"The Lord of the Rings" has sold 200 million copies in 39 languages. The movies based on the novel broke box-office records. And while Tolkien, the Oxford don who created "Rings," "The Hobbit" and "The Silmarillion," died in 1973, this year will be another big one for him.
The first "new" work by Tolkien in 30 years arrives in bookstores on April 17. The book, "The Children of Hurin," is an incomplete manuscript edited by Tolkien's son Christopher. And the release of a multiplayer Internet game, "The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar," is set for April 24.
Naturally, the Tolkien faithful organize Tolkien-themed events. Game players, medievalists, linguists and other scholars all have reasons to become lost in the heroic fantasy of "Rings" and can find gatherings to match their sensibilities.
At the most rarefied level, Tolkienism is a field of academic study, and conference participants leave their fur-tufted Hobbit feet behind. Tolkien's vast created world of invented languages, legends, maps, poetry and creatures invites explication — and debate.
The Tolkien Conference at the University of Vermont in mid-April will offer a keynote speaker, the presentation of papers, a reading and films. "A geek fest," said Chris Vaccaro, the conference co-founder and an adjunct lecturer at the university.
The undergraduate Elvish Club will put on a 10-minute performance entirely in Elvish, a language developed by Tolkien.
In May, the long-running annual International Congress on Medieval Studies at Western Michigan University will include a number of sessions devoted to Tolkien on topics like gender and ethnicity in the books. "In the hands of a knowledgeable instructor," Paul E. Szarmach, director of the university's Medieval Institute, said in an e-mail interview from London, "Tolkien's work can be the text that opens the medieval world."
Reading "Rings" or "The Silmarillion," has inadvertently converted more than one fan of Orlando Bloom, the actor who played the Elvish character Legolas, into an admirer of "Beowulf," which inspired Tolkien.
Two summer events appeal to both amateur scholars and budding actors.
"I'm an obsessed geek," said Marie Miesel, a nurse from Nashville and a presenter at Dragon(AST)Con, perhaps the nation's largest convention for fantasy fans, held in Atlanta annually on Labor Day weekend. "My parents brought me to science fiction conventions when I was 7." She will be leading a seminar on Sept. 2, "The Silmarillion for Dummies."
The four-day convention isn't just about Tolkien, but its Tolkien Track will be a cluster of lectures, game demonstrations, films and panel discussions on topics from "Customizing Your Action Figures" to "Misconceptions of Copyright Law for the Creator of Fan Works." A party called An Evening in Bree (Bree is a village in Middle-earth) will include folk dancing, a trivia contest and a band singing Tolkien-themed lyrics.
On Saturday morning, hundreds of costumed Tolkien fans will march through downtown Atlanta — bearded wizards and snarling orcs — mingling with Klingons ("Star Trek") and Imperial Guardsmen ("Star Wars") from other fantasy-loving groups.
"We have no objection to those things, but we are interested in the books," said David Bratman, chairman of Mythcon 38 (this year, Aug. 3-6 in Berkeley, Calif.). Largely presentations of 40 scholarly papers, this smaller event is run by the Mythopoeic Society, an organization devoted to studying Tolkien and others in the circle called the Inklings, which also included C.S. Lewis and Charles Williams.
But even the staid Mythcon has its whimsical side: the Not Ready for Mythcon Players — "half-rehearsed performances," Bratman said, "of some sort of silly adaptation."
To be closer to the source of the myths that inspired Tolkien, fans can journey to England for the British Tolkien Society's Tolkien Weekend in May. A grassy lawn at Sarehole Mill in Birmingham, where Tolkien spent his formative years, is the staging ground for activities like dramatizations of "The Hobbit," calligraphy, storytelling, folk singing and Viking battle re-enactments.
With about 10,000 visitors each year, the weekend suggests that Tolkien has finally moved beyond geeks.
1 comment:
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