The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien. Christopher Tolkien
present. I don’t believe there are any, for the word has been so abused by propaganda that it has ceased to have any value for reason and become a mere emotional dose for generating heat. At most, it would seem to imply that those who domineer over you should speak (natively) the same language – which in the last resort is all that the confused ideas of race or nation boil down to; or class, for that matter, in England. . . . . The western war-news of course occupies a good deal of our minds, but you know as much about it as we do. Anxious times, in spite of the rather premature shouting. The armoured fellows are right in the thick of it, and (I gather) think there is going to be a good deal more of the thick yet. I cannot understand the line taken by BBC (and papers, and so, I suppose, emanating from M[inistry] O[f] I[nformation]) that the German troops are a motley collection of sutlers and broken men, while yet recording the bitterest defence against the finest and best equipped armies (as indeed they are) that have ever taken the field. The English pride themselves, or used to, on ‘sportsmanship’ (which included ‘giving the devil his due’), not that attendance at a league football match was not enough to dispel the notion that ‘sportsmanship’ was possessed by any very large number of the inhabitants of this island. But it is distressing to see the press grovelling in the gutter as low as Goebbels in his prime, shrieking that any German commander who holds out in a desperate situation (when, too, the military needs of his side clearly benefit) is a drunkard, and a besotted fanatic. I can’t see much distinction between our popular tone and the celebrated ‘military idiots’. We knew Hitler was a vulgar and ignorant little cad, in addition to any other defects (or the source of them); but there seem to be many v. and i. 1. cads who don’t speak German, and who given the same chance would show most of the other Hitlerian characteristics. There was a solemn article in the local paper seriously advocating systematic exterminating of the entire German nation as the only proper course after military victory: because, if you please, they are rattlesnakes, and don’t know the difference between good and evil! (What of the writer?) The Germans have just as much right to declare the Poles and Jews exterminable vermin, subhuman, as we have to select the Germans: in other words, no right, whatever they have done. Of course there is still a difference here. The article was answered, and the answer printed. The Vulgar and Ignorant Cad is not yet a boss with power; but he is a very great deal nearer to becoming one in this green and pleasant isle than he was. And all of that you know. Still you’re not the only one who wants to let off steam or bust, sometimes; and I could make steam, if I opened the throttle, compared with which (as the Queen said to Alice) this would be only a scent-spray. It can’t be helped. You can’t fight the Enemy with his own Ring without turning into an Enemy; but unfortunately Gandalf’s wisdom seems long ago to have passed with him into the True West. . . . .
The NW gale in the ‘Straits of Dover’ has passed, and we are back in a mild September day with a silver sun gleaming through very high mottled clouds moving still fairly fast from the NW. I must try and get on with the Pearl and stop the eager maw of Basil Blackwell.2 But I have the autumn wanderlust upon me, and would fain be off with a knapsack on my back and no particular destination, other than a series of quiet inns. One of the too long delayed delights we must promise ourselves, when it pleases God to release us and reunite us, is just such a perambulation, together, preferably in mountainous country, not too far from the sea, where the scars of war, felled woods and bulldozed fields, are not too plain to see. The Inklings have already agreed that their victory celebration, if they are spared to have one, will be to take a whole inn in the country for at least a week, and spend it entirely in beer and talk, without reference to any clock! … God be with you and guide you in all your ways. All the love of your own
Father.
82 From an airgraph to Christopher Tolkien
30 September 1944 (FS 52)
We three have just come back through the rainy end of a golden day, from a v. poor production at Playhouse of ‘Arms and the Man’, which does not wear well. I saw the good lady (in the theatre with C. Williams) who is typing Ring and have hopes of more to send soon. I don’t think I should write any more, but for the hope of your seeing it. At moment I’m engaged in revision, as I can’t get on without having back stuff fresh in mind. Do you remember chapter ‘King of the Golden Hall’? Seems rather good, now it is old enough for a detached view.
83 From a letter to Christopher Tolkien
6 October 1944 (FS 54)
It has been rather an unusually interesting week. You know how, even if you are not hard up, the finding of a forgotten bob in an old pocket gives you a curious feeling of wealth. I am not referring to the fact that I netted about £51 from my vacation labours on Cadets, though that wasn’t too bad. But to the fact that I am a week up. Term does not begin today but next week! It has given me a wonderful (if fictitious and later to be paid for) sense of leisure. . . . . On Tuesday at noon I looked in at the Bird and B. with C. Williams. There to my surprise I found Jack and Warnie1 already ensconced. (For the present the beer shortage is over, and the inns are almost habitable again). The conversation was pretty lively – though I cannot remember any of it now, except C.S.L.’s story of an elderly lady that he knows. (She was a student of English in the past days of Sir Walter Raleigh. At her viva she was asked: What period would you have liked to live in Miss B? In the 15th C. said she. Oh come, Miss B., wouldn’t you have liked to meet the Lake poets? No, sir, I prefer the society of gentlemen. Collapse of viva.) – & I noticed a strange tall gaunt man half in khaki half in mufti with a large wide-awake hat, bright eyes and a hooked nose sitting in the corner. The others had their backs to him, but I could see in his eye that he was taking an interest in the conversation quite unlike the ordinary pained astonishment of the British (and American) public at the presence of the Lewises (and myself) in a pub. It was rather like Trotter at the Prancing Pony,2 in fact v. like. All of a sudden he butted in, in a strange unplaceable accent, taking up some point about Wordsworth. In a few seconds he was revealed as Roy Campbell (of Flowering Rifle and Flaming Terrapin). Tableau! Especially as C.S.L. had not long ago violently lampooned him in the Oxford Magazine, and his press-cutters miss nothing. There is a good deal of Ulster still left in C.S.L. if hidden from himself. After that things became fast and furious and I was late for lunch. It was (perhaps) gratifying to find that this powerful poet and soldier desired in Oxford chiefly to see Lewis (and myself). We made an appointment for Thursday (that is last) night. If I could remember all that I heard in C.S.L.’s room last night it would fill several airletters. C.S.L. had taken a fair deal of port and was a little belligerent (insisted on reading out his lampoon again while R.C. laughed at him), but we were mostly obliged to listen to the guest. A window on a wild world, yet the man is in himself gentle, modest, and compassionate. Mostly it interested me to learn that this old-looking war-scarred Trotter, limping from recent wounds, is 9 years younger than I am, and we prob. met when he was a lad, as he lived in O[xford] at the time when we lived in Pusey Street (rooming with Walton the composer,3 and going about with T. W. Earp, the original twerp, and with Wilfrid Childe4 your godfather – whose works he much prizes). What he has done since beggars description. Here is a scion of an Ulster prot. family resident in S. Africa, most of whom fought in both wars, who became a Catholic after sheltering the Carmelite fathers in Barcelona – in vain, they were caught & butchered, and R.C. nearly lost his life. But he got the Carmelite archives from the burning library and took them through the Red country. He speaks Spanish fluently (he has been a professional bullfighter). As you know he then fought through the war on Franco’s side, and among other things was in the van of the company that chased the Reds out of Malaga in such haste that their general (Villalba I believe) could not carry off his loot – and left on his table St. Teresa’s hand with all its jewels. He had most interesting things to say about the situation at Gib, since the war (in Spain). But he is a patriotic man, and has fought for the B. Army since. Well, well. Martin D’Arcy5 vouches for him, and told him to seek us out. But I wish I could remember half his picaresque stories, about poets and musicians etc. from Peter Warlock to Aldous Huxley. The one I most enjoyed was the tale of greasy Epstein (the sculptor) and how he fought him and put him in hospital for a week. However it is not possible to convey an impression of such a rare character, both a soldier and a poet, and a Christian convert. How