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Directed at whomever suggest otherwise -- I have no doubt, whatsoever, that Tolkien would have been a Margaret Thatcher/Ronald Reagan conservative, and supported George Bush now on this war against terror. My personal opinion here is based on the reading of the book The Inklings, specifically the sections where Tolkien and C.S. Lewis have their discussions on religion, and good and evil.

I would exercise caution in claiming Tolkien for any specific position or sentiment about the present day.

Reading The Letters of JRR Tolkien as well as some of the extent biographies gives a deeper look at his views on war, politics and society.

Tolkien was of course a conservative - but a rather specific kind of conservative. He was a man of the past, or at least of a way of life that was being slowly but shabbily destroyed by industrialization and war. He seems to have been a Tory by default, not out of any love for the party as it existed in his lifetime. He probably would have been a Whig had they still existed. We are after all talking about a guy who thought it all started going downhill in 1066.

Tolkien had some rather acerbic views on war and on some of the less attractive aspects of freebooting capitalism as practiced in Britain and especially America which lead one to believe that he would of course support the War on Terror, but be terribly depressed about its likely effects on his society - and not exactly enthusiastic about those aspects of Thatcherism (though certainly more so than of Labour and its high-tax ways - which he particularly resented as LOTR began to sell well - and social engineering fetishes). His view of World War II was that it was certainly necessary but certainly also an evil, a terrible waste of lives, treasure and social capital. He thought little of the military mind but then in fairness most of his direct exposure was in the WWI British Army.

If he shared any sentiments with lefty actors like Mortenson or McKellen at all it might be his disdain for the rapcious, coarsening and homogenizing effects of modernity - a sentiment which one can find in some quarters on both the Right and Left these days. He would have little little truck with their moral relativism and libertinism.

But then there's probably quite a lot about the present day he would not care much for.

You have described my own political journey, very well. I am not as old nor as educated as was he. But, I have taken the time to read what Bush himself says -- not relying on what people like Viggo here seem to imagine he is saying -- and I believe Tolkien would too. I see him making the right choices, and for the right reasons, and I believe Tolkien would too.

I enjoyed your very knowledgeable post and opinion.

I would exercise caution in claiming Tolkien for any specific position or sentiment about the present day.

LOL, something in this sentence sounds like the line in the FOTR movie - from Aragorn "A little caution...I know what hunts you. "

I would exercise caution in claiming Tolkien for any specific position or sentiment about the present day.

I agree, Iguana.... Your sentiment mirrors a conversation I had with Sam Cree this morning in the hobbit hole.

To: Sam Cree
I think there is room in Tolkien's philosophy for lots of people to feel at home in his ideal.
I dunno... I don't particularly claim Tolkien as a conservative of today. I think to try to fit him in a party platform trivializes a great fantasy. His world is not bound by our reality, our motives, or our problems.
I think Tolkien would hate today and not necessarily be conservative. He was English, after all, and even English conservatives are not like US... He was mourning industry and its impact on the world, so I hardly think he would be on the capitalist bandwagon. I think he would hate big business and big cities full of skyscrapers as much as he hated the industrial age.
He painted an ideal that was beautiful, but can no longer be. An ideal that I share with him. The Shire as a system of governance does not work in modern society with millions of people. That doesn't make it any less attractive as a place to escape to in our hearts.
45108 posted on 12/04/2002 8:59 AM PST by HairOfTheDog

Tolkien's world appeals to me in its simplicity of life, its rural and basic morality, its absence of bureaucracy and pollution that is life today. Tolkien was conservative in his dislike of power and control over people, but not in our view of unbridled capitalism or industry.

"He probably would have been a Whig had they still existed"

My reading of Tolkien has caused me to surmise this also. Particularly because of his creation of the Shire as a mythology for Anglo Saxons. I believe the Whig philosophies were rooted directly in Anglo Saxon traditions.

Interestingly, I believe F.A. Hayek, who is one of my inspirations, also considered himself to be in the tradition of the English Whig. And I have read that both Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan are admirers of Hayek. Certainly many of our founding fathers thoughts were also derived from the Whigs.

Hair, did you see my response in the Hole to your post to me?

This is turning out to be a fairly interesting thread, I was worried about it. Still wish Viggo would have a little more sense about politics.