THE
SILMARILLION
The Analysis. The Approach.
What
is "The Silmarillion"?
The Silmarillion is a collection
of J. R. R. Tolkien's mythopoeic works,
edited and published posthumously
by his son Christopher Tolkien in 1977, with assistance from Guy Gavriel Kay.
The Silmarillion, along with J. R. R. Tolkien's other works, forms an
extensive, though incomplete, narrative that describes the universe of Eä in which are found the lands of Valinor,
Beleriand, Númenor, and Middle-earth within which The Hobbit and The Lord of
the Rings take place.
The
significance of The Silmarillion
Often referred to as "the
Sil" by Tolkien-fans, it is one of the many influential works
of high-fantasy literature by the
Professor. Many hard-core JRRT fans consider it to
be his greatest work, better than
his most popular "The Lord of the Rings" and "the Hobbit". Tolkien
himself considered the Silmarillion to be his most important work, with The
Lord of the Rings being acting as a conclusion to the whole Middle-earth saga.The
Sil is basically a creation myth and serves as a base for all the events taking
place in other works like LOTR and The Hobbit. The Silmarillion covers lore of
over six thousands years of Elven, Dwarvish, Nuemenorian, and Middle-earth
history. Reading The Silmarillion is a bit more like doing anthropological or historical
research. Want to know what is Middle-earth? Curious who and from where the
Wizards came? Why are elves immortal while the men or dwarves are not? What are
Balrogs? Who is Sauron? How orc came into Middle-earth?
If you are curious about all such
things, then The Sil is the book for you.
If not, you should walk away.
How is
The Sil different from LotR or The Hobbit?
First of all, it should be noted,
that The Silmarillion is NOT a novel. It's a history or mythology or perhaps a
mix of both. It has no particular protagonist you can stick out with for the
whole. If you read it you would get the feeling of reading very minutely
detailed Celtic mythologies. And that's what makes Sil so special. It is a
source of enjoyment for the interested Tolkien fans even without having a
well-outlined plot.
Secondly, The Sil is a much denser
read than LotR or (of course) the Hobbit. The language and style are very much
related to archived histories of the 12-13th century. That is one of the main
reasons why it has not reached the same level of popularity as the other two
For non-English speaking folks,
it could definitely be boring, especially those who go for findinga sequel of
LotR. The Sil is NOT a sequel of LotR. It is just the starting point of
Tolkien's whole Middle-earth legendarium.
Thirdly, many events and
descriptions could be seen as been highly exaggerated. But we have to keep in
mind that all mythologies of all the cultures in the whole world are
exaggerated results of legends.
While reading Sil, think of it
like this way:
Try to imagine that you are in
Middle-earth and you are one of the elves or men, or dwarves or hobbits. Think that you are reading the history of the
world you belong to. i.e. You are one of the free peoples of Middle-earth and
you are reading it's history. That very much is the perspective from which The
Sil has been written. And the pleasure of reading it increases several folds by
this.
A Brief
Synopsys of The Silmarillion
The Sil has been divided mainly
into five sections:
Ainulindalë, Valaquenta, Quenta
Silmarillion, Akkalabeth and Third Age; in chronological order.
Ainulindalë: It tells of
how Eru Illuvatar (God) created the land called Ea (earth) with the help of the
songs of the Ainur (angels). One of the Ainur (Melkor) gets corrupted by his
arrogance and becomes what can be called the antagonist of the Sil (for most
part).
Valaquenta: The Ainur are
sent by Eru to Ea to shape all things on earth. These Ainur are called Vala.
Valaquenta introduces all the Valar, their spouses and the Maia (helpers of the
Valar) alongwith their special characteristics
and abilities.
Quenta Silmarillion: Forms
the main bulk of the book. It deals with the coming of various races like elves, dwarves, men and orcs on
Valinor (land of the Valar) and Middle-earth. The main account follows the
creation of the Silamrils, the most precious jewels on Ea, crafted by the
greatest craftsmen of the elves, Feanor and the struggle to take them back from
Melkor (later named Morgoth, who stole them). It also contains the story of
Beren and Luthien, which was produced concisely as a beautiful song in LotR. It
culminates after the destruction of Melkor.
Akallabêth: It deals with
the events surrounding the land
of Numenor
Of the Rings of power and
Third Age: This is a crucial part linking to The Lord of the Rings. It goes
into much detail about the making of the great Rings and Sauron's passing into
the shadow world, as well as the origins of the Nazguls. It is a great account
of the history of the One Ring till Isildur's
death.
How to
Approach The Sil?
A) Always remember that this work
is a history, and NOT a novel. Names, places, events, etc. tend to appear quite
often, and it's very easy to get as lost as Thorin and company in Mirkwood. Attempting
to skim the book is a very bad idea. Instead, read at a relatively slow pace
(and NEVER when you are feeling
sleepy).
B)Take notes as you read. This
doesn't mean the kind of notes that you'd make for a test in collegel, but
rather important names that you want to keep straight or remember. Perhaps you
might make a chart or a list of the Valar, or your own "tree" to keep
the various branches of Elves straight.
C) In one of the volumes of The
History Of The Lord Of The Rings, Christopher Tolkien explains that his father
worked on the manuscript of The Lord Of The Rings in "waves",
constantly going back a few chapters and rewriting. This is a technique
that I've found works well, especially with
remembering exactly which Elf is the son of another Elf, or which Vala did what. This technique
works I think, because like a history book each chapter builds material for the
consequent chapter.
D) Having a comprehensive map of
Ea never hurts, but it is not a necessity.
Influences
The Silmarillion is a complex
work exhibiting the influence of many sources. A major influence was the
Finnish epic Kalevala, especially the tale of Kullervo. Influence from Greek
mythology is also apparent. The island
of Númenor
Greek mythology also colours the
Valar, who borrow many attributes from the Olympian gods. The Valar, like the
Olympians, live in the world, but on a high mountain, separated from
mortals;But the correspondences are only approximate; the Valar also contain
elements of Norse mythology.
Several of the Valar have characteristics
resembling various Aesir, the gods of Asgard. Thor, for example, physically the
strongest of the gods, can be seen both in Oromë, who fights the monsters of
Melkor, and in Tulkas, the physically strongest of the Valar.[28] Manwë, the
head of the Valar, exhibits some similarities to Odin, the
"All-father". Tolkien also said that he saw the Maia Olórin (Gandalf) as an "Odinic
wanderer".
Influence of the Bible and
traditional Christian narrative are seen in The Silmarillion in the conflict
between Melkor and Eru Ilúvatar, a parallel of the polarity of Lucifer and God.
Further, The Silmarillion tells of the creation and fall of the Elves, as
Genesis tells of the creation and fall of Man. As with all of Tolkien's works, The
Silmarillion allows room for later Christian history, and one version of
Tolkien's drafts even has Finrod, a character in The Silmarillion, speculating
on the necessity of Eru's (God's) eventual Incarnation to save humankind. Medieval Christian cosmology shows
its influence especially in the account of the creation of the universe as the
manifestation of a sort of song sung by God with which the angels harmonize
until the fallen angel introduces discord. St. Augustine 's writings on music, as well as
the extensive medieval tradition of the divine harmony—more familiar to us
today in the notion of the "music of the spheres"—served as bases for
this telling of creation.
Celtic mythology show its
influence in the exile of the Noldorin Elves, for example,
that borrow elements from the story of Irish
legends of the Tuatha Dé Danann.
Welsh influence is seen in the
Elvish language Sindarin, that Tolkien gave "a
linguistic character very like
(though not identical with) British-Welsh ... because
it seems to fit the rather
'Celtic' type of legends and stories told of its speakers".
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