices plus sound effects plus singing the music where appropriate. He took two brief breaks where the films stopped and started, to chat with the audience a bit and catch his breath. The clips in the link also don't convey how funny the overall effect was. Ross is serious, even solemn at times, but he also knows full well that while he's serious about what he does (you can't do a show like this without really good timing), it's also all a bit silly. The jokey-ness tends to grow a bit towards the end, but he was able to keep the audience with him. For instance, when re-enacting the scene where Saruman expounds to his minion, asking did he know where orcs come from, Ross add the aside "read The Silmarillion. No, really", and elsewhere he lamented not having Tom Bombadil in the films (he thinks Brian Blessing shd have played the part) -- just the sort of touch to warm a purist's heart.

All in all, a really impressive performance. If you don't like the Peter Jackson movies, you're not his target audience, though you might still be impressed by the complexity of his performance. If you do, but don't mind some of their oddities being gently lampooned, then you'll like this. A lot.
Now Janice and I are curious what his one-man Star Wars show is like. Although in that case I'd probably need to re-watch the movies. It's been a long time . . .
--John R.current reading: PLAYS OF NEAR AND FAR, ALEXANDER by Lord D.

The Latest on the Hummingbird Front

About ten minutes ago, I had an amazing experience. I was making some Moroccan soup when, looking out the window, I noticed the hummingbird feeders were about empty. So I went out, collected the empty feeders, brought them in and cleaned them out, refilled them with fresh hummingbird juice (having a few days ago replenished the supply without filling the house w. smoke OR destroying another pan), and took them back out. A hummingbird flew away from the area where the feeders shd have been, and I started to hang them back out when I got an idea. Keeping v. still, I stood at the railing holding one of the feeders in each outstretched hand. Pretty soon the hummingbird came back, zoomed me a few times, with a tail-click and a few tsks. Then it v. slowly got nearer and nearer, until it was drinking out of the feeder in my left hand. When it'd had enough, off it flew.
Woah.
--JDR

Signs of Spring

Can spring really be coming to the Pacific Northwest at last?The signs look hopeful.
--the violets* have bloomed, and the strawberries in the little planter on the balcony have their first blossoms.
--last week, we saw the biggest rainbow I remember. And a strong, vivid one too, that lasted quite a while. Given Barfield's riff about the rainbow as an icon of participatory reality, it was interesting discussing with Janice what we were each seeing. For me, there was a strong band of red-orange, a yellow line, a thin streak of blue, and a bright band of green. She, on the other hand, could see the purple, and I gathered saw the individual colors more distictly. Then, interestingly enough, by focusing where she pointed I cd see the purple too, but that made the blue disappear altogether and the green shrink to a narrow ribbon. V. interesting!
--the first yellow jacket of the year scouting out the area around the hummingbird feeder.
--and we finally made our way back to Point Defiance Zoo & aquarium, for the first time in several years, to see the baby clouded leopard cubs. They were adorable; just eight weeks old. We timed our arrival to see them at feeding time: first a little wet catfood, then bottles of milk, then some playtime, after which they zonked out. Just like any kittens, albeit each is already about the size of a full-grown housecat already (well, not Feanor perhaps, but then he is a big cat). We saw their mother, too, with her long fluffy tail about the length of the rest of her hanging down from where she was lounging up in the branches. Also noteworthy were the otters, a show-off puffin splashing about, getting to actually see the arctic foxes (they've usually been in hiding), the red wolves (which we have in Arkansas but are quite distinct from the grey wolves in most of the U.S., looking more like big coyotes), three walruses (one of whom is enormous), and the peacock. Turns out they no longer have beluga whales -- who knew?
-- as for the weather, it keeps swinging back and forth between warm and sunny and the cool, windy, and wet. Sometimes both multiple times in the same day . . .
--John R.current reading: COMPLETE PLAYS of Lord Dunsany (currently I'm up to IF)also: IN THE SHADOW OF THE DREAMCHILD: A NEW UNDERSTANDING OF LEWIS CARROLL by Karoline Leach (recommended at last year's Kalamazoo by Doug and Dimitra; they were right)current audiobook: SILVER ON THE TREE (the final book in The Dark Is Rising series)current dvd: R.O.D.tv and SUSPENSE: THE LOST EPISODES

*transplanted from the yard in Magnolia before the house was knocked down, and carried back as one of my more unusual in-cabin personal items on a flight.

Hummingbirds and Smoke Alarms

So, this morning I noticed that the new little hummingbird was spending a lot of time at the feeder, trying to get those last few drops of hummingbird juice out. I'd seen it and another (presumably its parent) at the feeders yesterday, where it seemed to be following the other around. Usually two hummingbirds together do a lot of helicoptering and chasing about; not this time. Today there was only the one, and at one point it even hunched itself down on the rail, v. un-hummingbird-like, as if it were brooding like a tiny chicken.
I'd forgotten to put sugar on the list for last weekend's grocery run, but my conscience got to me and I decided to sacrifice the remaining sugar cubes for the cause, there being enough to make up a small batch. Accordingly, I got things started, and then sat down to have breakfast.
Coming back into the kitchen side of the house after breakfast, I wondered why it looked like a scene out of 'Fog on the Barrow-Downs'. Ah, I thought. Not fog. Smoke. Sure enough, the pan with the sugar-water I'd left simmering and forgotten about was giving forth a considerable plume of smoke, great swaths of which were hanging in the air. I got the pan off the burner and turned the burner off. Only then did the smoke detector, which yowls more often than not when we use the oven, decided to give voice.
I took the pan outside, onto the balcony, and found a place to sit it down where it cdn't do much harm. Then I went back in and started opening up windows and getting the fan going. Luckily there was a strong breeze today, and I soon had it gusting through the apartment, upstairs and down. Taking stock of things afterwards, I discovered that the cats were all calmly sitting upstairs, clearly aware something was amiss but not worried about it. When Janice came home, hours later, she reported that yes, there was still a bit of smokiness she cd smell.
As for the pot, despite some efforts at salvage I think it's a goner. The stovetop is fine. I found four little sugar-packets I'd picked up during my trip, mixed them with a little water, microwaved it, and put it in one of the feeders; the hummingbird came at once (while I was still there at the feeders, which showed how trusty/hungry it was) but didn't seem to like this makeshift-made hummingbird juice. Tough. I've now picked up a box of sugar and will make up a regular batch in the morning.
New resolution: only make hummingbird juice when I'm going to be in the kitchen throughout the whole process, start to finish.

--Despite all of which I had a pleasant and v. productive day. Go figure.
--JDR

Tolkien and Waugh

So, about a month ago, I made a post about Tolkien's disdain for the Nazis in which I observed in passing his being soft on Franco (a comment to which one reader took exception, but which I stand by):
"And there's also the matter of his sympathy for Franco, whom he saw rather as Defender of the Church than the fascist tyrant he was."
Now I've come across something from a younger contemporary of Tolkien's who I think might parse things in a way I would not: Evelyn Waugh. I've not been much of an admirer of Waugh's, having found what little I've read of him wholly uncongenial and his personality repugnant (upon learning that Carpenter had written a book about Waugh and his friends, I incautiously replied that I hadn't known he had any). But having been moved by Hitchens' enthusiasm for Waugh in some of his essays in ARGUABLY, I decided to give E.W. another try, tackling a book that I'd read about years earlier in Carpenter that had sounded moderately interesting: THE ORDEAL OF GILBERT PINFOLD [1957], the (autobiographical) story of a man who starts hearing voices.
And not benign voices, a la Barfield's UNANCESTRAL VOICE, but malicious and spiteful voices that accuse him of being homosexual, of being a recent Jewish immigre named 'Peinfeld', of being a has-been as a writer, of being a coward during the war, of being a Nazi sympathizer and blackshirt, of having caused the death of several people, of pretending to achievements he never earned, &c. The voices cajole and threaten, even at their most sinister urging him to suicide. On one of the rare occasions when he attempts to refute things the voices have said to other people (none of whom can hear the voices and so who have no idea what he's talking about), he has the following exchange:
'I was not at Eton,' he said suddenly, with a challenge in his tone. 'Nor was I,' said Glover. 'Marlborough.' 'I never said I was at Eton,' Mr. Pinfold insisted. 'No. Why should you, I mean, if you weren't?' 'It is a school for which I have every respect, but I was not there myself.' Then he turned across the table to the Norwegian. 'I never wore a black shirt in the Albert Hall.' 'No?' said the Norwegian, interested but uncomprehending. 'I had every sympathy with Franco during the Civil War.' 'Yes? It is so long ago I have rather forgotten what it was all about. In my country we did not pay so much attention as the French and some other nations.' 'I never had the smallest sympathy with Hitler.' 'No, I suppose not.' 'Once I had hopes of Mussolini. But I was never connected with Mosley.' 'Mosley? What is that?' 'Please, please,' cried pretty Mrs. Scarfield, 'don't let's get on to politics.' . . . [p. 125]
What's interesting here is that Penfold/Waugh (and elsewhere it is made v. clear that 'Penfold' is directly based on Waugh himself, who merely gave a light fictional gloss to events that had actually happened to him during a drug-addled phase three years earlier, in 1954) draws sharp distinctions between four separate manifestations of fascism:
(1) Franco, whom he fully supported
(2) Hitler, whom he denies any sympathy with whatsoever
(3) Mussolini, whom he "had hopes of" (presumably early on), &
(4) Oswald Mosley, head of the British fascists (the Blackshirts), whom he firmly distances himself from.
This accords pretty well with Tolkien's apparent support for Franco and well-recorded disdain for Hitler. I don't know of anywhere where Tolkien comments on Mosley or Mussolini, but I doubt he had much use for either, since he was (a) anti-Nazi (unlike Mosley) and (b) anti-imperial (unlike Mussolini). In any case, it's hard to believe Tolkien ever supported Mussolini to the extent Waugh did, the latter having gone out to Abyssinia to write a pro-Mussolini tract during the invasion and overthrow of Haile Selassie's realm.
My own guess is that Tolkien, whose beloved foster-father was a half-Spanish priest (who incidently had died just two years before Franco's war began), reacted strongly and viscerally to reports of Spanish priests being killed by the anti-Franco forces. Indeed, he refers to atrocities against priests in his letter describing Roy Campbell's regaling the Inklings with accounts of the Spanish war (Letters of JRRT p. 96). So, if there's any truth to the idea that Tolkien was 'soft' on Franco (and this one letter's the only proof of it I know, written when he was caught up in Campbell's lies and half-truths), I'd suggest that for him, this was personal: it got in under the radar due to it being all too easy to identify reports of slaughtered priests with Fr. Francis. And in any case I suspect Waugh's drawing firm distinctions between four different manifestations of what I'd lump all together as fascism might offer some insight into something we know all too little about.
--John R.
current reading: THE HAUNTED BOOKSHOP (Morley), A NIGHT AT AN INN (Dunsany), ABOVE KER-IS (Walton); current audiobook ARGUABLY (Hitchens)

Another Parting of the Ways

So, last night came the news, from another of the many overlapping worlds I inhabit, that Monte Cook is leaving Wizards of the Coast, where he was one of the three primary designers behind the ongoing Fifth Edition D&D project.
Dang.
Here's the link:
http://www.montecook.com/cgi-bin/page.cgi?montejournal
Wishing Monte all the best and also hoping this doesn't set back fifth edition, or send it off down the wrong track.
--John R.

P.S.: Speaking of fifth edition, I hope the guys who are working on it are reading posts like this one from Steve Winter:
http://www.howlingtower.com/2012/04/high-magic-low-magic.html

A Parting of the Ways

So, now it's official: Doug Anderson is no longer Review Editor for TOLKIEN STUDIES, starting with Vol. IX. I'd heard this a few weeks ago, but now it seems he's also leaving the editorial board as one of the three guiding lights for the journal as a whole. Sorry to hear it. Doug's posted the official word on the whys and wherefores on his blog; here's the link.
http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2012/04/publishing-mordor-style.html

The comments are well worth reading too --it's rather horrifying to read that a library can pay $40,000 as subscription for a single major academic journal. I knew things were bad back in my Marquette days in terms of how many journals a college library had to buy, and how much they were charged; they've clearly only gotten worse during the intervening years.
For an independent scholar like myself, it's tantalizing to know there's so much available on Project Muse (a site which comes up rather often when I'm doing research for a specific article), and yet it's inaccessible to those of us not affiliated with a university. And it was rather startling, a year or two back, to find that a book review I'd written for MYTHLORE was available from amazon.com at $9.95.
In any case, here's best wishes to Doug in his new venture at Nodens Books (the first release from which I ordered a few days ago*). And also good wishes to the remaining editors at TOLKIEN STUDIES for carrying on the good work there. Eight volumes are a record to be proud of, and I look forward to the more to come.
Times change. Good work remains.
--John R.just finished: THE ORDEAL OF GILBERT PINFOLD (#II.2995)currently reading: THE HAUNTED BOOKSHOP

*http://www.nodensbooks.com/