Tolkien fans-have you heard scholars say--?

Question

that Tolkien said his created world wasnt an allegory-

if its not an allegory doesnt that mean its true?

Answer 1

Yes I have heard that, and it is not true. I have to wonder, who was the first person to read that amazingly boring group of books, and what kind of sick joke was it to recommend them to their friends?

Answer 2

Allegory - a form of extended metaphor, in which objects, persons, and actions in a narrative, are equated with the meanings that lie outside the narrative itself. The underlying meaning has moral, social, religious, or political significance, and characters are often personifications of abstract ideas as charity, greed, or envy.

For example - Chronicles of Narnia is Christian allegory.  

The Princess Bride is political allegory - the original, beofre it was annotated, was actually very poor, rather boring satire.

No, plenty of fiction books are NOT allegories - and also not true.

Tolkien always insisted that all meaning in the book lie within the series and not out in the world.

EDIT - Excalibur, Le Morte De Arthur by Mallory and every other version of the King Arthur mythos ARE in the fiction section.  They certainly aren't in the history or reference sections.  Only book I know of that relates that is in the history section is a rather dry regional history called Arthur's Britain.

Answer 3

GIVE IT BACK TO OUR LADY OF THE LAKE

Answer 4

allegory is not another word for a lie

the dictionary defines allegory as follows

Allegory is a form of extended metaphor, in which objects, persons, and actions in a narrative, are equated with the meanings that lie outside the narrative itself. The underlying meaning has moral, social, religious, or political significance, and characters are often personifications of abstract ideas as charity, greed, or envy.

Thus an allegory is a story with two meanings, a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning.

there are those critics who were claiming that the lord of the rings were an allegory for world war two.  equating nazguls with n**i's  etc.  and tolkien denied this.

Answer 5

No. It simply means it wasn't an allegory. Allegories are like fables, parables, etc, in other words a story that symbolically represents something else. Tolkien created his world as a story, not as an allegory of World War II, which is what it is most often compared with. THAT is why he said it was not an allegory. NOT because it was "real" but because it was NOT an allegory referring to World War II.

Answer 6

If it's not allegorical, then it's not short. Allegories are a short version of fiction, and are the opposite of epic.

Another interpretation of the word "allegory" is that it's a fictionalized representation of real events, and so it could mean that his work was completely fiction instead of reflecting something real that happened in a way to kind of hide it.

Answer 7

Tolkien did not create his world to compare to our own. It is true in the minds of his readers who use it to consider this world.

Middle Earth was not meant to hide a message about this world. That's what scholars mean when they say it is not an allegory.

I believe Tolkien wanted readers to have another world from which they could look at their own world.

That aside, he wanted readers to enjoy his writing and give them a moment of happiness.

Answer 8

i dont know what tolkiens are!!!!!