The Lord Of The Rings

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Tzvetan Todorov, the author of The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre, defined fantasy as “the creation of a moment of hesitation between two worlds”(qtd. Kelly, Course Introduction 2). This description of the genre compliments J.R.R Tolkien’s The Lord Of The Rings trilogy due to the author’s use of sub-creation to construct his alternate world. Tolkien believed that the way to create a believable, all-encompassing world was to combine fragments of reality, or the “primary world”, together to construct a new, seemingly credible “secondary world”. Sub-creation, if successful, forms an alternate but parallel world to reality, “which your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is ‘true’: it accords with the laws of the…show more content…
Here, Tolkien signifies that humans were moulded in the likeness of God, the ultimate creator; therefore we are able to, and should, create. This quotation highlights how his Catholic belief deeply influenced his personal philosophy, which in turn affected his writing of The Lord Of The Rings. Numerous parallels can be drawn between Christianity and the trilogy, such as that between God and The Creator Eru, who was the source of all life on Arda. Furthermore, like God, all that was created by Eru was once good, even Sauron, and it is outside forces such as power, corruption and greed that twist what is good and make it bad. Tolkien’s creationist philosophy is evident and his embedded Christian messages were his attempt to reinforce his religious beliefs on a world that he felt had become too secular.
It is widely known that Tolkien detested the allegorical assumptions made about his work. The author insisted that allegory was restrictive to readers and he preferred ‘history, whether real or feigned’(Tolkien I, 12). As Ursula Le Guin states “fantasy is nothing but the writer’s view of the world” highlighting that fact that Tolkien’s life experiences heavily influenced his work (qtd Kelly, 27). Tolkien’s work reflects and comments on 20th Century Western society and in doing so, enlightens his readers of a past time. In fact, this is demonstrated outright by
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