The Fall of Arthur

So, today's the release date for Tolkien's long-awaited Arthurian poem, THE FALL OF ARTHUR. My copy arrived early this afternoon, but by that point I was already almost finished reading it, having found out it was already available on Kindle last night (around ten o'clock our time). That makes it the first Tolkien book I first read in electronic format. I've been waiting for this one since Rayner Unwin told me it was "forthcoming" back in 1985. As for the poem itself, I enjoyed it much more than I expected (like Poe, I'm really not that much into long poems, and this one runs almost a thousand lines). It probably helped that I read it aloud, Tolkien being an author who paid attention to sound as well as sense. And I found the additional material Christopher Tolkien provided, providing JRRT's outlines and notes (such as they are) as well as many alternate passages that didn't make it into the final version.

Most surprising bit? The explicit linkage of his Arthur story with the legendarium. Didn't expect that as all. Next, that in Guinevere he's produced what I think must be his least sympathetic female character. That should make for some interesting discussions. As should CT's guess at the reason for its abandonment: developments in the mythos, such as the creation of the Numenorean story and The World Made Round drew his attention away from this rewarding but deeply labor-intensive project.

It'll take me a while to absorb all this, obviously, but I'm relieved that the paragraphs I wrote about THE FALL OF ARTHUR in my contribution to the Shippey festschrift (a collection that now seems to be clearing the last of the hurdles that have so long delayed it) isn't superseded or rendered null and void by the publication of the whole.

And it's wonderful to have a new book by Tolkien, and to read more of Christopher's crisp, incisive commentary thereon laying out all the interconnections between the masses of manuscript.

So, a good day to be a Tolkienist!

--John R.
current reading: THE FALL OF ARTHUR (obviously), THE PERILOUS CEMETERY (L'ATRE PERILLEUX*)


*which is not an Edgar Gorey picture book but a little-known 13th-century Arthurian romance featuring Gawain

The Rumor

So, here's a tantalizing link, courtesy of the MythSoc list (thanks, "Drussy"):

http://www.amazon.fr/Fall-Arthur-Deluxe-Edi-Hb/dp/0007489897/ref=sr_1_6?s=english-books&ie=UTF8&qid=1342094217&sr=1-6

The Fall of Arthur? Tolkien's long (almost 1,000 lines), unfinished Arthurian poem? The one with clear affinities to the fourteenth century Alliterative Morte Arthur? The one praised by E. V. Gordon, and R. W. Chambers, and C. S. Lewis? That Fall of Arthur?

Dare we hope? I remember Rayner Unwin, when I got to meet with him in 1985, telling me about this as one of the forthcoming projects already in the works, but which wdn't be coming out until some more pressing projects (like the HISTORY OF MIDDLE-EARTH series, whose third volume I'd just picked up that same day).*

This is one of the unpublished Tolkien works I've most been wanting to see in print. We'll see if the rumors are just rumors, or if it's really on the way. I'd say the whole thing is wishful thinking (I know the PULP CTHULHU rulebook still gets listed on amazon and similar sites, despite never having been published), but the precision of May 13th 2013 as its release date hints that perhaps it's more than that.

We'll see.

--John R.

*I wound up giving that volume to Owen Barfield, who was interested to hear that Lewis had critiqued some of Tolkien's poetry and was curious to see those comments for himself