Talk:Tolkienology

People always keep going "why didn't the Eagles help on the Quest?" But the answer is very simple to the point that it's annoying that people keep asking: Mordor has flying monsters that could intercept them. The Winged Nazgul (astride the Fell Beasts) could have attacked them if they tried to fly into Mordor (plus, there's the whole argument that as servants of Manwe, the Great Eagles are meant to rarely interfere in the events of Middle-earth, but the above explanation is more direct and practical).

Further, on the director commentary for ROTK:EE when the Eagles appear at the Black Gate, Peter Jackson begins to say "yeah, why didn't the Eagles just fly it there from Rivendell?" and Philippa Boyens shouts "Because the Flying Nazgul would have killed them! Why does everyone always say that? It's really simple." It really isn't a big debate thing in the way that "who is Tom Bombadil?" is. ---Ricimer, April 11, 2005.

This is not so simple. First of all, during the time of the council there were no flying Nazgul yet (their horses had JUST drowned), so why the matter of the Eagles was not simply brought into consideration? THIS is the question that needs explanation. Second, even if they did consider the Eagles and Nazgul problem, they had already considered some plans. Wouldn't then eventually at least discuss a plan about how to drive them out of Mordor with some military trick (somehow what Aragorn did with the battle of Morannon to lure all the enemies close to him and help Frodo's journey)? Wouldn't an entire council of wise just mention them, propose something before the plan be rejected for whatever reason? As for the matter of 'rarely interference', the Eagles had already helped Gandalf not a few times (not to mention their appearances in the Silmarillion), and I doubt those events were more critical than the destruction of the Ring. Goof, Blooper, Plot hole, or just something simple and obvious that can be easily explained, it IS something that brings up questions and becomes a matter to argue about.

I suggest this should be merged with Tolkien research (possibly as a "story internal" section, although I'm unsure whether "Tolkienolgy" is exclusively applied to story-internal investigations) dab (ᛏ) 16:26, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The Eagles couldn't carry the Ringbearer as the murmrings of Sauron would be too much for their (admittedly intelligent, but still) animal minds. I think that may have been in an appendix? I'm sure I've seen it printed on paper (if not, I've certainly heard it from ex-Tolkein-nerd sources) Tar7arus 23:54, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Too narrow definition

Tolkienology is a term used by Tolkien fans to describe the study of the works of J. R. R. Tolkien treating Middle-earth as a real world

This definition is too narrow. The more serious "tolkienologues" actually study the works of Tolkien for what they are. Think about the journal Vinyar Tengwar for example, which explicitely studies Tolkien's languages as a continually evolving creation of Tolkien who used to change his mind quite often. Those people are as much interested in the way Tolkien created the languages, as in the "product" itself.

AFAIK the definition 'as a real world' was simply to rule out the external explanations, like 'because Tolkien wanted so', 'because it would be a better story' or 'because Tolkien forgot about it later'. As for the VT and 'external' studies centered on Tolkien himself, I think this belongs to another subject, linked already from here 62.74.5.202 23:01, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

It's a question of terminology. We do have an article on Tolkien research. Is "Tolkienology" an accepted term at all? Is it used for either of these pursuits? Do we want to merge these articles, or keep them separate, and maybe make Tolkienology a disambiguation page? I would certainly want to point out that one is serious literary criticism, while the other is geeky "fandom". Tolkien was shunned in literary circles for decades precisely because of that type of thing, and we do not want to further the impression that scholars doing research into Tolkien's work are all dorks dressing as Elves. dab (ᛏ) 20:54, 13 November 2005 (UTC)