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The Tower and the Ruin: J.R.R. Tolkien's Creation
A leading scholar draws on fifty years of reading and studying J.R.R. Tolkien to explain how he created an entire world.
No writer has surpassed the epic achievement of J.R.R. Tolkien, who spent decades refining his Middle-earth—a world that has felt so real to so many readers that it is almost impossible to imagine that any single person could have simply created it, seemingly out of thin air. In The Tower and the Ruin, Michael D. C. Drout takes us deep into Tolkien’s genius, allowing us to glimpse the making of not only The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, and The Silmarillion but also lesser-known books such as The Fall of Gondolin as well as Tolkien’s poetry and innovative scholarship.
Drout, who has spent decades reading, studying, and teaching Tolkien, allows us to understand the author’s methods and to embrace his works as never before. With great erudition and sparkling prose, Drout shows us how Tolkien invented myths, legends, cultures, languages, histories, and an intricate, multivocal narrative. We come to understand how Tolkien drew upon and modified material he found in Beowulf, the Kalevala, and other medieval literature from northern Europe, using the subtle qualities of those famous works as inspiration for his own. We also see the process by which he created the complex form of sorrow that is the primary emotional effect of his mature works, a sadness “blessed without bitterness,” carefully woven through a tapestry of themes that has resonated with generations of readers.
Sweeping and hugely perceptive—and enhanced throughout by Drout’s personal reflections on how Tolkien has shaped his own life and relationships—The Tower and the Ruin illuminates Tolkien anew and will come to be seen as an essential work for anyone who has journeyed to Middle-earth.
No writer has surpassed the epic achievement of J.R.R. Tolkien, who spent decades refining his Middle-earth—a world that has felt so real to so many readers that it is almost impossible to imagine that any single person could have simply created it, seemingly out of thin air. In The Tower and the Ruin, Michael D. C. Drout takes us deep into Tolkien’s genius, allowing us to glimpse the making of not only The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, and The Silmarillion but also lesser-known books such as The Fall of Gondolin as well as Tolkien’s poetry and innovative scholarship.
Drout, who has spent decades reading, studying, and teaching Tolkien, allows us to understand the author’s methods and to embrace his works as never before. With great erudition and sparkling prose, Drout shows us how Tolkien invented myths, legends, cultures, languages, histories, and an intricate, multivocal narrative. We come to understand how Tolkien drew upon and modified material he found in Beowulf, the Kalevala, and other medieval literature from northern Europe, using the subtle qualities of those famous works as inspiration for his own. We also see the process by which he created the complex form of sorrow that is the primary emotional effect of his mature works, a sadness “blessed without bitterness,” carefully woven through a tapestry of themes that has resonated with generations of readers.
Sweeping and hugely perceptive—and enhanced throughout by Drout’s personal reflections on how Tolkien has shaped his own life and relationships—The Tower and the Ruin illuminates Tolkien anew and will come to be seen as an essential work for anyone who has journeyed to Middle-earth.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published December 2, 2025
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4370 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 75 reviews
January 6, 2026
I preordered this, such is my love of Michael Drout's work on Tolkien. I was a bit taken aback upon receiving it and finding that it was largely directed toward textual analysis and outside influences upon Tolkien's story telling. That's not usually my sort of thing. However, Drout was straight forward enough that I don't mind it because he's not nitpicking things to death — as Tolkien would have said, he's not tearing the tower apart into a ruin. We're looking at the sea together while admiring the tower that makes it possible. Also, I did my fair share of skimming past the bits I didn't care about. Because there was plenty that I did find appealing.
Eventually, Drout began looking at deeper messages rather than just textual content. I truly loved his examination of The Hobbit through the bourgeois world versus the epic world. Anyone familiar with The Hobbit can quickly see why this works so well, but it takes Drout to look at both sides fairly. Yes, Bilbo learns more about the epic world which we admire. However, his bourgeois side also has benefits that the epic world simply cannot comprehend or adapt to purely because of the code that is followed. This was fascinating. And there's more where that came from.
Also, this is just enough of Drout's own memoir of Tolkien's influence in his own life to draw me along for more. The concluding chapter was enough to break one's heart but it was in a style that Tolkien would have appreciated.
Definitely recommended.
Eventually, Drout began looking at deeper messages rather than just textual content. I truly loved his examination of The Hobbit through the bourgeois world versus the epic world. Anyone familiar with The Hobbit can quickly see why this works so well, but it takes Drout to look at both sides fairly. Yes, Bilbo learns more about the epic world which we admire. However, his bourgeois side also has benefits that the epic world simply cannot comprehend or adapt to purely because of the code that is followed. This was fascinating. And there's more where that came from.
Also, this is just enough of Drout's own memoir of Tolkien's influence in his own life to draw me along for more. The concluding chapter was enough to break one's heart but it was in a style that Tolkien would have appreciated.
Definitely recommended.
March 22, 2026
I’d rank this next to two key critical studies by TA Shippey, his pioneering philological research in Road to Middle Earth (which I originally enjoyed when it appeared in its first edition in 1982), and his popular reworking as Tolkien: Author of the Century in 2002. As an Anglo-Saxonist in the wake of Shippey and of course Professor Tolkien, Michael DC Drout displays the relevant medievalist’s acumen to present sharp scholarship to a wider audience while faithfully explaining details from a range of modern and earlier literary creations to challenge reductive and facile “evaluation of art by ephemeral contemporary mores” (212). He never panders to passing trends, yet he tackles tough topics and never ameliorates the tragedy unleashed by the Ring and the damage in a fallen world which refuses easy moral consolations. He insists on the decaying nature of a flawed Middle-earth.
Drout, a longtime faculty member at Wheaton (not the flagship evangelical institution in Illinois but a venerable liberal arts college in Massachusetts), surprised me by his welcome ability to situate his fresh, cogent research firmly outside the Christian-dominated frameworks which increasingly have become standard for too many who would equate Tolkien’s legendarium with CS Lewis’ Narnia or Ransom/ Space Trilogy. Drout correctly emphasizes the crafting of Tolkien’s “textual ruins” to symbolize and embody the “inventive synthesis” as the appropriate origin story for the tales over six decades that Tolkien and then his erudite editor-son Christopher labored to (partially, thus the vast fragments) construct and preserve from Middle-earth (Drout insists upon this lower-case usage as matching the OE passage which inspired in that Earendel verse the catalyst joining imagination to the medieval corpus to make it viable. He won me over. Got to get used to typing it.)
Drout’s been pursuing questions about Tolkien since the age of 5 1/2. He got the newly issued Silmarillion for his ninth birthday in 1977. So, he’s been fortunate to teach the books for over 25 years after growing up with them; his own backstory integrates his father’s career, his parents’ divorce during the East Coast storms of winter 1978, and how his own children have perpetuated the lovely tradition of hearing the lore from their progenitors. He starts his own investigation with apt queries which I’ve always shared (having first encountered Tolkien in 1969 as part of the now-fading cohort who predated any films, with me being about half a dozen years Drout’s senior) …
That is why, as I’ve long put it, “Tolkien at a young age ruined me for any other fantasy.” (Drout ranks Ursula Le Guin as nearly Tolkien’s equal but for all her skill, I gently dissent. Even if I liked her observation about the "walking pace" of the Hobbit and LotR as I've been revisiting them on audio during strolls, my own fifty-five years after first engagement more attenuated than that of diligent Drout). Drout senses (although he may not agree with either “eucatastrophe” per se or the conceit that Tolkien didn’t invent but discovered the narrative in a fundamental sense; I’d counter with Drout’s skillful interpretation of Earendel in Cynewulf's Old English “Christ” poem to bolster Tolkien's "On Fairy-Stories" argument) how countless people of widely varying backgrounds keep repeating what I've intuitively, deeply felt. Entering a portal, not merely opening an imaginary tale.
That in a manner true and unique, experiencing Tolkien’s core stories creates an unshakable conviction of their evocative portrayals of not so much nostalgia as “heimweg”: German for our “pain for a lost home.” This parallels and resonates with my formative childhood encounters exactly. (I’d never heard this point stressed in previous attempts to articulate Tolkien’s appeal, except by that precise 1982 mention in Shippey suggesting how Proto Indo-European could be retrospectively described; that "asterisk-reality" citation’s stuck with me since I learned it then.)
And I wish that Drout would’ve spent more space on whatever the Tolkien Experience Project has archived (it’s relegated to a blip buried at the back) via Iser's reader-reception theory to elaborate this rather than less-helpful if hipper deep dives into lexomics to tally iterations of “is” or “and” in the books. Or the very dense treatment of racism in the Silmarillion or the “bourgeois” Bilbo; that knotty material seems taken from academic monographs or specialist articles nearly verbatim.
Still, overall, this offers serious students lots of valuable insights and dogged analysis which few preceding academic studies can match for a blend of accessibility and personality (as in both footnotes and endnotes). He sums up (p. 90) four aspects that characterize Tolkien’s inimitable approach: depth of supporting evidence and size of his landscapes; allusions which may contradict or reinforce the central storytelling; logical gaps given multiplication of tellers and perspectives; concomitant variations in style and scope from the extant yet scattered textual evidence. And his survey of Gollum’s struggles within the framework of Sam and especially Frodo--said to have penned the documents Professor Tolkien (and son) compiled--merits special attention; “The Ring's final victory is when I= eye [rebus in original]. Sauron’s is when this applies to everyone.” (275)
P.S. Don't miss asides in the endnotes such as Gergely Nagy's that what we'd call magic in our plane of existence in Middle-earth oft passes as theology. I encourage everyone to attend to it all: the study, documentation, and, proving the relevance of his devotion to the Professor himself, Dr. Drout’s plangent poignant coda…He leaves you with wisdom hard-earned and delicately cherished.
Drout, a longtime faculty member at Wheaton (not the flagship evangelical institution in Illinois but a venerable liberal arts college in Massachusetts), surprised me by his welcome ability to situate his fresh, cogent research firmly outside the Christian-dominated frameworks which increasingly have become standard for too many who would equate Tolkien’s legendarium with CS Lewis’ Narnia or Ransom/ Space Trilogy. Drout correctly emphasizes the crafting of Tolkien’s “textual ruins” to symbolize and embody the “inventive synthesis” as the appropriate origin story for the tales over six decades that Tolkien and then his erudite editor-son Christopher labored to (partially, thus the vast fragments) construct and preserve from Middle-earth (Drout insists upon this lower-case usage as matching the OE passage which inspired in that Earendel verse the catalyst joining imagination to the medieval corpus to make it viable. He won me over. Got to get used to typing it.)
Drout’s been pursuing questions about Tolkien since the age of 5 1/2. He got the newly issued Silmarillion for his ninth birthday in 1977. So, he’s been fortunate to teach the books for over 25 years after growing up with them; his own backstory integrates his father’s career, his parents’ divorce during the East Coast storms of winter 1978, and how his own children have perpetuated the lovely tradition of hearing the lore from their progenitors. He starts his own investigation with apt queries which I’ve always shared (having first encountered Tolkien in 1969 as part of the now-fading cohort who predated any films, with me being about half a dozen years Drout’s senior) …
That is why, as I’ve long put it, “Tolkien at a young age ruined me for any other fantasy.” (Drout ranks Ursula Le Guin as nearly Tolkien’s equal but for all her skill, I gently dissent. Even if I liked her observation about the "walking pace" of the Hobbit and LotR as I've been revisiting them on audio during strolls, my own fifty-five years after first engagement more attenuated than that of diligent Drout). Drout senses (although he may not agree with either “eucatastrophe” per se or the conceit that Tolkien didn’t invent but discovered the narrative in a fundamental sense; I’d counter with Drout’s skillful interpretation of Earendel in Cynewulf's Old English “Christ” poem to bolster Tolkien's "On Fairy-Stories" argument) how countless people of widely varying backgrounds keep repeating what I've intuitively, deeply felt. Entering a portal, not merely opening an imaginary tale.
That in a manner true and unique, experiencing Tolkien’s core stories creates an unshakable conviction of their evocative portrayals of not so much nostalgia as “heimweg”: German for our “pain for a lost home.” This parallels and resonates with my formative childhood encounters exactly. (I’d never heard this point stressed in previous attempts to articulate Tolkien’s appeal, except by that precise 1982 mention in Shippey suggesting how Proto Indo-European could be retrospectively described; that "asterisk-reality" citation’s stuck with me since I learned it then.)
And I wish that Drout would’ve spent more space on whatever the Tolkien Experience Project has archived (it’s relegated to a blip buried at the back) via Iser's reader-reception theory to elaborate this rather than less-helpful if hipper deep dives into lexomics to tally iterations of “is” or “and” in the books. Or the very dense treatment of racism in the Silmarillion or the “bourgeois” Bilbo; that knotty material seems taken from academic monographs or specialist articles nearly verbatim.
Still, overall, this offers serious students lots of valuable insights and dogged analysis which few preceding academic studies can match for a blend of accessibility and personality (as in both footnotes and endnotes). He sums up (p. 90) four aspects that characterize Tolkien’s inimitable approach: depth of supporting evidence and size of his landscapes; allusions which may contradict or reinforce the central storytelling; logical gaps given multiplication of tellers and perspectives; concomitant variations in style and scope from the extant yet scattered textual evidence. And his survey of Gollum’s struggles within the framework of Sam and especially Frodo--said to have penned the documents Professor Tolkien (and son) compiled--merits special attention; “The Ring's final victory is when I= eye [rebus in original]. Sauron’s is when this applies to everyone.” (275)
P.S. Don't miss asides in the endnotes such as Gergely Nagy's that what we'd call magic in our plane of existence in Middle-earth oft passes as theology. I encourage everyone to attend to it all: the study, documentation, and, proving the relevance of his devotion to the Professor himself, Dr. Drout’s plangent poignant coda…He leaves you with wisdom hard-earned and delicately cherished.
December 18, 2025
Of course if it's anything related to Professor Tolkien I just simply can't resist. This is the work of one who has studied Tolkien and is an expert into his writing. Excellent read.
January 26, 2026
I loved this book! In Sam Gamgee parlance: "That was an eye-opener, and no mistake!"
'The Tower and the Ruin' is Drout's examination of how Tolkien built Middle-earth and why it feels so powerfully real and meaningful to many people by connecting Tolkien's stories to universal human experiences of loss and endurance. Some of the sections tend to be a bit technical/jargony, but it's fairly obvious what Drout is trying to convey, so nothing too difficult or complex. This is also something of Drout's personal experiences with the works of Tolkien, both as a reader and then later as a scholar of medieval literature. Drout's personal observations and his pithy comments make this something more than just a scholarly text. Drout emphasizes a reader's experience of reading Tolkien. He tries to explain why certain readers, including himself, feel that Tolkien's novels are more than just words on a page, that these works provide an experience that is deeply meaningful to the reader.
Michael D.C. Drout explores J.R.R. Tolkien's creative process, arguing that Tolkien built his mythology from medieval literature like Beowulf, and more modern texts (e.g.the Kalevala, William Morris and H. Rider Haggard novels), to create a rich, layered world that feels ancient and real through "textual ruins" - broken references and pseudo-references, fragments, echoes and hints of deeper histories, symbolizing loss and enduring reality, like the cats of Queen Beruthiel, and Gimli's song of Khazad-dum.
Drout also considers Tolkien's use of a framing narrative - some more obvious than others. The Eriol-frame of the early Lost Tales, the Notion Club frame of the "Notion Club Papers", the less-obvious frame of the Hobbit, and the "translation" of the Red Book of Westmarch frame of the Lord of the Rings. There is also a more scholarly (and somewhat opaque) examination of the texts that explores "multivocality" and "heterotextuality" - essentially "another quality of Tolkien's work that creates the impression that they are somehow older and more authentic than the printed volumes the readers hold in their hands" by suggesting that Tolkien's works are a compilation of many older authors or have input from other sources to make the final product.
Drout also examines Tolkien's use of "focalization", in this case, using the least knowledgeable character as the point-of-view in each chapter. This makes it possible for Tolkien to convey pertinent information to the least knowledgeable character (usually a hobbit) as well as the reader, without having whole swaths of pages devoted to "information dumps". And the least-knowledgeable character usually has to pry information out of the more knowledgeable character (usually Gandalf or the nearest elf) with the proverbial crow-bar!
A particularly interesting chapter (to me anyway) examines patterns in the narrative. There is the linear flow of the narrative - the story from the beginning to the end. And also the cyclical narrative, in which patterns are repeated, and then the combination of the linear and cyclical features to form an "interlace", which reflects the fundamental character of reality. Patterns in the Lord of the Rings includes such repeated actions as characters entering/exiting caves or tunnels, walking through unknown forests, recovery after an illness, getting rescued from dangers and having rest periods in temporary refuges, meetings and departures. While the individual scenes are unique, the pattern of repetitions with variation create expectations and resonances in the minds of the readers - until the pattern is derailed, creating contrast and tension. There is also the structural symmetry between books and chapters.
Drout also provides a brief examination of the major themes of the Silmarillion and the Hobbit - namely elvish prejudices and bigotry (arrogant Noldor vs everyone else) and the static nature of Elven society/hierarchy (imagine being Finwë's dishwasher for eternity!). Drout argues that the elves' inability to overcome these societal differences is what causes their downfall, more than anything Morgoth did. An overview of Tom Shippey's bourgeois-burglar conflict (Bilbo's world vs that of the more heroic/epic world of the dwarves) is also provided. This particular chapter, while interesting, wasn't my favourite and I think is open to counterargument, or at least, a more thorough analysis.
Drout's overview of the multiple themes make up the Lord of the Rings is particularly interesting to me. Drout's argument that Frodo uses the Ring to dominate Gollum on their first meeting (it never occurred to me), and pays the price for this for the rest of the novel. His psychoanalysis of Smeagol/Gollum/Ring triumvirate in terms of speech patters is also fascinating. The other major theme in Tolkien's works is the loss that comes with the passing time, and "heinweh" - how Tolkien evokes these feelings in his novels, especially the feeling of 'sadness leavened by joy'. Galadriel's lament and the hobbits' return to the Shire are just two of the examples. There are also all sorts of other interesting goodies in this book.
Interesting, illuminating, provides food for thought, and I probably need to re-read this (and Tolkien's works, not to mention Tom Shippey's books) after an extended period of rumination.
'The Tower and the Ruin' is Drout's examination of how Tolkien built Middle-earth and why it feels so powerfully real and meaningful to many people by connecting Tolkien's stories to universal human experiences of loss and endurance. Some of the sections tend to be a bit technical/jargony, but it's fairly obvious what Drout is trying to convey, so nothing too difficult or complex. This is also something of Drout's personal experiences with the works of Tolkien, both as a reader and then later as a scholar of medieval literature. Drout's personal observations and his pithy comments make this something more than just a scholarly text. Drout emphasizes a reader's experience of reading Tolkien. He tries to explain why certain readers, including himself, feel that Tolkien's novels are more than just words on a page, that these works provide an experience that is deeply meaningful to the reader.
Michael D.C. Drout explores J.R.R. Tolkien's creative process, arguing that Tolkien built his mythology from medieval literature like Beowulf, and more modern texts (e.g.the Kalevala, William Morris and H. Rider Haggard novels), to create a rich, layered world that feels ancient and real through "textual ruins" - broken references and pseudo-references, fragments, echoes and hints of deeper histories, symbolizing loss and enduring reality, like the cats of Queen Beruthiel, and Gimli's song of Khazad-dum.
Drout also considers Tolkien's use of a framing narrative - some more obvious than others. The Eriol-frame of the early Lost Tales, the Notion Club frame of the "Notion Club Papers", the less-obvious frame of the Hobbit, and the "translation" of the Red Book of Westmarch frame of the Lord of the Rings. There is also a more scholarly (and somewhat opaque) examination of the texts that explores "multivocality" and "heterotextuality" - essentially "another quality of Tolkien's work that creates the impression that they are somehow older and more authentic than the printed volumes the readers hold in their hands" by suggesting that Tolkien's works are a compilation of many older authors or have input from other sources to make the final product.
Drout also examines Tolkien's use of "focalization", in this case, using the least knowledgeable character as the point-of-view in each chapter. This makes it possible for Tolkien to convey pertinent information to the least knowledgeable character (usually a hobbit) as well as the reader, without having whole swaths of pages devoted to "information dumps". And the least-knowledgeable character usually has to pry information out of the more knowledgeable character (usually Gandalf or the nearest elf) with the proverbial crow-bar!
A particularly interesting chapter (to me anyway) examines patterns in the narrative. There is the linear flow of the narrative - the story from the beginning to the end. And also the cyclical narrative, in which patterns are repeated, and then the combination of the linear and cyclical features to form an "interlace", which reflects the fundamental character of reality. Patterns in the Lord of the Rings includes such repeated actions as characters entering/exiting caves or tunnels, walking through unknown forests, recovery after an illness, getting rescued from dangers and having rest periods in temporary refuges, meetings and departures. While the individual scenes are unique, the pattern of repetitions with variation create expectations and resonances in the minds of the readers - until the pattern is derailed, creating contrast and tension. There is also the structural symmetry between books and chapters.
Drout also provides a brief examination of the major themes of the Silmarillion and the Hobbit - namely elvish prejudices and bigotry (arrogant Noldor vs everyone else) and the static nature of Elven society/hierarchy (imagine being Finwë's dishwasher for eternity!). Drout argues that the elves' inability to overcome these societal differences is what causes their downfall, more than anything Morgoth did. An overview of Tom Shippey's bourgeois-burglar conflict (Bilbo's world vs that of the more heroic/epic world of the dwarves) is also provided. This particular chapter, while interesting, wasn't my favourite and I think is open to counterargument, or at least, a more thorough analysis.
Drout's overview of the multiple themes make up the Lord of the Rings is particularly interesting to me. Drout's argument that Frodo uses the Ring to dominate Gollum on their first meeting (it never occurred to me), and pays the price for this for the rest of the novel. His psychoanalysis of Smeagol/Gollum/Ring triumvirate in terms of speech patters is also fascinating. The other major theme in Tolkien's works is the loss that comes with the passing time, and "heinweh" - how Tolkien evokes these feelings in his novels, especially the feeling of 'sadness leavened by joy'. Galadriel's lament and the hobbits' return to the Shire are just two of the examples. There are also all sorts of other interesting goodies in this book.
Interesting, illuminating, provides food for thought, and I probably need to re-read this (and Tolkien's works, not to mention Tom Shippey's books) after an extended period of rumination.
Read
March 12, 2026A deeply personal work of scholarship - I need to take time and approach each chapter as it's own entity to review because this runs a whole gamut of topics (elvish racism, heterotextuality, constructing and interpreting grief, etc - so much).
One thing I do appreciate in *all* the chapters is the footnotes. The footnotes brought humor to the text, and were one of the areas that Drout's passion for teaching had extra time to shine.
The entire book will appeal to Tolkien scholars and to Tolkien readers who love diving into discussions on how the text made you feel. It was more memoir than I anticipated, but it simply added a new dimension to the scholarship I expect from Drout. I'm very much looking forward to reading responses to this as they come out.
Many thanks to Norton for the review copy!
One thing I do appreciate in *all* the chapters is the footnotes. The footnotes brought humor to the text, and were one of the areas that Drout's passion for teaching had extra time to shine.
The entire book will appeal to Tolkien scholars and to Tolkien readers who love diving into discussions on how the text made you feel. It was more memoir than I anticipated, but it simply added a new dimension to the scholarship I expect from Drout. I'm very much looking forward to reading responses to this as they come out.
Many thanks to Norton for the review copy!
February 24, 2026
I have sat in the aftermath of this book for the last few weeks, reflecting on the depth and poignance of both Drout's scholarship and his love for the author whom I have loved in similar fashion. It is moving, masterful, and beautiful -- a book-long meditation on Tolkien's metaphor of the ruined tower in his essay-long Beowulf defense, "The Monsters and the Critics." Drout's layered deployment of this metaphor as a hermeneutical key is brilliant in ways that were both personally, spiritually, and intellectually meaningful to me, and the upshot is a rigorous case for why the experience of reading Tolkien, for many readers, is compelling in ways that no other books can match.
Having begun in trepidation, worried as I always am that over-analysis of Tolkien risks "breaking a thing to find out what it is" (as Gandalf warns Saruman), I was thrilled to find nothing of the sort. No breakage characterizes Drout's work here, and indeed, many themes are pieced together in ways that will further enrich appreciation for the Tolkien corpus -- especially for those who know it well. However, I do think I would refrain from recommending the book to just anyone, and specifically to new readers of Tolkien, for fear that its level of "textual nerdiness" might prevent some readers from appreciating Tolkien's first work as a whole creation to be loved on its own terms.
A final note: interestingly, Drout does not directly engage with Tolkien's Christianity, and at first I found this a bit jarring. However, as the book wore on, I realized that this was a conscious choice, perhaps even an intentional imitation of Tolkien's own devotion to allowing the True Myth to rest in the background of the story at hand, though never completely out of the frame.
Having begun in trepidation, worried as I always am that over-analysis of Tolkien risks "breaking a thing to find out what it is" (as Gandalf warns Saruman), I was thrilled to find nothing of the sort. No breakage characterizes Drout's work here, and indeed, many themes are pieced together in ways that will further enrich appreciation for the Tolkien corpus -- especially for those who know it well. However, I do think I would refrain from recommending the book to just anyone, and specifically to new readers of Tolkien, for fear that its level of "textual nerdiness" might prevent some readers from appreciating Tolkien's first work as a whole creation to be loved on its own terms.
A final note: interestingly, Drout does not directly engage with Tolkien's Christianity, and at first I found this a bit jarring. However, as the book wore on, I realized that this was a conscious choice, perhaps even an intentional imitation of Tolkien's own devotion to allowing the True Myth to rest in the background of the story at hand, though never completely out of the frame.
February 11, 2026
An excellent non-biographical look at Tolkien's work. If you're a Tolkien fan, you know he's a genius, and Michael Drout explains why. No one needs to apologize any more for taking Tolkien seriously as a writer. Really glad I read this, and now I'm finally going to read the Similarillion.
March 17, 2026
After I heard Michael Drout on The Literary Life podcast, I was excited and inspired to read his book. I must admit that it was (mostly) beyond me. Oh, I read it all with care and attention, but I'm just not that into Tolkien. Perhaps a second reading will change things. [I've tried -multiple times- to read The Silmarillion, knowing I *should* like it. But I couldn't get past the first two chapters.]
Still. It's some kind of wonderful to see a man devote his life to the works of Tolkien, and to wave over his shoulder and bring us along. There are many personal anecdotes relative to grief, joy, life.
"TOWERS are achievements, visible expressions of design and knowledge, technology and labor."
"Even as it preserves a memory of lost time, a RUIN forces us to confront the permanence of our separation from the past."
One thing I regularly look for in a book is the representation of life that includes both beauty and brokenness. This book abounded with the juxtaposition of those two elements.
"Transforming that sorrow into something more, into tears that are not bitter, is the great achievement of Tolkien's art and the reason that Sam's final words, "Well, I'm back," are both heartbreaking and blessed, as we, like him, go on as we must despite all that has passed and all that keeps passing away.
Special kudos to Steve Attardo on the jacket design. Making the O in Tower a ring with the flame from Tolkien's lighter/match is *genius*.
Still. It's some kind of wonderful to see a man devote his life to the works of Tolkien, and to wave over his shoulder and bring us along. There are many personal anecdotes relative to grief, joy, life.
"TOWERS are achievements, visible expressions of design and knowledge, technology and labor."
"Even as it preserves a memory of lost time, a RUIN forces us to confront the permanence of our separation from the past."
One thing I regularly look for in a book is the representation of life that includes both beauty and brokenness. This book abounded with the juxtaposition of those two elements.
"Transforming that sorrow into something more, into tears that are not bitter, is the great achievement of Tolkien's art and the reason that Sam's final words, "Well, I'm back," are both heartbreaking and blessed, as we, like him, go on as we must despite all that has passed and all that keeps passing away.
Special kudos to Steve Attardo on the jacket design. Making the O in Tower a ring with the flame from Tolkien's lighter/match is *genius*.
January 31, 2026
An interesting book that actually helped me better understand the writings of J.R.R. Tolkien. I have always enjoyed his mainstays, "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings." Over the past decade, or more, I have become much more interested in the overarching mythology that Tolkien developed associated with his 'Middle-Earth' and the history he crafted. Professor Drout spends much of this book on why he believes all of this was so important to Tolkien. This has given me a lot to think about as I reread "The Silmarillion" and the fragments of alliterative poetry from "The Lays of Beleriand". Thank god for Tolkien's son, Christopher, in organizing and publishing all of this material over the past 40+ years. In any event, I learned a lot from Professor Drout's book, and it has inspired me to start reading Tolkien's works again. This time I am starting with the mythology, "The Silmarillion", and then on to "The Hobbit" and then "The Lord of the Rings", followed by the other minor works.
December 13, 2025
Well Worth The Wait!!!
As with everything Professor Drout has written an incredibly insightful and important work of scholarship. The Tower and the Ruin has given me new insights into works I have read and studied practically my whole life and has made me want to dig back into them. From Drout’s Tower you will see new vistas and perspectives into Tolkien’s legendarium.
As with everything Professor Drout has written an incredibly insightful and important work of scholarship. The Tower and the Ruin has given me new insights into works I have read and studied practically my whole life and has made me want to dig back into them. From Drout’s Tower you will see new vistas and perspectives into Tolkien’s legendarium.
April 9, 2026
I loved soaking in this in-depth analysis of The Lord of The Rings. I am usually fond of this type of book, but this one was more profound somehow and also beautiful and sad (as it would almost have to be to truly explore a work that is both beautiful and sad). I appreciated his discussions of the framing of the Lord of the Rings, the narrative conventions, deep analysis into how the way Tolkien wrote it makes it really feel like a many-voiced work. His discussion of the racial hierarchy of the elves as the ultimate source of the misery of the Silmarillion is so thought-provoking, and I've never read anything like his analysis of the way that the Ring plays on Frodo, Denethor, and Boromir.
April 29, 2026
I had some minor quibbles here and there, but overall a great analysis of Tolkien’s works.
March 13, 2026
3.5 stars. It’s not badly written but chapters 1-5 just elaborate what Drout has already said in the past. Chapter 6 is by far the most original and interesting but oh boy do I have thoughts…
June 16, 2025
Outstanding blend of original and well-crafted analysis and a touch of sentimental bond with author's works
May 2, 2026
I think Drout has been writing this book for decades. A lot of what was in here was covered in his class at Wheaton, but having everything compiled together was wonderful to revisit. The Tolkien class was one of the only ones I kept my notes from, everything else getting tossed the day after graduation. Those notes felt different somehow, and the red Moleskine notebook I filled during those 50 minute sessions is still tucked away with other college memories.
April 8, 2026
“The ruin cannot bring back the tower, not redeem its fall, but shows us that beauty can arise from loss. The toppled statue garlanded with flowers catches the light of the setting sun and we know: ‘They cannot conquer forever.’”
“…because beyond the circles of the world there is more than memory.”
The tower and the ruin, a metaphor that has become extremely important to me the more I read and one that is deeply personal. I am sure that is true for many and I am no different. This is a metaphor that I hold in the deepest part of me. Something that I believe Tolkien did as well. Something that Drout lays out in a way that not only shows all of that beauty but the ways in which it is illuminated in Tolkien’s work. This is beautiful scholarship. A heartbreaking book that touches on some of the deepest and most painful ruins that there are in a very personal way.
“…because beyond the circles of the world there is more than memory.”
The tower and the ruin, a metaphor that has become extremely important to me the more I read and one that is deeply personal. I am sure that is true for many and I am no different. This is a metaphor that I hold in the deepest part of me. Something that I believe Tolkien did as well. Something that Drout lays out in a way that not only shows all of that beauty but the ways in which it is illuminated in Tolkien’s work. This is beautiful scholarship. A heartbreaking book that touches on some of the deepest and most painful ruins that there are in a very personal way.
December 28, 2025
I never expected a scholarly work on Tolkien’s creative masterpiece to leave me sobbing but then I almost could not make it through the last chapter due to my own personal experiences. The weaving of memories into scholastic insight proved to be remarkably impactful and truly highlighted the through theme of experiential storytelling that is Tolkien’s work.
February 9, 2026
"The ruin cannot bring back the tower, nor redeem its fall, but it shows us that beauty can arise from loss."
It took me a couple of weeks to read this analysis of (essentially), why Tolkien's works can feel like they are experienced rather than just read. Drout has a long list of accolades related to his scholarship of Tolkien. He goes into some of Tolkien's inspirations, use of frame narratives, the very long compositional history, themes, etc. I found it accessible with a background in English and in Tolkien, but it is an academic work.
A few things that stood out to me: the pov change to the least knowledgeable character to maintain tension in the story (I never really noticed as it feels like it's always just hobbits, but it tracks), racism being a motivating cause of a lot of the first age troubles for the elves, Frodo's use of the ring and the cost always paid for doing evil (even for good reason), Gondor's systemized, strict and tbh nearly sepulchral culture vs Rohan's individualistic and glory-seeking culture. Everything on Denethor was very worth thought. Overall, a lot to think on and honoring toward Tolkien.
It took me a couple of weeks to read this analysis of (essentially), why Tolkien's works can feel like they are experienced rather than just read. Drout has a long list of accolades related to his scholarship of Tolkien. He goes into some of Tolkien's inspirations, use of frame narratives, the very long compositional history, themes, etc. I found it accessible with a background in English and in Tolkien, but it is an academic work.
A few things that stood out to me: the pov change to the least knowledgeable character to maintain tension in the story (I never really noticed as it feels like it's always just hobbits, but it tracks), racism being a motivating cause of a lot of the first age troubles for the elves, Frodo's use of the ring and the cost always paid for doing evil (even for good reason), Gondor's systemized, strict and tbh nearly sepulchral culture vs Rohan's individualistic and glory-seeking culture. Everything on Denethor was very worth thought. Overall, a lot to think on and honoring toward Tolkien.
December 18, 2025
3.5 ⭐️
This ended up being different from what I expected. While Drout is clearly knowledgeable about Tolkien and his literature, this book felt a bit chaotic. The author’s goal was to explore why Tolkien’s stories have the universal impact on people that they anecdotally seem to have. Drout explores a bunch of different categories in order to explain why he thinks this is the case.
This method is all well and good, but the execution was lacking a bit. He would abruptly switch gears from reminiscing on how Tolkien impacted his personal life to then getting deeply in the weeds of some analytical literary minutiae all within a couple of pages. There were also times where I just couldn’t understand why he was spending so much time on a particular theme in Tolkien’s work that seemed not worth exploring (e.g. Elvish racism).
Overall, I learned a lot and there were some brilliant moments contained within Drout’s project, but this book feels like one that I will reference specific sections in rather than rereading or recommending the whole.
This ended up being different from what I expected. While Drout is clearly knowledgeable about Tolkien and his literature, this book felt a bit chaotic. The author’s goal was to explore why Tolkien’s stories have the universal impact on people that they anecdotally seem to have. Drout explores a bunch of different categories in order to explain why he thinks this is the case.
This method is all well and good, but the execution was lacking a bit. He would abruptly switch gears from reminiscing on how Tolkien impacted his personal life to then getting deeply in the weeds of some analytical literary minutiae all within a couple of pages. There were also times where I just couldn’t understand why he was spending so much time on a particular theme in Tolkien’s work that seemed not worth exploring (e.g. Elvish racism).
Overall, I learned a lot and there were some brilliant moments contained within Drout’s project, but this book feels like one that I will reference specific sections in rather than rereading or recommending the whole.
January 29, 2026
Michael D. C. Drout's The Tower and the Ruin stands out as a compelling and insightful scholarly exploration. With a philological approach, Drout weaves language, history, and myth into a richly detailed and emotionally evocative narrative. To fully appreciate this work, readers should be familiar with The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion. The book offers extraordinary value for those intrigued by how words, stories, and cultures evolve or endure over time. Reflective and imaginative, The Tower and the Ruin invites deeper reflection on the power of language and the tangible and mythical ruins that shape human memory.
April 16, 2026
Lots of excellent thoughts about Tolkien's works which I have loved. I do think this book would be hard to enjoy if you have not at least read The Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit, but it is not necessary to have read beyond that. But the book may inspire the reader to go more into the Middle Earth world.
I appreciate that Dr. Drout interacts with the material as a reader and how it impacts him. That made it more real to me and more relatable.
I did listen on audio, which was read by the author. I think this material is probably best read in print for my learning style, but I got a great deal on the book and so interacted this way and it worked.
I appreciate that Dr. Drout interacts with the material as a reader and how it impacts him. That made it more real to me and more relatable.
I did listen on audio, which was read by the author. I think this material is probably best read in print for my learning style, but I got a great deal on the book and so interacted this way and it worked.
April 16, 2026
This book was not written for me. I don't enjoy the process of writing, so I didn't really enjoy the analysis of Tolkien's writing.
However, the book is very well-written. If a quote like the one below appeals to you, you absolutely should try this book.
"The poetic language therefore creates the impression of heterotextuality and thus the same sorts of effects as the broken reference or traditional referents, hinting to the reader that there is a much larger culture, possessed of long standing traditions, behind the surface narrative."
However, the book is very well-written. If a quote like the one below appeals to you, you absolutely should try this book.
"The poetic language therefore creates the impression of heterotextuality and thus the same sorts of effects as the broken reference or traditional referents, hinting to the reader that there is a much larger culture, possessed of long standing traditions, behind the surface narrative."
December 9, 2025
This guy Tolkeins! That said was hot and cold on different aspects of it: as a kid who grew up on the Rankin/Bass movie and double LP abridged audio version (my first audiobook!) of the Hobbit and the Bakshi movie version of LOTR (it seemed completely awesome at 8 years old) and am among the apparently very wide demographic of your-dad-reading-this-book (albeit made it about 20% into the first volume and promptly gave up), I really enjoyed the aspects where the author discusses these aspects (although I heretically found Jackson's trilogy to be kind of cheesy as an adult). As a work of literary criticism the book was maybe too much for a casual reader such as myself? That said, if you love Tolkien's work then this might give you much more mileage. However, the whole section about racism embedded in the work was just tiresome - it seems that this aspect is a must for a large section of modern non-fiction to trawl these themes and find evidence from thin air; whereas it seems that the whole dwarves-are-jews antisemitism claim was too verboten for the author to comment on.
April 23, 2026
I am re-reading LOTR after reading Drout's book. Tolkien's writing became clearer, and I find myself agreeing and understanding exactly why I am drawn to these books. I found myself returning to Norse mythology and Beowulf and gaining a deeper understanding of LOTR. Drout not only delves into ancient poetry and shows the nuances of Tolkien's poetry and his genius as he composes in response to these poems, but also shows how healing the books are when tragedy hits.
May 1, 2026
There's a lot here to love, and the book contains some of the best literary analysis I've ever read on Tolkien. However, there are some rougher patches (for instance, Chapter 6 is easily the weakest one in the book, and there's a lot to Frodo and Gollum's dynamic that I think Drout completely misses) that keep me from giving it 5 stars.
December 8, 2025
Great scholarship in here and some profound insights. He acknowledges but does shy away from Tolkien’s Christianity as an impact on Tolkien’s creative genius.
March 1, 2026
Full review here: https://dearstrangethings.substack.co...
February 12, 2026
The Tower and the Ruin is the kind of book that makes you want to become a Tolkien scholar, but I admit this book is challenging. Heavy on textual analysis, I appreciated the depths of mythology and language that create the dense layers of Middle Earth lore. Drout's thematic analysis of Lord of the Rings is tinged with the bittersweet as he weaves some of his own personal experience when his own father read LoTR to him. Drout made me want to read and understand the Icelandic Sagas and more Norse mythology, but more than that, he made me love The Lord of the Rings even more.
February 20, 2026
A mixed bag for me. At times, Drout got maddeningly academic to the point I wondered how this would play with a normal audience. The first 100 pages were a real effort. My other complaint was that even with the organization of the book into chapters, there was a lot of chaos, as the author jumped from topic to topic with no real structure I could discern. On the flip side, the best parts of the book were when Prof. Drout got personal about the blizzard of 78, his parents’ marriage, his relationship with his dad, and his own horrific family tragedy, all blended with his experience reading Tolkien’s books. The more personal he got, the better the book was for me.
December 31, 2025
Michael Drout has long and precious memories of the writings of J.R.R. Tolkien. He is a scholar who has been reading Tolkien like the Bible and for decades, thinking about what he loves, trying to understand better, and gathering from it all a sense of something he puts into this book. This has to be one of the most extraordinary and wonderful books on the significance of Tolkien that exists.
Drout starts out with Tolkien's lineage. Walter Scott was a writer trying to capture a sense of true things that we still remember. William Morris endeavored to translate that sense of the Medieval through his romances. Rider Haggard wrote Eric Brighteyes, endeavoring to transmit to his generation the sense of the world of the Sagas of Icelanders. The very title of Drout's book evokes Tolkien's essay, definitive in Anglo-Saxon studies about Beowulf, The Monsters and the Critics, in which a dominant illustration is that of the ruins of a tower, examined in all kinds of foolish ways, but which were made as a tower from which the builder could look out on the sea. Beowulf is poignant because it is obviously written by a Christian remembering and lamenting the passing and loss of a heroic pagan way of life. Drout argues that Tolkien figured out a way to lament something made up in such a way that it powerfully suggests an enduring reality. Aristotle said that fiction is better than history, because fiction can be calibrated and focused on the permanent things. Drout's book is an explanation of how Tolkien did that.
The argument of the second chapter is that in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien uses frames. The frame of The Hobbit is more obvious: we are being told thing through a narrator who is framing the story with his observations. The frame of The Lord of the Rings is more subtle: it is suggested in the appendices and in allusions to other books. The frame here consists in various different people telling stories which are being transmitted, translated, compiled, and imperfectly collated. That contributes in at least a subliminal way to the sense that we are getting ancient records. These layers in turn suggest historical accuracy, even when there are inconsistencies because historical records always generate these. It gives the whole a feel of real memories of true experiences.
This leads Drout to consider how Tolkien focalizes his narrative through the most ignorant character. It is what keeps him from expositing crucial information tediously. We are watching developments, even when other characters talk, through the eyes of the person who has the most at stake in learning that information. It avoids a notorious pitfall of which imitators are often guilty: awkward, uninteresting information dumps. There is a lot of information one has to gather to make sense of The Lord of the Rings. There are appendices, genealogies, and the detailed maps, all beside a long, intricate story. All these are incorporated in such a way that after the main narrative, you read on, you flip back and study the map, you ponder the relations in the family trees. It is due to that ingenious focalization, with the curious intrusion only once (if I remember correctly) of a narrator who's point of view cannot be explained.
Scholars, among whom Drout is not the least, have figured out that The Lord of the Rings has repeated patterns. If you think of it, any story by Tolkien will have caves, perils, treasures, giants, battles, etc. There is also the pattern of alternating good and bad. Tolkien did not tell The Tale of the Children of Hurin that way, for example. That story is only worse and worse. But in The Lord of the Rings especially, you have the pattern of expecting good to follow bad. As you have episodes repeat, you have the variations in the general pattern that generate experiences and expectations. This is part of the magic: repeated experiences of trouble overcome, which train the reader's soul in hope. The sense of possibilities, for example, is generated thereby, till you have Frodo's amazing possibility when he glimpses a far green shore.
This book is deeply personal. Drout does not apologize for it because he understands that his life has been so intertwined with the experience of reading and rereading Tolkien's works that it is not possible for him to understand his life apart from them, and that he cannot understand Tolkien apart from the important personal experiences Tolkien has shaped through his stories. So that things that are secret, and difficult, and of the most profound sadness are offered up in this public way: there is no other way to demonstrate how real and true the shaping is. It is what Tolkien has most meaningfully given him, as if Drout were the mines of Moria and Tolkien the smith who shaped what can then be brought to the light of day.
The sixth chapter, Threads, was for me the most ambivalent. I read it with a lot of attention, but attention full of misgiving. Drout is arguing about The Silmarillion that the plot is driven in part by the racism of its characters. He is not arguing that Tolkien was writing a racist book. He is arguing that the perceived ontological hierarchies that the characters experience, are abused, sinfully abused, leading to lamentable consequences. Here is where I think I somewhat disagree with Drout: I don't think he understands the hierarchies that obtain between beings to be ontological. That elves are better than men, and men are better than dwarves. Not just superior in some ways, but in an ontological hierarchy. I can affirm unreservedly an analogia entis. I don't think Drout can. He cannot understand that some elves are better than others because some elves are more proximate to grace. Or if he acknowledges that grace (I doubt it though) he cannot acknowledge ontological benefits: that some elves are greater beings than others. I don't think he even believes dwarves are inferior beings – the whole consideration is off the table for him—it seems to me. I can't agree with this. If you put that aside, his argument is good. It is by looking down on others, treating them with contempt, despising and lowering others in sinful and abusive ways drives the conflict in The Silmarillion. Something similar occurs in The Hobbit. There, Drout demonstrates, there is an interesting conflict created by the interaction of the bourgeois world of Bilbo, and the epic world of the dwarves. Neither is dismissed by the narrator, both have their limits, and brought together they enrich and mature the protagonist.
The climax of his argument is chapter seven, Threads. In The Lord of the Rings the epic and the tragic are woven together to great effect. Drout examines two things in detail: the exact power of the ring and the occasion for its beginning to dominate Frodo and the consequences. Here is where Drout's long studies and wide acquaintance with all the scholarship, which are so stupendous all through this book that one is in danger of taking it all for granted in the chapter for which all the book prepares, shine. You have to read how he does this, how he uses it to explain what is happening to Frodo, and why Frodo's triumph is imbued with tragedy, pregnant with intangible realities that fill the reader to brimming.
Drout ends with a very personal conclusion that allows him to show how, despite his knowing that Tolkien's works is all fiction, and despite the fact that he is not a believer, The Lord of the Rings has formed his soul in the virtue of hope. I understand there was a chapter he had to excise. I hope we will eventually get this. Drout can talk as long as he wants to me about Tolkien. I will pay. I will read. I will listen.
Reader, this book is one of the best things to happen ever in the now blossoming field of Tolkien studies. It is technical, intricate, and is best read after good exposure to the works it seeks to illuminate: everything Tolkien ever wrote. But it is worth it. It is a truly astonishing tribute to the greatness of Tolkien's accomplishment.
Drout starts out with Tolkien's lineage. Walter Scott was a writer trying to capture a sense of true things that we still remember. William Morris endeavored to translate that sense of the Medieval through his romances. Rider Haggard wrote Eric Brighteyes, endeavoring to transmit to his generation the sense of the world of the Sagas of Icelanders. The very title of Drout's book evokes Tolkien's essay, definitive in Anglo-Saxon studies about Beowulf, The Monsters and the Critics, in which a dominant illustration is that of the ruins of a tower, examined in all kinds of foolish ways, but which were made as a tower from which the builder could look out on the sea. Beowulf is poignant because it is obviously written by a Christian remembering and lamenting the passing and loss of a heroic pagan way of life. Drout argues that Tolkien figured out a way to lament something made up in such a way that it powerfully suggests an enduring reality. Aristotle said that fiction is better than history, because fiction can be calibrated and focused on the permanent things. Drout's book is an explanation of how Tolkien did that.
The argument of the second chapter is that in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien uses frames. The frame of The Hobbit is more obvious: we are being told thing through a narrator who is framing the story with his observations. The frame of The Lord of the Rings is more subtle: it is suggested in the appendices and in allusions to other books. The frame here consists in various different people telling stories which are being transmitted, translated, compiled, and imperfectly collated. That contributes in at least a subliminal way to the sense that we are getting ancient records. These layers in turn suggest historical accuracy, even when there are inconsistencies because historical records always generate these. It gives the whole a feel of real memories of true experiences.
This leads Drout to consider how Tolkien focalizes his narrative through the most ignorant character. It is what keeps him from expositing crucial information tediously. We are watching developments, even when other characters talk, through the eyes of the person who has the most at stake in learning that information. It avoids a notorious pitfall of which imitators are often guilty: awkward, uninteresting information dumps. There is a lot of information one has to gather to make sense of The Lord of the Rings. There are appendices, genealogies, and the detailed maps, all beside a long, intricate story. All these are incorporated in such a way that after the main narrative, you read on, you flip back and study the map, you ponder the relations in the family trees. It is due to that ingenious focalization, with the curious intrusion only once (if I remember correctly) of a narrator who's point of view cannot be explained.
Scholars, among whom Drout is not the least, have figured out that The Lord of the Rings has repeated patterns. If you think of it, any story by Tolkien will have caves, perils, treasures, giants, battles, etc. There is also the pattern of alternating good and bad. Tolkien did not tell The Tale of the Children of Hurin that way, for example. That story is only worse and worse. But in The Lord of the Rings especially, you have the pattern of expecting good to follow bad. As you have episodes repeat, you have the variations in the general pattern that generate experiences and expectations. This is part of the magic: repeated experiences of trouble overcome, which train the reader's soul in hope. The sense of possibilities, for example, is generated thereby, till you have Frodo's amazing possibility when he glimpses a far green shore.
This book is deeply personal. Drout does not apologize for it because he understands that his life has been so intertwined with the experience of reading and rereading Tolkien's works that it is not possible for him to understand his life apart from them, and that he cannot understand Tolkien apart from the important personal experiences Tolkien has shaped through his stories. So that things that are secret, and difficult, and of the most profound sadness are offered up in this public way: there is no other way to demonstrate how real and true the shaping is. It is what Tolkien has most meaningfully given him, as if Drout were the mines of Moria and Tolkien the smith who shaped what can then be brought to the light of day.
The sixth chapter, Threads, was for me the most ambivalent. I read it with a lot of attention, but attention full of misgiving. Drout is arguing about The Silmarillion that the plot is driven in part by the racism of its characters. He is not arguing that Tolkien was writing a racist book. He is arguing that the perceived ontological hierarchies that the characters experience, are abused, sinfully abused, leading to lamentable consequences. Here is where I think I somewhat disagree with Drout: I don't think he understands the hierarchies that obtain between beings to be ontological. That elves are better than men, and men are better than dwarves. Not just superior in some ways, but in an ontological hierarchy. I can affirm unreservedly an analogia entis. I don't think Drout can. He cannot understand that some elves are better than others because some elves are more proximate to grace. Or if he acknowledges that grace (I doubt it though) he cannot acknowledge ontological benefits: that some elves are greater beings than others. I don't think he even believes dwarves are inferior beings – the whole consideration is off the table for him—it seems to me. I can't agree with this. If you put that aside, his argument is good. It is by looking down on others, treating them with contempt, despising and lowering others in sinful and abusive ways drives the conflict in The Silmarillion. Something similar occurs in The Hobbit. There, Drout demonstrates, there is an interesting conflict created by the interaction of the bourgeois world of Bilbo, and the epic world of the dwarves. Neither is dismissed by the narrator, both have their limits, and brought together they enrich and mature the protagonist.
The climax of his argument is chapter seven, Threads. In The Lord of the Rings the epic and the tragic are woven together to great effect. Drout examines two things in detail: the exact power of the ring and the occasion for its beginning to dominate Frodo and the consequences. Here is where Drout's long studies and wide acquaintance with all the scholarship, which are so stupendous all through this book that one is in danger of taking it all for granted in the chapter for which all the book prepares, shine. You have to read how he does this, how he uses it to explain what is happening to Frodo, and why Frodo's triumph is imbued with tragedy, pregnant with intangible realities that fill the reader to brimming.
Drout ends with a very personal conclusion that allows him to show how, despite his knowing that Tolkien's works is all fiction, and despite the fact that he is not a believer, The Lord of the Rings has formed his soul in the virtue of hope. I understand there was a chapter he had to excise. I hope we will eventually get this. Drout can talk as long as he wants to me about Tolkien. I will pay. I will read. I will listen.
Reader, this book is one of the best things to happen ever in the now blossoming field of Tolkien studies. It is technical, intricate, and is best read after good exposure to the works it seeks to illuminate: everything Tolkien ever wrote. But it is worth it. It is a truly astonishing tribute to the greatness of Tolkien's accomplishment.
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