Paolo Gulisano
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien or a literary event in size beyond the value of the work of the English scholar, and testifying to its significance as a teacher in a society of good teachers that they desperately need. It is now more than 40 years after the publication of his masterpiece "The Lord of the Rings", but interest remains high for this author.
THE "AUTHOR OF THE CENTURY"
Last year, a referendum among all frequent readers of the British library has proclaimed "The Lord of the Rings" book of the century, a response that has caused some disappointment among the official critics, since Tolkien is still regarded by 'snobbish intelligentsia-a children's author. In the meantime, is turning the Lord of the Rings film, which promises to be a big blockbuster for next season, even if the rumors that come from the set that raises doubt about the fidelity of Tolkien's original work.
MANY TO REISSUE
keep alive the attention of readers of all time and those belonging to the younger generation, the publishing house Simon and Schuster, who took over from Ruskin's entire catalog Tolkien, began to reprint the classic and most successful English writer. In spite of all the charges therefore more or less malicious and unjustified riots in years this writer, Tolkien must now be considered not only a successful author, but also as a true classic.
A POINT OF REFERENCE
Tolkien has revived, in the middle twentieth century, the epic genre, restoring dignity to the ancient literary genre of narrative imagination, despite the cynicism of a dominant culture that, as Brecht taught, had to do without values, in particular heroism. Tolkien became a teacher, an existential point of reference for generations of young readers who were moved and exalted by the reading of his epic pages so far removed from realism then prevalent in the literature that told the story giustappunto of heroes, to restore the lost kingdom of Lords Evil opposed to elves, knights and gentle little creatures, but ready for any sacrifice for the triumph of the good: The Hobbit, Tolkien's characters distinctively and absolutely.
a conception of man
There has long questioned whether behind this great interest as we have pointed out that Tolkien does not seem to run out there was a particular ideology. The answer is definitely negative: it is reductive any "labeling" of the Oxford professor, as this that inspired and gave meaning to his life and his work did not result from an ideology but a vision of life, a conception of 'be, man, the story is much more than an ideology: it is a philosophy.
against modernity even has
Tolkien what we might call a theological vision of history, through which judges, with the authority of a philosopher or a prophet of human events, it is impressive to read today that the proceedings had in 1945 to express respect to the scenarios after the Second World War: "Everything becomes a little provincial suburb cursed. When they introduced the American health care system, morality, feminism and the mass production of the East, the Middle East, the USSR, the Pampas, in the Gran Chaco, in the Danube Basin, in equatorial Africa, and in Lhasa Berkshire villages in deep, as we will all be happy ... But joking aside, I find this terrifying cosmopolitanesimo American. "
AGAINST THE MASS CULTURADI
Tolkien as a critic of modernity, then, the globalism, the overpowering type, which contrasted the culture of belonging and rootedness. In a multiethnic and multicultural society such as that of Middle-earth, small Hobbit defend their county, their little world peacefully rural and rich traditions. Tolkien's "conservative", it was said, and certainly the professor if they adonterà, but conservative of all that is beautiful, pure, small, neat, interesting, important. "I absorb the large and small around the world becomes more flat and boring," he once wrote.
THAT THE ENEMY IS U.S. This aversion Tolkien for the ugliness and errors of modernity is not realistic because it is ideological, not born, that is, from an idea of \u200b\u200bthe world, or a project more or less utopian about it, but from the observation of nature and the human condition, indelibly marked by the Fall, so that the enemies to defeat the enemy is so evil (Sauron or Saruman) but it is especially treacherous evil that lurks in all of us. "You can not fight the enemy, he wrote to his son Christopher with his ring without turning yourself into an enemy, but unfortunately the wisdom of Gandalf seems to have disappeared with him in the far West and genuine." The religious element is rooted in the stories of Tolkien and their symbolism. His own passion for narration comes from the desire to communicate the truth through symbols and visions. "The Gospel explained is the biggest fairy tale, and produces the sensation fundamental Christian joy that drew tears because it is qualitatively similar to the pain, because it comes from that place where joy and pain are one thing, meeting, as well as selfishness and altruism are lost in Love. "
between good and evil in this epic and spiritual intensity of Tolkien's work is the secret of the significance of this extraordinary author of fantastic fiction that becomes a vehicle for immutable values, deeply ingrained with the heart of man, his dreams, his hopes. His masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings is the epic tale of a transition period, which represents a genuine survival guide between the errors and horrors of modernity. "How can a man judge what to do in times like these?" Asks a character, and meets Aragorn, the man destined to be king: "As always judged: good and evil have not changed Within a year, and are not something with elves and dwarves and another among men. It is up to each of us to discern. "
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