The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien (47 page)

3 April 1956

Of course, I wish you to pursue your efforts with regard to foreign editions. . . . . It is however surely intelligible that an author, while still alive, should feel a deep and immediate concern in
translation.
And this one is, unfortunately, also a professional linguist, a pedantic don, who has wide personal connexions and friendships with the chief English scholars of the continent. . . . . The translation of
The Lord of the Rings
will prove a formidable task, and I do not see how it can be performed
satisfactorily without the assistance of the author.
^fn58
That assistance I am prepared to give, promptly, if I am consulted.

I wish to avoid a repetition of my experience with the Swedish translation of
The Hobbit
.
¹
I discovered that this had taken unwarranted liberties with the text and other details, without consultation or approval; it was also unfavourably criticized in general by a Swedish expert, familiar with the original, to whom I submitted it. I regard the text (in all its details) of
The Lord of the Rings
far more jealously. No alterations, major or minor, re-arrangements, or abridgements of this text will be approved by me – unless they proceed from myself or from direct consultation. I earnestly hope that this concern of mine will be taken account of.

11 April 1956

I find that many children become interested, even engrossed, in
The Lord of the Rings,
from about 10 onwards. I think it rather a pity, really. It was not written for them. But then I am a very ‘unvoracious' reader, and since I can seldom bring myself to read a work twice I think of the many things that I read – too soon! Nothing, not even a (possible) deeper appreciation, for me replaces the bloom on a book, the freshness of the unread. Still what we read and when goes, like the people we meet, by ‘fate.'

3 July 1956

I hope you, & the Foreign Rights Dept., will forgive my now at length writing to
you
about the Dutch translation. The matter is (to me) important; it has disturbed and annoyed me greatly, and given me a good deal of unnecessary work at a most awkward season. . . . .

In principle
I object as strongly as is possible to the ‘translation' of the
nomenclature
at all (even by a competent person). I wonder why a translator should think himself called on or entitled to do any such thing. That this is an ‘imaginary' world does not give him any right to remodel it according to his fancy, even if he could in a few months create a new coherent structure which it took me years to work out.

I presume that if I had presented the Hobbits as speaking Italian, Russian, Chinese, or what you will, he would have left the names alone. Or, if I had pretended that ‘the Shire' was some fictitious Loamshire
¹
of actual England. Yet actually in an imaginary country and period, as this one, coherently made, the nomenclature is a more important element than in an ‘historical' novel. But, of course, if we drop the ‘fiction' of long ago, ‘The Shire' is based on rural England and not any other country in the world – least perhaps of any in Europe on Holland, which is topographically wholly dissimilar. (In fact so different is it, that in spite of the affinity of its language, and in many respects of its idiom, which should ease some part of the translator's labour, its
toponymy
is specially unsuitable for the purpose.) The toponymy of
The Shire,
to take the first list, is a ‘parody' of that of rural England, in much the same sense as are its inhabitants: they go together and are meant to. After all the book is English, and by an Englishman, and presumably even those who wish its narrative and dialogue turned into an idiom that they understand, will not ask of a translator that he should deliberately attempt to destroy the local colour. I do not ask that of a translator, though I might be glad of a glossary where (seldom) the meaning of the place-name is essential. I would not wish, in a book starting from an imaginary mirror of Holland, to meet
Hedge, Duke'sbush, Eaglehome, or Applethorn
even
if
these were ‘translations' of 'sGravenHage, Hertogenbosch, Arnhem, or Apeldoorn! These ‘translations' are not English, they are just homeless.

Actually the Shire Map plays a very small part in the narrative, and most of its purpose is a descriptive build-up. It is, of course, based on some acquaintance with English toponymical history, which the translator would appear not to possess (nor I guess does he know much of that of the Netherlands). But he
need not,
if he would leave it alone. The proper way to treat the first map is to change its title to
Een Deel von ‘The Shire'
and no more; though I suppose
naar
for ‘to' in such directions as
‘To Little Delving'
wd. do no harm.

The Translator has (on internal evidence) glanced at but not used the Appendices. He seems incidentally quite unaware of difficulties he is creating for himself later. The ‘Anglo-Saxon' of the Rohirrim is not much like Dutch. In fact he is pulling to bits with very clumsy fingers a web that he has made only a slight attempt to understand. . . . .

The essential point missed, of course, is: even where a place-name is
fully analysable by speakers of the language (usually not the case) this is not as a rule done. If in an imaginary land
real
place-names are used, or ones that are carefully constructed to fall into familiar patterns, these become integral names, ‘sound real', and translating them by their analysed senses is quite insufficient. This Dutchman's Dutch names should sound real Dutch. Well, actually I am no Dutch scholar at all, and know little of the peculiar history of Dutch toponymy, but I do not believe that as a rule they do. Anyway lots of them are
nonsense
anyway or wholly erroneous, which I can only equal by supposing that you met Blooming, Newtown, Lake How, Documents, Baconbury, Blushing and then discovered the author had written Florence, Naples, (Lake or Lago di) Como, Chartres, Hamburg, and Flushing=Vlissingen!

I enclose in justification of my strictures a detailed commentary on the lists. . . . . I am sure the correct (as well as for publisher and translator the more economical?) way is to leave the maps and nomenclature alone as far as possible, but to substitute for some of the least-wanted Appendices a glossary of names (with meanings but no refs.). I could supply one for translation.

May I say now at once that I will
not
tolerate any similar tinkering with the
personal nomenclature.
Nor with the name/word
Hobbit.
I will not have any more
Hompen
(in which I was not consulted), nor any
Hobbel
or what not. Elves, Dwarfs/ves, Trolls, yes: they are mere modern equivalents of the correct terms. But
hobbit
(and
orc
) are of that world, and they must stay, whether they sound Dutch or not. . . . .

If you think I am being absurd, then I shall be greatly distressed; but I fear not altered in my opinions. The few people I have been able to consult, I must say, express themselves equally strongly. Anyway I'm not going to be treated à la Mrs Tiggywinkle = Poupette à l'épingle.
^fn59
Not that B[eatrix] P[otter] did not give translators hell. Though possibly from securer grounds than I have. I am no linguist, but I do know something about
nomenclature
, and have specially studied it, and I am actually very angry indeed.

26 July 1956

If you re-read all the passages dealing with Frodo and the Ring, I think you will see that not only was it
quite impossible
for him to surrender the Ring, in act or will, especially at its point of maximum power, but that this failure was adumbrated from far back. He was honoured because he had accepted the burden voluntarily, and had then done all that was within his utmost physical and mental strength to do. He (and the
Cause) were saved – by Mercy: by the supreme value and efficacy of Pity and forgiveness of injury.

Corinthians I x. 12–13
¹
may not at first sight seem to fit – unless ‘bearing temptation' is taken to mean resisting it while still a free agent in normal command of the will. I think rather of the mysterious last petitions of the Lord's Prayer: Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. A petition against something that cannot happen is unmeaning. There exists the possibility of being placed in positions beyond one's power. In which case (as I believe) salvation from ruin will depend on something apparently unconnected: the general sanctity (and humility and mercy) of the sacrificial person. I did not ‘arrange' the deliverance in this case: it again follows the logic of the story. (Gollum had had his chance of repentance, and of returning generosity with love; and had fallen off the knife-edge.) In the case of those who now issue from prison ‘brainwashed', broken, or insane, praising their torturers, no such immediate deliverance is as a rule to be seen. But we can at least judge them by the will and intentions with which they entered the
Sammath Naur;
and not demand impossible feats of will, which could only happen in stories unconcerned with real moral and mental probability.

No, Frodo ‘failed'. It is possible that once the ring was destroyed he had little recollection of the last scene. But one must face the fact: the power of Evil in the world is
not
finally resistible by incarnate creatures, however ‘good'; and the Writer of the Story is not one of us.

I am afraid I have the same feeling – I have been forced to publish up-side-down or backwards; and after the grand crash (and the end of visibly incarnate Evil) before the Dominion of Men (or simple History) to which it all led up the mythological and elvish legends of the Elder Days will not be quite the same. But perhaps read, eventually, from beginning to end in the right order, both parts may gain. I am not writing the
Silmarillion,
which was long ago written; but trying to find a way and order in which to make the legends and annals publishable. And I have a dreadful lot of other work to do as well.

27 July 1956

By chance, I have just had another letter regarding the failure of Frodo. Very few seem even to have observed it. But following the logic of the plot, it was clearly inevitable, as an event. And surely it is a more significant and real event than a mere ‘fairy-story' ending in which the hero is indomitable? It is possible for the good, even the saintly, to be subjected to a power of evil which is too great for them to overcome – in
themselves. In this case the cause (not the ‘hero') was triumphant, because by the exercise of pity, mercy, and forgiveness of injury, a situation was produced in which all was redressed and disaster averted. Gandalf certainly foresaw this. See Vol. I p. 68–9.
¹
Of course, he did not mean to say that one must be merciful, for it may prove useful later – it would not then be mercy or pity, which are only truly present when contrary to prudence. Not ours to plan! But we are assured that we must be ourselves extravagantly generous, if we are to hope for the extravagant generosity which the slightest easing of, or escape from, the consequences of our own follies and errors represents. And that mercy does sometimes occur in this life.

Frodo deserved all honour because he spent every drop of his power of will and body, and that was just sufficient to bring him to the destined point, and no further. Few others, possibly no others of his time, would have got so far. The Other Power then took over: the Writer of the Story (by which I do not mean myself), ‘that one ever-present Person who is never absent and never named'
^fn60
(as one critic has said). See Vol. I p. 65.
²
A third (the only other) commentator on the point some months ago reviled Frodo as a scoundrel (who should have been hung and not honoured), and me too. It seems sad and strange that, in this evil time when daily people of good will are tortured, ‘brainwashed', and broken, anyone could be so fiercely simpleminded and selfrighteous.

I do not think Walter de la Mare walked in my country, whether you mean: read my work before he died, or inhabited a similar world, or both. I only met him once, many years ago, and we had little to say; but as far as my feelings for and understanding of his work goes, I should guess that he inhabited a much darker and more hopeless world: one anyway that alarms me profoundly.

2 November 1956

Taking ‘accent' to mean, as it usually does in non-technical language: ‘more or less consistent alterations of the vowels/consonants of “received” English': I should say that, in the cases you query,
no
accent-differentiation is needed or desirable. For instance, it would probably be better to avoid certain, actual or conventional, features of
modern ‘vulgar' English in representing Orcs, such as the dropping of aitches (these are, I think,
not
dropped in the text, and that is deliberate).