''The Notion Club Papers'' is an abandoned novel by J. R. R. Tolkien, written during 1945 and published posthumously in '' Sauron Defeated'', the 9th volume of ''

The History of Middle-earth ''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 that collect and analyse much of Tolkien's legendarium, compiled and edited by his son, Christopher Tolkien. The series shows the development over ti ...

''. It is a

time travel Time travel is the concept of movement between certain points in time, analogous to movement between different points in space by an object or a person, typically with the use of a hypothetical device known as a time machine. Time travel is a ...

story, written while ''

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's bo ...

'' was being developed. The Notion Club is a fictionalization of (and a play on words on the name of) Tolkien's own such club,

the Inklings The Inklings were an informal literary discussion group associated with J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis at the University of Oxford for nearly two decades between the early 1930s and late 1949. The Inklings were literary enthusiasts who pr ...

. Although unfinished, the text of ''The Notion Club Papers'' runs for some 120 pages in ''Sauron Defeated''. Embedded within the story are Tolkien's versions of European legends: '' King Sheave'', and '' The Death of St. Brendan'', a three-page poem also titled 'Imram'. ''Sauron Defeated'' includes some further 40 pages of Christopher Tolkien's commentary and notes on ''The Notion Club Papers'', and reproduces examples of the pages hand-written by his father.

Plot

The story revolves around the meetings of an

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

arts discussion group, the Notion Club. During these meetings, Alwin Arundel Lowdham discusses his lucid dreams about

Númenor Númenor, also called Elenna-nórë or Westernesse, is a fictional place in J. R. R. Tolkien's writings. It was the kingdom occupying a large island to the west of Middle-earth, the main setting of Tolkien's writings, and was the greatest civil ...

, a lost civilisation connected with

Atlantis Atlantis ( grc, Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, , island of Atlas) is a fictional island mentioned in an allegory on the hubris of nations in Plato's works '' Timaeus'' and '' Critias'', wherein it represents the antagonist naval power that b ...

and with Tolkien's

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 ...

. Through these dreams, he "discovers" much about the Númenor story and the

languages of Middle-earth Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of me ...

(notably

Quenya Quenya ()Tolkien wrote in his "Outline of Phonology" (in '' Parma Eldalamberon'' 19, p. 74) dedicated to the phonology of Quenya: is "a sound as in English ''new''". In Quenya is a combination of consonants, ibidem., p. 81. is a constructed l ...

Sindarin Sindarin is one of the fictional languages devised by J. R. R. Tolkien for use in his fantasy stories set in Arda, primarily in Middle-earth. Sindarin is one of the many languages spoken by the Elves. The word is a Quenya word. Called in E ...

, and

Adûnaic Adûnaic (or Adunaic) ("language of the West") is one of the fictional languages devised by J. R. R. Tolkien for his fantasy works. One of the languages of Arda in Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium, Adûnaic was spoken by the Men of Númenor ...

). While not finished, at the end of the given story it becomes clear Lowdham himself is a reincarnation of sorts of Elendil. Other members of the Club mention their vivid dreams of other times and places. ''The Notion Club Papers'' is elaborately constructed. The main story (the Notion Club, itself the frame of the

story) is set within a

frame story A frame is often a structural system that supports other components of a physical construction and/or steel frame that limits the construction's extent. Frame and FRAME may also refer to: Physical objects In building construction *Framing (co ...

. Both are set in the future; Tolkien created the work in 1945. In the

, a Mr. Green finds documents in sacks of waste paper at Oxford in 2012. These documents, the Notion Club Papers of the title, are the incomplete notes of meetings of the Notion Club; these meetings are said to have occurred in the 1980s. The notes, written by one of the participants, include references to events that 'occurred' in the 1970s and 1980s. Green publishes a first edition containing excerpts from the documents. Two scholars read the first edition, ask to examine the documents, and then submit a full report. The "Notes to the Second Edition" mentions the contradictory evidence in dating the documents, and an alternative date is presented: they may have been written in the 1940s (which was of course when Tolkien actually created the matter).

Analysis

Literary group

The text comments on

C. S. Lewis Clive Staples Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963) was a British writer and Anglican lay theologian. He held academic positions in English literature at both Oxford University (Magdalen College, 1925–1954) and Cambridge Univer ...

's '' Space Trilogy''. Lewis and Tolkien were close friends and members of

literary club. The two men had agreed to write space travel (Lewis) and time travel (Tolkien) novels, since they agreed there were too few stories in existence that they really liked. Tolkien's remarks on the trilogy are similar in style to Lewis's commentary on Tolkien's poem ''

The Lay of Leithian ''The Lays of Beleriand'', published in 1985, is the third volume of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume book series, ''The History of Middle-earth'', in which he analyzes the unpublished manuscripts of his father J. R. R. Tolkien. Book Inscr ...

'', in which he created a fictional history of scholarship of the poem and even referred to other manuscript traditions to recommend changes to the poem. Tolkien's biographer,

Humphrey Carpenter Humphrey William Bouverie Carpenter (29 April 1946 – 4 January 2005) was an English biographer, writer, and radio broadcaster. He is known especially for his biographies of J. R. R. Tolkien and other members of the literary society the Inkl ...

, describes ''The Notion Club'' as a "thinly disguised" Inklings, noting that the time travellers are two

Oxford don Don (; ; pt, Dom, links=no ; all from Latin ', roughly 'Lord'), abbreviated as D., is an honorific prefix primarily used in Spain and Hispanic America, and with different connotations also in Italy, Portugal and its former colonies, and Croat ...

s who are members of the club. Jane Stanford links ''The Notion Club Papers'' to

John O'Connor Power John O'Connor Power (13 February 1846 – 21 February 1919) was an Irish Fenian and a Home Rule League and Irish Parliamentary Party politician and as MP in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland represented Ma ...

's 1899 ''The Johnson Club Papers''; the two books have a similar title page. The Johnson Club was a "Public House School" and met in

tavern A tavern is a place of business where people gather to drink alcoholic beverages and be served food such as different types of roast meats and cheese, and (mostly historically) where travelers would receive lodging. An inn is a tavern t ...

s as the Inklings did. The purpose was "Fellowship and free Exchange of Mind". Both clubs presented papers "which were read before the members and discussed". The Johnson Club was named for

Samuel Johnson Samuel Johnson (18 September 1709 – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. The ''Oxford ...

, who like Tolkien, had a strong connection to

Pembroke College, Oxford Pembroke College, a constituent college of the University of Oxford, is located at Pembroke Square, Oxford. The college was founded in 1624 by King James I of England, using in part the endowment of merchant Thomas Tesdale, and was named aft ...

. Stanley Unwin, Tolkien's publisher, was a nephew of Fisher Unwin, the founding member of The Johnson Club.

Time travel

''The Notion Club Papers'' may be seen as an attempt to re-write the incomplete ''

The Lost Road ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the ...

'' (written around 1936-1937), being another attempt to tie the Númenórean legend in with a more modern tale through

, following the then-popular theory of

J. W. Dunne John William Dunne (2 December 1875 – 24 August 1949) was a British soldier, aeronautical engineer and philosopher. As a young man he fought in the Second Boer War, before becoming a pioneering aeroplane designer in the early years of the 20th ...

. Both stories however break off before much time-travelling takes place. Tolkien finally managed to incorporate time travel in ''The Lord of the Rings'', in the form of a visit to the Elvish land of Lothlorien, following a tradition that in Elfland, time is different. According to Christopher Tolkien, had his father continued ''The Notion Club Papers'', he would have linked the real world of Alwin Lowdham with his eponymous ancestor Ælfwine of England, the fictional compiler of ''

The Book of Lost Tales ''The Book of Lost Tales'' is a collection of early stories by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien, published as the first two volumes of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume series ''The History of Middle-earth'', in which he presents and analyses ...

'', and with Atlantis. One of the members of the Notion Club, Michael George Ramer, combines lucid dreams with time-travel and experiences the tsunami that sank Númenor. He cannot tell if it is history, or fantasy, or something in between. Verlyn Flieger writes that the journeying about of the protagonist recalls the Celtic

Imram An immram (; plural immrama; ga, iomramh , 'voyage') is a class of Old Irish tales concerning a hero's sea journey to the Otherworld (see Tír na nÓg and Mag Mell). Written in the Christian era and essentially Christian in aspect, they preser ...

voyages, noting that Tolkien wrote a poem named "Imram" at the same time, and it was the only element published in his lifetime. The modern name "Alwin", the

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th ...

name " Ælfwine", and the

name " Elendil" all mean "Elf-friend"; in ''The Lost Road'', the story involves father-son characters named Edwin/Elwin, Eadwine/Aelfwine, Audoin/Alboin, Amandil/Elendil, all meaning "Bliss-friend/Elf-friend", as the pair travel successively further back in time all the way through history to Númenor. This situates Númenor, whose downfall is described in ''

The Silmarillion ''The Silmarillion'' () is a collection of myths and stories in varying styles by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien. It was edited and published posthumously by his son Christopher Tolkien in 1977, assisted by the fantasy author Guy Gavri ...

'', as part of an invented mythology for England. Flieger comments that had either ''The Lost Road'' or ''The Notion Club Papers'' been finished,

Prophecy

''The Notion Club Papers'' mentions a great storm in England, on 12 June 1987. The actual Great Storm of 1987 occurred in October of that year.''Great Storm 1987: The day 18 people were killed'' BBC News Online.
/ref> Christopher Tolkien drew attention to this, saying "my father's 'prevision' was only out by four months".

References

Sources

* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Notion Club Papers, The The History of Middle-earth Unfinished novels Novels about time travel