Tolkien and antiquarianism
J. R. R. Tolkien's literary approach / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
J. R. R. Tolkien included many elements in his Middle-earth writings, especially The Lord of the Rings, other than narrative text. These include artwork, calligraphy, chronologies, family trees, heraldry, languages, maps, poetry, proverbs, scripts, glossaries, prologues, and annotations. Much of this material is collected in the many appendices. Scholars have stated that the use of these elements places Tolkien in the tradition of English antiquarianism.
Other scholars have discussed why Tolkien spent so much effort on these antiquarian-style elements. Some of the materials suggest that Tolkien was just the editor of real materials that had come into his hands. This applies, for example, to artworks like the found manuscript Book of Mazarbul, and to annals that seem to have been edited and annotated by different people over many years. It applies, too, to Tolkien's frame stories for his writings, including the memoirs of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins in the case of The Lord of the Rings, which supposedly survived as the Red Book of Westmarch. All of these elements together form an editorial frame for the book, placing the author in the role of fictional translator of the surviving ancient text, and helping to make the secondary world of Middle-earth seem real and solid.