Earlier in the month, we discussed J.R.R. Tolkien’s views on authority.
SPOILER ALERT: He did not like it.
He did not like democracy, and the kind of king he preferred here in the real world—since truly meritorious, worthy kings were less that “one in a million”—was a distracted ditherer: someone who technically has authority, but can’t be bothered to use it because he’s too busy collecting stamps or cultivating new varieties of orchid.
In that piece, I promised to tell you more about Tolkien’s anarchism, so here goes…
People who are predisposed to a bias against authority are two hot meals and a couple of philosophical revelations away from becoming full-blown anarchists. (As you know, I am speaking from personal experience.) Later in life, Tolkien appears to have undergone this transformation himself:
“My political opinions lean more and more to Anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning the abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs)—or to ‘unconstitutional’ Monarchy.”
It is extremely gratifying that one of history’s greatest creators—a maker of worlds that felt so real to millions—had this most important realization.
Having a romantic and generally conservative temperament, he had a soft spot for monarchy. Yet the ideal monarchy was not the constitutional monarchy of Britain, but the kinds of monarchies he created in his stories. This Redditor says it well:
Tolkien detested government, the state, and industrialized bureaucracies. His ideal world was, we can gather, something like the Shire under Aragorn — sure, there’s a king, but he’s far off and doesn’t do anything to affect you, and the people are roughly self-governed and self-policed.
[…]
There are kings, many kings, but rarely concrete state structures. The ‘best’ rulers like Elrond and Galadriel don’t seem to sit atop a hierarchy or a class system — they are just there at the top being wise and smart, and their subjects are free to associate with them or leave as they will. There are no tax collectors in Lothlorien, or Elven cops. The most ‘statelike’ Kingdom we see, Númenór, is implicitly a critique of the British Empire — an island nation which colonized the world and enslaves lesser men before quite literally being destroyed by god for its hubris.
An erudite commenter responds in kind:
I had noticed the anarchism in Tolkien's world, I wasn't aware that it corresponded to his actual beliefs, but it makes a lot of sense. The elves especially, while they do have kings and rulers, seem to follow them completely voluntarily, and when there are major political differences they are resolved by everyone just going and following a leader they agree with - the sons of Finwe don't fight each other, they just split off with their followers and do different things. When Celegorm and Curufin take over Nargothrond, they do it by convincing the people to listen to them, and Finrod leaves voluntarily with what men remain loyal to him.
Likewise, the moral dimension of the relationship between creators and their works is very anarchist in nature. The elves create for the sake of creating, and when they share freely that is presented as unambiguously moral, while covetousness and greed are corrupting forces. This also ties into ancient and medieval "gift cultures" where an individual's social status, especially that of a ruler, is tied to their ability and willingness to give gifts to others. This is a theme in works like Beowulf, that Tolkien clearly was very fond of.
Tolkien appears to have blended a quiet, growing philosophical anarchism with the romantic sentiments of someone born into the late Victorian era…and these are precisely the sorts of leaders that one ought to expect such a person to prefer.
David Bentley Hart recognizes as much:
There are those whose political visions hover tantalizingly near on the horizon, like inviting mirages, and who are as likely as not to get the whole caravan killed by trying to lead it off to one or another of those nonexistent oases. And then there are those whose political dreams are only cooling clouds, easing the journey with the meager shade of a gently ironic critique, but always hanging high up in the air, forever out of reach.
I like to think my own political philosophy—derived entirely from my exactingly close readings of The Compleat Angler and The Wind in the Willows—is of the latter kind. Certainly Tolkien’s was. Whatever the case, the only purpose of such a philosophy is to avert disappointment and prevent idolatry. Democracy is not an intrinsic good, after all; if it were, democratic institutions could not have produced the Nazis. (HT: Erik Kain)
Democracy may have been necessary as a transitional step away from the fiction of ontological authority, but on its own merits, it is a mistake—one that we need to put in our rear-view mirror sooner rather than later. Yet it is difficult for most people to recognize or admit that—inertia, tradition, fear, lack of imagination, and a host of other reasons keep us mired right where we are, fighting the same un-winnable war, decade after decade.
Later in the same letter (to Christopher, his son), his frustration boils over with the whole mess:
There is only one bright spot and that is the growing habit of disgruntled men of dynamiting factories and power-stations; I hope that, encouraged now as 'patriotism', may remain a habit! But it won't do any good, if it is not universal.
Earlier in the letter, he says that he does not espouse the kind of anarchy characterized by the actions of “whiskered men with bombs,” yet by the end, he has worked up enough frustration to describe just such actions as a “bright spot.”
That seems like an inconsistency, but if so, it is a very human and understandable one, for he is going on a classic journey: First he realizes the true injustice of involuntary authority. Then he realizes how little is likely to be done about it. Finally, despairing of a solution, he extolls the virtue of radical measures.
It is our job to find a solution that can be accomplished peacefully. In the coming months, I will be speaking more of this.
In the meantime, we can all be grateful for the fact that Tolkien’s frustration with the situation was diverted not into growing a beard and blowing up power stations, but into creating beautiful stories with kings who led by merit rather than force.
PS: In this portion of the letter, is Tolkien devising his own version of the Munger Test?
If we could get back to personal names, it would do a lot of good. Government is an abstract noun meaning the an and process of governing and it should be an offence to write it with a capital G or so as to refer to people. If people were in the habit of referring to 'King George's council, Winston and his gang', it would go a long way to clearing thought, and reducing the frightful landslide into Theyocracy.
I think so. What do you think?
Beautiful piece. And you have me wishing I was an elf living in Rivendell (again!!) I’ve been there, on a trip to NZ, where they constructed that world. Breathtaking.
I always think of “government” as “control over mind”.
I love the sentiment of the last paragraph- reverting to using personal names. I’m reminded of the Law for Mankind course. Have you taken it?
When we use titles we are playing the legal game constructed to keep us enslaved. When we use names, we are all equal again. When we remember who we are, no man or woman can lawfully divide us from our sovereignty.
They-ocracy. I like that. Nice job thanks.
I am a longterm Tolkien fan and it has been a little difficult realizing that a lot of these famous writers knew something of elite insider cult or may have been part of it. Sometimes it is more clear if they were part, or only warning about what they were observing at surface levels.