Re: also sprach Tolkien

PS Tolkein himself illustrated the Hobbit, and some of his Christmas
letters/stories to his children when they were young. I wonder if he
has different standards for adults than for children, or if he only
developed this idea later in life?

Jim

Scottie Bowman wrote:

> Herewith as requested, out of J.R.Tolkien, courtesy of Daniel.
>
> Scottie B.
>_____________________________________________________
>
>However good in themselves, illustrations do little good to fairy-stories.
>The radical distinction between all art (including drama) that offers a
>visible presentation and true literature is that it imposes one visible
>form. Literature works from mind to mind and is thus more progenitive. It
>is at once more universal and more poignantly particular. If it speaks of
>bread or wine or stone or tree, it appeals to the whole of these things, to
>their ideas; yet each hearer will give them a peculiar personal embodiment
>in his imagination. Should the story say 'he ate bread', the dramatic
>producer or painter can only show 'a piece of bread' according to his taste
>and fancy, but the hearer of the story will think of bread in general and
>picture it in some form of his own. If a story says 'he climbed a hill and
>saw a river in the valley below', the illustrator may catch, nor nearly
>catch, his own vision of such a scene; but every hearer of the words will
>have his own picture, and it will be made out of all the hills and rivers
>and dales he has ever seen, but especially out of The Hill, The River, The
>Valley which were for him the first embodiment of the word (67).
>________________________________________________________
>
>
>
>
>-
>* Unsubscribing? Mail majordomo@roughdraft.org with the message
>* UNSUBSCRIBE BANANAFISH
>
>
>

-
* Unsubscribing? Mail majordomo@roughdraft.org with the message
* UNSUBSCRIBE BANANAFISH
Received on Wed Aug 20 13:28:30 2003