Eastern Europe bad. West good.

....posted my article before I'd finished writing -- about the idea
that Eastern Europe is harsh (both socially as well as the climate)
and that it gets more agreeable as you travel west.

By this reasoning, the best place in Europe to be is on the
Atlantic coast of Ireland! (perhaps Tearaght Isle outside
Dingle Bay).

However, Bilbo has never heard of Ireland... or has he?

Middle Earth doesn't resemble Europe now, but what about
during the last Ice Age? The sea levels were lower, making
Ireland and England continguous with the continent.

Could the Gulf of Lhun be St. George's Channel in the Irish Sea?
The Anduin would have flowed just north of what are now
the Channel Isles on its way to the sea. The Grey Havens are
somewhere in Wales; the Shire being in the English Midlands.

Oh well, just a thought.

Sean
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

Christopher Kreuzer wrote:

 > This quotation from _The Hobbit_ seems to show a commonly held attitude
 > about you and your kind:
 >
 > "Dawn take you all, and be stone to you!"

Strangely enough, the first light of dawn this morning
didn't turn me to stone.

Sean<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

Sean <no.spam.RemoveThis@no.spam> wrote:

 > Strangely enough, the first light of dawn this morning
 > didn't turn me to stone.

Aha! You are one of the Olog-hai!<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

Christopher Kreuzer wrote:

  > > Strangely enough, the first light of dawn this morning
  > > didn't turn me to stone.
 >
 > Aha! You are one of the Olog-hai!

Which brings the dialog around to my original thesis about
Eastern Europe. "Olog" has a Slavic sound to it, or perhaps
Slavic influenced by the Varangian Rus (riverine Vikings),
who established a kingdom in the Ukraine under their King Oleg
in 882 AD.

All sorts of thugs seemed to have come out of Rhun and
beyond, giving the East a sinister reputation. The Wainriders,
for instance. Perhaps the Wainriders were actually Huns
or Mongols who were a bit unsteady on horseback so they
travelled the endless grassy steppe in wagons.

Sean<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

On Sun, 22 Aug 2004 20:22:12 GMT,
Sean <no.spam RemoveThis @no.spam> wrote:
 > This quotation from _The Hobbit_ seems to show a commonly held
 > attitude about Eastern Europe
 >
 >
 > "There is more in you of good than you know,
 > child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom,
 > blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song
 > above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world."

Yes, that's why both Men and Elves awoke in the East. You see, that's the
problem with taken one quotation and building on top of it, either ignoring
other facts of the mythos, or being ignorant of other facts.

--
Aaron Clausen
mightymartianca RemoveThis @hotmail.com

WOODY: How's it going Mr. Peterson?
NORM : It's a dog eat dog world out there, Woody, and I'm wearing
milkbone underwear.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

On Sun, 22 Aug 2004 20:22:12 GMT, Sean <no.spam.RemoveThis@no.spam> wrote:

 >This quotation from _The Hobbit_ seems to show a commonly held
 >attitude about Eastern Europe
 >
 >
 > "There is more in you of good than you know,
 > child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom,
 > blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song
 > above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world."

Which part of Europe did that "child of the kindly West" live in, then?


--
Steve Hayes
E-mail: hayesmstw.RemoveThis@hotmail.com
Web: <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/hayesstw/stevesig.htm" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/hayesstw/stevesig.htm</a>
<a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/books.htm" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/books.htm</a><!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

Steve Hayes wrote:

 > Which part of Europe did that "child of the kindly West" live in, then?

"Those days, the Third Age of Middle-earth, are now long past,
and the shape of all lands has been changed; but the regions
in which Hobbits then lived were doubtless the same as those
in which they still linger: the North-West of the Old World,
east of the Sea."

ie, Western Europe, at least as I read it. However, I was
more interested in Tolkien's attitude behind that quote.

For long millenia, Western Europe looked uneasily at the East
because of waves of invasions -- Huns, Mongols, Tartars,
Turks, Ostrogoths, etc. I wonder if that's what the author
had in mind.

Sean<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

Sean wrote:
 > Steve Hayes wrote:
 >
 >
  >>Which part of Europe did that "child of the kindly West" live in, then?
 >
 >
 > "Those days, the Third Age of Middle-earth, are now long past,
 > and the shape of all lands has been changed; but the regions
 > in which Hobbits then lived were doubtless the same as those
 > in which they still linger: the North-West of the Old World,
 > east of the Sea."
 >
 > ie, Western Europe, at least as I read it. However, I was
 > more interested in Tolkien's attitude behind that quote.
 >
 > For long millenia, Western Europe looked uneasily at the East
 > because of waves of invasions -- Huns, Mongols, Tartars,
 > Turks, Ostrogoths, etc. I wonder if that's what the author
 > had in mind.

I see that you are sufficiently unaware of JRRT's works that you do not
know what he thinks of allegory.

"But I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and
always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its
presence. I much prefer history, true or feigned, with its varied
applicability to the thought and experience of readers."
Letter #131

--
Aaron Clausen
mightymartianca RemoveThis @hotmail.com

WOODY: How's it going Mr. Peterson?
NORM : It's a dog eat dog world out there, Woody, and I'm wearing
milkbone underwear.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

On Sun, 22 Aug 2004 22:35:57 GMT, Sean <no.spam.DeleteThis@no.spam> wrote:

 >Christopher Kreuzer wrote:
 >
   >> > Strangely enough, the first light of dawn this morning
   >> > didn't turn me to stone.
  >>
  >> Aha! You are one of the Olog-hai!
 >
 >Which brings the dialog around to my original thesis about
 >Eastern Europe. "Olog" has a Slavic sound to it, or perhaps
 >Slavic influenced by the Varangian Rus (riverine Vikings),
 >who established a kingdom in the Ukraine under their King Oleg
 >in 882 AD.
 >
 >All sorts of thugs seemed to have come out of Rhun and
 >beyond, giving the East a sinister reputation. The Wainriders,
 >for instance. Perhaps the Wainriders were actually Huns
 >or Mongols who were a bit unsteady on horseback so they
 >travelled the endless grassy steppe in wagons.

And did America take off into outer space after the two trees died?


--
Steve Hayes
E-mail: hayesmstw.DeleteThis@hotmail.com
Web: <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/hayesstw/stevesig.htm" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/hayesstw/stevesig.htm</a>
<a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/books.htm" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/books.htm</a><!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

AC wrote:
 > I see that you are sufficiently unaware of JRRT's works that you do
 > not know what he thinks of allegory.

Tolkien statement about this is well known. The quote can even be found
in the "Foreword to the Second Edition".

However: Even if the whole work (LOTR) can't be considered an allegory,
there are a lot intertextual references to history, myths and
literature. Without these, the book would not be a very interesting read
at all.

The world of LOTR isn't all that different from the world-view of the
traditional history-telling of Western Europe: The West is the centre of
civilization and goodness. To the south and east the evil forces roam,
and cast forth waves of invasions on the West. Of course, this doesn't
imply that the entire M-E mythology should be read as an allegory to
"real history".

Regards,
Tarjei<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

Sean <no.spam.DeleteThis@no.spam> wrote in news:41290709.DACEA104@no.spam:

 > ...posted my article before I'd finished writing -- about the idea
 > that Eastern Europe is harsh (both socially as well as the climate)
 > and that it gets more agreeable as you travel west.
 >
 > By this reasoning, the best place in Europe to be is on the
 > Atlantic coast of Ireland! (perhaps Tearaght Isle outside
 > Dingle Bay).
 >
 > However, Bilbo has never heard of Ireland... or has he?
 >
 > Middle Earth doesn't resemble Europe now, but what about
 > during the last Ice Age? The sea levels were lower, making
 > Ireland and England continguous with the continent.

I'm not by a long way an expert in Ice Ages but I think that what today
is Ireland was a land placed to deep into the north to be "the best
place in Europe", climate during the ice age was very extreme, with
brutal winters that froze the land and made even mammoths (arguably one
of the animals best adapted to the weather of the era) perform a huge
north-south migration every year. I don't know if there were mammoth in
Ireland, but there were certainly in regions of eastern europe with
similar latitudes. Another inconvenience of those times were summers,
with hot weather came the melting of the incredible amounts of ice that
formed during winter, and with it came huge floods every single year.

Therefore, I don't think that Ireland during the ice age is what Tolkien
had in mind when he made western ME the best place to live.


--
"La cosa más bella que podemos experimentar es el misterio.
Es la fuente de cualquier arte y ciencia verdaderos".
ALBERT EINSTEIN

Javier Caselli Fernández
(javicaselliNOSPAM@yahoo.es)<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

In article <2otbofFeb3l1U1.RemoveThis@uni-berlin.de>,
AC <mightymartianca.RemoveThis@hotmail.com> wrote:

 >I see that you are sufficiently unaware of JRRT's works that you do not
 >know what he thinks of allegory.
 >
 >"But I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and
 >always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its
 >presence. I much prefer history, true or feigned, with its varied
 >applicability to the thought and experience of readers."
 >Letter #131

And specifically about spurious comparisons between Mordor & the
USSR (and the inference that Sauron 'perhaps' in some way represents
Stalin!):

"There is no 'perhaps' about it. I utterly repudiate any such 'reading',
which angers me. The situation was conceived long before the Russian
revolution. Such allegory is entirely foreign to my thought. The placing
of Mordor in the east was due to simple narrative and geographical
necessity, within my 'mythology'. The original stronghold of Evil was (as
traditionally) in the North; but as that had been destroyed, and was
indeed under the sea, there had to be a new stronghold, far removed from
the Valar, the Elves, and the sea-power of Numenor."

(from Letter #229)

Richard.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good. 

Didn't Tolkien's quote about allegory referred to religion? Anyway,
just because he denounced allegory after writing his myths, doesn't
mean he was consciously or unconsciously applying geographical
allegory between Europe and Middle Earth at the time he was writing.

You can't ignore the similarities to European geography and history:

EAST: Horse-based tribes invade in waves
SOUTHEAST: mountainous, inaccessible, hordes of enemies, evil religion
SOUTH: deserts, swarthy men, elephants
NORTH: angmar/viking invasions
WEST: sail to the promised land, vanished island with advanced
civilization

All somewhat vague but the general similarity is obvious.
 >> Stay informed about: Eastern Europe bad. West good.