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Tolkien And Race
J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth fantasy writings have often been accused of embodying outmoded attitudes to race. However, scholars have noted that he was influenced by Victorian attitudes to race and to a literary tradition of monsters, and that he was anti-racist both in peacetime and during the two World Wars. With the late 19th century background of eugenics and a fear of moral decline, some critics believed that the mention of race mixing in ''The Lord of the Rings'' embodied scientific racism. Other commentators thought that Tolkien's description of the orcs was modelled on racist wartime propaganda caricatures of the Japanese. Critics have noted, too, that the work embodies a moral geography, with good in the West, evil in the East. Against this, Tolkien strongly opposed Nazi racial theories, as seen in a 1938 letter he wrote to his publisher, while in the Second World War he vigorously opposed anti-German propaganda. His Middle-earth has been described as definitely po ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Middle-earth
Middle-earth is the fictional setting of much of the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy. The term is equivalent to the ''Miðgarðr'' of Norse mythology and ''Middangeard'' in Old English works, including ''Beowulf''. Middle-earth is the human-inhabited world, that is, the central continent of the Earth, in Tolkien's imagined mythological past. Tolkien's most widely read works, ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings'', are set entirely in Middle-earth. "Middle-earth" has also become a short-hand term for Tolkien's legendarium, his large body of fantasy writings, and for the entirety of his fictional world. Middle-earth is the main continent of Earth (Arda) in an imaginary period of the Earth's past, ending with Tolkien's Third Age, about 6,000 years ago. Tolkien's tales of Middle-earth mostly focus on the north-west of the continent. This part of Middle-earth is suggestive of Europe, the north-west of the Old World, with the environs of the Shire reminiscent of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Man (Middle-earth)
In J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth fiction, Man and Men denote humans, whether male or female, in contrast to Elves, Dwarves, Orcs, and other humanoid races. Men are described as the second or younger people, created after the Elves, and differing from them in being mortal. Along with Ents and Dwarves, these are the "free peoples" of Middle-earth, differing from the enslaved peoples such as Orcs. Tolkien uses the Men of Middle-earth, interacting with immortal Elves, to explore a variety of themes in ''The Lord of the Rings'', especially death and immortality. This appears throughout, but is the central theme of an appendix, "The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen". Where the Hobbits stand for simple, earthbound, comfort-loving people, Men are far more varied, from petty villains and slow-witted publicans to the gentle warrior Faramir and the genuinely heroic Aragorn; Tolkien had wanted to create a heroic romance suitable for the modern age. Scholars have identified real-world analogue ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aftonbladet
''Aftonbladet'' (, lit. "The evening paper") is a Swedish daily newspaper published in Stockholm, Sweden. It is one of the largest daily newspapers in the Nordic countries. History and profile The newspaper was founded by Lars Johan Hierta in December 1830 under the name of ''Aftonbladet i Stockholm'' during the modernization of Sweden. Often critical and oppositional, the paper was repeatedly banned from publishing. However, Hierta circumvented the bans by constantly reviving the paper under slightly modified names, as, legally speaking, a new publication. Thus, on 16 February 1835, he issued the first edition of New Aftonbladet, which would – after yet another ban – be followed by Newer Aftonbladet, in turn followed by Fourth Aftonbladet, Fifth Aftonbladet, and so on. In 1852 the paper began to use its current name, ''Aftonbladet'', after a total of 25 name changes. It currently describes itself as an "independent social-democratic newspaper." The owners of ''A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harad
In J. R. R. Tolkien's high fantasy ''The Lord of the Rings'', Harad is the immense land south of Gondor and Mordor. Its main port is Umbar, the base of the Corsairs of Umbar whose ships serve as the Dark Lord Sauron's fleet. Its people are the dark-skinned Haradrim or Southrons; their warriors wear scarlet and gold, and are armed with swords and round shields; some ride gigantic elephants called ''mûmakil''. Tolkien based the Haradrim on ancient Aethiopians, people of Sub-Saharan Africa, following his philological research on the Old English word '' Sigelwara''. He deduced that this word referred to some kind of soot-black fire demon before it was applied to the Aethiopians. He based the Haradrim's use of war elephants, meanwhile, on that of Pyrrhus of Epirus in his war against Ancient Rome. Critics have debated whether Tolkien was racist in making the protagonists white and the antagonists black, but others have noted that Tolkien showed anti-xenophobic sentiments in real li ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jared Lobdell
Charles Jared Lobdell (29 November 1937 – 22 March 2019) was an American author and one of the first Tolkien scholars. He is best known for some thirty academic books on American history and the Inklings including J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, and Charles Williams. Biography Jared Lobdell was born to Charles and Jane Elizabeth (Hopkins) Lobdell in New York. He was educated at Yale University. He wrote many books on aspects of American history, and on each of the three major Inklings, the Oxford literary society centred on C. S. Lewis that also included J. R. R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philology, philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was ... and Charles Williams. He died at Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania. Works Books Lobdell wrote some 30 non-fiction books, including: * ''A Tolkien Compass'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sandra Ballif Straubhaar
Sandra Ballif Straubhaar is a Germanic studies scholar known for her work on women's poetry in Old Norse, and for her contributions to scholarship on J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium, in particular his use of the Nordic medieval. Biography Sandra Straubhaar obtained her bachelor's degree in German and English at Brigham Young University in 1972. She gained an MA in German at Stanford University in 1975, and then studied Old Norse and modern Icelandic at the University of Iceland until 1978. She obtained her PhD in German Studies and Humanities at Stanford University in 1982. She held positions as lecturer and assistant professor at Lansing Community College, the University of São Paulo, Michigan State University, and Brigham Young University before moving to the University of Texas at Austin in 1998; she became a distinguished senior lecturer there in 2013. Straubhaar is well known from her articles on Old Norse women's poetry as well as her popular entry on that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Medievalism
Medievalism is a system of belief and practice inspired by the Middle Ages of Europe, or by devotion to elements of that period, which have been expressed in areas such as architecture, literature, music, art, philosophy, scholarship, and various vehicles of popular culture. Since the 17th century, a variety of movements have used the medieval period as a model or inspiration for creative activity, including Romanticism, the Gothic revival, the pre-Raphaelite and arts and crafts movements, and neo-medievalism (a term often used interchangeably with ''medievalism''). Renaissance to Enlightenment In the 1330s, Petrarch expressed the view that European culture had stagnated and drifted into what he called the "''Dark Ages''", since the fall of Rome in the fifth century, owing to among other things, the loss of many classical Latin texts and to the corruption of the language in contemporary discourse. Scholars of the Renaissance believed that they lived in a new age that broke f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
White Supremacism
White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White supremacy has roots in the now-discredited doctrine of scientific racism and was a key justification for European colonialism. As a political ideology, it imposes and maintains cultural, social, political, historical, and/or institutional domination by white people and non-white supporters. In the past, this ideology had been put into effect through socioeconomic and legal structures such as the Atlantic slave trade, Jim Crow laws in the United States, the White Australia policies from the 1890s to the mid-1970s, and apartheid in South Africa. This ideology is also today present among neo-Confederates. White supremacy underlies a spectrum of contemporary movements including white nationalism, white separatism, neo-Nazism, and the Chri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Journal Of Tolkien Research
The works of J. R. R. Tolkien have generated a body of research covering many aspects of his fantasy writings. These encompass ''The Lord of the Rings'' and ''The Silmarillion'', along with his legendarium that remained unpublished until after his death, and the constructed languages that he invented, especially the Elvish languages Quenya and Sindarin. Scholars from different disciplines have examined the linguistic and literary origins of Middle-earth, and have explored many aspects of his writings from Christianity to feminism and race. Biographical Biographies of Tolkien have been written by Humphrey Carpenter, with his 1977 '' J. R. R. Tolkien: A Biography'' and of Tolkien's wartime years by John Garth with his 2003 '' Tolkien and the Great War: The Threshold of Middle-earth''. Carpenter edited the 1981 ''The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien'', assisted by Christopher Tolkien. The brief period after the war when Tolkien worked for the OED is detailed in the 2006 book '' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Men (Middle-earth)
A man is an adult male human. Prior to adulthood, a male human is referred to as a boy (a male child or adolescent). Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chromosome from the father. Sex differentiation of the male fetus is governed by the SRY gene on the Y chromosome. During puberty, hormones which stimulate androgen production result in the development of secondary sexual characteristics, thus exhibiting greater differences between the sexes. These include greater muscle mass, the growth of facial hair and a lower body fat composition. Male anatomy is distinguished from female anatomy by the male reproductive system, which includes the penis, testicles, sperm duct, prostate gland and the epididymis, and by secondary sex characteristics, including a narrower pelvis, narrower hips, and smaller breasts without mammary glands. Throughout human history, traditional gender roles have often defined ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Saruman
Saruman, also called Saruman the White, is a fictional character of J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novel ''The Lord of the Rings''. He is leader of the Istari, wizards sent to Middle-earth in human form by the godlike Valar to challenge Sauron, the main antagonist of the novel, but eventually he desires Sauron's power for himself and tries to take over Middle-earth by force from his base at Isengard. His schemes feature prominently in the second volume, ''The Two Towers''; he appears briefly at the end of the third volume, ''The Return of the King''. His earlier history is summarized in the posthumously published ''The Silmarillion'' and ''Unfinished Tales''. Saruman is one of several characters in the book illustrating the corruption of power; his desire for knowledge and order leads to his fall, and he rejects the chance of redemption when it is offered. The name ''Saruman'' () means "man of skill or cunning" in the Mercian dialect of Anglo-Saxon; he serves as an example of te ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Treebeard
Treebeard, or ''Fangorn'' in Sindarin, is a tree-giant character in J. R. R. Tolkien's ''The Lord of the Rings''. He is an Ent and is said by Gandalf to be "the oldest living thing that still walks beneath the Sun upon this Middle-earth.", book 3, ch. 4 "Treebeard" He lives in the ancient Forest of Fangorn, to which he has given his name. It lies at the southern end of the Misty Mountains. He is described as being about 14 feet (4.5 m) in height, and in appearance similar to a beech or an oak. In ''The Two Towers'', Treebeard meets with Merry Brandybuck and Pippin Took, two Hobbits of the Shire. This meeting proves to have consequences that contribute significantly to the story and enables the events that occur in ''The Return of the King''. Origins In Sindarin, one of Tolkien's Elvish languages, "Fangorn" is a compound of ''fanga'', "beard", and ''orne'', "tree", so it is the equivalent of the English "Treebeard". The Rohirrim (Riders of Rohan) called Fangorn Forest the "En ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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