Re: Canon 

Author:    Steuard Jensen 
Email:     sjensen -aaatt- hmc -daht- edu 
Date:      1998/04/20
Forums:    alt.fan.tolkien, rec.arts.books.tolkien
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I think that the first thing we need to clear up is the definition of
the word "canon".  I tend to think of sources that are "canon" as
those which I can cite and have no fear of contradiction from other
canonical materials.  Everyone, I think, believes that LotR is canon.
Opinions differ on The Hobbit; I tend to believe that it is not quite
canonical.  We're currently discussing the Silmarillion; again, I tend
to believe that it is not canonical.  The works published in HoME are
fairly certainly not canon, as they are almost exclusively drafts
which Tolkien never considered final.

Why am I so reluctant to extend "canonical status" for works dealing
with Middle-earth?  If you'll humor me, I've come up with a metaphor
that seems to describe my feelings on the matter quite well.  To me,
Middle-earth is "so sacred" (as you put it in one of your comments)
because it is a single, pure crystal of imagination.  (Can you tell
I'm a scientist?)  Tolkien took great care to make it so, being
careful to remove and correct any flaws or fractures in its structure.
No matter how good their intentions, no other person could replicate
his process exactly, and hence, there would be a noticable boundary in
the crystal structure where the new process began.

A physical crystal can only be perfect if it is grown continuously in
the same environment with great care; I think that the same goes for a
crystal of the imagination.  In most cases, this isn't significant;
typical authors don't wait years for a perfect crystal to form before
selling their first book.  Tolkien, however, was anything but a
typical author, and he had plenty of time for a large and beautiful
crystal to form before writing anything about it.

Even then, the first thing that he wrote that involved his crystal of
imagination was _The Hobbit_.  At the time, the crystal was nowhere
near its final form, and it only served as a backdrop for a story that
was originally not a part of it.  However, even that usage influenced
the way the crystal grew.  (And the growing crystal influenced it,
when Tolkien rewrote "Riddles in the Dark" to be consistent with
LotR.)  The influence became far stronger when Tolkien began writing
LotR: he encouraged the mythology to grow in a way that was consistent
with that story, and finished LotR once he was (fairly) satisfied with
the form of its part of the crystal.

The greater mythology is a more complicated situation.  I see the HoME
books as showing us snapshots of the crystal's form (or parts of it)
at various points in time.  None is finished, but they show how the
form developed and hint at where it was going.  As published, _The
Silmarillion_ took those unfinished pieces and glued them together as
well as possible.  After filling some holes as well as possible, the
final result was published in the form that we now have.  It was a
good effort and is the nearest thing we have to a single, complete,
self-consistent picture of Tolkien's true crystal of imagination, but
when examined closely, the crystal is flawed.  The points where pieces
were glued together are visible fractures in its structure, and there
is something subtley different about the parts that were filled in
from scratch.  _The Silmarillion_ remains beautiful, but it is not as
pure and "right" as Tolkien himself would have wanted it.

The crystal of imagination that Tolkien would have settled on, had he
lived to complete it, is my "canon."  Only it could have the uniform
subcreated perfection that I and many other Tolkien lovers yearn for.
We do not and cannot have that crystal.  However, we have pieces of
it, in LotR and in the fragments that were glued together to form _The
Silmarillion_, and HoME can indicate where it may have gone from
there.  All these debates, about Balrog wings and Glorfindel and
Orcish culture and Eru knows what else, they are our attempts to
better imagine where Tolkien's efforts would have led him, and us, in
the end.

Well, that just about covers it.  The truly interested can go on and
read some of my specific responses to the previous article below.

                                                Steuard Jensen

Prepare for lots of confusing multi-level quotations...

Quoth <<<jon.osborn -aaatt- eudoramail -daht- com>>>:
> On 18 Apr 1998, Steuard Jensen wrote:
>>Quoth <<<jon.osborn -aaatt- eudoramail -daht- com>>>:
>>>On Fri, 17 Apr 1998, Michael Martinez wrote:
>>>>Feanor's son Amras should have died in the burning of the ships
>>>>at Losgar.
>>>When you say "should" that implies the statements are your
>>>opinion.
>>...At any rate, it seems quite clear to me that
>>Michael is NOT in this case just posting his opinion, but rather
>>making reference to Tolkien's intentions as revealed in the HoME
>>series.
>I'm not saying he's wrong. I'm saying he's making some bold,
>judgmental statements without any reference to where they came from.

You aren't saying that he's wrong, but you _are_ saying that he cannot
be "right".  If a statement is an opinion, then it would be impossible
to prove or disprove it.  However, it would be quite straightforward
to look in Tolkien's notes (probably in HoME) and see if Tolkien's
most recent plan was for Amras to die in the burning at Losgar.
Hence, whether he's right or wrong, Michael's statement is factual in
nature.

>This NG is after all called alt.fan.tolkien, not
>alt.fan.tolkien.for.people.who.know.The.History.of.Middle-Earth.backwards.and.forwards.

'course, I don't know HoME backwards and forewards, either.  I've only
read up through #9 or so, and 6-9 are about the writing of LotR and
thus have little or nothing to do with the earlier legends.  I think
that the reason Michael did not list speific references for each of
his points is that reading all of HoME would be necessary to really
understand the differences between Tolkien's latest plans and
Christopher's reconstruction.  Going to the library and checking out
HoME books just to look for those references would probably be a
waste of time.

>If he's got the references I'd like to see them, and just the volumes
>and page numbers would be fine, he doesn't have to post the entire
>passages.

Knowing which volume had what would be kinda nice, now that I think of
it, although I think I'll eventually just read them all anyway.

>>> Conformity only makes sense..
>>Well, true, for the story's standpoint, but the subject of the thread
>>is "Canon".  If a text is to be considered truly canonical, it really
>>ought to have been written by Tolkien himself.
>Why? Seriously. The Sherlock Holmes Canon contains works by authors
>other than Conan-Doyle? Brian Lumley's books are considered part of
>the C'Thulhu Mythos cycle created by H.P. Lovecraft? Why is
>Middle-Earth so sacred that only works by JRRT could ever have hope of
>being considered Canonical?

I explained my thoughts on what is canonical in Middle-earth at the
beginning of this post, and I doubt that I will ever do much better
than that.  I am surprised to hear that the Sherlock Holmes Canon is
not exclusively the work of Arthur Conan-Doyle, though I am willing to
believe it.  If I recall correctly (and I may not), my father's copy
of "The Canon" (as the Baker Street Irregulars call it) only has
Arthur's name on the cover, though that's no guarantee, I suppose...

>They don't have to give the same weight to be considered Canonical. No
>one considers Adrian Conan-Doyle's Holmes stories on a par with *his*
>father's, or Lumley's with Lovecraft's. Yet they are still Canonical.

Again, here we are simply differing in definition.  I prefer to
reserve the label "canon" for sources which are beyond doubt.  My
comments at the beginning have probably made that clear.  I _do_ think
that my definition of canonical is the more useful, however: quotes
and citations of canonical texts are then, in some sense, final.

>>As it is, since
>>Tolkien never made the final form of the mythology consistent, I think
>>that we're left without much truly canonical writing on the first age
>>at all.  If Chistopher were to rewrite the Silmarillion today, I think
>>it would be a better (and more canonical) book, but as it is, Silm.
>>does not remain true to its author's intent.  Hence, it cannot be
>>considered canon.
>Says you. I don't think anyone's going to re-write Sil, so it's what
>we've got.

Here, I agree with you completely, though I wouldn't be at all
disappointed if Christopher decided to do so.

>And I think "Canonical" is an adjective like "pregnant".
>Something is either Canonical or it isn't. I threw this in because you
>poke fun further down at my comprehension of whether something can or
>can not be considered an opinion grammatically speaking.

I'll admit that you've got me here; I was making sloppy use of
language, "overloading operators", as it were.  When I said "more
canonical", I believe I meant "a more reliable guide to Tolkien's
intent" (and hence to the "true canonical crystal of imagination" as
described earlier) or something of the sort.

On the other hand, based on _my_ definition of "canonical", your
earlier comment that "no one considers Adrian Conan-Doyle's Holmes
stories on a par with *his* fathers... Yet they are still Canonical"
makes the exact same "mistake".

>>Sure, fine, so take them out.  "The story of Hurin and his family was
>>abridged, and the ultimate fate of Hurin was altered."
> How can a fictional event be "altered"?

If Tolkien's drafts consistently say (hypothetically, I don't recall
the actual story that Michael was referring to) "Hurin lived out the
rest of his life as a hermit in an isolated cave, never forgiving
Thingol for failing to protect his family" but the Silmarillion says
(as it actually does) that Hurin forgave Thingol and then cast himself
into the Sea, then the (fictional) event was altered.  The original
story said one thing, and its editor said another.

>>Even in this shortened form of his comment, it still
>>makes a rather good point that the Silmarillion does not remain true
>>to J.R.R.T's vision.
>Says who? You? Michael Martinez? Christopher Tolkien? It's still
>there, warts and all, like it or not.

I don't quite follow you here, but I think that an alteration like the
invented example I used in my previous comment would be enough to
convince just about anyone that the author's intent was not followed.
Whether the actual case is so cut and dried I don't know.

>>I don't actually see the point of your argument here, in fact: as I
>>just pointed out, the words you objected to have absolutely no bearing
>>on the question under discussion.  Given that, why object?  Michael
>>was giving us _more_ information, not less; are members of the group
>>no longer allowed to share their opinions when the facts are already
>>clear?
>Clear to whom? You? Apparently. David Lind? Probably. Me? No, or I
>wouldn't have asked for references.

I was actually not commenting on the truthfulness of the factual
statement that Michael made in his comment; in fact, as I mentioned
above, I do not know the reference that he was citing.  However, my
point was that (again showing my mathematical background) we can
decompose Michael's comment into a "factual part" and an "opinion
part".

The factual part would be my reduction above: "The story of Hurin and
his family was abridged, and the ultimate fate of Hurin was altered."
The opinion part would be that the abridgement was "woeful", and that
it was in fact "unnecessary".  Regardless of whether you have the same
detailed experience with HoME or other references, it is certainly
possible to make this kind of separation; I think I remember doing
some similar worksheets in my old English classes.  (No, not Old
English.)

>Are people in the NG who are not
>as conversant with UT/HoME as yourself, Michael and David no longer
>allowed to ask for references in order to further their own knowledge?

I'll admit that I've spent more time with UT and HoME than most, and
sometimes that can be too easy to forget.  On the other hand, my
objection was not to your request for references, but rather to your
assertion that Michael's comments were matters of opinion without
them.  His statements (or at least, their "factual parts" :) ) were
still factual in nature, just rather poorly documented.

>>>Would you mind posting references for your statements, otherwise they
>>>should be taken as nothing more than your opinions.
>>While I'm fairly certain that
>>Michael could provide full citations if asked to, I think that given
>>the nature of his post they weren't really necessary.
>I think they were, based on subjective nature of his phraseology. And
>I don't doubt his ability to post citations either. That's why I
>asked.

I understand your point better now, so I can see what you meant.  I
think that your point might be better phrased as "otherwise, we have
no way of verifying if they are accurate."  A bit more explanation
below...

>>While it can sometimes be difficult to distinguish between opinions
>>and factual statements, I think that the factual nature of Michael's
>>article was as clear as any article I've seen in quite some time.
>>Statements like "the ultimate fate of Hurin was altered" cannot,
>>grammatically, be opinions.
>Again I say, "How can a fictional event be 'altered?" That is why I
>called it "opinion".

I think I've answered that question above.  Based on my
interpretation, which I think is the one that Michael intended, a
fictional event can (verifiably) be altered, so his statement was not
an opinion.

>>I honestly don't
>>understand how you could have been confused on the issue.
>I don't consider myself confused. Others sure do, and I mean in
>addition to you. But I don't.

As I said above, I think I understand where you're coming from now.  I
thought your post indicated that you were somehow confused about the
difference between fact and opinion, when in reality you just weren't
interpreting a few words and phrases (such as fictional events being
"altered") in the same way I was.  Now, I'm still fairly convinced
that I'm right, but at least I can understand that you could have had
a different interpretation.

>>If you
>>weren't confused, I can't think of any good reason why you would post
>>an article indicating that you were.
>What was it I said that made you think I was confused? I never used
>the word "confused" in my post.

All has been explained above.  I suspected that you were intentionally
calling Michael's unreferenced facts "opinions", for shady purposes.
Michael has been flamed in the past because people accused him of
passing off his opinions as facts (or something to that effect).  As I
couldn't see how his post could be interpreted as opinion at all, I
was concerned that you might have been trying to annoy him to start
yet another flame war.  I apologize for making that guess too soon; my
post was a bit sharp in tone primarily because I wanted to head off
any potential battle before it started.  I thought that a level-headed
post that was nonetheless a little pointed would be just what was
needed to both discourage further baiting and to satisfy any need
Michael may have had to defend himself.  As I said, I apologize again
for any misunderstanding.  It's an interesting topic either way.

                                                Steuard Jensen