20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Well my dearest, here goes to begin a proper letter again … I did a certain amount of writing yesterday but was hindered by two things: the need to clear up the study (which had got into the chaos that always indicates literary or philological preoccupation) and attend to business; and trouble with the moon. By which I mean that I found my moons in the crucial days between Frodo’s flight and the present situation (arrival at Minas Morghul) were doing impossible things, rising in one part of the country and setting simultaneously in another. Rewriting bits of back chapters took all afternoon!. . . . Fr C.1 gave a pretty stirring little sermon, based on Rogation Days (next Mon – Wed) in which he suggested we were all a lot of untutored robots for not saying Grace; and did not suggest but categorically pronounced Oxford to deserve to be wiped out with fire and blood in the wrath of God for the abominations and wickedness there perpetrated. We all woke up. I am afraid it is all too horribly true. But I wonder if it is specially true now? A small knowledge of history depresses one with the sense of the everlasting mass and weight of human iniquity: old, old, dreary, endless repetitive unchanging incurable wickedness. All towns, all villages, all habitations of men – sinks! And at the same time one knows that there is always good: much more hidden, much less clearly discerned, seldom breaking out into recognizable, visible, beauties of word or deed or face – not even when in fact sanctity, far greater than the visible advertised wickedness, is really there. But I fear that in the individual lives of all but a few, the balance is debit – we do so little that is positive good, even if we negatively avoid what is actively evil. It must be terrible to be a priest!. . . .
Monday 4 p.m. . . . . I saw C.S.L. from 10.45 to 12.30 this morning: heard 2 chapters of his ‘Who Goes Home?’2 – a new allegory on Heaven and Hell; and I read my 6th new chapter ‘Journey to the Cross Roads’ with complete approval. So far it has gone well: but I am now coming to the nub, when the threads must be gathered and the times synchronized and the narrative interwoven; while the whole thing has grown so large in significance that the sketches of concluding chapters (written ages ago) are quite inadequate, being on a more ‘juvenile’ level. . . . .
I suddenly got an idea for a new story (of about length of Niggle3) – in church yesterday, I fear. A man sitting at a high window and seeing not the fortunes of a man or of people, but of one small piece of land (about the size of a garden) all down the ages. He just sees it illumined, in borders of mist, and things, animals and men just walk on and off, and the plants and trees grow and die and change. One of the points would be that plants and animals change from one fantastic shape to another but men (in spite of different dress) don’t change at all. At intervals all down the ages from Palaeolithic to Today a couple of women (or men) would stroll across scene saying exactly the same thing (e.g. It oughtn’t to be allowed. They ought to stop it. Or, I said to her, I’m not one to make a fuss, I said, but . . .). . . .
Your own dear and loving Father.
70 To Christopher Tolkien
21 May 1944 (FS 26)
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
My dearest,
I am afraid I have not written for some time. . . . . I have taken advantage of a bitter cold grey week (in which the lawns have not grown in spite of a little rain) to write: but struck a sticky patch. All that I had sketched or written before proved of little use, as times, motives, etc., have all changed. However at last with v. great labour, and some neglect of other duties, I have now written or nearly written all the matter up to the capture of Frodo in the high pass on the very brink of Mordor. Now I must go back to the other folk and try and bring things to the final crash with some speed. Do you think Shelob is a good name for a monstrous spider creature? It is of course only ‘she+lob’ (= spider), but written as one, it seems to be quite noisome. . . . .
Monday 22 May. . . . . It was a wretched cold day yesterday (Sunday). I worked very hard at my chapter – it is most exhausting work; especially as the climax approaches and one has to keep the pitch up: no easy level will do; and there are all sorts of minor problems of plot and mechanism. I wrote and tore up and rewrote most of it a good many times; but I was rewarded this morning, as both C.S.L and C.W. thought it an admirable performance, and the latest chapters the best so far. Gollum continues to develop into a most intriguing character. I was on ‘key duty’ last night and not supposed to retire, but did so at 3.30 a.m. A bit tired this morning. And I have to be on all night at the HQ Post tonight. . . . .
Your own Father.
71 To Christopher Tolkien (airgraph)
25 May 1944 (FS 27)
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Dearest Chris, Letters, immensely welcome, have poured in. . . . . I was disposed, at last, to envy you a little; or rather to wish I could be with you ‘in the hills’. There is something in nativity, and though I have few pictorial memories, there is always a curious sense of reminiscence about any stories of Africa, which always move me deeply. Strange that you, my dearest, should have gone back there. . . . . There is not much to report of self since Monday. That night I never slept at all (quite literally): partly owing to deafening traffic (on moldan
72 To Christopher Tolkien
31 May 1944 (FS 28)
20 Northmoor Road, Oxford
Dearest Chris,
About time I wrote again … On Thursday I dined in college, myself and the three old gents (Drake, Ramsden, and the Bursar1) who were very affable. The Inklings meeting. . . . was very enjoyable. Hugo2 was there: rather tired-looking, but reasonably noisy. The chief entertainment was provided by a chapter of Warnie Lewis’s book on the times of Louis XIV (very good I thought it); and some excerpts from C.S.L.’s ‘Who Goes Home?’ – a book on Hell, which I suggested should have been called rather ‘Hugo’s Home’. I did not get back till after midnight. The rest of my time, barring chores in and out door, has been occupied by the desperate attempt to bring ‘The Ring’ to a suitable pause, the capture of Frodo by the Orcs in the passes of Mordor, before I am obliged to break off by examining. By sitting up all hours, I managed it: and read the last 2 chapters