NP Tolkien Picks Up A Few More Bits Of Cultural Baggage

[vze422fs at verizon.net]

on 1/7/03 11:44 PM, barbara100 at jps.net at barbara100 at jps.net wrote:

> on 8/1/03 12:24 AM, jbor at jbor at bigpond.com wrote:
> 
>> So, your argument now is that the orcs are a "race" of humans, members of
>> the human race, is it? Sorry, that simply doesn't gel with the text or
> film
>> at all, as the quotes illustrate.
>> 
>> The orcs, just like the dwarves, elves, trolls etc, are *not human*.
>> 
>> best
> 
> 
> i think you're being much too literal. you're talking as if there really are
> elves and trolls that you could absolutely argue were *not human*.
> 
> it doesn't gel with the text and film you say. it doesn't gel with reality
> either. those different species must be representative of something.  apes?
> monkeys? lions?  that doesn't gel.
> 
The fact that they all speak English, or some imagined translation thereof,
doesn't gel either. Fantasy is a device that allows you to suspend selected
rules of logic and nature as long as verisimilitude is maintained. On Middle
Earth, there is more than one sentient verbal species. They can all
communicate with each other in vernacular. You can take that as a metaphor
or not. The plot progresses logically if that is taken as a given.