When I was seven years old, I went with my mother to her eye appointment. While we were waiting for her to be called, she started reading The Fellowship of the Ring to me. We got two chapters in before the appointment. Afterwards, she couldn’t read because of the eye drops, so I got tired of waiting and started to read it myself. This explains my absolute love for Tolkien, among other things. It also explains my love for Norse mythology at a young age, even though I didn’t know the connection at the time.For me, The Lord of the Rings is one of those books that I will always be re-reading, maybe not every year, but every year and a half. It is in many ways like Star Wars for me. Star Wars was the first movie I can ever remember going to a theater to see. It was a drive-in and I fell asleep during the Three Stooges pre show, and woke up right after they left Tattotine. It’s strange. It’s the first movie I remember seeing in a theater, but that wasn’t the first time I saw it.There are major differences. The World of Middle Earth is far better drafted and more real than the world of Star Wars. It is hard to imagine Tolkien making a mistake like having Padme die but Leia remembering her real mother, or having such a weakly thought out group as the Jedi. Really, why can’t they get married when they get married in some of earlier comic books? It is impossible to even think that Tolkien would make such a mistake as in Revenge of the Sith where Obi-Wan says, “Only a Sith believe in absolutes”. As one critic has correctly pointed out, such a statement not only insults any person who believes in religion, but is also an absolute sentence, so Obi-Wan is a Sith as well.No. Middle Earth is far, far, far better thought out. Everything fits. But there is one overwhelming similarity between the two, and that is marketing. Look at Star Wars, even during the first, the good, trilogy, you had the toys, you had the comics, you had the cartoons (Droids and Ewoks and those god awful Ewok movies, anyone else remember them?). More recently, there have been episodes 1-3, video games, books, a Cartoon Network series of 2 minute shorts, a cartoon movie as well as a cartoon series based on the movie. The drawback to that marketing is that the Clone Wars movie (the cartoon) has completely destroyed my blind watching of anything Star Wars. Honestly what does Skywalker Ranch, Lucas studios or whatever, have against New Orleans transvestites, and why would a Hutt talk like one?Thankfully, Christopher Tolkien can’t destroy LOTR the same way. It’s true that Middle Earth has had its down points. Does anyone remember the Rankin Bass Return of the King? It's true that Christopher Tolkien has published what seems to be every single scrap of paper his father scribbled on, regardless of whether or not it has anything to do with Middle Earth. We not only have The Hobbit and LOTR, but the Sil, The History of Middle Earth, Letters from Father Christmas, and Roverrandom among others. We even have “lost” or “new” tales that aren’t really new or lost, for instance, The Children of Hurin, which is far easier to read in its new format. It’s enough to wonder, if one is feeling mean, if Christopher Tolkien “finds” something whenever he needs cash. This doesn’t seem to be the case. It does truly seem to be the case that Christopher Tolkien loved his father and his father’s work. That is enough, unlike the case with Star Wars to keep people like me buying the books, even in hardcover.This work, The Legend of Sigurd & Gudrun is not Middle-Earth. It is part of the inspiration for Middle Earth, or to be more exact, a translation/retelling of work that helped inspire Middle Earth. But it is also a misnamed work. A better title would be J. R. R. Tolkien’s Translation/Re-Telling of the Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun with notes by Christopher Tolkien, for there seems to be far more C. Tolkien than J. R. R. Tolkien in this book. In part, this is understandable for the book is culled from Lecture notes, scribbled notes, and a hand written translation. Sadly, it also highlights the books two major flaws.The first flaw is connected to the translation/retelling itself. J. R. R. Tolkien’s translation/retelling is not a smooth retelling; it is jumpy in spots. It is not so jumpy that it puts off an informed reader. And that might be a problem. While it is true that some people reading this book (c’est moi, for instance) are more than familiar with the Volsung saga, it is equally likely to be true that some people are picking up the book without this familiarity, buying the book because of the Tolkien name. If you are one of these people, I would highly recommend that you read a gloss of the saga, be it a short prose version or another lyric translation. This will help make some plot points clearer. The second problem is the editing (or book structure). Large parts of the book are Christopher Tolkien’s notes. This includes discussions of plot differences, translation difference, or what he thinks his father thought about a certain aspect of the saga. There are several problems with this. The first is that Christopher Tolkien’s writing is pedantically dry. If you know about the sagas, none of the information related is new, and you lack the pleasure of reading what the J. R. R. Tolkien himself thought. Instead, you are told what someone else thinks he might have thought. If you are new to the saga, the information might be interesting, if you can stay awake to read it. It is really, really dry. Additionally, the notes are not footnotes or endnotes, but instead form a selection of the book. There is no indication in the actual text of the lay that there is a note about particular word or stanza. This is frustrating, or would be if you needed the information. It means that someone who is coming to the saga first hand is getting knowledge of the notes late. Would’ve adding note numbers been that much of a problem?Despite these problems, the book is not a waste. Well the story can at times be choppy, it also can be powerful. Take for instance, “In sweet embrace/to sleep she went,/to grief unending/Gudrun wakened”. It is a powerful in its starkness, and allows the reader to share something that Tolkien himself loved. It also is a good retelling of the story. It is constructed as a chant so that any reader can imagine a scop in front of fire singing it. Such a wonderful image is one that I’m happy the book could give me.
Chris' Fish Place
Thoughts on things, mostly books.
When I was seven years old, I went with my mother to her eye appointment. While we were waiting for her to be called, she started reading The Fellowship of the Ring to me. We got two chapters in before the appointment. Afterwards, she couldn’t read because of the eye drops, so I got tired of waiting and started to read it myself. This explains my absolute love for Tolkien, among other things. It also explains my love for Norse mythology at a young age, even though I didn’t know the connection at the time.For me, The Lord of the Rings is one of those books that I will always be re-reading, maybe not every year, but every year and a half. It is in many ways like Star Wars for me. Star Wars was the first movie I can ever remember going to a theater to see. It was a drive-in and I fell asleep during the Three Stooges pre show, and woke up right after they left Tattotine. It’s strange. It’s the first movie I remember seeing in a theater, but that wasn’t the first time I saw it.There are major differences. The World of Middle Earth is far better drafted and more real than the world of Star Wars. It is hard to imagine Tolkien making a mistake like having Padme die but Leia remembering her real mother, or having such a weakly thought out group as the Jedi. Really, why can’t they get married when they get married in some of earlier comic books? It is impossible to even think that Tolkien would make such a mistake as in Revenge of the Sith where Obi-Wan says, “Only a Sith believe in absolutes”. As one critic has correctly pointed out, such a statement not only insults any person who believes in religion, but is also an absolute sentence, so Obi-Wan is a Sith as well.No. Middle Earth is far, far, far better thought out. Everything fits. But there is one overwhelming similarity between the two, and that is marketing. Look at Star Wars, even during the first, the good, trilogy, you had the toys, you had the comics, you had the cartoons (Droids and Ewoks and those god awful Ewok movies, anyone else remember them?). More recently, there have been episodes 1-3, video games, books, a Cartoon Network series of 2 minute shorts, a cartoon movie as well as a cartoon series based on the movie. The drawback to that marketing is that the Clone Wars movie (the cartoon) has completely destroyed my blind watching of anything Star Wars. Honestly what does Skywalker Ranch, Lucas studios or whatever, have against New Orleans transvestites, and why would a Hutt talk like one?Thankfully, Christopher Tolkien can’t destroy LOTR the same way. It’s true that Middle Earth has had its down points. Does anyone remember the Rankin Bass Return of the King? It's true that Christopher Tolkien has published what seems to be every single scrap of paper his father scribbled on, regardless of whether or not it has anything to do with Middle Earth. We not only have The Hobbit and LOTR, but the Sil, The History of Middle Earth, Letters from Father Christmas, and Roverrandom among others. We even have “lost” or “new” tales that aren’t really new or lost, for instance, The Children of Hurin, which is far easier to read in its new format. It’s enough to wonder, if one is feeling mean, if Christopher Tolkien “finds” something whenever he needs cash. This doesn’t seem to be the case. It does truly seem to be the case that Christopher Tolkien loved his father and his father’s work. That is enough, unlike the case with Star Wars to keep people like me buying the books, even in hardcover.This work, The Legend of Sigurd & Gudrun is not Middle-Earth. It is part of the inspiration for Middle Earth, or to be more exact, a translation/retelling of work that helped inspire Middle Earth. But it is also a misnamed work. A better title would be J. R. R. Tolkien’s Translation/Re-Telling of the Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun with notes by Christopher Tolkien, for there seems to be far more C. Tolkien than J. R. R. Tolkien in this book. In part, this is understandable for the book is culled from Lecture notes, scribbled notes, and a hand written translation. Sadly, it also highlights the books two major flaws.The first flaw is connected to the translation/retelling itself. J. R. R. Tolkien’s translation/retelling is not a smooth retelling; it is jumpy in spots. It is not so jumpy that it puts off an informed reader. And that might be a problem. While it is true that some people reading this book (c’est moi, for instance) are more than familiar with the Volsung saga, it is equally likely to be true that some people are picking up the book without this familiarity, buying the book because of the Tolkien name. If you are one of these people, I would highly recommend that you read a gloss of the saga, be it a short prose version or another lyric translation. This will help make some plot points clearer. The second problem is the editing (or book structure). Large parts of the book are Christopher Tolkien’s notes. This includes discussions of plot differences, translation difference, or what he thinks his father thought about a certain aspect of the saga. There are several problems with this. The first is that Christopher Tolkien’s writing is pedantically dry. If you know about the sagas, none of the information related is new, and you lack the pleasure of reading what the J. R. R. Tolkien himself thought. Instead, you are told what someone else thinks he might have thought. If you are new to the saga, the information might be interesting, if you can stay awake to read it. It is really, really dry. Additionally, the notes are not footnotes or endnotes, but instead form a selection of the book. There is no indication in the actual text of the lay that there is a note about particular word or stanza. This is frustrating, or would be if you needed the information. It means that someone who is coming to the saga first hand is getting knowledge of the notes late. Would’ve adding note numbers been that much of a problem?Despite these problems, the book is not a waste. Well the story can at times be choppy, it also can be powerful. Take for instance, “In sweet embrace/to sleep she went,/to grief unending/Gudrun wakened”. It is a powerful in its starkness, and allows the reader to share something that Tolkien himself loved. It also is a good retelling of the story. It is constructed as a chant so that any reader can imagine a scop in front of fire singing it. Such a wonderful image is one that I’m happy the book could give me.
