Having studied in the French system for years, I was quite familiar with the concept of Barthe's "La mort de l'auteur" (the death of the author) and saw my curiosity spiked when a redditer attached the concept to Tolkien's work. Yet truth be told he was right, Tolkien's opposition to allegorical writing does the corespond to "the death of the author".
So what is "the death of the author" ?
Written by Barthes, a french theorist (theoricien) in the mid 20th century, it is an essay destined for litterary critics. In France, the analysis of a text is based upon discovering any political, religious or social messages passed through the text. This analysis technique is so widespread, not just in France, but across all Europe that I had to study it all throughout middle-school and high-school. It even created genres such as les "contes philosophiques" as written by Voltaire (philisophycal tales) in which the reader must attempt to discover the allegories, metaphores and underliying meanings to the text given by the author. Barthes rejects all of this. He believes that giving a text a "definitive explanation" of a text based upon an author's experience, faiths or ideologies, is imposing a limit on the text. As I talked about the tales of Voltaire earlier on, when the reader takes into account Voltaires Illuminations ideals (17th century pre-revolution ideology in France) when he is reading the text, then the reader might believe he is analysing a perfect and tidy interpretation of any meaning of the text, yet is actually doing a sloppy job, closing his mind to the plausible multiple meanings of the work, and perpetuating the author's tyranny.
So what is "the death of the author" ?
Written by Barthes, a french theorist (theoricien) in the mid 20th century, it is an essay destined for litterary critics. In France, the analysis of a text is based upon discovering any political, religious or social messages passed through the text. This analysis technique is so widespread, not just in France, but across all Europe that I had to study it all throughout middle-school and high-school. It even created genres such as les "contes philosophiques" as written by Voltaire (philisophycal tales) in which the reader must attempt to discover the allegories, metaphores and underliying meanings to the text given by the author. Barthes rejects all of this. He believes that giving a text a "definitive explanation" of a text based upon an author's experience, faiths or ideologies, is imposing a limit on the text. As I talked about the tales of Voltaire earlier on, when the reader takes into account Voltaires Illuminations ideals (17th century pre-revolution ideology in France) when he is reading the text, then the reader might believe he is analysing a perfect and tidy interpretation of any meaning of the text, yet is actually doing a sloppy job, closing his mind to the plausible multiple meanings of the work, and perpetuating the author's tyranny.
Yet where does Tolkien come in ?
Tolkien has a certain idea of what allegory should be, he doesn't enjoy seeing people giving his work meanings, each one being the "unedeniable explanation of his work". When Tolkien vociferously denies that LOTR is an "allegory", he seems to be denying that it is a fable such as "animal farm" by Orwell: that is, he is reacting against people who were inclined to say, "The ring is the atomic bomb. The Shire is England. Minas Tirith is the United States. Mordor is Nazi Germany. Isengard is Fascist Italy. Wormtongue is Neville Chamberlain. Eowyn is Vera Lynn." At any rate, in denying that it is "allegory" he points out all the ways in which it does NOT resemble the Second World War. For him an allegory should represent an idea such as Bilbo Baggins in the Hobbit would represent evolution (as in the evolution of the character from a small, simple Hobbit who stays at home, to an adventurous brave Hobbit, who wants to explore and overcome dangers rather than fleeing from them). These ideas would be given to the characters by the reader himself, and would vary based on the readers own experience, ideoligy, religious belief and more.
- The Mad Hobbit.
Tolkien has a certain idea of what allegory should be, he doesn't enjoy seeing people giving his work meanings, each one being the "unedeniable explanation of his work". When Tolkien vociferously denies that LOTR is an "allegory", he seems to be denying that it is a fable such as "animal farm" by Orwell: that is, he is reacting against people who were inclined to say, "The ring is the atomic bomb. The Shire is England. Minas Tirith is the United States. Mordor is Nazi Germany. Isengard is Fascist Italy. Wormtongue is Neville Chamberlain. Eowyn is Vera Lynn." At any rate, in denying that it is "allegory" he points out all the ways in which it does NOT resemble the Second World War. For him an allegory should represent an idea such as Bilbo Baggins in the Hobbit would represent evolution (as in the evolution of the character from a small, simple Hobbit who stays at home, to an adventurous brave Hobbit, who wants to explore and overcome dangers rather than fleeing from them). These ideas would be given to the characters by the reader himself, and would vary based on the readers own experience, ideoligy, religious belief and more.
- The Mad Hobbit.