Tolkien Canon

[TrackerOrc]

So as I've been immersing myself into Tolkien much more since I rejoined this excellent forum, I've come to realise that I rely more and more just on what I think of as the 'canonical' works - by which I mean the books published by Tolkien himself.
I'd actually go so far as to think that I may only read/quote/debate/discuss the 'core' works (TH and LoTR) in future, even though this would mean no longer looking at The Silmarillion or HoME (let alone stuff like The Letters). There's so much in the 'core' books to look at (the Appendices alone are a mine of information) that I'm actually thinking this would be a positive move.
Is there anyone else here who limits their reading like this, or am I really out on a limb here?

 

[Deimos]

Even Tolkien's "core works" which you define as "the books published by Tolkien himself" were edited.
And Tolkien did not publish his own works; Stanley Unwin was his publisher and he edited Tolkien's works.
So I don't see a whole lot of difference between Unwin editing Tolkien's works and Tolkien's son Christopher editing his father's works.
In fact Christopher had much greater insight into his father's world building the Unwin ever had, so his editing more truly reflected Tolkien's intentions.
(imo)

 

[Halasían]

You're not that far out on a limb in my opinion. I tend to limit my 'canon' to The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings and Appendices, Unfinished Tales, and The Silmarillion. I found the HoME series has a lot of variations to the published stories, and though there is some good information to fill in some gaps in some of the volumes, I tend to use then sparingly and with a footnote that it isn't truly 'canon'. as an aside, I take Children of Hurin as being the canonical story of that family. I don't consider Letters as anything more than a glimpse into what the Professor was thinking when he wrote them. A fun reference, but not anything more to me. Deimos makes some good points as well and agree that Christopher was probably the best analyst of his father's work and had the deepest insight.

 

[TrackerOrc]

Even Tolkien's "core works" which you define as "the books published by Tolkien himself" were edited.
And Tolkien did not publish his own works; Stanley Unwin was his publisher and he edited Tolkien's works.
So I don't see a whole lot of difference between Unwin editing Tolkien's works and Tolkien's son Christopher editing his father's works.
In fact Christopher had much greater insight into his father's world building the Unwin ever had, so his editing more truly reflected Tolkien's intentions.
(imo)

Ah, yes, I was using 'publish' as a kind of shorthand for the works that were published in Tolkien's lifetime, I realise that Tolkien had an editor.

I'd have to say that there is a world of difference from the works edited and then published in Tolkien's lifetime (and therefore with his express permission) and the works edited and published after he died, where he had no input whatsoever as to the finished, published work. This, to me, makes a work 'canonical' - that it was written, edited, and published in Tolkien's lifetime.

 

[TrackerOrc]

You're not that far out on a limb in my opinion. I tend to limit my 'canon' to The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings and Appendices, Unfinished Tales, and The Silmarillion. I found the HoME series has a lot of variations to the published stories, and though there is some good information to fill in some gaps in some of the volumes, I tend to use then sparingly and with a footnote that it isn't truly 'canon'. as an aside, I take Children of Hurin as being the canonical story of that family. I don't consider Letters as anything more than a glimpse into what the Professor was thinking when he wrote them. A fun reference, but not anything more to me. Deimos makes some good points as well and agree that Christopher was probably the best analyst of his father's work and had the deepest insight.

With the Letters as well, I've always had a problem with them being a selection by a third party; I've no doubt at all that Humphrey Carpenter did a great job, but I always wonder what was left out, what was never discovered in the first place.
Completely agree with the Letters being a glimpse of what Tolkien was thinking; I think of them now as the equivalent of an email to a works colleague - perfectly valid but in no way equal to the finished work that took decades of thought.

For a long time I thought of The Silmarillion as basically a 'finished' work with Christopher crossing the T's and dotting the I's, but I don't think this is actually the case. He seems to have done a lot more editorial work (with Guy Gavriel Kay) than I believed, so this is probably why I'd be happy to concentrate on Tolkien's finished works by themselves.

HoME is probably what I used to think The Silmarillion was - a lot of Tolkien's original material with minimal changes - but I always thought of this as the equivalent of a draft, or a work in progress which hasn't been finished, as opposed to the published work. It's basically me thinking that Tolkien had plenty of time to publish the material (and I reckon the publishers would have bitten his hand off) yet he didn't. So, to me, it's a lot of draft/revision material which we actually don't know whether Tolkien would ever have regarded as the finished product.

 

[Ent]

but I always wonder what was left out, what was never discovered in the first place.

There is an extensive body of 'letters' not published. With more constantly being uncovered.

One of the members of the Paul Corfield Godfrey Discord is deeply involved with a team collecting and logging them, and they've a website published with regard to them and (to a degree I think) their contents.

I find the value of the letters in many cases questionable - as is knowing Tolkien changed his views a number of times on a number of things.

Some tend to feel 'his last written thoughts on a thing' are most likely 'the most accurate' - but are they? Or did he ever return to former thoughts? Or would he eventually, had he gotten to completing his own work, changed the thoughts some more?

It's true even the published works saw revision - and Christopher has inserted revision into the "most current copies" of those published works based on his 'best guess' regarding his father's intent - (and indeed as someone above said, there's no one more qualified to make guesses).

To some degree, these changes both foster some of Fandom's disagreements, and fester with people aware of them.

And as it can bring our own lovable cat @Elthir to say, 'i disagree with Tolkien.'

WHAT? Disagree with the author? But of course, Watson, Tolkien disagreed with himself..!!! 😆

 

[Elthir]

And as it can bring our own lovable cat Elthir to say, 'i disagree with Tolkien.'

O I can disagree with some of Tolkien's ideas or choices: for example, I prefer "penitent Galadriel" over (JRRT's late idea) "unstained Galadriel".

But thankfully for me and my approach, penitent Galadriel (where she becomes a leader of the Rebellion of the Etyangoldi) is the canon Galadriel, since Tolkien himself published this version of her history in The Road Goes Ever On.

Tolkien canon for me: The Hobbit, The Lord of The Rings, The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, The Road Goes Ever On (include the Map by Pauline Baynes, but not necessarily her illustrations on it.)

🐾

 

[TrackerOrc]

Some tend to feel 'his last written thoughts on a thing' are most likely 'the most accurate' - but are they? Or did he ever return to former thoughts? Or would he eventually, had he gotten to completing his own work, changed the thoughts some more?

Hit the nail on the head here. I'm basically veering towards TH and LoTR simply because they are finished works; we can say that everything he wanted to be in them is there. HoME, Sil and especially the Letters don't have this level of completion - as you say, we can't know whether Tolkien would ever have changed his mind (even to a minor degree) or re-visited earlier ideas.

And I must say it's giving me a great sense of clarity just concentrating on the 'core' works - there's a tremendous amount of material just in the two books I've mentioned, so I can really dig deeply and not get distracted. I can still remember my bafflement when I read that Strider was originally going to be a hobbit called Trotter!

 

[Deimos]

Ah, yes, I was using 'publish' as a kind of shorthand for the works that were published in Tolkien's lifetime, I realise that Tolkien had an editor.

I'd have to say that there is a world of difference from the works edited and then published in Tolkien's lifetime (and therefore with his express permission) and the works edited and published after he died, where he had no input whatsoever as to the finished, published work. This, to me, makes a work 'canonical' - that it was written, edited, and published in Tolkien's lifetime.

OK...Since you have clarified your premise and defined your terms I understand your argument.
(I don't agree with your premise, but that is at it may be)

 

[Elthir]

With the Letters as well, I've always had a problem with them being a selection by a third party; I've no doubt at all that Humphrey Carpenter did a great job, but I always wonder what was left out, what was never discovered in the first place.

If we had every letter Tolkien ever wrote I still wouldn't consider them canon. Very simply, they were not published by Tolkien for a Once and Future Readership.

I'd say the closest we get here (although not a letter of course) is Tolkien's Nomenclature, which he intended as a guide for multiple translators.

For a long time I thought of The Silmarillion as basically a 'finished' work with Christopher crossing the T's and dotting the I's, but I don't think this is actually the case.

Not only is this made plain in HOME in my opinion, but I see no evidence that the constructed Silmarillion or the constructed Children of Húrin were ever meant to be taken as canon.

I'm basically veering towards TH and LoTR simply because they are finished works; we can say that everything he wanted to be in them is there.

I think we can add ATB and RGEO as canon. I add the Map made by Pauline Baynes 'cause Tolkien himself worked on it (although we know he didn't like some of the illustrations that went with it).

What I "subtract" (from canon) however is the revised Foreword to The Lord of The Rings, as this is not Tolkien as Translator, but Tolkien as Author. The first edition Foreword is canon to me -- and again, here I don't agree with JRRT that it's problematic in any way.

Some tend to feel 'his last written thoughts on a thing' are most likely 'the most accurate' - but are they? Or did he ever return to former thoughts? Or would he eventually, had he gotten to completing his own work, changed the thoughts some more?

A good argument for posthumously published works as Uncanon, I think. That said, I give great weight to Tolkien's last thoughts about a given subject because we live in time.

And when one is living in time, revision comes after the thing being revised

Moving on. . .

"It may be suggested that whereas my father set great store by consistency at all points with The Lord of the Rings and the Appendices, so little concerning the First Age had appeared in print that he was under far less constraint. I am inclined to think, however, that the primary explanation of these differences lies rather in his writing largely from memory. The histories of the First Age would always remain in a somewhat fluid state so long as they were not fixed in a published state; and he certainly did not have all the relevant manuscripts clearly arranged and set out before him." Christopher Tolkien, Foreword, The Peoples of Middle-Earth

To me, this is another way to say that Tolkien, and quite naturally in my opinion, treated already published work as canon. Or for example, after JRRT realized that he'd already published the word ros as a Sindarin word, he wrote "most of this fails" on the text that contained his later, newer idea of ros as a Beorian word.

In short, for Tolkien, here even a later text mostly failed, due to already published work.

Even when Tolkien just couldn't help himself (between editions of The Lord of the Rings for example), still, he knew that revising already published works affects the Art of World-building. Not so with revising piles of private papers periodically packed in desk drawers or (possibly) a practical box somewhere.

🐾

 

[TrackerOrc]

If we had every letter Tolkien ever wrote I still wouldn't consider them canon. Very simply, they were not published by Tolkien for a Once and Future Readership.

I'd say the closest we get here (although not a letter of course) is Tolkien's Nomenclature, which he intended as a guide for multiple translators.



Not only is this made plain in HOME in my opinion, but I see no evidence that the constructed Silmarillion or the constructed Children of Húrin were ever meant to be taken as canon.



I think we can add ATB and RGEO as canon. I add the Map made by Pauline Baynes 'cause Tolkien himself worked on it (although we know he didn't like some of the illustrations that went with it).

What I "subtract" (from canon) however is the revised Foreword to The Lord of The Rings, as this is not Tolkien as Translator, but Tolkien as Author. The first edition Foreword is canon to me -- and again, here I don't agree with JRRT that it's problematic in any way.



A good argument for posthumously published works as Uncanon, I think. That said, I give great weight to Tolkien's last thoughts about a given subject because we live in time.

And when one is living in time, revision comes after the thing being revised

Moving on. . .

"It may be suggested that whereas my father set great store by consistency at all points with The Lord of the Rings and the Appendices, so little concerning the First Age had appeared in print that he was under far less constraint. I am inclined to think, however, that the primary explanation of these differences lies rather in his writing largely from memory. The histories of the First Age would always remain in a somewhat fluid state so long as they were not fixed in a published state; and he certainly did not have all the relevant manuscripts clearly arranged and set out before him." Christopher Tolkien, Foreword, The Peoples of Middle-Earth

To me, this is another way to say that Tolkien, and quite naturally in my opinion, treated already published work as canon. Or for example, after JRRT realized that he'd already published the word ros as a Sindarin word, he wrote "most of this fails" on the text that contained his later, newer idea of ros as a Beorian word.

In short, for Tolkien, here even a later text mostly failed, due to already published work.

Even when Tolkien just couldn't help himself (between editions of The Lord of the Rings for example), still, he knew that revising already published works affects the Art of World-building. Not so with revising piles of private papers periodically packed in desk drawers or (possibly) a practical box somewhere.

🐾

All good points here.
ATB doesn't really interact with the main story arc too much for me, and Bombadil just irritates me personally, so although it's definitely canon, I tend to ignore it as much as I can get away with. Obviously might get shouted at for this but Orcs are known for their strength of personality and vision...

I'd have to say I'm quite happy with revision (in the foreword or elsewhere) as long as it occurs within Tolkien's lifetime and he was the driving force behind it.

 

[Vardarianna]

This discussion was just before my coming to Tolkien Forum, and it made for an interesting read. I got into a bit of an argument with someone on another Tolkien forum on the 'canonicity' of published works like 'Nature of Middle Earth' where things presented goes contrary to a lot of what I consider 'canon' from The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, and Unfinished Tales. I only recently discovered there was the 1st edition and a revised edition of Lord of the Rings.

I guess my question is this ... What do you consider 'canon' for story continuity purposes?

 

[Deimos]

This discussion was just before my coming to Tolkien Forum, and it made for an interesting read. I got into a bit of an argument with someone on another Tolkien forum on the 'canonicity' of published works like 'Nature of Middle Earth' where things presented goes contrary to a lot of what I consider 'canon' from The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, and Unfinished Tales. I only recently discovered there was the 1st edition and a revised edition of Lord of the Rings.

I guess my question is this ... What do you consider 'canon' for story continuity purposes?

My understanding of "canon" would be anything by Tolkien, including the works CRRT edited.
"The Nature of Middle Earth" is a secondary (derivative) work. It uses what Tolkien wrote to make a another work.
In other words , if [after the Title of the work] the name following the word "by" isn't the Professor's it ain't canon.

xxxxxxxxxxx Not no how!

 

[Vardarianna]

My understanding of "canon" would be anything by Tolkien, including the works CRRT edited.
"The Nature of Middle Earth" is a secondary (derivative) work. It uses what Tolkien wrote to make a another work.
In other words , if [after the Title of the work] the name following the word "by" isn't the Professor's it ain't canon.

Yeah, that is pretty much how I see it, though in reading Lost Tales and other History of Middle-earth volumes you get more than one version of the same thing. Oddly, I consider 'Children of Hurin' as 'canon' since it is a fully edited story compared to the Turin chapter in the Silmarillion.

So as far as Lord of the Rings go, is the 1st edition or the revised edition considered 'canon'? I tend to use the one I came to know and love as my 'canon' story, and that is the revised edition.

 

[Deimos]

Yeah, that is pretty much how I see it, though in reading Lost Tales and other History of Middle-earth volumes you get more than one version of the same thing. Oddly, I consider 'Children of Hurin' as 'canon' since it is a fully edited story compared to the Turin chapter in the Silmarillion.

So as far as Lord of the Rings go, is the 1st edition or the revised edition considered 'canon'? I tend to use the one I came to know and love as my 'canon' story, and that is the revised edition.

It depends..... (and, again, this is my opinion).... but an example might explain my reasoning better than just my saying something.
Let's say that Tolkien changed something from the first edition to the second (and this would be in anything he wrote), so maybe from a second edition to a third... but it's a change that makes a definite difference, even if that difference doesn't change the story's action or outcome. The latest version becomes "canonical" . But let's say that in the second edition he leaves something out that was in the first edtition; he doesn't contradict what he said in the first ed. , he merely doesn't mention it at all one way of the other.
So if that topic comes up for discussion, you'd have to go back to the first edition for a substantive "argument" (your position on it) so then the First edition becomes canonical with respect to that topic.
So that is why I said "it depends". Basically it comes down to : find where he last talked about something and that work, or that part of that work becomes canonical.

 

[ZehnWaters]

This discussion was just before my coming to Tolkien Forum, and it made for an interesting read. I got into a bit of an argument with someone on another Tolkien forum on the 'canonicity' of published works like 'Nature of Middle Earth' where things presented goes contrary to a lot of what I consider 'canon' from The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, and Unfinished Tales. I only recently discovered there was the 1st edition and a revised edition of Lord of the Rings.

I guess my question is this ... What do you consider 'canon' for story continuity purposes?

Whatever I cobble together in my headcanon. It's a fictional setting and since so much of it takes place in conflicting notes and letters, I'm allowed to make up whatever I want for "canon". For instance, Morinehtar and Rómestámo are the offical Blue Wizards. They come in the Second Age and are successful and return West after the War of the Ring.

 

[Elthir]

My understanding of "canon" would be anything by Tolkien, including the works CRRT edited.

By works Christopher Tolkien edited, do you mean the constructed Silmarillion (1977) and the constructed Children of Húrin (2007)?

Oddly, I consider 'Children of Hurin' as 'canon' since it is a fully edited story compared to the Turin chapter in the Silmarillion.

Hmm. I know you sad oddly, but both versions are edited by CJRT, it's just that one version is (meant to be) shorter.

So as far as Lord of the Rings go, is the 1st edition or the revised edition considered 'canon'?

In my opinion both, which I think agrees with what Deimos said, with the Second Edition seen as internally "corrective" > but of course, only where it alters a previously known detail.

It's a fictional setting and since so much of it takes place in conflicting notes and letters, I'm allowed to make up whatever I want for "canon".

What about that much of it that takes place in the books Tolkien published for a once and future readership?

 

[Ent]

They come in the Second Age and are successful and return West after the War of the Ring.

I am certainly not opposed to accepting the 'official' names as such.
I do struggle with 'they are successful' because "the Istari" were all sent to help the free peoples against the again growing menace of Sauron - a charge that initially Gandalf was 'frightened' by to a degree.
We do not find them involved with helping the Free Peoples in any way in any work - published by Tolkien or otherwise. And I believe "somewhere" it's written only Gandalf was successful and returned. (though my sapwood isn't producing the right stuff to locate the citation at the moment.)

Even Radagast failed - devoting most of his time to the creatures which he loved, rather than aiding the free peoples according to the charge. (Even PJ's mythical Radagast helpiing while using his sled drawn by oversized bunnies doesn't help the picture. It's the bird poop in his hair and hat that's telling..!!)

No, I feel Tolkien included the different wizards, and HOW they handled their charge, to depict certain moral and religious elements (and purely ethical principles) just as he included every other character to do. The diffferences between the 5 Istari are clear, and telling, in many ways.

 

[Elthir]

We do not find them involved with helping the Free Peoples in any way in any work - published by Tolkien or otherwise.

ZehnWaters is referring to a very late text that Christopher Tolkien could not decipher well enough for publication in Unfinished Tales -- a text in which the "other two" wizards arrived in the Second Age.

This idea was scribbled on the very same piece of paper containing another note about the Istari, in which all five Wizards appear to arrive in Middle-earth at the same general time > or in Tolkien's words: "at a crucial moment in the history of Middle-earth" -- which must be the Third Age in my opinion, agreeing better with the already published Appendix B, in which: "When maybe a thousand years had passed, and the first shadow had fallen on Greenwood the Great, the Istari or Wizards appeared in Middle-earth."

Side note: the late scribble does not call the other two wizards "blue", which agrees with JRRT's 1958 letter that he doesn't know the colours of these Wizards (a letter written later than the "Blue Wizards" text published in Unfinished Tales).

 

[Ent]

Yes, I do recall the differences here, now you've mentioned them again for me.
That said, we enter the realm of 'fanfiction' yet again, where we know 'given what we know and what we don't, anything is possible'.
Thus we remain with the age old and (for some) unresolvable question of "what is canon."
Others pick a spot, and determine their perspective - (often opinion instead) - from the weight each gives to evidence at hand.

In any of the above events, for me and my perspective, the 5 Wizards were sent to aid the free peoples. Two are never heard of again - other than to perhaps infer Saruman initially went west with them but returned - one devoted his time to the animals he loved rather than the people who were his charge - the 4th determined to try to gather power and glory to himself alone, and one only was true to the task given him.

These are all meaningful personality types, character traits, inner motivations, situational events, and other issues in Tolkien's overall scope and intent for his work.

Again, we do better and closer to his own desires, if we seek what the things and people he wrote represent in relation to the whole, rather than what they themselves are or represent as individuals or separated things and events.

Tolkien was exceedingly detailed. In every way.

But of course - this thinking is not directly related to the thread "what is canon" and the comment about the wizards and their roles and ends in particular, so I am tending into derailment. Therefore, I'll shut up.