Lord of the Geeks

An anonymous reader sent in links to two LOTR pieces in the Village Voice - a short bit about the LOTR excerpt shown at the Cannes film festival, and a longer piece about Tolkien and geekdom written by the guy who wrote A Rape in Cyberspace. I don't think I really agree with him, but it's an interesting read nonetheless.

Comments

interesting but flawed

[joss]

The long article is interesting, but several things bugged me a lot:
"he was a straitlaced, archconservative Catholic himself"

Bullshit - compared to who ? Tolkein was an Oxford don:
"How many Oxford dons does it take to change a lightbulb ?"
"CHANGE ?? !!"

Calling him a straightlaced conservative is disingenuous at best. My grandmother knew Tolkein, he was a regular visitor to her antiques shop in central Oxford (where I actually met him a couple of times, but can't pretend to remember the experience since I was being babysat at the time). My grandmother mentioned him as being charming, with a mischeivous air.

As for the critical disclaim from the likes of a young Germain Greer (she was a militant feminist back then, and most likely rankled by Tolkein's chivalrous attitude) or some pompous, self-satisfied Private Eye hack, it doesn't deserve repetition without ridicule.

But, the central point about Tolkein's significance to geeks is valid, and I've never heard computer games referred to as culture before, let alone as "culture's center of gravity". Hmmmm...

What you said about linguist!

[thulldud]

Really. I was thoroughly impressed with his use of English, but never so much as when I read the entire trilogy aloud to my wife, and years later to my whole family. His stuff is a pleasure to read aloud, and that doesn't come automatically.

C.S.Lewis was a linguist as well; in fact he and Tolkien associated frequently in such ventures as the Kolbitar club, which studied ancient Icelandic poetry. And Lewis is about as famous a writer as Tolkien. But when I tried to read the Narnia Chronicles aloud, it was like slogging through waist-high jello in comparison. (I couldn't finish.)

One thing that makes Tolkien's prose so refreshing is that he used his familiarity with Germanic languages cognate to English such as Gothic, Anglo-Saxon, and Icelandic to minimize the influence of late Latin on it. To native English speakers, Latin-derived words often sound distant and antiseptic, while Germanic ones sound earthy and vivid. I'm sure that Tolkien was aware of it; it's no accident that the language of the Rohirrim (rendered in the story as Anglo-Saxon) seemed to Meriadoc to be a richer, fuller version of his own Westron tongue (rendered as English).

Anti-geek angst

[Stiletto]

"But maybe you could indulge me and imagine, just for a moment, that the fact that we live in a world increasingly made by geeks actually makes their collective imagination worth understanding."


Ha ha ha...

This guy reminds me of the high school sports stars that are still living in my home town flipping burgers, saying "Those damn nerds are taking over the world. What a bunch of losers!"

Look who the losers are now, guys...

Letter to the Editor

[gmhowell]

I'm not hoity-toity enough for my opinions to matter to the Villiage Voice. I live on the border between the red states and the blue states;) But if you want to beat your head against the wall, send email to editor@villiagevoice.com or fill out the area at: http://www.villagevoice.com/aboutus/letters.shtml

Remember to be careful when feeding the trolls.

Here is my letter:

It seems that Mr. Dibbell has some sort of chip on his shoulder. Did some geek wipe out his bank account? Run off with his girl? Beat him in a game of StreetFighter?

I'm not certain what his article regarding Lord of the Rings is supposed to prove. An animus towards 'geeks' is the only common thread through his various ramblings. That and apparant jealousy that Mr. Tolkien (and Lucas) have achieved far more success than he ever will.

While many have referred to LOTR as literature, a great artistic work, and so forth, that is mostly in jest. Most people I know (and granted, the people with whom I have discussed LOTR are ensconsed neither in academia nor in the entertainment industry, thus invalidating their existence with respect to such as Mr. Dibbell) who have read the work accept it for what it is: an incredibly long series of children's stories set in a wholly imagined world.

So perhaps it is not high art. So what? Much of what we regard today as literature (Shakespeare, Chaucer, the greek tragedies, and so forth) are 'merely' entertainment. Or at least that is what they were originally.

The 'feature' fails in the most important respect: justifying its' own existence. It certainly adds nothing new to the discussion of the literary value (or lack thereof) of the LOTR series. It fails to properly cite any of the numerous references made to the original and intelligent criticisms made by others. There is a half-hearted attempt to denigrate modern society, the United States, and the internet. Even this fails, as the two points upon which these criticisms are based lack foundation. First that 'mere entertainment' is a bad thing. Second that there is anything other than anecdotal evidence to support the notion that a high percentage of those in technology, for instance, have read LOTR, view it as 'serious literature', and that this somehow indicates a flaw or at least a system to their thinking.

The lack of quality and direction of and in this feature leave me wanting to say much more. Unfortunately, there is so little of substance with which to argue.

There is a website called slashdot (from where I learned of this article) that contains areas for article discussion. When one writes commentary whose sole purpose is to incite argument, it is referred to as a 'troll'. In my estimation, Julian Dibbell has proven himself to be a troll. And one with much less to say than those who grace the pages of JRR Tolkien's works.

Much longer series on Salon this week

[jenkin sear]

There was a much longer (and I think a bit more sympathetic) review of Shippey's book on Tolkien over at Salon- it's in 2 parts:

Part One
Part Two

Definitely worth reading, but set aside some time.

Dibbell is off base, as usual

[Salamander]

As when he wrote about LambdaMOO, Dibbell has no idea whatsoever what he's talking about. Here are some examples.

the vast genre of fantasy fiction is, along with sci-fi, one of the two great narrative flows feeding the Nerd Nation's imaginative life, and nobody doubts that Tolkien single-handedly invented it

Lots of people, even among Tolkien's most devoted fans, would dispute the claim that Tolkien invented the genre. World-building fantasy has existed as a continuous tradition for millenia, from some of the earliest known writings to contemporaries of Tolkien such as Fritz Lieber and Lloyd Alexander. Tolkien's work brought this genre back into the mainstream from a relative backwater, but nobody in their right mind would claim he invented it.

Tolkien's take on "human existence"? A hard gig, certainly, full of danger and tough decisions, but fortunately not enough to threaten the wise Gandalf, the noble Aragorn, the sly Saruman, or any of Tolkien's other characters with more than the occasional moment of psychological complexity.

It's true that many of Tolkien's main characters are pretty "flat" and that even accounts for much of their appeal to younger readers. However, a closer reading will reveal more complexity than Dibbell gives credit for. Aragorn, Boromir, and Gandalf are not entirely unconflicted. The ambivalence of many elves and half-elves - Glorfindel, Elrond, Celeborn - is worthy of some thought. The corruption or degeneration of several characters - Theoden, Denethor, Saruman - is complex and interesting. Perhaps the most interesting character is Gollum; I used to spend many evenings wondering what must have been going on inside that slimy little head. If you go beyond LoTR and read the Silmarillion you find even more complex, conflicted characters. There's plenty of psychological complexity to Tolkien's work, if you're willing to read instead of skimming.

Strip away his meaning and what is left? Well, Middle Earth itself.

How absurd. You can't strip away the other elements, because it is those elements that make Middle Earth special. The peoples, the language, the history - all of those things considered rightly or wrongly to be the subject of allegory - are what makes Middle Earth more compelling and memorable than so many other laughable attempts at fantasy world-building.

Typical anger

[cisko]

An article like that is just a response from someone who doesn't "get it" and feels obligated to defend himself for not being in the with-it crowd. Fine, he doesn't like the book, tastes differ. But it's funny to see the vitriol he pours on it's supposed geeky fans.

Sure, some of us are incredibly geeky, there's the whole D&D connection, etc. But you're just as likely to find tweedy academics or -- gosh -- just average plain John/Jane Doe folks who love the books as pale computer professionals.

Frankly I think he's just trying to get a rise out of the fandom. His ad hominem attacks don't even do a good job of masquerading as literary criticism.

Yawn.

Re:Typical anger

[Alatar]

I think Professor Tolkien provided the best retort himself. Let him speak in his own words:

"Some who have read the book, or at any rate have reviewed it, have found it boring, absurd, or contemptible; and I have no cause to complain, since I have similar opinions of their works, or of the kinds of writing that they evidently prefer."

Tolkien's remark deeper than it looks ...

[Somnus]

Just because Tolkien dispenses with allegory, does not mean he disavows metaphor. LOTR has strong, undeniable themes, which if they match real life, do so by accident. In fact, all great art is like this: themes are important for the most basic reasons, abstracting the metaphysics of man and his creations, having nothing to do with concretes directly. Tokien skillfully (and artfully) creates his own universe, but one we can relate to, then is off to the races as a storyteller.

The author, Julian Dibbell, must take a naturalistic view of art, where the world recreated must be a "slice of life" rather than an original creation. How stultifying, and sad. Tolkien eschews this arrested development to embrace fantasy Romanticism, and did an amazing job of it.

This is not to say, of course, that I like everything about Tolkien. His prose doesn't flow like and F. Scott Fitzgerald or Ralph Ellison, but that's but a quibble.


*** Proven iconoclast, aspiring epicurean ***

Re:Tolkien's remark deeper than it looks ...

[krmt]

I was going to mod you up but I wanted to reply instead. I think you're very correct about the metaphor idea. Tolkien's work isn't an allegory (like the Faery Queen by Edmund Spencer for example) in that the whole story isn't a metaphor, but the themes that run through it help grab us in ways that everyone who likes the books understands at some basic level.

It's important though that Tolkien's work isn't a wholly original creation. The precedent of Arthurian legends and Beowulf certaintly lend some important weight to his work. The fertility myth (Arthur) is a very important classic genre, and in many ways LOTR can be seen as inheriting from that. The theme of retribution after desolation via sacrifice is critical and is prevalent in many modern works as well. Pynchon's "Gravity's Rainbow" can be construed this way for instance. This is in contrast to many other modern works that does not have such endings, like Paul Auster's "City of Glass" and Beckett's "Waiting for Godot".

The thing about literary critics is they are just waiting to show off how smart they are. No one gets upset with James Joyce for making "Finnigan's Wake" completely impenetrable (anyone who says they understand that work is a liar), but they rail against Tolkien for making a work that is just as original and epic in scale and still accessible at the same time. It's this kind of attitude that turns people off to literature (it's the same attitude that critics have towards "Harry Potter" right now) and it's really very sad. There's nothing I like as much as a challenging piece of art, but everyone wants a good story now and then. "Lonesome Dove" can sit happily next to my copy of "Gravity's Rainbow", and it depreciates neither.

"I may not have morals, but I have standards."

Geek Rage (Rant disclaimer)

[bonoboy]

The author of the longer article goes through the article seemingly heaping praise on Tolkien (obviously in some attempt to get us 'geeks' on side for when he demolishes it (and us) later. Of course he does this so well, you're inclined to listen to his arguments. But he bring up several absoutely blind points, like "the bad guys are evil, the good guys are not". This is patently untrue, as anyone who's even read the book once knows. What kind of a fool spends all this time researching the author and his critics and none of his time checking that his main line of argument (the book!) isn't actually right? Boromir is corrupted by the ring, Frodo goes from a nice chap to someone who can kill giant spiders in very nasty ways (and that scene was very dark, with the shadow of murder hanging over it totally). Merry and Pippin are tainted by the journey, Saruman is the good brought low, Strider (sic) is the mighty king basically reduced to a ruthless killer. Gollum was nothing but a mischevious child until the ring corrupted him. What does he see in these 'oh so pure' characters BUT evil? The evil of the ring corrupts all who come near it, and the quest to destroy evil leads people to questionable deeds. Ok, nothing like killing families in Vietnamese villages, but they still change utterly through the story. The end leaves you with an utter sense of loss, and none of the characters are ever the same. Even Hobbiton has been corrupted and scarred.

And at the risk of being a karma whore, for Christ's sake, he just took one of the world's most obviously intelligent groups, and said we'e all "children" for liking Tolkien! Perhaps we could point at those of such a literal mindset and say their lack of imagination renders them "childish" in their expectation that the world around them is the only one worth thinking about. Reporters don't discover quantum fluctuation, or super string theory, geeks do! I fail to see how broadly saying we're all emotional runts fails to take into account the overwhelming burden of evidence which is our contribution to the world, and his life.

Fuck the media and fuck this guy. Learn to read the book you're writing about, and learn that not everything is about politics or fucking lawyers. It's easy to read about doctors, because everyone's afraid of dying. Lack of imagination doesn't make you a better person.

Anti-geek?

[Gregoyle]

Am I the only /. reader who didn't interpret this article ("Lord of the Geeks") as a slam against all that is geekdom? I think we should all remember the audience for whom _The Village Voice_ is intended. It's written for people who consider themselves "intellectuals". Truth to tell I think most of these people are just trying to comfort themselves that they majored in Liberal Arts in undergrad and wrote their graduate thesis on something like "Symbolism in the Later Works of George Carlin" or some such thing (disclaimer: I just graduated with a B.A. in Linguistics, but I also consider myself fairly geeky).

The article was aiming at its audience and identifying their common view of Tolkien, but was also disputing that view. The author identified one of the common views of geeks (that they/we are nothing but antisocial losers stuck in childhood), but then noted that even if you hold that view you had to admit that there was something to geekiness. He was trying to show the people who think geeks and J.R.R. Tolkien are just silly that his work really *does* have significance even if you aren't a geek. Also, as far as him talking about Tolkien appealing to people's (is that a word?) inner childishness... well of course it does!! Do you REALLY want to act completely "grown up"? I think most of the fun we manage to derive from our dreary jobs (well some of us) and boring lives (okay, well maybe just me ;-)) comes from moments of pure childishness. There is nothing wrong with being childish, indeed, if you take Tolkien's philosphy there is much to be said about preserving something precious that is fading from our lives

Now damn you all for stopping me from moderating up some really good posts just so I could post this silly reply to ungrounded rants.

Star Trek ur-geeks, unite!

[tookish]

"Or something even geekier, arguably: ur-geeks. Keepers of the geek flame. For if The Lord of the Rings is not the sine qua non of geek culture, it's hard to think what is."

The folks who spend their weekends dressed as Klingons will be mighty unimpressed with this.

"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be . . . an easy way to factor large prime numbers"

Oo, Those Awful Orcs!

[dazed-n-confused]

Here's a link to the classic critical review of Tolkien's work by Edmund Wilson (April 14, 1956).

Re:High test scores, but...

[Kingfox]

All these outraged reactions to Julian Dibbel crack me up. The guy is pretentious, too sure of himself, capable of overwriting anything. But just from the couple of samples of his writing that I've seen, he's also unarguably a Geek himself. He celebrates the culture via critique, because he's a full-fledged member of it himself. Dibbel is a geek.

Let's not forget that after Dibbel wrote the Rape in Cyberspace article, he spent a large amount of time on LambdaMOO, eventually writing My Tiny Life... Anyone who thinks Dibbel is anti-geek should read that book. You'd realize that if he were anti-geek, he'd be self-destructive.

Attitudes towards Tolkien

[Alien54]

[quotes taken from the Village voice articles]

Germaine Greer, who arrived at Cambridge as a student in 1964, wrote "it has been my nightmare that Tolkien would turn out to be the most influential writer of the twentieth century. The bad dream has materialized." Nor does the official stance seem to have softened any since.

which sort of sums up the official attitude towards Tolkien. The Literatti are appalled that something with so much mass appeal would become so meaningful to so many people.

that said, while Tolkien may not have been the most profound or the most skilled of the twentieth century writers, the canvas that he wrote own, the size of his unified work and its' integrity has ensured it a place in the history of the 20th century. people tend tyo romanticize it a bit. seaking symbolisms thatmight not be true to the author. As is said of one review:

It fails to take Tolkien's literary project as seriously as he took it himself. "I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations," he famously wrote in one foreword to the trilogy, warning readers against the temptation of finding in it "any inner meaning or 'message.' " Nearly every thoughtful piece of Tolkien criticism makes some kind of nod to the letter of that admonition, but very few can resist violating its spirit.

So simply it is its own creation, intended to be separate from the traditions that are part of our culture. In a sense, it is intended to be a true history of a different world. even so:

Because of its extra-cinematic life [online, etc], it can't escape being a monument to its own built-in cult, which is roughly the size of humanity.

sounds about right to me.

Check out the Vinny the Vampire comic strip

Good take

[Millard Fillmore]

I think Dibbell has a good take on what Tolkien's works actually are. His books are to literature what Lucas' trilogy is to film - not the height of twentieth century culture nor the epitome of style and technique, but certainly a formative part of the narrative landscape. Whether he realizes it or not, Dibbell is right to point out that Tokien, along with Lucas and a host of others who worked their way into the popular culture, has specified the architecture for the imagination-space of our culture, especially those who create and support technology. And it is exactly that, if we look back to the earliest works we consider "great," which western literature was born to do.

You can protect yourself

[infiniti99]

Don't read Slashdot links unless they look credible. I'm sorry, but there are just too many trolls here to assume that any link is going to take you somewhere useful. And after that auto-modding incident, you can't even trust a link from a "Score: 5, Insightful" post.

Steps to ensure you don't get goatsexed:

• *Always* check the real link (displayed at the bottom of most browsers). Don't trust the link in the posting.
• Make sure the link is from a credible source. In other words, a site you've been to before.
• Never trust a redirected link (bigfoot, cjb, etc).
• It is possible to use tricks to redirect from a credible source like msn.com. If the link is too long, or contains something in the URL that you don't understand, don't click it.
• If you see goatse in the URL anywhere, definitely don't click it :)
• Last but not least, use lynx. Generally if I don't trust the link then I don't even bother clicking it. But if it's something that you really need to check into, use lynx on it (or some no-image browser). I've caught quite a few goatse redirects through lynx.

Just a few extra steps go a long way. No person should have to go through the viewing of that image in their lifetime. And for those of us for which it is already too late: multiple viewings..

Why Tolkien wrote his books

[Alatar]

Tolkien didn't write his books as allegory, or to give obsessive people something to obsess over, or any of the usual reasons people write books. Professor Tolkien was a linguist, and liked to invent languages. Being a linguist, he realized that languages are nothing without a cultural context to place them in. Hence, he created a world, based it on some legends he had grown up with, populated it with cultures and races such as Elves and Dwarves, and gave them each unique languages. And he wrote a story about one of the events that happened in that world. Nothing more, nothing less. That's actually one of the reasons I like LOTR so much, it's just a good story, you don't have to work at reading it. You can just spend time reading and re-reading each paragraph, so rich are the descriptions and scenery. Tolkien's work is "fractal"...every person in it has a darned good reason for being there and good motivations for taking the actions they do. From the green hills of Hobbiton to the cracked plains of Gorgoroth, the story just gets better and better as it goes on, and takes on bigger and bigger events. Damn...what a story it is. I have to read it again before the movie release forever changes the way I think about LOTR.

LOTR Trailers

[BIGJIMSLATE]

For those of you (all eight of you goatse-obsessed kids) who havn't seen ANYTHING about LOTR yet, or have no interest to, these links might help you get an idea (plaintext links [too late for html :p]).

Teaser Trailer:
http://a912.g.akamai.net/5/912/51/7f33d9e39a6b87 /1 a1a1aaa2198c627970773d80669d84574a8d80d3cb12453c02 589f25382f668c9329e0375e81785ea61cd36a40938a41385e 948b71d7cf058bd1c8ef765cc3f/lotr_640_full.mov

Teaser Trailer 2:
http://a1872.g.akamai.net/5/1872/51/4e446d3cbafe ec /1a1a1aaa2198c627970773d80669d84574a8d80d3cb12453c 02589f25382f668c9329e0375e81785ea61cd36a40938a4138 5e948b71d7cf058bd1c8ef765cc3f/fellowshipofthering_ 480.mov

Fellowship of the Rings trailer:
http://www.film.warka.pl/trailer/lotr3big.mpg

NOW, go and actually read the article for once. ;)

Some questions about evil

[OpenSourced]

Tolkien's theory of evil? Well, orcs are, our heroes aren't, and that about sums it up.

What about Gollum? What about the concept, pervasive in the book, of good to be found in the innermost of even the most evil of creatures? What about the parallel concept of all the "good ones", being corruptable? And about that being true specially of the highest of them, being the lower ones (read the hobbits), less prone to corruption as they are not so worried about power and riches, because they enjoy thouroughly their lives? And about the many paths that corruption may take, masquerading itself at first as "neccesary steps against a bigger evil" (read censorship, martial laws...)?

Has he read the books? Has he understood them?

You do not need to look up the word "literary snob" in the dictionary now, you have been presented with a (presumably) living exemplar. A literary snob, after all is said and done is, sadly, really only a troll. I mean in the geek sense of the term, not the Tolkien sense. He will always seek the new slant about something, not caring if it's remotely consistent or interesting, but only that is provoking. He will never consider they own feelings about something, only how is that going to look from the outside. Nothing popular can be good. If Shakespeare were to prove now too popular, he would say that no book in which characters say things like "Out, you mad-headed ape!" (Henry IV) can be more than a lightweight work. Well, I've ranted enough. I must remember... not to feed the trolls.

Keepers of the geek flame..

[uigrad_2000]

Geek can mean a lot of different things. Webster says:

geek: a carnival performer often billed as a wild man whose act usually includes biting the head off a live chicken or snake

The article says:

Or something even geekier, arguably: ur-geeks. Keepers of the geek flame. For if The Lord of the Rings is not the sine qua non of geek culture, it's hard to think what is.

So, we can blame LOTR for all the decapitated snakes and chickens we see at carnivals.

Reference: Webster online http://www.webster.com

This isn't a troll, and not that rare an opinion.

[Flying Headless Goku]

My own opinion on first reading was that Tolkien wrote in a stiff, unnatural style about a world that had many interesting pieces, but didn't really fit together into a believable whole. Many of the people I spoke to agreed with me. I still think The Hobbit was his best work.

However, I had not been told a hundred times before I read it that it was the Best Thing Ever, as I am reminded several times weekly on the internet. It's hard to develop or maintain an honest individual opinion about something presented as a major part of the basis of your adopted culture. Look at the above post, for example: moderated down as a troll just for wondering what the big deal is!

I wince every time I hear of anything containing wizards or goblins referred to as derived from Tolkien's work. Wizards and goblins were fairy-tale standards long before he came along, and they resonate deeply from the hundreds of years in which they were experimented with and tuned for maximum entertainment value.

I regard his work as merely a primitive early example of the western-european folklore-based fantasy novel, not the root from which all such works grow. The range of source materials used for novels was rapidly growing, and he just happened to be the first (or at least one of the first) to try cobbling together the monsters and heroes of medieval myth into a good long story to be printed up in cheap volumes for mass entertainment. In this way, he is more like the first man to cross the finish line in a race than an explorer who shows people a new place worth going to.

I believe strongly that if Tolkien had never lived, the main difference in fantasy literature would be no mentions of Tolkien in the reviews. There would still be stories about fireball-hurling wizards, sneaking goblins, vicious trolls, haughty elves, talking trees, and tough dwarves. Tales would still revolve around the world-threatening artifact and would still commonly feature the fish-out-of-water everyman-hero.

Why? Because the creatures are common in fairy tales (only recently driven from childhood bed-time reading by the incredible horde of modern authors), and the themes are common in ancient myths.
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