TOLKIEN, REALISM, AND MYTH

TOLKIEN, REALISM, AND MYTH

Introduction

One of the most common critiques against Tolkien's work is that it is "unrealistic". Critics of this kind will complain that Tolkien does not care for the use of subtlety when he portrays the reality of Good and evil in his work. Good characters will be fair, glimmering, brave, and noble, while evil characters will be crooked, ugly, dark, and wicked. In other words, there are no "gray areas", no moral ambiguity in the characters. And it is this lack of "grayness" that Tolkien's critics will take as "unrealistic" and proof that his work is nothing more than shallow tales of cheap fantasy.

However, even though it is true that Tolkien is rather explicit when it comes to his portrayal of Good and evil, these critiques fail to see what Tolkien was intending to do when he portrayed morality in this way. Indeed, once one understands what Tolkien's intention was, his portrayal not only makes sense but it also makes more sense than all those so-called "realistic" portrayals, filled with gray ambiguities. Therefore, if one wishes to reply to these critiques, it is crucial that we first understand Tolkien's motives.

Tolkien's Intention

Unlike most writers of his time, when Tolkien wrote his work, he was not intending to craft a modern series of novels. Rather, what he was trying to do was to sub-create a mythology, a web of mythic tales.

Myth, by definition, is quite distinct from the modern novel. Not only is myth much more ancient, but it is also operating on an entirely different framework of reality. The modern novel often assumes that reality is just the sensible world. In other words, according to the framework of reality under which the modern novel operates, only what can be seen, heard, smelled, touched, or tasted is real. All else is either a lie or figment of our imagination. As a result, the novels of the 20th century have a strictly materialistic and often-times nihilistic view of reality. There is no truth, no goodness, no beauty, according to this view, because, after all, Truth, Goodness, and Beauty are all part of a worldview that directly contradicts the materialistic nihilism of modernity. Myth, on the other hand, does recognize the existence of a world beyond the sensible: an invisible, spiritual, and metaphysical world where Truth, Goodness, and Beauty can and do exist. And it is this more integral view (the view that integrates both the visible and invisible sides of reality) that Myth takes as its framework. Hence, Myth and the modern novel are not only different but one could go as far as to say that they are irreconcilably opposed.

As such, when we say that Tolkien's intention was to write a mythic story, we must understand that he was working under a drastically distinct framework from the one that the modern novel takes as its own. This realization, logically, has significant implications in the portrayal of Good and evil. Since the mythic framework acknowledges the reality of the spiritual, it also recognizes the fact that the origin of moral evil is not ambiguous but rather very concrete and defined. Moral evil originates from a disordered act of the will to not conform to the Will of God. Evil, in other words, is an act of spiritual rebellion that ultimately ends in chaos. And since the spiritual inevitably affects the material, it does not take long before this invisible evil is embodied by a visible evil.

Myth vs. Modern Novel

All of this is incomprehensible to the modern novelist. The modern novelist, in his materialistic nihilism, cannot understand that evil is spiritual rebellion because he does not acknowledge any kind of metaphysical and spiritual order at all. For him, reality is already chaotic and meaningless, so when he is confronted with manifestly evil acts, he has no way to rationally recognize them as such. Hence, all he can do is to see things in a perpetual mist of confusion where nothing is ever good or evil.

But when we hold both of these views up for scrutiny, it is evident which one makes more sense. After all, only someone who has totally lost his mind can fall into the pitfall of denying the objective reality of Good and evil. It is right there for us to see. For example, the gulags of Soviet Russia are clear manifestations of a spiritual evil that has taken over the whole political system of a nation. Likewise, on a more personal scale, the visible brokenness of addicts and criminals is clearly a symptom of a much deeper spiritual sickness in the souls of those persons. There is no ambiguity when evil is so manifest. Even the most depressed nihilist will have to admit that there is something wrong in these situations, even if he has no way of explaining why that is. Therefore, it is evidently true that the invisible, moral reality soon takes its form in the visible reality, thus proving that the mythic worldview is the right one.

This is why Tolkien chose to portray Good and evil the way he did. He knew that the spiritual realm is very much real and that its effect would soon find an echo in the material world. Hence, when we see the evil creatures of his mythology as these terrifying and disgusting beings, what we are really seeing are the repercussions of a spiritual state of cursedness, beings that are spiritually dead. On the other hand, when we see the heroes of this mythic world and notice how beautiful and noble they look, we are witnessing the effects that an orderly spiritual state has. That is the reason why Tolkien seems to be explicit in his portrayal of Good and evil.

A More Real Portrayal

And to be honest, this portrayal is ultimately much more realistic than all the gray ambiguity that the modern novel is so fond of. After all, since the spiritual realm is a reality that we ought to contend with, it is absolutely reasonable to portray Good and evil in a way that the spiritual effects on matter are starkly manifested. Therefore, when one hears critiques of Tolkien's work as being "unrealistic", we should remember that the spiritual is more real than the material, and as such, the mythic is more real than the modern.