No, they don't if they do it in a way that's weaker than most other products on the market.
No, it doesn't come just from the story because ethnical makeup of societies very often played into the narrative and military/governmental organization of said societies, as well as local tensions, and was extremely important to understanding history to begin with. So I can't believe you're being serious with this statement, that's certainly a new "wuuut" moment for me. Plus, that's a little bit naïve, in a way. The result of messing with history like that would be establishing falsehood/rewriting history in our next generation and so on, not upholding truths. An average person watching a movie labelled historical (or documentary!) is going to consider it a fact, and eventually even hobbyists and more historically versed people from newer generations will come to accept the new "interpretation."
Never said I was fine with that, and that fact alone does not give anyone the upper ground to mess with historical facts as they see fit. Castings should be historically accurate and there are plenty of historical stories and kingdoms to include everyone with different varieties of movies and settings portrayed.
Who says it is done in a weaker way than most other products on the market? You? SSG? The audience of said Market? It's already been brought up in this thread how popular it is for players to make a character, that reflects their RL self. There are literally hundred and hundreds of different entertainment avenues that cast . . . off the historical story, all successful. If it were such a bad thing to do in business, they would have stopped doing it, a long time ago. Yet, we see far more of it now. Companies tend to drop a trend if it's losing them money, not step it up.
Happy to give you a "wuuut" moment for sure. I've had quite a lot of "seriously?" moments in these threads too.
I understand that with some films, it is only ever going to work if they cast the group written into the story, when it comes to history. That will never change. But guess what? LotR isn't history, its a game, based on a fantasy book. There is room for some change, especially with some of the things that are written into, and/or omitted from the story.
And I never said that you were fine with that, hence, why I asked how it fits in with your view. It gives no upper hand, correct, but it does prove beyond any doubt, that this isn't as cut and dry as you're trying to make it out to be. I don't agree that actors should only act within their own groups. Equality and all that.
Enough back and forth though. You have your opinion, I have mine. SSG have theirs, and what they say - goes.
Sometimes, no matter how hard you look, there is no best light.
Objective reason. Play some other games and compare. It's quite self-evident after playing through and immersing oneself in enough games.
That's not necessarily true and depends on what kind of companies and from where. But in gaming industry in particular, seems easier to notice that companies are actually interested in making money above all else, in the end, and that's why there is a trend there. I already mentioned what's the trend and why SSG's new implementation comes off as much weaker compared with most others (needlessly really, because most of the work to alleviate that would be text work, so not terribly demanding).
I said 'English' and I meant 'English' to show it's not literal, since of course they aren't. But Tokien just plain up said English, and he should know: that's who he meant them to resemble and he said as much. End of story. He gives them names that are variously from English, Frankish, Gothic and Breton that I know of. Now why would he do that, I wonder? Those weren't their 'real' names as he imagined them to himself (as they'd have looked weird to his readers), for storytelling purposes he chose ones which had a comfortably familiar ring to them and an equivalent air thanks to their derivation. 'Samwise', for example, is taken from an Old English word while 'Gamgee' is a real English surname. 'Frodo' is adapted from an Old English name. 'Baggins' is a real surname too, from Anglo-Saxon. So little 'English' people with names meant to seem somehow familiar to English readers, in a little patch of purposeful 'Englishness' meant to seem cosily familiar and welcoming to his readers by virtue of that. And almost nobody seems to have a problem with that, even if you do.
As a more general point: LOTR and the Silmarillion were written as constructed myth and legend and those are naturally localised, they come from a particular culture and while there are always universals within them, that isn't all they consist of. If you take away their local cultural character then what you get is just blandly generic. If you put anyone and everyone in them then there's no coherent sense of place or time or culture, and it looks oddly modern rather than ancient and hence fake. It lacks the consistency and compellingly genuine atmosphere that made the original appealing. It's not just LOTR that'd suffer through that, Netflix managed to screw up The Witcher when all they had to do in order to have a surefire lasting hit was to conjure a compellingly dark vision of Slavic folklore and the feeling of that culture and then stick with it (plus letting Geralt do what he does best). But no, they simply had to make it generic and gutted it, and look how that turned out. And don't even get me started on Rings of Power - suffice to say, that failed. A large majority of viewers didn't watch the whole series. So doing things your way doesn't exactly come recommended.
They're not going to learn anything about it if it's fake. Like the way the game has done it, with it not being connected to anything or in any way realistic within the setting but just being there as if by magic and unaccountably modern. Diversity is a result of history: artificially imposing the diversity seen in some other place and time entirely (like, big cities in the US as they are nowadays, or whatever) on some supposedly 'ancient' time like LOTR's is just tokenism. If you actually wanted to teach anyone about it, you'd have to make it part of the story and that'd mean making it a real, solid part of that - and really, you'd want a different setting to do that with.
Some interesting commentary by Tolkien and American influences trying to change British culture and ideals….
I wonder (if we survive this war) if there will be any niche, even of sufferance, left for reactionary back numbers like me (and you). The bigger things get the smaller and duller or flatter the globe gets. It is getting to be all one blasted little provincial suburb. When they have introduced American sanitation, morale-pep, feminism, and mass production throughout the Near East, Middle East, Far East, U.S.S.R., the Pampas, el Gran Chaco, the Danubian Basin, Equatorial Africa, Hither Further and Inner Mumbo-land, Gondhwanaland, Lhasa, and the villages of darkest Berkshire, how happy we shall be. At any rate it ought to cut down travel. There will be nowhere to go. So people will (I opine) go all the faster. Col. Knox4 says 1/ 8 of the world’s population speaks ‘English’, and that is the biggest language group. If true, damn shame–say I. May the curse of Babel strike all their tongues till they can only say ‘baa baa’. It would mean much the same. I think I shall have to refuse to speak anything but Old Mercian. But seriously: I do find this Americo-cosmopolitanism very terrifying. Qua mind and spirit, and neglecting the piddling fears of timid flesh which does not want to be shot or chopped by brutal and licentious soldiery (German or other), I am not really sure that its victory is going to be so much the better for the world as a whole and in the long run than the victory of——. 5 I don’t suppose letters in are censored. But if they are, or not, I need to you hardly add that them’s the sentiments of a good many folk–and no indication of lack of patriotism. For I love England (not Great Britain and certainly not the British Commonwealth (grr!)), and if I was of military age, I should, I fancy, be grousing away in a fighting service, and willing to go on to the bitter end–always hoping that things may turn out better for England than they look like doing. Somehow I cannot really imagine the fantastic luck (or blessing, one would call it, if one could dimly see why we should be blessed–implying God) that has attended England is running out yet. Chi vincerà? said the Italians (before they got involved poor devils), and answered Stalin. Not altogether right perhaps. Our Cherub above referred to can play a wily hand–one guesses, one hopes, one does not know. . . . . Your own father.”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
…(I should like to add) to veto anything from or influenced by the Disney studios (for all whose works I have a heartfelt loathing). I have seen American illustrations that suggest that excellent things might be produced–only too excellent for their companions. But perhaps you could tell me how long there is before I must produce samples that might hope to satisfy Transatlantic juvenile taste (or its expert connoisseurs)?. . . . Yours sincerely J. R. R. Tolkien 14 To Allen & Unwin”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
…and a very nice young American Officer, New-Englander. I stood the hot-air they let off as long as I could; but when I heard the Yank burbling about ‘Feudalism’ and its results on English class-distinctions and social behaviour, I opened a broadside. The poor #### had not, of course, the very faintest notions about ‘Feudalism’, or history at all–being a chemical engineer. But you can’t knock ‘Feudalism’ out of an American’s head, any more than the ‘Oxford Accent’. He was impressed I think when I said that an Englishman’s relations with porters, butlers, and tradesmen had as much connexion with ‘Feudalism’ as skyscrapers had with Red Indian wigwams, or taking off one’s hat to a lady has with the modern methods of collecting Income Tax; but I am certain he was not convinced. I did however get a dim notion into his head that the ‘Oxford Accent’ (by which he politely told me he meant mine) was not ‘forced’ and ‘put on’, but a natural one learned in the nursery–and was moreover not feudal or aristocratic but a very middle-class bourgeois invention. After I told him that his ‘accent’ sounded to me like English after being wiped over with a dirty sponge, and generally suggested (falsely) to an English observer that, together with American slouch, it indicated a slovenly and ill-disciplined people–well, we got quite friendly. We had some bad coffee in the refreshment room at Snow Hill, and parted.”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
“The Americans are not as a rule at all amenable to criticism or correction…”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
“Not a soil in which the fungus-growth of cults is likely to arise. The horrors of the American scene I will pass over, though they have given me great distress and labour. (They arise in an entirely different mental climate and soil, polluted and impoverished to a degree only paralleled by the lunatic destruction of the physical lands which Americans inhabit.). . . .”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
“But it is the aeroplane of war that is the real villain. And nothing can really amend my grief that you, my best beloved, have any connexion with it. My sentiments are more or less those that Frodo would have had if he discovered some Hobbits learning to ride Nazgûl-birds, ‘for the liberation of the Shire’. Though in this case, as I know nothing about British or American imperialism in the Far East that does not fill me with regret and disgust, I am afraid I am not even supported by a glimmer of patriotism in this remaining war. I would not subscribe a penny to it, let alone a son, were I a free man. It can only benefit America or Russia: prob. the latter. But at least the Americo-Russian War won’t break out for a year yet.”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
Last edited by Baggins; Apr 30 2023 at 01:36 PM.
From the point of view of this game. They would still learn, that Frodo, a hobbit from the Shire, who's uncles name was Bilbo, who was a friend of a Wizard named Gandalf, but also called Mithrandir, by a powerful, female elf named Galadriel, took the ring of power to Mordor to destroy it. Unless those characters were specifically described, as in, Galadriel being fair, with long golden hair, they could be cast as anything, and the story would tell the same thing.
We as players create minor characters in the game, the majority of which do not appear in any way, shape, or form, in the lore. These characters will not change the story of Lord of the Rings. Until we can create a character called Galadriel, and give her black skin, a mohawk, and a beard, the status quo is solid.
Sometimes, no matter how hard you look, there is no best light.
Confused are you not able to read the quotes?
Here is his stuff in American film company attempting to adapt and change things…
“198 From a letter to Rayner Unwin 19 June 1957 [An American film-maker had enquired about the possibility of making a cartoon film of The Lord of the Rings.] As far as I am concerned personally, I should welcome the idea of an animated motion picture, with all the risk of vulgarization; and that quite apart from the glint of money, though on the brink of retirement that is not an unpleasant possibility. I think I should find vulgarization less painful than the sillification achieved by the B.B.C.”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
[On 4 September, Tolkien was visited by representatives of the American company which was interested in making an animated film of The Lord of the Rings. He was given a copy of the synopsis of the film, which he agreed to read.] You will receive on Monday the copy of the ‘Story Line’ or synopsis of the proposed film version of The Lord of the Rings. I could not get it off yesterday. . . . . An abridgement by selection with some good picture-work would be pleasant, & perhaps worth a good deal in publicity; but the present script is rather a compression with resultant over-crowding and confusion, blurring of climaxes, and general degradation: a pull-back towards more conventional ‘fairy-stories’. People gallop about on Eagles at the least provocation; Lórien becomes a fairy-castle with ‘delicate minarets’, and all that sort of thing. But I am quite prepared to play ball, if they are open to advice–and if you decide that the thing is genuine, and worthwhile.”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
207 From a letter to Rayner Unwin 8 April 1958 [Negotiations were proceeding with the American film company. The synopsis of the proposed film of The Lord of the Rings was the work of Morton Grady Zimmerman.] Zimmerman–‘Story-Line’ Of course, I will get busy on this at once, now that Easter is over, and the Dutch incense is dissipated. Thank you for the copy of the Story-line, which I will go through again. I am entirely ignorant of the process of producing an ‘animated picture’ from a book, and of the jargon connected with it. Could you let me know exactly what is a ‘story-line’, and its function in the process? It is not necessary (or advisable) for me to waste time on mere expressions if these are simply directions to picture-producers. But this document, as it stands, is sufficient to give me grave anxiety about the actual dialogue that (I suppose) will be used. I should say Zimmerman, the constructor of this s-l, is quite incapable of excerpting or adapting the ‘spoken words’ of the book. He is hasty, insensitive, and impertinent. He does not read books. It seems to me evident that he has skimmed through the L.R. at a great pace, and then constructed his s.l. from partly confused memories, and with the minimum of references back to the original. Thus he gets most of the names wrong in form–not occasionally by casual error but fixedly (always Borimor for Boromir); or he misapplies them: Radagast becomes an Eagle. The introduction of characters and the indications of what they are to say have little or no reference to the book. Bombadil comes in with ‘a gentle laugh’!. . . . I feel very unhappy about the extreme silliness and incompetence of Z and his complete lack of respect for the original (it seems wilfully wrong without discernible technical reasons at nearly every point). But I need, and shall soon need very much indeed, money, and I am conscious of your rights and interests; so that I shall endeavour to restrain myself, and avoid all avoidable offence. I will send you my remarks, particular and general, as soon as I can; and of course nothing will go to Ackerman1 except through you and with at least your assent.”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. TolkieN
A back-wash from the Convention was a visit from an American film-agent (one of the adjudicating panel) who drove out all the way in a taxi from London to see me last week, filling 76 S[ andfield] with strange men and stranger women–I thought the taxi would never stop disgorging. But this Mr Ackerman brought some really astonishingly good pictures (Rackham rather than Disney) and some remarkable colour photographs. They have apparently toured America shooting mountain and desert scenes that seem to fit the story. The Story Line or Scenario was, however, on a lower level. In fact bad. But it looks as if business might be done. Stanley U. & I have agreed on our policy: Art or Cash. Either very profitable terms indeed; or absolute author’s veto on objectionable features or alterations.”
— The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien by J.R.R. Tolkien
Tolkien’s comments on the film ‘treatment’ of The Lord of the Rings.]
I have at last finished my commentary on the Story-line. Its length and detail will, I hope, give evidence of my interest in the matter. Some at least of the things that I have said or suggested may be acceptable, even useful, or at least interesting. The commentary goes along page by page, according to the copy of Mr Zimmerman’s work, which was left with me, and which I now return. I earnestly hope that someone will take the trouble to read it. If Z and/ or others do so, they may be irritated or aggrieved by the tone of many of my criticisms. If so, I am sorry (though not surprised). But I would ask them to make an effort of imagination sufficient to understand the irritation (and on occasion the resentment) of an author, who finds, increasingly as he proceeds, his work treated as it would seem carelessly in general, in places recklessly, and with no evident signs of any appreciation of what it is all about. . . . . The canons of narrative art in any medium cannot be wholly different; and the failure of poor films is often precisely in exaggeration, and in the intrusion of unwarranted matter owing to not perceiving where the core of the original lies. Z. . . . has intruded a ‘fairy castle’ and a great many Eagles, not to mention incantations, blue lights, and some irrelevant magic (such as the floating body of Faramir). He has cut the parts of the story upon which its characteristic and peculiar tone principally depends, showing a preference for fights; and he has made no serious attempt to represent the heart of the tale adequately: the journey of the Ringbearers. The last and most important part of this has, and it is not too strong a word, simply been murdered. [Some extracts from Tolkien’s lengthy commentary on the Story Line:] Z is used as an abbreviation for (the writer of) the synopsis. References to this are by page (and line where required); references to the original story are by Volume and page. 2. Why should the firework display include flags and hobbits? They are not in the book. ‘Flags’ of what? I prefer my own choice of fireworks. Gandalf, please, should not ‘splutter’. Though he may seem testy at times, has a sense of humour, and adopts a somewhat avuncular attitude to hobbits, he is a person of high and noble authority, and great dignity. The description on I p. 2391 should never be forgotten. 4. Here we meet the first intrusion of the Eagles. I think they are a major mistake of Z, and without warrant. The Eagles are a dangerous ‘machine’. I have used them sparingly, and that is the absolute limit of their credibility or usefulness. The alighting of a Great Eagle of the Misty Mountains in the Shire is absurd; it also makes the later capture of G. by Saruman incredible, and spoils the account of his escape. (One of Z’s chief faults is his tendency to anticipate scenes or devices used later, thereby flattening the tale out.) Radagast is not an Eagle-name, but a wizard’s name; several eagle-names are supplied in the book. These points are to me important. Here I may say that I fail to see why the time-scheme should be deliberately contracted. It is already rather packed in the original, the main action occurring between Sept. 22 and March 25 of the following year. The many impossibilities and absurdities which further hurrying produces might, I suppose, be unobserved by an uncritical viewer; but I do not see why they should be unnecessarily introduced. Time must naturally be left vaguer in a picture than in a book; but I cannot see why definite time-statements, contrary to the book and to probability, should be made. . . . . Seasons are carefully regarded in the original. They are pictorial, and should be, and easily could be, made the main means by which the artists indicate time-passage. The main action begins in autumn and passes through winter to a brilliant spring: this is basic to the purport and tone of the tale. The contraction of time and space in Z destroys that. His arrangements would, for instance, land us in a snowstorm while summer was still in. The Lord of the Rings may be a ‘fairy-story’, but it takes place in the Northern hemisphere of this earth: miles are miles, days are days, and weather is weather. Contraction of this kind is not the same thing as the necessary reduction or selection of the scenes and events that are to be visually represented. 7. The first paragraph misrepresents Tom Bombadil. He is not the owner of the woods; and he would never make any such threat. ‘Old scamp!’ This is a good example of the general tendency that I find in Z to reduce and lower the tone towards that of a more childish fairy-tale. The expression does not agree with the tone of Bombadil’s long later talk; and though that is cut, there is no need for its indications to be disregarded. I am sorry, but I think the manner of the introduction of Goldberry is silly, and on a par with ‘old scamp’. It also has no warrant in my tale. We are not in ‘fairy-land’, but in real river-lands in autumn. Goldberry represents the actual seasonal changes in such lands. Personally I think she had far better disappear than make a meaningless appearance. 8 line 24. The landlord does not ask Frodo to ‘register’! 2 Why should he? There are no police and no government. (Neither do I make him number his rooms.) If details are to be added to an already crowded picture, they should at least fit the world described. 9. Leaving the inn at night and running off into the dark is an impossible solution of the difficulties of presentation here (which I can see). It is the last thing that Aragorn would have done. It is based on a misconception of the Black Riders throughout, which I beg Z to reconsider. Their peril is almost entirely due to the unreasoning fear which they inspire (like ghosts). They have no great physical power against the fearless; but what they have, and the fear that they inspire, is enormously increased in darkness. The Witch-king, their leader, is more powerful in all ways than the others; but he must not yet be raised to the stature of Vol. III. There, put in command by Sauron, he is given an added demonic force. But even in the Battle of the Pelennor, the darkness had only just broken. See III 114.3 10. Rivendell was not ‘a shimmering forest’. This is an unhappy anticipation of Lórien (which it in no way resembled). It could not be seen from Weathertop: it was 200 miles away and hidden in a ravine. I can see no pictorial or story-making gain in needlessly contracting the geography. Strider does not ‘Whip out a sword’ in the book. Naturally not: his sword was broken. (Its elvish light is another false anticipation of the reforged Anduril. Anticipation is one of Z’s chief faults.) Why then make him do so here, in a contest that was explicitly not fought with weapons? 11. Aragorn did not ‘sing the song of Gil-galad’. Naturally: it was quite inappropriate, since it told of the defeat of the Elven-king by the Enemy. The Black Riders do not scream, but keep a more terrifying silence. Aragorn does not blanch. The riders draw slowly in on foot in darkness, and do not ‘spur’. There is no fight. Sam does not ‘sink his blade into the Ringwraith’s thigh’, nor does his thrust save Frodo’s life. (If he had, the result would have been much the same as in III 117–20: 4 the Wraith would have fallen down and the sword would have been destroyed.) Why has my account been entirely rewritten here, with disregard for the rest of the tale? I can see that there are certain difficulties in representing a dark scene; but they are not insuperable. A scene of gloom lit by a small red fire, with the Wraiths slowly approaching as darker shadows–until the moment when Frodo puts on the Ring, and the King steps forward revealed–would seem to me far more impressive than yet one more scene of screams and rather meaningless slashings. . . . . I have spent some time on this passage, as an example of what I find too frequent to give me ‘pleasure or satisfaction’: deliberate alteration of the story, in fact and significance, without any practical or artistic object (that I can see); and of the flattening effect that assimilation of one incident to another must have. 15. Time is again contracted and hurried, with the effect of reducing the importance of the Quest. Gandalf does not say they will leave as soon as they can pack! Two months elapse. There is no need to say anything with a time-purport. The lapse of time should be indicated, if by no more than the change to winter in the scenery and trees. At the bottom of the page, the Eagles are again introduced. I feel this to be a wholly unacceptable tampering with the tale. ‘Nine Walkers’ and they immediately go up in the air! The intrusion achieves nothing but incredibility, and the staling of the device of the Eagles when at last they are really needed. It is well within the powers of pictures to suggest, relatively briefly, a long and arduous journey, in secrecy, on foot, with the three ominous mountains getting nearer. Z does not seem much interested in seasons or scenery, though from what I saw I should say that in the representation of these the chief virtue and attraction of the film is likely to be found. But would Z think that he had improved the effect of a film of, say, the ascent of Everest by introducing helicopters to take the climbers half way up (in defiance of probability)? It would be far better to cut the Snow-storm and the Wolves than to make a farce of the arduous journey. 19. Why does Z put beaks and feathers on Orcs!? (Ores is not a form of Auks.) The Orcs are definitely stated to be corruptions of the ‘human’ form seen in Elves and Men. They are (or were) squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, with wide mouths and slant eyes: in fact degraded and repulsive versions of the (to Europeans) least lovely Mongol-types. 20. The Balrog never speaks or makes any vocal sound at all. Above all he does not laugh or sneer. . . . . Z may think that he knows more about Balrogs than I do, but he cannot expect me to agree with him. 21 ff. ‘A splendid sight. It is the home of Galadriel … an Elvenqueen.’ (She is not in fact one.) ‘Delicate spires and tiny minarets of Elven-color are cleverly woven into a beautiful[ ly] designed castle.’ I think this deplorable in itself, and in places impertinent. Will Z please pay my text some respect, at least in descriptions that are obviously central to the general tone and style of the book! I will in no circumstances accept this treatment of Lórien, even if Z personally prefers ‘tiny’ fairies and the gimcrack of conventional modern fairy-tales. The disappearance of the temptation of Galadriel is significant. Practically everything having moral import has vanished from the synopsis. 22. Lembas, ‘waybread’, is called a ‘food concentrate’. As I have shown I dislike strongly any pulling of my tale towards the style and feature of ‘contes des fées’, or French fairy-stories. I dislike equally any pull towards ‘scientification’, of which this expression is an example. Both modes are alien to my story. We are not exploring the Moon or any other more improbable region. No analysis in any laboratory would discover chemical properties of lembas that made it superior to other cakes of wheat-meal. I only comment on the expression here as an indication of attitude. It is no doubt casual; and nothing of this kind or style will (I hope) escape into the actual dialogue. In the book lembas has two functions. It is a ‘machine’ or device for making credible the long marches with little provision, in a world in which as I have said ‘miles are miles’. But that is relatively unimportant. It also has a much larger significance, of what one might hesitatingly call a ‘religious’ kind. This becomes later apparent, especially in the chapter ‘Mount Doom’ (III 2135 and subsequently). I cannot find that Z has made any particular use of lembas even as a device; and the whole of ‘Mount Doom’ has disappeared in the distorted confusion that Z has made of the ending. As far as I can see lembas might as well disappear altogether. I do earnestly hope that in the assignment of actual speeches to the characters they will be represented as I have presented them: in style and sentiment. I should resent perversion of the characters (and do resent it, so far as it appears in this sketch) even more than the spoiling of the plot and scenery. Parts II & III. I have spent much space on criticizing even details in Part I. It has been easier, because Part I in general respects the line of narrative in the book, and retains some of its original coherence. Part II exemplifies all the faults of Part I; but it is far more unsatisfactory, & still more so Part III, in more serious respects. It almost seems as if Z, having spent much time and work on Part I, now found himself short not only of space but of patience to deal with the two more difficult volumes in which the action becomes more fast and complicated. He has in any case elected to treat them in a way that produces a confusion that mounts at last almost to a delirium. . . . . The narrative now divides into two main branches: 1. Prime Action, the Ringbearers. 2. Subsidiary Action, the rest of the Company leading to the ‘heroic’ matter. It is essential that these two branches should each be treated in coherent sequence. Both to render them intelligible as a story, and because they are totally different in tone and scenery. Jumbling them together entirely destroys these things. 31. I deeply regret this handling of the ‘Treebeard’ chapter, whether necessary or not. I have already suspected Z of not being interested in trees: unfortunate, since the story is so largely concerned with them. But surely what we have here is in any case a quite unintelligible glimpse? What are Ents? 31 to 32. We pass now to a dwelling of Men in an ‘heroic age’. Z does not seem to appreciate this. I hope the artists do. But he and they have really only to follow what is said, and not alter it to suit their fancy (out of place). In such a time private ‘chambers’ played no part. Théoden probably had none, unless he had a sleeping ‘bower’ in a separate small ‘outhouse’. He received guests or emissaries, seated on the dais in his royal hall. This is quite clear in the book; and the scene should be much more effective to illustrate. 31 to 32. Why do not Théoden and Gandalf go into the open before the doors, as I have told? Though I have somewhat enriched the culture of the ‘heroic’ Rohirrim, it did not run to glass windows that could be thrown open!! We might be in a hotel. (The ‘east windows’ of the hall, II 116, 119,6 were slits under the eaves, unglazed.) Even if the king of such a people had a ‘bower’, it could not become ‘a beehive of bustling activity’!! The bustle takes place outside and in the town. What is showable of it should occur on the wide pavement before the great doors. 33. I am afraid that I do not find the glimpse of the ‘defence of the Hornburg’–this would be a better title, since Helm’s Deep, the ravine behind, is not shown–entirely satisfactory. It would, I guess, be a fairly meaningless scene in a picture, stuck in in this way. Actually I myself should be inclined to cut it right out, if it cannot be made more coherent and a more significant part of the story. . . . . If both the Ents and the Hornburg cannot be treated at sufficient length to make sense, then one should go. It should be the Hornburg, which is incidental to the main story; and there would be this additional gain that we are going to have a big battle (of which as much should be made as possible), but battles tend to be too similar: the big one would gain by having no competitor. 34. Why on earth should Z say that the hobbits ‘were munching ridiculously long sandwiches’? Ridiculous indeed. I do not see how any author could be expected to be ‘pleased’ by such silly alterations. One hobbit was sleeping, the other smoking. The spiral staircase ‘weaving’ round the Tower [Orthanc] comes from Z’s fancy not my tale. I prefer the latter. The tower was 500 feet high. There was a flight of 27 steps leading to the great door; above which was a window and a balcony. Z is altogether too fond of the words hypnosis and hypnotic. Neither genuine hypnosis, nor scientifictitious variants, occur in my tale. Saruman’s voice was not hypnotic but persuasive. Those who listened to him were not in danger of falling into a trance, but of agreeing with his arguments, while fully awake. It was always open to one to reject, by free will and reason, both his voice while speaking and its after-impressions. Saruman corrupted the reasoning powers. Z has cut out the end of the book, including Saruman’s proper death. In that case I can see no good reason for making him die. Saruman would never have committed suicide: to cling to life to its basest dregs is the way of the sort of person he had become. If Z wants Saruman tidied up (I cannot see why, where so many threads are left loose) Gandalf should say something to this effect: as Saruman collapses under the excommunication: ‘Since you will not come out and aid us, here in Orthanc you shall stay till you rot, Saruman. Let the Ents look to it!’ Part III. . . . is totally unacceptable to me, as a whole and in detail. If it is meant as notes only for a section of something like the pictorial length of I and II, then in the filling out it must be brought into relation with the book, and its gross alterations of that corrected. If it is meant to represent only a kind of short finale, then all I can say is: The Lord of the Rings cannot be garbled like that.”On 5 June 1955 in the New York Times Book Review, the columnist Harvey Breit devoted part of his weekly article ‘In and Out of Books’ to an account of Tolkien and his writings. It included this passage: ‘What, we asked Dr [sic] Tolkien, makes you tick? Dr T., who teaches at Oxford when he isn’t writing novels, has this brisk reply: “I don’t tick. I am not a machine. (If I did tick, I should have no views on it, and you had better ask the winder.) My work did not ‘evolve’ into a serious work. It started like that. The so-called ‘children’s story’ [The Hobbit] was a fragment, torn out of an already existing mythology. In so far as it was dressed up as ‘for children’, in style or manner, I regret it. So do the children. I am a philologist, and all my work is philological. I avoid hobbies because I am a very serious person and cannot distinguish between private amusement and duty. I am affable, but unsociable. I only work for private amusement, since I find my duties privately amusing.”’ These remarks were apparently taken from a letter written by Tolkien in answer to enquiries by a representative of the New York Times. On 30 June 1955, Tolkien wrote to the Houghton Mifflin Co., his American publishers:
‘Please do not blame me for what Breit made of my letter!. . . . The original made sense: not a quality, however, of which Harvey B. seems perceptive. I was asked a series of questions, with a request to answer briefly, brightly, and quotably. . . . . Out of sheer pity [for another enquirer wanting information]. . . . I do enclose a few notes on points other than mere facts of my “curriculum vitae” (which can be got from reference books).’ What follows is these ‘few notes’. The text is taken from a typescript apparently made by the Houghton Mifflin Co. from Tolkien’s original; this typescript was sent to a number of enquirers at different times, some of whom quoted from it in articles about Tolkien. Tolkien himself was given a copy of the typescript, and he made a number of annotations and corrections to it, which are incorporated into the text which is here printed.] My name is TOLKIEN (not-kein). It is a German name (from Saxony), an anglicization of Tollkiehn, i.e. tollkühn. But, except as a guide to spelling, this fact is as fallacious as all facts in the raw. For I am neither ‘foolhardy’ 1 nor German, whatever some remote ancestors may have been. They migrated to England more than 200 years ago, and became quickly intensely English (not British), though remaining musical–a talent that unfortunately did not descend to me.fn43 I am in fact far more of a Suffield2 (a family deriving from Evesham in Worcestershire), and it is to my mother who taught me (until I obtained a scholarship at the ancient Grammar School in Birmingham) that I owe my tastes for philology, especially of Germanic languages, and for romance. I am indeed in English terms a West-midlander at home only in the counties upon the Welsh Marches; and it is, I believe, as much due to descent as to opportunity that Anglo-Saxon and Western Middle English and alliterative verse have been both a childhood attraction and my main professional sphere. (I also find the Welsh language specially attractive.fn44) I write alliterative verse with pleasure, though I have published little beyond the fragments in The Lord of the Rings, except ‘The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth’ (in Essays and Studies of the English Association, 1953, London, John Murray) recently twice broadcast by the BBC: a dramatic dialogue on the nature of the ‘heroic’ and the ‘chivalrous’. I still hope to finish a long poem on The Fall of Arthur in the same measure. 3 All the same, I was born in Bloemfontein, Orange River Free State–another fallacious fact (though my earliest memories are of a hot country) since I was shipped home in 1895, and have spent most of 60 years since in Birmingham and Oxford, except for 5 or 6 years in Leeds: my first post after the 1914–18 War was in the university there. I am very untravelled, though I know Wales, and have often been in Scotland (never north of the Tay), and know something of France, Belgium, and Ireland. I have spent a good deal of time in Ireland, and am since last July actually a D. Litt. of University College Dublin; but be it noted I first set foot in ‘Eire’ in 1949 after The Lord of the Rings was finished, and find both Gaelic and the air of Ireland wholly alien–though the latter (not the language) is attractive. I might add that in October I received a degree (Doct. en Lettres et Phil.) at Liège (Belgium)–if only to record the fact that it astonished me to be welcomed in French as ‘le createur de M. Bilbo Baggins’ and still more to be told in explanation of applause that I was a ‘set book’ ?????? Alas! If I might elucidate what H. Breit has left of my letter: the remark about ‘philology’ was intended to allude to what is I think a primary ‘fact’ about my work, that it is all of a piece, and fundamentally linguistic in inspiration. The authorities of the university might well consider it an aberration of an elderly professor of philology to write and publish fairy stories and romances, and call it a ‘hobby’, pardonable because it has been (surprisingly to me as much as to anyone) successful. But it is not a ‘hobby’, in the sense of something quite different from one’s work, taken up as a relief-outlet. The invention of languages is the foundation. The ‘stories’ were made rather to provide a world for the languages than the reverse. To me a name comes first and the story follows.fn45 I should have preferred to write in ‘Elvish’. But, of course, such a work as The Lord of the Rings has been edited and only as much ‘language’ has been left in as I thought would be stomached by readers. (I now find that many would have liked more.) But there is a great deal of linguistic matter (other than actually ‘elvish’ names and words) included or mythologically expressed in the book. It is to me, anyway, largely an essay in ‘linguistic aesthetic’, as I sometimes say to people who ask me ‘what is it all about?’ It is not ‘about’ anything but itself. Certainly it has no allegorical intentions, general, particular, or topical, moral, religious, or political. The only criticism that annoyed me was one that it ‘contained no religion’ (and ‘no Women’, but that does not matter, and is not true anyway). It is a monotheistic world of ‘natural theology’. The odd fact that there are no churches, temples, or religious rites and ceremonies, is simply part of the historical climate depicted. It will be sufficiently explained, if (as now seems likely) the Silmarillion and other legends of the First and Second Ages are published. I am in any case myself a Christian; but the ‘Third Age’ was not a Christian world. ‘Middle-earth’, by the way, is not a name of a never-never land without relation to the world we live in (like the Mercury of Eddison). 4 It is just a use of Middle English middel-erde (or erthe), altered from Old English Middangeard: the name for the inhabited lands of Men ‘between the seas’. And though I have not attempted to relate the shape of the mountains and land-masses to what geologists may say or surmise about the nearer past, imaginatively this ‘history’ is supposed to take place in a period of the actual Old World of this planet. There are of course certain things and themes that move me specially. The inter-relations between the ‘noble’ and the ‘simple’ (or common, vulgar) for instance. The ennoblement of the ignoble I find specially moving. I am (obviously) much in love with plants and above all trees, and always have been; and I find human maltreatment of them as hard to bear as some find ill-treatment of animals. I think the so-called ‘fairy story’ one of the highest forms of literature, and quite erroneously associated with children (as such). But my views on that I set out in a lecture delivered at St Andrew’s (on the Andrew Lang foundation, eventually published in Essays Presented to Charles Williams by Oxford University Press, as ‘On Fairy Stories’). I think it is quite an important work, at least for anyone who thinks me worth considering at all; but the O.U.P. have infuriatingly let it go out of print, though it is now in demand–and my only copy has been stolen. Still it might be found in a library, or I might get hold of a copy. If all this is obscure, wordy, and self-regarding and neither ‘bright, brief, nor quotable’ forgive me. Is there anything else you would like me to say? Yours sincerely, J( ohn) R( onald) R( euel) Tolkien. P.S. The book is not of course a ‘trilogy’. That and the titles of the volumes was a fudge thought necessary for publication, owing to length and cost. There is no real division into 3, nor is any one part intelligible alone. The story was conceived and written as a whole and the only natural divisions are the ‘books’ I–VI (which originally had titles). [Most of the central portion of this autobiographical statement was incorporated into an article, ‘Tolkien on Tolkien’, in the October 1966 issue of the magazine Diplomat. This article included three paragraphs not in the text quoted above, which were presumably written circa 1966:] This business began so far back that it might be said to have begun at birth. Somewhere about six years old I tried to write some verses on a dragon about which I now remember nothing except that it contained the expression a green great dragon and that I remained puzzled for a very long time at being told that this should be great green. But the mythology (and associated languages) first began to take shape during the 1914–18 war. The Fall of Gondolin (and the birth of Eärendil) was written in hospital and on leave after surviving the Battle of the Somme in 1916. The kernel of the mythology, the matter of Lúthien Tinúviel and Beren, arose from a small woodland glade filled with ‘hemlocks’ (or other white umbellifers) near Roos on the Holderness peninsula–to which I occasionally went when free from regimental duties while in the Humber Garrison in 1918. I came eventually and by slow degrees to write The Lord of the Rings to satisfy myself: of course without success, at any rate not above 75 percent. But now (when the work is no longer hot, immediate or so personal) certain features of it, and especially certain places, still move me very powerfully. The heart remains in the description of Cerin Amroth (end of Vol. I, Bk. ii, ch. 6), but I am most stirred by the sound of the horses of the Rohirrim at cockcrow; and most grieved by Gollum’s failure (just) to repent when interrupted by Sam: this seems to me really like the real world in which the instruments of just retribution are seldom themselves just or holy; and the good are often stumbling blocks. . . . . Nothing has astonished me more (and I think my publishers) than the welcome given to The Lord of the Rings. But it is, of course, a constant source of consolation and pleasure to me. And, I may say, a piece of singular good fortune, much envied by some of my contemporaries. Wonderful people still buy the book, and to a man ‘retired’ that is both grateful and comforting.”
Last edited by Baggins; Apr 30 2023 at 02:06 PM.
I totally agree. The dev's need to make the game more authentic to Tolkien's Middle Earth. I think the new avatar update is terrible and I don't like the bearded female dwarves either, honestly. If they do go down this route the original poster is right, it's just going to get worse.
Yes, but different groups of *actually* diverse people rather than fake-diverse ones based on the sort of modern diversity that nowhere in Middle-earth would have. So that's misapplying the message to something that's not even being presented as a real part of the setting, that's a shallow impression and nothing more. This is about player representation, but the player isn't the one fighting evil, are they? It's the character. But we don't really have those now, just avatars. Without any sort of story to this - something to put it in context - these options are completely meaningless as far as the game's story goes.
Really not; think again. That's just poisoning the well. You could do with actually reading what people have been saying rather than trying to play armchair psychologist: it's not that Middle-earth lacks diverse people, it's that they're not all in Eriador or Rhovanion! Simple as that. Many are on the wrong side of the conflict between good and evil, through no fault of their own, with many simply being victims of Sauron's malice and cruelty. That's a message that's actually in the book.People are bringing their real life fears and phobias into a game under the guise of "it's not part of the lore".
Did you somehow contrive to forget what the game's been like for the last sixteen years? No, you simply have people who thought the game was fine the way it was as far as that went, because it was actually trying to reflect Middle-earth rather than the modern world. And now it's doing a poorer job of reflecting Middle-earth, because the devs have done nothing to make these changes actually about that. No story, in an otherwise strongly story-based game. A real welcome would make the change actually relevant to the story.Now we have folks that want people to conform to a certain look in order to be welcome in game.
I just wanted to throw in a thank you at Baggins for nicely put together collections of quotes. A great occasion to re-call and reread Tolkien's words regarding all these subjects.
What's that got to do with the point I made? They're not going to learn anything about diversity and inclusion unless it were actually reflected in the game's story in some meaningful, relevant way. Neither simply fiddling with the appearance options given to players nor race-swapping NPCs at random would really do a damn thing, as those are just box-ticking exercises. It'd have to be given actual meaning.
I have never argued any of this, so answer your own phony arguments, that doesnt interest me.
If you care to discuss what I actually posted:
"One of the three houses of men that crossed the Ered Luin into Beleriand, the house of Beor (also the First House of the Edain) was dark skinned, some even black:"
Arguing for the sake of arguing, interesting way to spend your time, but not really interesting to me.![]()
Bingo.
It wasn't English, they aren't English, they were partly based upon people whom he knew from his childhood, partly on earlier fantasy/ fairy tales like The Marvellous Land of Snergs
and an earlier book called The Rabbits.
In other words: they are fantasy figures, end of story indeed.
Had he intended to make them a purely English people, he would have situated the shire in england, but he didnt.
Since Tolkien knew the danger of connecting existing Norse mythology to a certain area or people, he'd turn around
in his grave if he would realize how his books are claimed to be English, or English mythology.
"Do not laugh! But once upon a time (my crest has long since fallen) I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend,
ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of romantic fairy-story – the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth,
the lesser drawing splendour from the vast backcloths – which I could dedicate simply to: to England; to my country. It should possess the tone and
quality that I desired, somewhat cool and clear, be redolent of our ‘air’ (the clime and soil of the North West, meaning Britain and the hither parts of Europe;
not Italy or the Aegean, still less the East), and, while possessing (if I could achieve it) the fair elusive beauty that some call Celtic (though it is rarely found in
genuine ancient Celtic things), it should be ‘high’, purged of the gross, and fit for the more adult mind of a land long now steeped in poetry. I would draw some
of the great tales in fullness, and leave many only placed in the scheme, and sketched. The cycles should be linked to a majestic whole, and yet leave scope for
other minds and hands, wielding paint and music and drama. Absurd.
What's funny is I saw some of these arguments when WoW updated their models. Complaints about black blood elves and even over african facial featured humans "africa doesn't exist" and etc. A lot of these arguments sound like that to me.
And while this is a discussion that has literally been debated among tolkien scholars for literally decades, there are racist elements in the works simply due to the time period in which they were written. And just because that is the case doesn't mean we have to accept that in a video game in 2023.
Couldn't care less??? None of those other games are set in Middle-earth!
I fell in love with my wife alpha and beta testing this game, in part because we have a mutual love and respect for Tolkien's work. Our first cat together was named after the only named ringwraith. Her engagement ring was specifically inspired by the book description of Nenya. She's the one I turn to when I want/need help with Elvish. I used to keep HTML copies of all the books so I could do quick searches for passages(I have kindle copies for that now). My favorite characters of all time are from the Silm. Every character I make I try to have a name that actually has a meaning. Middle-earth is home to us, even if I've always felt like Lotro was more a vacation spot, even back in beta. (the theme park MMO feeling part, mostly, the world itself is fantastic)
And I fundamentally disagree with the notion that any of these changes reduce or eliminate the immersion of Middle-earth. They just finally make it look more like the Middle-earth I've seen in my head for 20 years.
What mental gymnastics, plenty of human women IRL have beards.
The only things getting banned or deleted are posts that are very obviously being bigoted.
And I would love rainbow colored hair. My high elf hunter's name means 'rainbow woman'
Agreed on all counts.
This was unnecessary change in my opinion, and doesn't solve anything. More hair styles and body types would suffice.
It is hard to believe that we are having this conversation. Is anyone here an actual Elf, or Beorning? Anyone rune scribe, tossing javelins, mastering elemental forces in your line of work? Anyone living in a burrow, or cave, or tree? No? I can go on... So you want to be presented, obviously, only skin-deep, and for the rest you can use imagination? Very selective representation indeed. One would venture to think, we are more than just it.
To talk about lore, or claim of many here that want to be in the Middle-earth and not in fact elsewhere, is a delusion. This have nothing to do with either.
I personally enjoy being presented in the spirit of something or someone. For my part, I can live with this, just as I lived with many other things, but ought to ask where do we draw the line.
I never questioned anyone's love for Middle-earth. What I meant was care/a way of experiencing a specific aspect of a game, something that's beyond Tolkien and whether one loves Tolkien or not. Also, a more objective care if one judges the game not from their own personal player position but as business all across the board, so detached from how it affects them as a veteran player (and Tolkien geek, who already knows it all anyway). See below
You can disagree all you want and as I've already mentioned (to no avail apparently) it doesn't make it real. The end result, as of now (with how they delivered it), is that the next rpg/fantasy game with some character creation choices I will play is most likely to turn out superior to LOTRO's and far more immersive/informative in this department. And of course... you already know it all + have no fancy for such things, so of course you don't care. I happen to fancy and appreciate such things, and many other players do too, plus it's crucial for casuals and newbies to Tolkien's world. Creation panel is supposed to convey some info and immerse someone like that into the world from the very first second. If some other games were as lousy in execution (plus whatever goes treatment) as LOTRO is right now, then I would have quit in frustration because I wouldn't be able to grasp some basics about the world I'm playing in, which race comes from where, how some places may appear for racial/ethnicity makeup, cultural features, all key countries/lands of the game and so on (while deciding who my character is going to be in this world).
Last edited by TesalionLortus; Apr 30 2023 at 06:06 PM.
Oh but I did discussed what you posted. But I have no idea what you were trying to prove in the first place, then.
"There were fair-haired men and women among the Folk of Bëor, but most of them had brown hair (going usually with brown eyes), and many were less fair in skin, some indeed being swarthy."
Many less fair. (We can debate what that means all we want but nowhere near actual blackness). Some swarthy. (Doesn't mean the entire house was central African black nor that said swarthy was anywhere near dominant.) Which leads to this that I said:
And the original (not ours) conversation was about hobbits and elves, primarily, so one might wonder what you wanted to prove with the house of Beor.
So, here is what I originally said and then you started this entire debacle about the etymology of swarthy.
Which doesn't change the fact what I said is accurate, and in this sentence I specifically said swarth-ier, not exactly swarthy, but even then swarthy does not mean any specific level of blackness in particular (we can debate which part of Africa/world, in our real world terms, that might actually refer to). You know the skin tone range is pretty rich right and certain ranges may dominate in specific areas of the globe? Which leads back to what I said, I don't understand people's obsession with these words, because no, such a word being used somewhere (in specific context/timeframe) does not give anyone an upper ground to say "super black Eriador or the Shire in Third Age, hurray, all tones go! whatever!"
And yet you do, arguing for the sake of arguing, and not making any coherent rebuttal whatsoever. Because you can't. Though I have no idea whether you realize it or not.
That is correct. You didnt have a clue, you keep arguing and you still have no clue.
It was very simple to say: yeah you're correct that was what Tolkien said about the house of beor.
But...
Instead, you have spent an entire thread arguing that you know better than Tolkien what the word swarthy meant, that he ofc didnt mean it as such..and
the absolute winner: that people become less black over the years.
Okidoki.
![]()
I was discussing nuance but apparently you're not interested in that. And you're someone who calls people out on their "limited views" under this thread... well, a bit ironic. Also, you are clearly not interested in science but skin color can change over generations depending on different factors or even randomly, to some extent, without intermarriage at that, not to mention with intermarriage. That's ok if you're not interested in that, though doesn't make science of it any less real. I recommend a simple "skin color over generations" google search
Of course I appreciate such things, I love them. I just disagree that it negatively impacts LOTRO. I would in fact prefer additional origins, I'm also going to be realistic and not expect them to ever come AND also not expect that they'll ever let us change origins for free (which I have wanted for years).
It's just not that big a deal, especially since I can take a step back and understand how someone who might look different from the average person to exist in a region might also exist in that region. And there is plenty of historical evidence in real world situations. Gondor is of course the easiest for this due to location and history(as is Dale, major trading hubs have historically been very diverse), but even Bree-landers are descended from Arnor in large part, which is descended from Numenor, a seafaring nation oft compared to egypt and other Mediterranean empires.
Honestly, I like how FF14 did it. The races there aren't so much defined by their racial characteristics (though those do exist and each 'tribe' of the race has it's own distinct backstory and naming conventions), but by the nation-state the character hails from. You're a Miqo'te second, a Limsan first, etc. Any given outpost or settlement or town is full of various races who see themselves as countrymen before anything else, though there are a few places where one race outnumbers others, with associated prejudices present.
Non-whites and trans people have existed as long as humanity has, they existed in medieval europe, they existed in greece and the roman empire, they certainly existed in the Mediterranean areas for as long as modern humans have existed. So 'modern earth' isn't a really valid argument.
And yet that's what he says that they essentially are, so you're just being pedantic: it doesn't have to be literal for there to be a direct and purposeful resemblance. The Shire's based on rural England, and is a gentle parody of both it and its inhabitants. Deal with it.
I'm laughing out loud at this. Err, hello: Dwarves? He got the names for them from the Elder Edda, that's Norse mythology. And that's where Dwarves are originally from: Norse or Germanic myth, take your pick and those *are* connected to a certain area and people by way of ancestry: the English were a largely Germanic people, after all, and prior to converting to Christianity they had their own flavour of Germanic mythology. And rather a lot of Norse people set up shop here as well, so at one time it was a firm feature of local culture. He's only harking back to that.Since Tolkien knew the danger of connecting existing Norse mythology to a certain area or people, he'd turn around
in his grave if he would realize how his books are claimed to be English, or English mythology.
I think you need to allow for just how much of a thing he had about England. Not something I share, I just happened to be born here and I'm not into it like he was. He speaks of "that noble northern spirit, a supreme contribution to Europe, which I have ever loved, and tried to present in its true light. Nowhere, incidentally, was it nobler than in England, nor more early sanctified and Christianized" (while lamenting that it had been left ruined and forever accursed by what certain other people had made of it, elsewhere in Europe at the time he wrote that) but he wasn't nationalistic about it, just *very* patriotic (just about England, mind you, not the rest of the UK and absolutely not the Commonwealth, which he detested). So it seems he saw no harm in relating this stuff to England, whereas you're just making things up to suit yourself there. If you read the rest of that letter you quoted from, you'll find that while he'd deemed his overweening ambition absurd, the idea of developing a story-cycle and it having the 'air' of North-West Europe (and so on, and so forth) remained; hence his approach to the linguistics, and the particular languages he took inspiration from when inventing his own. And none of that supports what you've been saying at all.