Rare Reminiscence of Tolkien

[Extollager]

... from an Icelandic au pair who lived with the Tolkien family.

http://svanurg.blog.is/blog/svanurg/entry/1065767/

 

[Stephen Palmer]

Fascinating!

 

[Extollager]

This rare reminiscence gives a sense of Tolkien’s personal connection with Icelanders.

 

[Hugh]

"and he really believed that all of nature was alive".

Great to see this remembered by someone who knew him.

 

[Extollager]

I wish we could have a thick volume compiling the interviews with Tolkien and reminiscences like this.

 

[Hugh]

I thought the references to Edith were particularly interesting.

 

[Extollager]

Whether we want them or not, glimpses of Edith and difficulties in the Tolkiens' private life together are in print and more may be forthcoming, though I don't believe for a moment that there will be anything shocking.

 

[Hugh]

No, I don't expect anything remotely shocking*, but I'm interested in knowing more about all aspects of Tolkien, and his relationship with Edith has been deliberately downplayed.

*It's unlikely that further details re the alleged interview with his son John will emerge.

 

[Extollager]

Hugh, what's the interview you mention...?

Yes, I think you are right about matters of the Tolkiens' marriage having been veiled a bit, and that's fine. I think the Tolkien family handled their normal, wholesome desire for privacy on one hand, and their realization that JRRT was of great interest to devoted fans and scholars on the other, with patience, tact, and generosity. I do wonder if Tolkien's diary/diaries will eventually be published, perhaps after those of us now in our sixties or older have died.

This account

J.R.R. Tolkien's diaries

J.R.R. Tolkien's diaries are unpublished diary entries written by J.R.R. Tolkien. The manuscripts are part of the Tolkien Papers at the Bodleian Library, a collection...

tolkiengateway.net

makes me wonder if Tolkien didn't keep a diary during some of the years we would most be interested in, or if the diary/diaries for those years have not been made available to any researchers but are retained by the family. You'll remember that somewhere in his diary Warnie, C. S. Lewis's brother, alludes to stresses in the Tolkiens' marriage. I can look that up later today.

It is easy for me to speculate and that's often not helpful. In some of my speculations about "sources and influences" I seem to have been wrong as further study has shown, and I had perhaps more to go on, on those occasions! But I have wondered if one of the complications in the friendship of Tolkien and Lewis was not just that Lewis married an American divorcee, but that there was so much happiness in their marriage, and that that might have contrasted a bit with the state of things in Tolkien's own marriage -- though he loved Edith faithfully and she him. I have pointed out this glimpse of the Lewis marriage before, written by "Tripods Trilogy" author John Christopher:

Notes on Joy, by John Christopher, ENCOUNTER

www.unz.com

"The atmosphere was extraordinary; I had never been in the presence of two people sharing a gladness so pervasive as to seem almost palpable," etc. If Tolkien glimpsed this, it may have made him feel a bit sore -- not that he would have begrudged CSL his happiness.

 

[Hugh]

Hugh, what's the interview you mention...?

I'm not posting this with a view to further speculation...

Further sad news concerning John Tolkien

People here have probably been aware for some years of the sad accusations concerning Tolkien's eldest son John: there's a fair bit of stuff on the internet and the Catholic church paid compensation without the case coming to court (As I understand it, the case did not come to court due to...

www.sffchronicles.com

 

[Extollager]

Yes, thank you both for sharing the link and for suggesting the matter should be left as it is, at least till further, reasonable evidence is forthcoming.