NP? =?ISO-8859-1?B?oA==?="the formerly colonised coming back to haunt us"

[thomas kyhn rovsing hj=?ISO-8859-1?B?+A==?=rnet]

On 17/12/02 10:32, "CyrusGeo at netscape.net" <CyrusGeo at netscape.net> wrote:

> thomas kyhn rovsing hjørnet<tkrh at worldonline.dk> wrote:
> 
>> >Being Œa form of entertainment¹ does not imply innocence or absence of
>> >ideology.
> 
> By "a form of entertainment" I was referring to the "burning of witches".
> Sorry I wasn't clear enough. Now, as to the core of your argument, you are of
> course right (look at Disney, for example), but I don't see anything like that
> in Tolkien. We should always be very careful not to confuse fiction with
> reality. For many years, critics believed (some still do, apparently), that
> "the Lord of the Rings" was really about the World War and the general
> international political situation at the time. Tolkien has repeatedly denied
> that. Why not take his word for it? After all, the themes of his trilogy are
> universal and timeless, which is why (in my opinion) it had such a huge
> success in so many countries. It's not great literature, but it's quite
> catchy.
> 
> Cyrus


Taking an author¹s word for what his literary products Œare about¹ doesn¹t
seem such a good idea. Basically, that would  be assuming that a writer is
in complete control of what he writes. And that he is telling the truth.
Etc. Which is not to defend the idea that The Lord of the Rings is really
about the World War. However, critique of its completely clear-cut
opposition between good (quiet ‹ petit bourgeois ‹ life in the small ‹
English style ‹ village ) and bad (black, ugly, smelly, primitive, etc.) is,
in my opinion, welcome.

Thomas