The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien (73 page)

I relate these things because I hope they may interest you, and at the same time reveal how closely linked is linguistic invention and legendary growth and construction. And also possibly convince you that looking around for more or less similar words or names is not in fact very useful even as a source of sounds, and not at all as an explanation of inner meanings and significances. The borrowing, when it occurs (not often) is simply of
sounds
that are then integrated in a new construction; and only in one case
Eärendil
will reference to its source cast any light on the legends or their ‘meaning' – and even in this case the light is little. The use of
éarendel
in A-S Christian symbolism as the herald of the rise of the true Sun in Christ is completely alien to my use. The Fall of Man is in the past and off stage; the Redemption of Man in the far future. We are in a time when the One God, Eru, is known to exist by the wise, but is not approachable save by or through the
Valar
, though He is still remembered in (unspoken) prayer by those of Númenórean descent.

Oxford 61639

76 Sandfield Road

Headington

Oxford

11 September, 1967.

Dear Mr. White,

I can give you a brief account of the name
Inklings:
from memory. The Inklings had no recorder and C. S. Lewis no Boswell. The name was not invented by C.S.L. (nor by me). In origin it was an undergraduate jest, devised as the name of a literary (or writers') club. The founder was an undergraduate at University College, named Tangye-Lean,—the date I do not remember: probably mid-thirties. He was, I think, more aware than most undergraduates of the impermanence of their clubs and fashions, and had an ambition to found a club that would prove more lasting. Anyway, he asked some ‘dons' to become members.
C.S.L. was an obvious choice, and he was probably at that time Tangye-Lean's tutor (C.S.L. was a member of University College). In the event both C.S.L. and I became members. The club met in T.-L.'s rooms in University College; its procedure was that at each meeting members should read aloud, unpublished compositions. These were supposed to be open to immediate criticism. Also if the club thought fit a contribution might be voted to be worthy of entry in a Record Book. (I was the scribe and keeper of the book).

Tangye-Lean proved quite right. The club soon died: the Record Book had very few entries: but C.S.L. and I at least survived. Its name was then transferred (by C.S.L.) to the undetermined and unelected circle of friends who gathered about C.S.L., and met in his rooms in Magdalen. Although our habit was to read aloud compositions of various kinds (and lengths!), this association and its habit would in fact have come into being at that time, whether the original short-lived club had ever existed or not. C.S.L. had a passion for hearing things read aloud, a power of memory for things received in that way, and also a facility in extempore criticism, none of which were shared (especially not the last) in anything like the same degree by his friends.

I called the name a ‘jest', because it was a pleasantly ingenious pun in its way, suggesting people with vague or half-formed intimations and ideas plus those who dabble in ink. It might have been suggested by C.S.L. to Tangye-Lean (if he was the latter's tutor); but I never heard him claim to have invented this name.
Inkling
is, at any rate in this country, in very common use in the sense that you quote from C.S.L.'s writings. (I remember that when I was an undergraduate there was, briefly, an undergraduate club called the
Discus,
suggesting a round-table conference, and
discuss:
it was a discussion club.)

With best wishes,

Yours sincerely,

J. R. R. Tolkien.

12 December 1967

76 Sandfield Road, Headington, Oxford

My dear Roger,

Best wishes to you and all your family. Thank you for your most gracious review (esp. for comment on the search for source of bounce!). Though I have been much better treated than I expected. But the little
tale was (of course)
not
intended for children! An old man's book, already weighted with the presage of ‘bereavement'. (I am sorry that I cannot remember your address. I have rung up Merton.) But Merton comes in. Our present admirable little chef (with a v. tall hat) is, at least pictorially, the original of Alf.

All graces and cheer at Christmas

Ronald Tolkien.

20 February 1968

The lines which Jack
¹
gives as examples are not unfortunately entirely accurate examples of Old English metrical devices. The occasion is entirely fictitious. I have never seen a dragon, nor ever seen a man who said that he has. I don't wish to see either. A remote source of Jack's lines may be this: I remember Jack telling me a story of Brightman, the distinguished ecclesiastical scholar,
²
who used to sit quietly in Common Room saying nothing except on rare occasions. Jack said that there was a discussion on dragons one night and at the end Brightman's voice was heard to say, ‘I have seen a dragon.' Silence. ‘Where was that?' he was asked. ‘On the Mount of Olives,' he said. He relapsed into silence and never before his death explained what he meant.

29 February 1968

Thank you for trying to cheer me up. But I am not cheered. You are too optimistic. In any case your kind of performance is quite different from mine – as a writer. I am merely impressed by the complete ‘bogosity' of the whole performance. The producer, a very nice, very young man and personally equipped with some intelligence and insight, was nonetheless already so muddled and confused by BBCism that the last thing in the world he wished to show was me as I am/or was, let alone ‘human or lifesize'. I was lost in a world of gimmickry and nonsense, as far as it had
any design designed it seemed simply to fix the image of a fuddy not to say duddy old fireside hobbitlike boozer. Protests were in vain, so I gave it up, & being tied to the stake stayed the course as best I could. I am told that the picture results were v.g. – at which my blood runs cold: it means they've got what they wanted, and that my histrionic temperament (I used to like ‘acting') betrayed me into playing ball (the ball desired) to my own undoing. I was not lifted up in a helicopter, though I am surprised one was not substituted for an eagle: they appeared completely confused between ME and my story, and I was made to attend a firework show: a thing I have not done since I was a boy. Fireworks have no special relation to me. They appear in the books (and would have done even if I disliked them) because they are part of the representation of
Gandalf
, bearer of the Ring of Fire, the Kindler: the most childlike aspect shown to the Hobbits being fireworks.

2 May 1968

Your ideas of the natural and mine are different, since I never in any circumstances do work while being photographed, or talked to, or accompanied by anybody in the room. A photograph of me pretending to be at work would be entirely bogus.

6 May 1968

As for knowing Sarehole Mill,
¹
it dominated my childhood. I lived in a small cottage almost immediately beside it, and the old miller of my day and his son were characters of wonder and terror to a small child.

4 June 1968

My domestic situation came at the end of April and the beginning of May to a point at which something had to be done quickly. I am now leaving Oxford and going to live on the south coast. As things are at present arranged I shall be removing at the end, or very soon after the end, of this month. For my own protection I shall remove my address from all books of reference or other lists. By arrangement with them, my address will be c/o Messrs. Allen & Unwin, and they will not inform enquirers of my actual address. When this is finally settled, I will let a few persons know – those who I can trust not to publish it abroad.

26 June 1968

I am beginning to come to my senses. I believe I am making a fairly good and quick physical recovery and may hope to be about on crutches about July 8th, but not sooner. My fall has, all the same, proved disastrous for my work and arrangements at this time, and even with good luck I cannot hope to emerge from chaos now till the end of August at the earliest.

I am. . . . delighted that you have made the acquaintance of Switzerland, and of the very part that I once knew best and which had the deepest effect on me. The hobbit's (Bilbo's) journey from Rivendell to the other side of the Misty Mountains, including the glissade down the slithering stones into the pine woods, is based on my adventures in 1911
^fn120
: the
annus mirabilis
of sunshine in which there was virtually no rain between April and the end of October, except on the eve and morning of George V's coronation. (Adfuit Omen!)
^fn121
1

Our wanderings mainly on foot in a party of 12 are not now clear in sequence, but leave many vivid pictures as clear as yesterday (that is as clear as an old man's remoter memories become). We went on foot carrying great packs practically all the way from Interlaken, mainly by mountain paths, to Lauterbrunnen and so to Mürren and eventually to
the head of the Lauterbrunnenthal in a wilderness of morains. We slept rough – the men-folk – often in hayloft or cowbyre, since we were walking by map and avoided roads and never booked, and after a meagre breakfast fed ourselves in the open: cooking utensils and quantities of ‘spridvin' (as the one uneducated French-speaking member of the party both called and wrote it, for ‘methylated spirit'). We must then have gone eastward over the two Scheidegge to Grindelwald, with Eiger and Mönch on our right, and eventually reached Meiringen. I left the view of
Jungfrau
with deep regret: eternal snow, etched as it seemed against eternal sunshine, and the
Silberhorn
sharp against dark blue: the
Silvertine
(
Celebdil
) of my dreams. We later crossed the Grimsell Pass down on to the dusty highway, beside the Rhône, on which horse ‘diligences' still plied: but not for us. We reached Brig on foot, a mere memory of noise: then a network of trams that screeched on their rails for it seemed at least 20 hrs of the day. After a night of that we climbed up some thousands of feet to a village at the foot of the Aletsch glacier, and there spent some nights in a chalet inn under a roof and in beds (or rather under them: the
bett
being a shapeless bag under which you snuggled). I can remember several incidents there! One was going to confession in Latin; others less exemplary were the invention of a method of dealing with your friends the harvestmen spiders, by dropping hot wax from a candle onto their fat bodies (this was not approved of by the servants); also the practice of the beaver-game which had always fascinated me. A wonderful place for the game, plenty of water at that altitude coming down in rills, abundant damming material in loose stones, heather, grass and mud. We soon had a beautiful little ‘pond' (containing I guess at least 200 gallons). Then the pangs of hunger smote us, and one of the hobbits of the party (he is still alive) shouted ‘lunch' and wrecked the dam with his alpenstock. The water soared down the hill-side, and we then observed that we had dammed a rill that ran down to feed the tanks and butts behind the inn. At that moment an old dame trotted out with a bucket to fetch some water, and was greeted by a mass of foaming water. She dropped the bucket and fled calling on the saints. We lay more doggo than ‘men of the moss-hags' for some time, and eventually wound our way round to present ourselves grubby (but we were usually so on that trip) and sweetly innocent at ‘lunch'. One day we went on a long march with guides up the Aletsch glacier – when I came near to perishing. We had guides, but either the effects of the hot summer were beyond their experience, or they did not much care, or we were late in starting. Any way at noon we were strung out in file along a narrow track with a snow-slope on the right going up to the horizon, and on the left a plunge down into a ravine. The summer of that year had melted away much snow, and stones and boulders were
exposed that (I suppose) were normally covered. The heat of the day continued the melting and we were alarmed to see many of them starting to roll down the slope at gathering speed: anything from the size of oranges to large footballs, and a few much larger. They were whizzing across our path and plunging into the ravine. ‘Hard pounding,' ladies and gentlemen. They started slowly, and then usually held a straight line of descent, but the path was rough and one had also to keep an eye on one's feet. I remember the member of the party just in front of me (an elderly schoolmistress) gave a sudden squeak and jumped forward as a large lump of rock shot between us. About a foot at most before my unmanly knees. After this we went on into Valais, and my memories are less clear; though I remember our arrival, bedraggled, one evening in Zermatt and the lorgnette stares of the French bourgeoises dames. We climbed with guides up to [a] high hut of the Alpine Club, roped (or I should have fallen into a snow-crevasse), and I remember the dazzling whiteness of the tumbled snow-desert between us and the black horn of the Matterhorn some miles away.