As always, dear readers, welcome.

If you’re fond of British comedy, you may have come across a famous duo from long ago, Flanders and Swann.

These were (words and commentary) Michael Flanders—the one on the left—(1922-1975) and (composer and accompaniment) Donald Swann—the one on the right (1923-1994).  Once at the same school, they eventually collaborated on two long-running two-man shows, At the Drop of a Hat,

and At the Drop of Another Hat, in which Flanders introduced songs and did comic monologues and he and Swann sang songs, all of their own composition.  Here’s a LINK to one of their numbers:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkYrj2DQlVc  (This is a very clever use of the final rondo from Mozart’s Horn Concerto #4 in E flat—and here’s the original very beautiful concerto:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=roqBo-uBYIQ  Someone has supplied the words on the screen, but makes one mistake, writing “Tricky”, where Flanders actually uses the musical term “tutti”, meaning all of the instruments are supposed to join in at this point.)

Swann,

however, was, besides being Flanders’ collaborator, a well-known and very active composer, one of his compositions being a little cycle of songs with words taken from the works of a favorite author, JRR Tolkien, which, as an LP, combined the songs with readings/recitings from his work by Tolkien himself, Poems and Songs of Middle Earth (1967).

The score for the songs also appeared as a book, The Road Goes Ever On (1967; 1978; 1993).

One of the settings from this score has been in my head recently, and has prompted this posting.  Number 5 in the cycle of songs, it’s entitled “Namarie”, and is drawn from The Fellowship of the Ring, Book Two, Chapter 6, “Farewell to Lorien”.  In fact, the original has no title, being the second of two songs sung by Galadriel as she sends the Fellowship off on their journey once more.  It’s clear that JRRT felt a special love—almost longing—for Lothlorien and he himself appears reluctant to leave it as the farewell is a very elaborate one, almost as operatic as the entrance of Lohengrin, in Wagner’s 1850 opera of the same name.

Once the company has assembled and its ordinary tasks—explaining the boats, giving Sam rope—are completed, Galadriel appears:

“They turned a sharp bend in the river, and there, sailing proudly down the stream towards them, they saw a swan of great size.  The water rippled on either side of the white breast beneath its curving neck.  Its beak shone like burnished gold, and its eyes glinted like jet in yellow stones; its huge white wings were half lifted.”

(Although this isn’t credited, the beautiful attention paid to the natural world makes me think that this is a Ted Nasmith illustration.)

“A music came down the river as it drew nearer; and suddenly they perceived that it was a ship, wrought and carved with elven-skill in the likeness of a bird.  Two elves clad in white steered it with black paddles.  In the midst of the vessel sat Celeborn, and behind him stood Galadriel, tall and white; a circlet of golden flowers was in her hair, and in her hand she held a harp, and she sang…”

(As you can see, this is a loose reading of the text by Denis Gordeev—one steersman and Celeborn is sitting behind Galadriel, but what I find persuasive is Galadriel and her harp.  In general, I really like Gordeev’s style, which looks back to people like Howard Pyle and NC Wyeth, artists from the golden age of book illustrators.  There doesn’t appear to be much information about him readily available, but if you google his name, there is a good deal of his art on-line and he’s illustrated everything from Tolkien to Robert Louis Stevenson.)

Here’s the text:

Ai! laurie lantar lassi surinen,
Yeni unotime ve ramar aldaron!
Yeni ve linte yuldar avanier
mi oromardi lisse-miruvoreva
Andune pella, Vardo tellumar
nu luini yassen tintilar i eleni
omaryo airetari-lirinen.

Si man i yulma nin enquantuva?

An si Tintalle Varda Oiolosseo
ve fan yar maryat Elentari ortane
ar ilye tier undulave lumbule;
ar sindanoriello caita mornie
i falmalinnar imbe met, ar hisie
untupa Calaciryo miri oiale.
Si vanwa na, Romello vanwa, Valimar!

Namarie! Nai hiruvalye Valimar.
Nai elye hiruva. Namarie!

And here’s Frodo’s translation (which is in prose form in the book—this is from the Tolkien Gateway site, which includes JRRT reciting the poem:  https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Nam%C3%A1ri%C3%AB#Translation ) :

Ah! like gold fall the leaves in the wind,
long years numberless as the wings of trees!
The years have passed like swift draughts
of the sweet mead in lofty halls beyond the West,
beneath the blue vaults of Varda
wherein the stars tremble in the song of her voice, holy and queenly.

Who now shall refill the cup for me?

For now the Kindler, Varda, the Queen of the Stars,
from Mount Everwhite has uplifted her hands like clouds,
and all paths are drowned deep in shadow;
and out of a grey country darkness
lies on the foaming waves between us,
and mist covers the jewels of Calacirya for ever.
Now lost, lost to those from the East is Valimar!

Farewell! Maybe thou shalt find Valimar.
Maybe even thou shalt find it. Farewell!

And here is Donald Swann’s setting, which has stayed with me since I first heard it years ago:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=690OiCByWRc –this is the whole LP, but “Namarie” is at 33:43.

There is a special ache in this, in part, as I said, because of JRRT’s own feelings about Lothlorien,

but it is hardly the only lament in The Lord of the Rings.  If you think for a moment, you can add to this (and the previous one):

1. the fragment which Frodo works on in Lothlorien for Gandalf (The Fellowship of the Ring, Book Two, Chapter 7, “The Mirror of Galadriel”)

2. the song which Aragorn and Legolas make for Boromir (The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter 1, “The Departure of Boromir”)

3. we might see the chant which Treebeard sings to Merry and Pippin as a kind of grieving for lands he has visited, but which are now gone (The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter 4, “Treebeard”)—Swann set this as well, on the LP at 29:32:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=690OiCByWRc

4. the fragment which Aragorn recites when the company reaches Edoras and stands by the grave mounds of the past kings of Rohan (The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter 6, “The King of the Golden Hall”)

5. “a maker in Rohan said in his song of the Mounds of Mundberg”—a lament for those fallen at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields (The Return of the King, Book Five, Chapter 6, “The Battle of the Pelennor Fields”)

6. and a possible sixth, with only five lines given, would be the song which the Riders of the King’s House, sang—“a song of Theoden Thengel’s son that Gleowine his minstrel made” (The Return of the King, Book Six, Chapter 6, “Many Partings”

Although of a thoughtful nature, I don’t believe that Tolkien was a melancholy man, and all of these clearly have their place in the story:  Galadriel has already said that the world of the elves is doomed to fade, Boromir has died bravely and the urge is to commemorate that, Treebeard understands that, for all his enormous life-span, his people, lacking the Entwives, must also fade, Aragorn and the company can see the green mounds which show the long history of the Rohirrim, Sauron’s initial attack is defeated, but at a terrible cost, and Theoden has died an heroic death.

As well, as a scholar of Old English, JRRT has the strong lament tradition of its surviving literature in his head, which includes poems like “The Ruin”, “Deor”, and “The Wife’s Lament”, with that same feel of grieving over the end of things.  For a very useful website with translations for these and many others, see:  https://oldenglishpoetry.camden.rutgers.edu/

But, for all of the art in laments, they are just that, laments, and, as this has always been a positive blog, let me end with this, which I couldn’t resist.  Having read this posting, you’ll know exactly how I found it.

And you can see more images at:  https://ideas.lego.com/projects/fa7b6dd5-6a8e-4b6d-af58-1b42948922c0/updates

Thanks, as ever, for reading,

If a swan boat arrives, climb aboard—but expect to be a little sad,

And know that, as always, there’s

MTCIDC

O

Welcome, dear readers, as always.

As I’ve said before, although I don’t write fan fiction, I think that it’s a very useful thing.  If it’s well done, it can be an imaginative, even ingenious, addition to what an author has already devised.  If it’s not so well done, it’s certainly not harmful, and, in any case, trying to imitate the work of an admired creator can be a great way to learn how you want to write.

So, you’re asking, is this the prelude to my first fan fiction?  Well, yes and no.  Recently, I’ve been watching a really engrossing tv series from 1979 titled Danger UXB.

In it, we follow the adventures of Second Lieutenant (with later promotions, Captain) Brian Ash, played extremely well by Anthony Andrews,

who is in charge of a small unit of soldiers

whose job is to defuse and remove bombs dropped by the German air force and which, for various reasons, haven’t exploded (UXB stands for “unexploded bomb”).

This series is based upon various real life experiences of those whose actual job it was to do this, from 1940 to 1945, and there are hair-raising moments, as the real bombs could cause devastating damage, both to people and their surroundings.

At this same time, of course, Tolkien

 was teaching at Pembroke College, Oxford,

and serving as an air raid warden,

as well as working on The Lord of the Rings.

There was a gap, however, in this work, from December, 1938 to August, 1939, and this was a significant time just before the war to come.   In March, 1938, Hitler had sent his army into Austria, adding that to “Greater Germany”.

On September 30^th, 1938, Great Britain, France, Germany, and Italy had signed the Munich Pact,

which allowed Hitler to gobble up the Sudetenland, a border territory between Czechoslovakia and Germany.

This was part of the policy of “Appeasement”, the mistaken idea that giving Hitler (and Mussolini) what they demanded would keep Europe out of another terrible war.  When the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, returned home, he was actually convinced that this was going to stop the German dictator from further demands, proclaiming to people on his doorstep at 10 Downing Street, “It is peace for our time.”

Then, in March, 1939, Hitler’s army invaded the Czech Republic, after Slovakia had broken ties with it.

In April, Mussolini’s troops invaded Albania.

So much for appeasement.

Although JRRT always claimed that his work, if it contained any contemporary influence, would be that of the Great War, Hitler’s constant demands always remind me of this moment from the last chapter of Book 5 of The Return of the King, “The Black Gate Opens”, in which the Mouth of Sauron (I can easily see him in full Nazi uniform) lists the terms his master offers the West:

“The Rabble of Gondor and its deluded allies shall withdraw at once beyond the Anduin, first taking oaths never again to assail Sauron the Great in arms, open or secret.  All lands east of the Anduin shall be Sauron’s for ever, solely.  West of the Anduin as far as the Misty Mountains and the Gap of Rohan shall be tributary to Mordor, and men there shall bear no weapons, but shall have leave to govern their own affairs.  But they shall help to rebuild Isengard which they have wantonly destroyed, and that shall be Sauron’s, and there his lieutenant shall dwell:  not Saruman, but one more worthy of trust.”

Although, as far as I can presently ascertain, Tolkien never explains the gap in his creativity, it gave me a “what if” moment. 

Suppose, in that period from December, 1938 to August, 1939, JRRT was not in Oxford, but, instead, was off on a “There and Back Again” adventure of his own, something which then inspired him to return to his book with new purpose and energy.  Tolkien won’t go alone, however, but be assisted by his old sergeant

(This is actually Sergeant AE Lovejoy of the East Surrey Regiment.)

 from his days as 2^nd Lieutenant,

who has been employed (at Tolkien’s earnest recommendation), as the porter—the gatekeeper, an important staff post—of Pembroke College.

(This is, in fact, a portrait by Louise Riley-Smith of two modern-day porters at Cambridge from The Tab, a youth news service.)

Notice a certain similarity to another heroic pair?

But what about the rest of the—shall I say it?—fellowship?

Well, Tolkien would need an elderly counselor, wouldn’t he?  Someone with the ability to communicate and deal with all sorts of others—perhaps Joseph Wright,

who had been one of JRRT’s tutors at Oxford and among whose specialties was the Germanic languages.  If this adventure were to take the fellowship to the Third Reich—perhaps the closest thing to Mordor in the Europe of 1939–Wright, who had studied there, might be a very useful guide.  In our world, Wright had been born in 1855 and died in 1930, but, just how old is Gandalf, really?

Younger companions?  A couple of larky undergraduates of Pembroke would fit that bill easily.

Dwarves and elves would have been in short supply at Oxford in 1939, but, since a specialty of dwarves was engineering, perhaps Tolkien had a friend in the Royal Engineers during the war

and an elf we’ve met was a crack shot with a bow—perhaps Tolkien and his engineer had had a mutual friend who was a sniper?

What about a ranger?  This is an older man, with lots of practical experience and might have been—perhaps still is– a member of Military Intelligence.

And, finally we might add a warrior from a country threatened by another—so, that would suggest someone French, like a number of the others, a veteran of the Great War, come as a guest lecturer to Oxford.

But aren’t we leaving someone out?

We are, indeed—and what we want is someone a bit shifty, with a knowledge of where the fellowship—or at least a part of it—will go, but with his own agenda—a double-agent.

Now, with all of these in place, all we need is a goal.  Are they going somewhere to obtain something?  Or to take it back?  And where are they going to go?  If Hitler is Sauron-to-be,

then Mussolini is a natural for Saruman

and, although Germany lacks active volcanos, there are several in Italy.,,

To be continued?

As ever, thanks for reading,

Stay well,

be careful of picking up rings which may cause later difficulties,

and know that, as always, there’s

MTCIDC

O

ps

Part of my inspiration for this posting was a really interesting paper given by Franco Manni and Simone Bonechi at a conference in Birmingham in 2005.  Here’s the LINK:  https://valarguild.org/varda/Tolkien/encyc/articles/t/Tolkien/TolkienandWW2.htm

Gandalf is very firm. 

“I always meant to see you all safe (if possible) over the mountains…and now by good management and good luck I have done it.  Indeed we are now a good deal further east than I ever meant to come with you, for after all this is not my adventure.  I may look in on it again before it is all over, but in the meanwhile I have some other pressing business to attend to.”  (The Hobbit, Chapter 7, Queer Lodgings”)

Even when the dwarves beg him to stay, even when they offer him gold, which, as we know, would be very unusual for such grasping folk, Gandalf resists.  And so Thorin and Co, with their burglar, Bilbo, are about to be on their own.

Welcome, dear readers, as always!

Wizards are always shown to us as ancient and mysterious creatures, with great powers, and rather severe behavior.  Think of Mickey’s sorcerer in Fantasia’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”, for example.

Even so, when called upon, they usually do what they’re requested or obliged to—even coming back from death, as Gandalf does after finally defeating the Balrog—

to complete what they’ve begun.

For those reading The Hobbit for the first time, then, it must come as quite a disappointment (never mind to Bilbo and the dwarves) that Gandalf seems almost to shrug, saying ”It’s not my adventure”, and disappearing, just as the company is about to enter the perilous Mirkwood.

After all, it was Gandalf who originally appeared on Bilbo’s doorstep

and brought the dwarves

and coaxed and threatened both Bilbo and the dwarves to make a contract,

as well as producing the map with its secret moon runes.

On their journey, Gandalf saved the company from the trolls,

obtained shelter for them—and a reading of the map’s secret—at Rivendell,

was instrumental in their escaping the goblins,

indirectly in their rescue from the Wargs,

as well as cheerfully tricking their way into their refreshing and reequipping at Beorn’s.

(This is a Ted Nasmith illustration wonderfully showing the puzzlement of Beorn at the appearance of the dwarves in installments.   He, along with the Hildebrandts and Alan Lee, are among my real heroes of Tolkien illustration.  This isn’t to leave other brilliant artists out, however, and, some time soon, I want to write a post about as many of the wonderful illustrators of JRRT’s work as I can.  We are truly blessed that so many gifted artists have spent so much time on Tolkien’s work.)

This is not the only wizardly disappointment I’ve encountered recently, however. 

Think of what Dorothy and her friends have gone through, not only to reach Oz,

but then to return, having fulfilled his demand that they deal with the Wicked Witch of the West, which Dorothy does with a simple bucket of water.

They then find that he is a fraud,

and, although he gently tricks Dorothy’s friends into believing in themselves,

he sails off in his balloon,

leaving Dorothy herself to take one more hazardous trip to find the way home.

Add to this list a more recent installment.  In 1981, the Disney studio produced Dragonslayer.

It’s a film I recently rewatched and enjoyed—pre-CGI, I don’t think that you’d ever see a more wonderfully imagined dragon (built, in fact, by the same Industrial Light and Magic which had just done the special effects for Star Wars 4 and 5)—

but in which the wizard, having agreed to help villagers plagued by a dragon, never even leaves his keep,

but appears to be murdered in his own courtyard!

“Appears” is the right word, however, because the wizard, Ulrich, reappears in a rather spectacular way and is instrumental in the ultimate destruction of the dragon.

As well, although the Wizard, who accurately describes himself as “a good man, but a bad wizard”, fails her, Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, tells Dorothy the secret of the silver (not ruby, as in the film) slippers and Dorothy flies home to Kansas.

Gandalf, however, is another matter.  When he leaves the company, they are then faced with Mirkwood

and its spiders,

imprisonment

and escape

from the Elvenking’s dungeons even before they reach the Lonely Mountain

and Smaug the dragon.

When Gandalf does reappear, he has little to do with the story, participating in the Battle of the Five Armies, but mostly acting as a traveling companion on Bilbo’s return journey, via Beorn,

until he finally reaches home again, where, a few years later, Gandalf turns up with a dwarvish friend to visit.

In fact, as events prove (and we might imagine that Gandalf believed that they would), Bilbo has very ably filled Gandalf’s place through the latter part of the story, not only defeating the spiders and rescuing the dwarves from the dungeons, but even in finding out Smaug’s vulnerability,

as well as in using the Arkenstone as a political tool to gain concessions from the extremely reluctant Thorin.

But what was Gandalf actually doing, when he told the dwarves that he had “pressing business” (later adding “pressing business away south”), which took him away from his role in their adventure?

In fact, as we learn in “The Council of Elrond” in Book Two of The Lord of the Rings, it was to deal with another disappointing wizard—and this almost a fatal one, not only for Gandalf, but perhaps for Middle-earth as a whole.

Thanks, as ever, for reading.

Stay well,

Avoid disappointments—and wizards who may be good men, but…

And know that, as always, there’s

MTCIDC

O

PS

If you’re interested in Dragonslayer, don’t be put off by the very mixed reviews it initially received.  Although, as some critics jumped to point out, it doesn’t have the most original plot (apprentice wizard, left on his own, is initially brash, but finds his way), on what is maybe my third viewing, I was still pleased by the lush settings and costume designs, and, for 1981, very imaginative special effects and there are several twists—and not only the apparent early death of the wizard–which are quite unexpected…

Welcome, as always, dear readers.

Recently, I’ve rewatched Rogue One

and Solo

and, among other things, was interested this time to observe the two droid characters, K2SO, in the former,

and L3-37 in the latter.

Droids, of course, have appeared in Star Wars films all the way back to 1, where the small Anakin is building what will become C3PO.

Mechanical people in fiction go back much farther, however.  You can meet several in the stories of the German Romantic, E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776-1822),

where they are all extremely disturbing, from the Talking Turk in the short story, “The Automata” (Die Automate, 1814/1819—you can read a translation of it here:  https://www.gutenberg.org/files/31820/31820-h/31820-h.htm ) to the automaton Olympia in “The Sandman” (Der Sandmann, 1816, which you can read a translation of here:  https://germanstories.vcu.edu/hoffmann/sand_e.html ).

In the US, a rather remarkable novella about one such appeared in 1868, under the title, The Huge Hunter; or, The Steam Man of the Prairies, by Edward Ellis.

(And you can read it here:  https://www.gutenberg.org/files/7506/7506-h/7506-h.htm

It was, in fact, based upon a real invention in 1868 by Zadoc P. Dederick (yes—that’s his real name) of a steam-powered automaton.  Here’s a photograph–)

In 1907, L. Frank Baum (1856-1919), added a mechanical man, the Tik-Tok,

to his growing gallery of Ozians in Ozma of Oz

and gave him his own book, Tik-Tok of Oz, in 1914.

(You can have your own copy of Ozma at:  https://ia800206.us.archive.org/9/items/ozmaofozrecordof00baum/ozmaofozrecordof00baum.pdf

and Tik-Tok at:  https://archive.org/details/tiktokofozfrank00baumrich

The Tik-Tok, by the way, makes a memorable appearance in Walter Murch;s 1985  Return to Oz,

where he is called “The Army of Oz”.

This is a film which was poorly received when it was first released, but I’ve always enjoyed it for its look-Kansas prairie really is Kansas prairie and not an elegant stage set– its visual effects—rocks as spies, with faces which come and go across the surface of the stone–and for the darker story it tells, although in blending incidents from several Oz books, it takes liberties with the stories which, if you were an Oz purist, might upset you.)

And then, in 1920/1 appeared the first real android—a combination of machine and humanlike tissue, and the first robot–in the Czech writer Karel Capek’s (1890-1938)

play, R.U.R. (for “Rossum’s Universal Robots”).

Capek (CHAH-pek) gave us the word robot, based upon the Czech verb, robotiti, “to work” (perhaps with a darker sense, as the noun robota can mean “forced labor”), and the robots in his play gradually become as menacing as those in the stories of Hoffmann, as they revolt and practically polish off the human race.  (You can read the first English translation, from 1923, here:  https://www.gutenberg.org/files/59112/59112-h/59112-h.htm )

This is a far cry from that most familiar Star Wars duo, C3PO and RTD2,

who are the closest mechanical equivalent to the early screen team of Laurel and Hardy I can imagine

and reviewers since the first film in 1977 have agreed.

(You’ll notice, by the way, that, in this first poster, by the Hildebrandts, whose Tolkien illustrations I often use in this blog, Luke and Leia are rather vaguely portrayed, but, in the background, the two droids are pretty accurately depicted.)

For all that they’re made of metal and supposedly only capable of reacting as their programming dictates, C3PO and R2D2 clearly have personalities, C3PO being the pessimist and R2D2 the optimist, and that contrast provides a constant level of comedy throughout 4-6, a constant which relieves the tension in what is basically a serious adventure narrative. 

Although gradually the pair make an appearance in 1-3, they are not given the same role (although in 2, C3PO briefly and comically loses his head, but not his identity, in the droid factory on Geonosis)

and, for me, this gives these three films a darker cast, not lightened in 1 by the much-attacked Jar Jar,

who has almost disappeared by 2.

As I want to focus on the two semi-independent films, I’m going to bypass 7-9, although there are flashes not only of the duo, but of another droid, one much less developed, Bb8,

and perhaps, if one wants to criticize 7-9, one approach might be that, without the comic potential, they may fall into the same category as 1-3—perhaps having lost the lighter touch of 4-6?  (For more on the structure of the whole 9 episodes, please see the four-part “Three Times Three” series which I posted from January 8 to 31, 2020.)

It’s clear that C3PO and R2D2 were never replaced in their original role, so what of the two main droid characters we see in these films?

K2SO in Rogue One, brings some very interesting baggage, being an ex-Imperial security droid.

In structure, he seems more basic, like one of the Separatist battle droids,

rather than like someone dressed in a suit of gilded armor, like C3PO,

which, to me, along with his height and hulking stance, gives him an odd sense of menace and reinforces his initial hostility to Jyn Erso.

C3PO, as I said, is clearly a pessimist, with lines like “We seem to be made to suffer.  It’s our lot in life.”  In contrast, K2SO is often given sarcastic lines, like “Jyn, I’ll be there for you.  Cassian said I had to.” and “There were a lot of explosions for two people blending in.”  (For a short list of such lines, see:  https://www.bustle.com/p/11-k-2so-quotes-from-rogue-one-that-prove-the-droid-was-the-films-breakout-star-25352 )  I’m guessing that what was planned here was to produce a character with something of the sceptical repartee which made Han Solo such a memorable—and important part—of 4-6, which would certainly be a departure from any previous droid.

And the same could be said of L3-37 in Solo,

although here the writers have taken the character in a completely different—and rather surprising– direction.  Rather like the robots in R.U.R., this droid is an advocate for droid liberation, which considering how many droids must exist in the entire Star Wars galaxy, would, if carried out, bring the entire galaxy to a standstill.  We only see L3-37 sporadically throughout the film, so it’s never really explained why it thinks this way, as well as why, it being something programmed (or so we would normally assume), it could have romantic ideas about its partner, the young Lando Calrissian.

The writers, in interviews, have said that the droid had reprogrammed itself, although I’m not sure how this would have created the activist and potentially romantic character with which we’re presented, but, for me, it’s more important that there is a playfulness here, a willingness in the construction of both characters to go beyond what we’ve been given and have accepted as droids in earlier Star Wars films.  Perhaps we might think that future films in this galaxy might have droids more like the replicants in Blade Runner, self-aware—and very dangerous when opposed.

Thanks, as ever, for reading,

Stay well and think of snappy dialogue lines

And know that, as always, there’s

MTCIDC

O