The Letters of J.R.R Tolkien: Letter 9
Summary
Date: January 4, 1937
To: Susan Dagnall
Background: By 1932, Tolkien had completed a text for The Hobbit that ended just before the defeat of Smaug. C.S. Lewis read it that winter, and the typescript was later seen by Susan Dagnall, an Oxford graduate working for the publishing house of Allen & Unwin. Dagnall encouraged Tolkien to complete the story and give it to Allen & Unwin for publication. More on Dagnall will come up in connection to other letters, but this particular letter comes after The Hobbit was accepted for publication.
Summary: In this short letter, Tolkien apologizes for some of his delays, as he and his family were laid out with influenza. He is providing Dagnall with some illustrations and maps, but he apologies for their poor, “amateur” quality and asks that any rejected work be sent back to him.
Reflection
Of course no one can fault Tolkien for being sick, but, for various reasons, he often struggled with production. Now, he most certainly produced more than most of us have, but he struggled with production relative to the depths that he plumbed. For more on this, read his short story, Leaf by Niggle, which tells of a painter who desired to paint a tree, but who continually found himself hyper-fixating on individual leaves. There may be some weakness wrapped up in this, but not entirely, or, I would argue, primarily. If you have read Tolkien’s writing and studied his life, it is abundantly evident that he is a man of great love.
He loved the northern mythos and language, and he loved discussing them. “[Tolkien] could turn a lecture room into a mead hall in which he was the bard and we were the feasting, listening guests” (J.M. Stewart, former pupil of Professor Tolkien).
He loved Edith. See my post on Letter 1
He loved his children. This will be made very clear in some of his letters, as well as the charming stories that came out of his fatherly impulses. For example, Roverandom was written as a fantastical explanation for why Michael lost his beloved toy dog. Letters to Father Christmas is a remarkable collection of letters, which creates an entire story and mythology, that he wrote to enchant his children at Christmastime. So much of his life and work is connected to his deep love for his children.
He loved Christ and the church: “Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament. .... There you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves upon earth” (Letter 43). More on this when we get to this letter.
Such love allows for great depth of human spirit, but those who are most entangled in spirit (even blessedly so) are very often those who struggle most with publishable output. When you want to move with the fullness of your being in a given direction, or, more likely, many directions, it becomes exceedingly difficult to buckle down and focus on completing assignments. This is one reason why Lewis and Tolkien’s collaborative book on language and meaning never made any headway. Lewis charged ahead, but, as far as we know, it does not appear that Tolkien ever actually put pen to paper, leading Lewis to abandon the project. Now, do not take this as a defense of an undisciplined life. Love also demands discipline, but, for a poetic soul, that can be an even more foreign language than Old Icelandic or Gothic. It is the poetry built into the very fibers of his mythos that continually beckoned Tolkien “further up and further in,” to borrow a phrase from Lewis. Regularly drawn to such affairs of passion and spiritual significance, “production” often become a secondary or tertiary concern, as we see in several of his letters of apology. This is why it took people like Lewis and Dagnall to push Tolkien along to finishing and publishing his work, and the world is greatly enriched by their efforts.
I suppose this is the lesson I will leave with you today: If you are a Tolkien, make sure you are in active relationship with a Lewis and a Dagnall. If you are someone who knows how to get things done, perhaps you need to find a Tolkien to prod along. Find your fellowship. If you do not already have one, perhaps Mythic Mind can be a start.
I hope you will join me on this journey through all of Tolkien’s letters! I also hope that you will consider supporting my work financially to help me afford the time to keep up the schedule.
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