ensayo acerca sobre el rey arturo y tolkien

8/12/2019 Ensayo Acerca Sobre El Rey Arturo y Tolkien

1/10

INKLINGS FOREVER, Volume VIII

A Collection of Essays Presented at the Joint Meeting of

The EighthFRANCES WHITE EWBANK COLLOQUIUM ON C.S. LEWIS & FRIENDS

and

THE C.S. LEWIS AND THE I NKLINGS SOCIETY CONFERENCE

Taylor University 2012

Upland, Indiana

Gandalf and Merlin, Aragorn and Arthur:

Tolkiens Transmogrification of the Arthurian Traditionand Its Use as a Palimpsest for The Lord of the Rings

Mark R. HallOral Roberts University

Hall, Mark R. Gandalf and Merlin, Aragorn and Arthur: Tolkiens Transmogrification of the ArthurianTradition and Its Use as a Palimpsest for The Lord of the Rings . Inklings Forever 8 (2012)www.taylor.edu/cslewis

1


2/10

Gandalf and Merlin, Aragorn and Arthur:Tolkiens Transmogrification of the Arthurian Tradition

and Its Use as a Palimpsest for The Lord of the Rings

Mark R. HallOral Roberts University

Certainly J. R. R. Tolkien was verymuch aware of the Arthurian tradition thatexisted during the medieval period andeven earlier, especially as depicted byThomas Malory in Le Morte dArthur andLaamon's Brut . The affinities of thecharacters of Aragorn and Gandalf withArthur and Merlin are too obvious not tonotice, yet transformed in such a way byTolkien that they are infused with newmeaning and purpose. It is this trans-mogrification that connects Tolkiens workwith the past and provides the palimpsest forthe world he creates in his epic adventuredepicted in The Lord of the Rings . Anexamination of the specific details of thisprocess enlightens and invigorates thereader, and enlivens and exfoliates the text.

By examiningThe Lord of the Rings inlight of the Arthurian tradition that Tolkienwas immersed in, it becomes apparenthow texts produced by . . . precursors . . .often become palimpsests as they areappropriated by successive generations ofauthors (Harrison 1). This appropriation oftexts of one author by another, often calledintertextuality, occurs for various reasons: toexpress admiration, to appeal to the writer as

an authority figure, to engage the author in adebate of ideas, or to confront and evenoppose the basic contentions of the earlierauthor (Harrison 1). Regarding inter-textuality, Mikhail Bakhtin (1974) believesthat a text can be understood only as theindividual compares it with different texts; inother words, the text lives only by cominginto contact with another text (with

context). Only at the point of this contactbetween texts does a light flash, illuminatingboth the posterior and anterior, joining agiven text to a dialogue (66). Thus, a textcannot stand alone. Since the author of thetext is also a reader of texts, he or she bringsto the created work numerous influences, andthe reader as well brings to any text beingread all of the other texts he or she has readbefore this one (Worton and Still,Introduction 1-2).

However, Tolkiens story differs fromsome of the conventional notions ofintertextuality and seeks to transcend,transform, and transmogrify the texts of KingArthur and Merlin in such a way as to releasenew meaning and re-envision his ideas forsubcreating the world of Middle Earth andstaging the ultimate conflict between theforces of Powergood versus evil. Theessence of the tale may be ancient, but theretelling is indeed newone that isapplicable for past, present, and futuregenerations. In fact, during the Victorian era,Thomas Carlyle (1830) demanded that closeattention be given to the pastto history. Inhis essay On History (1830), he says thatmeaning in the present and the future can be

known only as the past is studied. He writes,For though the whole meaning lies farbeyond our ken; yet in that complexManuscript covered over with formlessinextricably-entangled unknown characters, nay which is aPalimpsest , and had onceprophetic writing, still dimly legible there,--some letters, some words, may be de-ciphered (56, authors emphasis). Certainly

2


3/10

Gandalf and Merlin, Aragorn and Arthur Mark R. Hall

the Arthurian tradition is legible as an urtextin Tolkiensmagnum opus The Lord of theRings one that can definitely be uncovered.

Claus Uhlig concurs with Carlyle andmaintains that in the intertext, which helikens to the palimpsest, historicallyconditioned tensions come to the fore:tensions not only between calendar time andintraliterary time but also between theauthors intention and the relative autonomyof a text, or between the old and the new ingeneral (502). The presence of the pastcoexists with the text; thus, any text will themore inevitably take on the characteristics ofa palimpsest the more openly it allows thevoices of the dead to speak, thus-in aliterary transcription of our culturalheritage-bringing about a consciousness ofthe presentness of the past (Uhlig502). Uhlig thus concludes that the goal ofthe critic is to determine to what extent thepresent is indeed based upon the past(palingenesis), nay up to a point evendetermined by it (ananke)-a dependencewhich is most clearly reflected in themultilayered structure of worksor texts saturated with history (palimpsest)(503). Deciphering the present moment ofthe text as it relates to many past moments

reveals the intertextual meaning the textseeks to convey and the critic touncover.1 Thus, for the present study, theancient personages of Arthur and Merlin andtheir literary, cultural, and religiousbackground provide the palimpsest for muchof the material that frames the characters ofAragorn and Gandalf in TolkiensThe Lord ofthe Rings .

As a child, Tolkien learned to lovemyth and story, for his mother, who was hisfirst teacher, began to assign him storybooks

to read that included Andrew LangsRedFairy Book , where he learned to love dragons(I desired dragons with a profounddesire [On Fairy Stories 63]) and GeorgeMacDonalds Curdie books that depictedevil goblins that lived under the mountains(Carpenter 22-23). Tolkien was also veryenthusiastic about Arthurian myths(Carpenter 22), devour[ing] Sir Thomas

MalorysMorte dArthur , especially thelegend of the Holy Grail and the Knights of theRound Table (Grotta 65). Later, as a studentat King Edwards, along with his brotherHilary, he turned back to Middle English anddiscovered Sir Gawain and the GreenKnight (Carpenter 35). According toHumphrey Carpenter, this was anotherpoem to fire his imagination: the medievaltale of an Arthurian knight and his search forthe mysterious giant who is to deal him aterrible axe-blow. Tolkien was delighted bythe poem and also by its language, for herealised that its dialect was approximatelythat which had been spoken by his mothersWest Midland ancestors (35). In 1925Tolkien and E.V. Gordon published the textof Sir Gawain and the Green Knight thatbecame a standard in the field, and in 1967Tolkien translated this particular edition ofthe poem into new English (Grotta 66).

During the 1930s, Tolkien began towrite a non-rhyming alliterative poementitled The Fall of Arthur, whichHumphrey Carpenter describes as Tolkiensonly imaginative incursion into the Arthuriancycle, whose legends had pleased him sincechildhood (168). In this work, he did nottouch on the Grail but began an individual

rendering of the Morte dArthur, in which theking and Gawain go to war in Saxonlands but are summoned home by news ofMordreds treachery (168). AlthoughTolkien intended to finish the work as late asJune 1955 (Letters 218-219), it exists only asa fragment. His fellow scholars, E. V. Gordonand R. W. Chambers, read the poem andpraised it (Carpenter 168). His connection ofArthur and Merlin with the world of fairy ismade clear in his 1939 essay On FairyStories when Tolkien writes that the good

and evil story of Arthurs court is a fairystory (41), for the land of Merlin andArthur, what Tolkien calls an Other-world, was better than his relatively safeworld, the world without dragons (63).

T. A. Shippey points out that Tolkienwas influenced by "Brut , an ArthurianChronicle-epic by one Laamon. Tolkiencertainly valued this as a repository of past

3


4/10


tradition, borrowing from it, for instance,owyn's word dwimmerlaik. At some stagehe must also have noted that the stream bywhich the poet livedit is a tributary of theSevernwas the River Gladdon" (The Road toMiddle-Earth 348-349). Even C. S. Lewis inhis review ofThe Fellowship of the Ringquotes Naomi Mitchison who makes theArthurian connection: "One takes it asseriously as Malory" ("On Stories" 83), "but,"Lewis observes, "then the ineluctable sense ofreality which we feel in theMorted'Arthur comes largely from the great weightof other men's work built up century bycentury, which has gone into it" (83); forLewis, Tolkien's "book is like lightning from aclear sky. . . . To say that in it heroic romance,gorgeous, eloquent, and unashamed,has suddenly returned . . . is inadequate"(83). Continuing his praise, Lewis says, "Theutterly new achievement of Professor Tolkienis that he carries a comparable sense ofreality unaided" (83). Clearly, in Lewis' mindthe Arthurian connection exists.

It is true that in a letter to MiltonWaldmon, more than likely composed duringthe latter part of 1951, Tolkien asserts thatthe Arthurian myths are inadequate for theworld he is making. He writes, Of course

there was and is all the Arthurian world, butpowerful as it is, it is imperfectly naturalized,associated with the soil of Britain but notwith English; and does not replace what I feltto be missing. For one thing its faerie is toolavish, and fantastical, incoherent andrepetitive (Letters 144). Perhaps sur-prisingly, the belief of Tolkien that the"incoherent and repetitive" "Arthurian world"was insufficient actually provides support forthe assertion that the Celtic myth is apalimpsest for his subcreation. Tolkien's

"dismissal of Arthur is negative evidence ofits power, for it shows that Arthur was in hismind" (Flieger, "J. R. R Tolkien" 48).

It is certainly to be expected that thecollision of worlds and texts (Tolkien'sMiddle-earth and the Arthurian legends)results in the elimination of some aspects ofthe tales, the incorporation of others, and thetransformation of many, but it seems that the

"once prophetic writing [is] still dimly legiblethere,--some letters, some words, may bedeciphered (Carlyle 56). As Verlyn Fliegerobserves, "Although Tolkien made use ofArthurian motifs inThe Lord of the Rings (thewithdrawal of a sword, a tutelary wizard, theemergence of a hidden king, a ship departureto a myth-enshrined destination), these arereinvented to fit the context of his own story"("Arthurian Romance"35).

Nowhere does this seem clearer than"[i]n his portrait of Gandalf, [where] Tolkienhas drawn on earlier texts and traditions,particularly those featuring Merlin, but he hasnot done so formulaically. On the contrary,Gandalf tests the limits and moves beyond theexpectations raised by many previous Merlinfigures, especially in his use of magic, hisassociation with women, his relationship topower, and his pedagogical strategies" (Riga21). Ruth Noel in her bookThe Mythology ofMiddle Earth argues that Gandalf and Merlinare clearly connected, for they are both"powerful, prophetic, inscrutable, and,suddenly, unexpectedly human"; they alsohave "the responsibility for the fortunes of anation and its future king"; and both have"obscure beginnings and mysterious endingsto their lives" (109).

The Merlin of Arthurian tradition is afigure who wields great power and is notunwilling or hesitant to use it to accomplishhis purposes of preserving the kingdom orchanging the future. He is responsible for thebirth of King Arthur and his being crownedking of Camelot. Merlin is also the creator ofthe Round Table and guides the affairs of thekingdom with his advice and through hismagic. In contrast, Gandalf adamantly refusesthe absolute power offered to him by Frodo,for he fears he cannot control it. The ring

Frodo is willing to give up can only bring evil,never good. Frodo says to Gandalf, "You arewise and powerful. Will you not take theRing?" To which Gandalf emphaticallyreplies, "No! . . . With that power I shouldhave power too great and terrible. And overme the Ring would gain a power still greaterand more deadly. . . . Do not tempt me! For Ido not wish to become like the Dark Lord

4


5/10


himself" (Fellowship of the Ring 87). In aletter to Eileen Elgar (September 1963),Tolkien describes Gandalf had he possessedthe ring: "Gandalf as Ring-Lord would havebeen far worse than Sauron. He would haveremained 'righteous,' but self-righteous. . . . -Gandalf would have made good detestableand seem evil" (Letters 332-333). Accordingto Tolkien, he would control the wills ofothers, and they would no longer be free:"The supremely bad motive is (for this tale,since it is specially about it) domination ofother 'free' wills." ("Letter to NaomiMitchison,"Letters 200). The act ofdomination of one human being overanotherforcing individuals to do somethingthey do not choose to do even if it is whatthey should docorrupts the one whocoerces (Riga 38). According to Tom Shippey,the evil of the ring is not just external; itreaches out to "echo in the hearts of thegood," and therefore the bearer of the Ringcannot trust himself or his friends (The Roadto Middle-Earth 145). The Gandalf whorefuses to carry the ring of power is not thesame as the Merlin of history. As Frank Rigaobserves, "Gandalf is quite unlike any otherMerlin figure from the past. . . . Whereasprevious Merlin figures embraced power,

Gandalf recognizes its inherent andinescapable dangers and thus renounces it"(38). Hence, Tolkiens transmogrification ofMerlin takes place. The wizard who cravespower is transformed to become the wizardwho rejects it.

Another point of divergence forTolkien from the Arthurian traditionconcerns Gandalf's and Merlin's relationshipwith women: he "critiques a longstandingtradition according to which Merlin's loss ofpower comes about through his love for a

woman who becomes powerful by gainingaccess to his magic" (Riga 24). Thus, in theancient tales, "Merlin's love is depicted as aweakness or obsession, leading to hisunwillingor willingimprisonment ordeath" (Riga 24). For example, inLe MortedArthur, Malory relates the famous tragic taleof Merlin and Nimue, the Lady of the Lake:

[I]t fell so that Merlin fell in a dotage onthe damosel that King Pellinorebrought to court, and she was one ofthe damosels of the lake. . . . But Merlinwould let her have no rest, but alwayshe would be with her. And ever shemade Merlin good cheer till she hadlearned of him all manner thing thatshe desired; and he was assotted uponher, that he might not be from her. . . .And so, soon after, the lady and Merlindeparted, and by the way Merlinshowed her many wonders, and cameinto Cornwall. And always Merlin layabout the lady to have her maidenhood,and she was ever passing weary of him,and fain would have been delivered of

him, for she was afeard of him becausehe was a devil's son, and she could notbeskift him by no mean. And so on atime it happed that Merlin showed toher in a rock whereas was a greatwonder, and wrought by enchantment,that went under a great stone. So by hersubtle working she made Merlin to gounder that stone to let her wit of themarvels there; but she wrought sothere for him that he came never outfor all the craft he could do. And so shedeparted and left Merlin. (bk. 4, ch. 1)

In this story, Merlin is beguiled by a womanwho desires to discover his esotericknowledge. He, a willing victim with ulteriormotives of his own, is outmaneuvered andtrapped helplessly under a rock, andaccording to this tradition, there he dieddeceived and alone.

In contrast, Tolkien's wizard Gandalffinds "forceful women with supernaturalpowers . . . [as his] source of strength,

protection, and healing, not instruments oftemptation and destruction" (Riga 24). Forexample, after Gandalf defeats the Balrog ("Ithrew down my enemy, and he fell from thehigh place and broke the mountainside wherehe smote it in the rain" [Two Towers 125]),Galadriel sends Gwaihir the Windlord to bearGandalf to Lothlrien where she brings himhealing, clothes him in white, and apparently

5


6/10


gives him a new staff. He becomes Gandalfthe White (Two Towers 126). So, although thecharacter Merlin seems to clearly function asa palimpsest for the Gandalf Tolkien creates,demonstrating the presence of the pastcoexisting with the text and acquiring thecharacteristics of a palimpsest the moreopenly it allows the voices of the dead tospeak" (Uhlig 502), Tolkien transmogrifiesthe Arthurian figure and enlivens hischaracter Gandalf with a proper motivationfor his magic and a right relationship withwomen.

Both Merlin and Gandalf areinstrumental in the success of their respectivekings, Arthur and Aragorn, exhibiting greatdevotion and loyalty. Gandalf is responsiblefor Aragon becoming King of Gondor, whileMerlin aids Arthur in being crowned King ofCamelot. Both wizards put aside their ownambitions to promote their hero-kings (Finn23). Richard Finn observes, "As in the comingof Arthur, a wizard heralds Aragorn's'arrival.' Fulfilling prophecy, he comesbearing a sword of legend, and he isvictorious in uniting the lands around him"(24). InThe Lord of the Rings , once Sauron isdestroyed, Gandalf proclaims to Aragorn that"my work is finished. I shall go soon. The

burden must lie now upon you and yourkindred" (Return of the King 278). Thus, heleaves Middle-earth to be ruled by men. Hetells Saruman, "[T]he time of my labours nowdraws to an end. The King has taken on theburden" (Return of the King 291).

Even the childhoods of Arthur andAragorn are similar, for they are both raisedamong elves. Laamon in hisBrut describesthe childhood of King Arthur: "So soon as hecame on earth, elves took him; theyenchanted the child with magic most strong,

they gave him might to be the best of allknights; they gave him another thing, that heshould be a rich king; they gave him the third,that he should live long; they gave to him theprince virtues most good, so that he was mostgenerous of all men alive." In like manner,Aragorn was raised by the Elves who lived inRivendell and Lothlrien. Finn points out,"Aragorn exemplifies elven virtues and beliefs

by respecting and admiring nature, theancient traditions of elves and men, the elvenlanguage, and healing lore" (24). Aragorn,like Arthur, is given long life, for he is one ofthe Numenoreans, and they, according toTolkien, are "rewarded by a triple, or morethan a triple, span of years." (Letters 154).

Key to the stories of Arthur andAragorn are the swords they both carry:Excalibur (also known as Caledfwich andCaliburen) and Andril (which means "Flameof the West," also called Narsil, Red and WhiteFlame, or the Sword that was Broken, andsubsequently renamed the Sword Re-forged),respectively. They are both symbols of theirkingships (Finn 24), and according to MaraJos lvarez-Faedo, "the connection [ofAragon's sword] with Excalibur isunquestionable" (196). How Arthur becameking is related inLe Morte dArthur and verymuch involves a sword:

How gat ye this sword? said Sir Ector toArthur.Sir, I will tell you. When I came homefor my brother's sword, I found nobodyat home to deliver me his sword; and soI thought my brother Sir Kay should notbe swordless, and so I came hithereagerly and pulled it out of the stonewithout any pain.Found ye any knights about this sword?said Sir Ector.Nay, said Arthur.Now, said Sir Ector to Arthur, Iunderstand ye must be king of thisland.Wherefore I, said Arthur, and for whatcause?

Sir, said Ector, for God will have it so;for there should never man have drawnout this sword, but he that shall berightwise king of this land. (bk, 1, ch. 5)

Arthur is the only one able to remove thesword from the stone and is thereforecrowned the ruler of the land.

6


7/10


Later, Arthur fights Pellinore, a knightwho knocks him off of his horse, with thissame sword. Le Morte dArthur relates theevent:

And there began a strong battle with

many great strokes, and so hewed withtheir swords that the cantels flew in thefields, and much blood they bled both,that all the place there as they foughtwas overbled with blood, and thus theyfought long and rested them, and thenthey went to the battle again, and sohurtled together like two rams thateither fell to the earth. So at the lastthey smote together that both theirswords met even together. But thesword of the knight smote King

Arthur's sword in two pieces,wherefore he was heavy. (bk. 1, ch. 23)The sword was no longer of one piece butrent in twain. Merlin later takes Arthur to theLady of the Lake and receives from her handthe reforged Excalibur (at least that is impliedin Malory's account): "So Sir Arthur andMerlin alighted and tied their horses to twotrees, and so they went into the ship, andwhen they came to the sword that the handheld, Sir Arthur took it up by the handles, andtook it with him, and the arm and the handwent under the water" (bk.1, ch. 25).

Aragorn's sword is essential to hisrestored kingship. In the past it was wieldedby Isildur who struck Sauron with it, resultingin the loss of the One Ring and the breaking ofNarsil:

From the ruin of the Gladden Fields,where Isildur perished, three men onlycame ever back over the mountainsafter long wandering. One of these wasOhtar, the esquire of Isildur, who borethe shards of the sword of Elendil; andhe brought them to Valandil, the heir ofIsildur, who being but a child hadremained here in Rivendell. But Narsilwas broken and its light extinguished,and it has not yet been forgedagain. (Fellowship of the Ring 293 )

While journeying through Middle-earth,Aragorn carried the shards of his sword in asheath. After Frodo meets Aragorn at Bree,Frodo opens a letter that Gandalf had left forhim that contained a poem mentioning thereforging of Aragorn's sword and the returnof the king.

All that is gold does not glitter,Not all those who wander are lost;The old that is strong does not wither,Deep roots are not reached by the frost.From the ashes a fire shall be woken,A light from the shadows shall spring;Renewed shall be blade that was broken,The crownless again shall beking. (Fellowship of the Ring 212)

Aragon reveals the worthless sword: "'But Iam Aragorn, and those verses go with thatname.' He drew out his sword, and they sawthat the blade was indeed broken a footbelow the hilt. 'Not much use is it, Sam?' saidStrider. 'But the time is near when it shall beforged anew'" (Fellowship of theRing 214). The prophecy says that the swordoriginally named Narsil, broken in two pieces,will be renewed, and it is indeed fulfilled, forthe elves repair the sword before Aragon andthe Fellowship of the Ring leave Rivendell:

The Sword of Elendil was forged anewby Elvish smiths, and on its blade wastraced a device of seven stars setbetween the crescent Moon and therayed Sun, and about them was writtenmany runes; for Aragorn son ofArathorn was going to war upon themarches of Mordor. Very bright wasthat sword when it was made wholeagain; the light of the sun shone redlyin it, and the light of the moon shone

cold, and its edge was hard and keen.And Aragorn gave it a new name andcalled it Andril, Flame of the West.(The Fellowship of the Ring 331)

The sword is very much connected to the onewho wields it. Aragorn makes this very clearwhen he removes it before entering the houseof Theoden.

7


8/10


Slowly Aragorn unbuckled his belt andhimself set his sword upright againstthe wall. "Here I set it," he said; "but Icommand you not to touch it, nor topermit any other to lay hand on it. Inthis elvish sheath dwells the Blade thatwas Broken and has been madeagain. Telchar first wrought it in thedeeps of time. Death shall come to anyman that draws Elendils sword saveElendils heir" (Two Towers 136).

The swords of the kings areinstrumental in the acquisition and thepreservation of their kingdoms, for "the bestswords break so that no one else can wieldthem until a worthy successor appears. Therestored sword is both the signal and the

means by which a rightful dynasty isrestored" (Colbert 149). Tolkien is especiallyinterested in the symbolism and significanceof the "blade that was broken" (Fellowship ofthe Ring 212) and its renewal. As he re-imagines Excalibur in his work, "historicallyconditioned tensions come to the fore" (Uhlig502). Tolkien's ExcaliburAragorn'sAndrilis re-envisioned and recast into oneof the mightiest swords of Middle-earth,forged by one of its greatest smiths, Telchar, adwarf (Silmarillion 85-86), and later reforgedby the elves of Rivendell. Not only do therestored swords signal the return of therightful heirs to their respective thrones, buttheir sheaths are wrought with magicalpower. Merlin emphatically tells Arthur ofthe power that resides in the scabbard ofExcalibur:

Then Sir Arthur looked on the sword,and liked it passing well. Whetherliketh you better, said Merlin, thesword or the scabbard? Me liketh

better the sword, said Arthur. Ye aremore unwise, said Merlin, for thescabbard is worth ten of the swords, forwhiles ye have the scabbard upon you,ye shall never lose no blood, be yenever so sore wounded; therefore keepwell the scabbard always with you. (bk.1, ch. 25)

This is also true with Andril, for whenAragorn leaves Lothlrien, Galadriel giveshim a most special gift.

"Here is the gift of Celeborn andGaladriel to the leader of your

Company," she said to Aragorn, and shegave him a sheath that had been madeto fit his sword. It was overlaid with atracery of flowers and leaves wroughtof silver and gold, and on it were set inelven runes formed of many gems thename Andril and the lineage of thesword."The blade that is drawn from thissheath shall not be stained or brokeneven in defeat," she said. (TheFellowship of the Ring 442)

Galadriel's sheath protects Andril fromdestruction; it will never be broken again.

For Tolkien, consciously orunconsciously, the light that shines fromExcalibur in the Arthurian textual traditionserves as a palimpsest for the brilliance ofAndril, a mighty weapon of Middle-earth.Ironically, when the two textual traditions(Arthurian legend and Middle-earth myth)contact or collide, flashes of meaning emergeand result in an intensity of light in Tolkiens

work. Colin Duriez asserts, Light, and itscontrast with darkness, is a key motif inTolkiens mythology of Middle-earth (157).In Le Morte dArthur, as Arthur wieldsExcalibur, the sword dazzles his enemies andpaves the way for victory in battle. ThomasMalory relates the story:

Then King Lot brake out on the backside, and the King with the HundredKnights, and King Carados, and set onArthur fiercely behind him. With that

Sir Arthur turned with his knights, andsmote behind and before, and ever SirArthur was in the foremost press till hishorse was slain underneath him. Andtherewith King Lot smote down KingArthur. With that his four knightsreceived him and set him on horseback.Then he drew his sword Excalibur, butit was so bright in his enemies' eyes,

8


9/10


that it gave light like thirty torches. Andtherewith he put them a-back, and slewmuch people. (bk. 1, ch. 9)

Like Excalibur, Narsil is very much connectedto light. In a letter to Richard Jeffrey (Dec. 12,

1972), Tolkien describes the meaning of thename of the sword: "Narsil is a namecomposed of 2 basic stems without variationor adjuncts: NAR 'fire', & THIL 'whitelight'. It thus symbolised the chief heavenlylights, as enemies of darkness, Sun ( Anar ) andMoon (in Q) Isil. Andril means Flame of theWest (as a region) not of the Sunset"(Letters 425).

Both Excalibur and Andril lead theirkings to a conquest of their enemies. KingArthur "slew much people," and Aragorn

returns victorious from Minas Tirath and iswelcomed by Faramir, the Steward of Gondor,who introduced him to his people as therightful heir to the throne: "Here is Aragornson of Arathorn, chieftain of the Dnedain ofArnor, Captain of the Host of the West, bearerof the Star of the North, wielder of the SwordReforged, victorious in battle, whose handsbring healing. . . . Shall he be king and enterinto the City and dwell there?And all the hostand all the people cried yea with onevoice (Return of the King 273). The wieldersof Excalibur and the Sword Reforged arise asvictorious warriors ready to rule theirkingdoms justly and in peace; they haveproven their kingship. Their futures areforged by their swords.

The juxtaposition of the Arthuriantradition with Tolkien's Middle-earth creationcertainly provides flashes of meaning,enlightening the texts, "illuminating both theposterior and anterior, joining a given text toa dialogue (Bakhtin 66). This explorationand exfoliation of the works provide glimpsesinto connections not always obvious, butnevertheless meaningful and elucidating. Forjust as Tolkien never stopped revising (whichfrustrated his publishers greatly), theconsummate scholar and dedicated readerwill continue to plumb the depths of hisworks. Intertextual relationships betweentexts and the palimpsests that function as

urtexts may be one of the most effective waysto do just that, and perhaps through thiseffort, all who explore Middle-earth can graspin their hands "a little of the gold" thatTolkien once held ("On Fairy Stories" 38).

Note

1. Much of the information in this paperconcerning intertextuality and palimpsests hasbeen taken directly from chapter 1 of mydissertation entitled The Function ofIntertextuality in the Poetry of Gerard ManleyHopkins and George Herbert: Catching a Glimpseof Christ (University of Tulsa, 2000).

9


10/10


Works Cited

lvarez-Faedo, Mara Jos. ArthurianReminiscences in Tolkiens Trilogy: The Lordof the Rings. Avalon Revisited: Reworkings ofthe Arthurian Myth . Ed. Mara Jos lvarez-Faedo . Frankfurt, Germany: Peter Lang,2007. 185-205. Print.

Bakhtin, Mikhail. Toward a Methodology for theHuman Science.Professing the NewRhetorics: A Sourcebook . Ed. Theresa Enosand Stuart C. Brown. Englewood Cliffs, NJ:Prentice Hall, 1994. 63-74. Print.

Carlyle, Thomas. "On History."Thomas Carlyle:Selected Writings . New York: Penguin Books,1971. 51-58. Print.

Carpenter, Humphrey.Tolkien: A Biography .Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1977. Print.

Colbert, David.The Magical Worlds of Lord of theRings:The Amazing Myths, Legends and FactsBehind the Masterpiece. New York: Berkley,2002. Print.

Duriez, Colin.The J. R. R. Tolkien Handbook: AConcise Guide to His Life, Writings, and Worldof Middle-Earth . Grand Rapids, MI: BakerBooks, 1992. Print.

Finn, Richard J. Arthur and Aragorn: ArthurianInfluences inThe Lord of theRings . Mallorn 43 (2005): 23-26. Print.

Flieger, Verlyn. "Arthurian Romance." J.R.R.Tolkien Encyclopedia: Scholarship and Critical Assessment . Ed. Michael D. C. Drout. NewYork: Routledge, 2007. 34-35. Print.

---. J. R. R. Tolkien and the Matter ofBritain.Mythlore 23.1 (Summer/Fall 2000):47-58. Print.

Grotta, Daniel. J. R. R. Tolkien: Architect of MiddleEarth. Philadelphia: Running, 1992. Print.

Harrison, Antony H.Victorian Poets and RomanticPoems: Intertextuality andIdeology . Charlottesville: UP of Virginia,1990. Print.

Layamon. Brut . Trans. Eugene Mason. ProjectGutenberg. Dec. 2004. Web. 1 June 2012.

Lewis, C.S. "Tolkien'sThe Lord of the Rings ."OnStories, and Other Essays on Literature . Ed.Walter Hooper. New York: Harcourt BraceJovanovich, 1982. 83-90. Print.

Malory, Thomas. Le Morte Darthur: Sir ThomasMalory's Book of King Arthur and of His NobleKnights of the Round Table. Vol.1. eBook. University of VirginiaLibrary. Web. 1 June 2012.

Noel, Ruth S.The Mythology of Middle-earth .

Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1977. Print.Riga, Frank P. "Gandalf and Merlin: J.R.R.'s

Adoption and Transformation of a LiteraryTradition."Mythlore 27.1/2 (2008): 21-44.Print.

Shippey, T. A.The Road to Middle-earth: How J.R.R.Tolkien Created a New Mythology . Boston:Houghton Mifflin, 2003. Print.

Tolkien, J. R. R.The Fellowship of the Ring: Beingthe First Part of the Lord of the Rings . 1954.New York: Ballantine, 1982. Print.

---.The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien . Ed. Humphrey

Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien. Boston:Houghton Mifflin, 1981. Print.---. "On Fairy-Stories."Essays Presented to Charles

Williams. Ed. C. S. Lewis. Grand Rapids:Eerdmans, 1966. 38-89. Print.

---.The Return of the King: Being the Third Part ofthe Lord of the Rings . 1955. New York:Ballantine, 1983. Print.

---.The Silmarillion . Ed. Christopher Tolkien. 1977.New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2004. Print.

---.The Two Towers: Being the Second Part of theLord of the Rings . 1954. New York: Ballantine,

1982. Print.Uhlig, Claus. Literature as Textual Palingensis: On

Some Principles of Literary History.NewLiterary History 16 (1985): 481-513. Print.

Worton, Michael, and Judith Still,eds. Introduction. Intertextuality: Theoriesand Practices . New York: Manchester UP,1990. 1-44. Print.

10

ensayo acerca sobre el rey arturo y tolkien

Documents