JRRT vs Wagner
Lord Jubjub
http://www.newyorker.com/critics/atlarge/?031222crat_atlarge
I pretty much agree with him. I like his description of the Ring's
tempations:
"Tolkien mutes the romance of medieval stories and puts us out in
self-abnegating, Anglican-modernist, T. S. Eliot territory. The ring is
a never-ending nightmare to which people are drawn for no obvious
reason. It generates lust and yet gives no satisfaction."
--
Lord Jubjub, ruler of the slithy toves.
If you want to contact me, remember I am a LORD.
A Tsar Is Born
"Lord Jubjub" <jub...@ev1.net> wrote in message
news:jubjub-35F05B....@corp.supernews.com...
> Interesting article in the New Yorker:
>
> http://www.newyorker.com/critics/atlarge/?031222crat_atlarge
Ross is one of their best critics.
But anyone who's hung around this ng for a while knows QUITE WELL that
Ross's crack about a conspiracy of silence by Tolkien fans about Wagner's
influence is nonsense -- we've gone on and on about it.
(I'm one of those who insists that a Ring of Power was Wagner's invention,
and Tolkien found it there -- Wagnerian ideas being difficult to avoid in
the half century before LotR began to be written, and we know that JRRT saw
Wagner's Ring and disliked it. There are a lot of people who seem hurt by
that, but none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
people, and no one can deny that JRRT knew Wagner's work quite well.)
Tsar Parmathule
Stan Brown
>none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
>people,
Isn't there a magic Ring in one of the tales of the Arabian Nights,
that controls a genie?
Did Wagner actually invent the Ring he used? I thought he adapted it
from earlier materials in German and Norse myths.
--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Cortland County, New York, USA
http://OakRoadSystems.com
Tolkien FAQs: http://Tolkien.slimy.com (Steuard Jensen's site)
Tolkien letters FAQ:
http://users.telerama.com/~taliesen/tolkien/lettersfaq.html
FAQ of the Rings: http://oakroadsystems.com/genl/ringfaq.htm
Encyclopedia of Arda: http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/default.htm
more FAQs: http://oakroadsystems.com/tech/faqget.htm
Apteryx
news:MPG.1a4dc12ba...@news.odyssey.net...
> In article <XQOEb.400$YS4...@nwrdny01.gnilink.net> in
> rec.arts.books.tolkien, A Tsar Is Born wrote:
> >none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> >people,
>
> Isn't there a magic Ring in one of the tales of the Arabian Nights,
> that controls a genie?
>
> Did Wagner actually invent the Ring he used? I thought he adapted it
> from earlier materials in German and Norse myths.
The Norse sources (which I haven't read) may have a more powerful ring.
But in Wagner's main German source, The Nibelungenlied, the ring is just
a ring. It becomes significant, but only because through it Brunhilde
comes to realise that it was Siegfried, and not Gunther, who (forcibly)
overcame her resistance to her marriage to Gunther (unwisely taking a
ring from her in the process as a trophy).
--
Apteryx
Treat anger like gold. Spend it wisely or not at all.
A Tsar Is Born
> rec.arts.books.tolkien, A Tsar Is Born wrote:
> >none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> >people,
>
> Isn't there a magic Ring in one of the tales of the Arabian Nights,
> that controls a genie?
Yep. A minor genie. (Subservient to the one in the lamp.) True.
> Did Wagner actually invent the Ring he used? I thought he adapted it
> from earlier materials in German and Norse myths.
In Volsunga Saga there's a dwarf in the Rhine with a ring that attracts
gold.
Loki steals it and the dwarf places a curse on it.
The curse is not resolved until the treasure is put in the Rhine -- we are
to infer (used correctly, Stan!) that eventually it all drifted back,
curse-clean, to the dwarf.
That much Wagner got from saga.
It was ENTIRELY his idea to make this the world-ruling ring.
There is no precedent whatever for any such thing.
Wagner was at the pinnacle of culture (whether you loved him or hated him)
for fifty years after his death. Forty of those years were Tolkien's first
forty. No way you could be a scholar and an intellectual and interested in
Norse myth and not be subjected to heavy doses of Wagner.
Tolkien did not set out to create something Wagnerian (and it's NOT a
Wagnerian creation), but when he needed the ring to have significance,
that's where he turned, without even thinking about it. Rings of power were
in the air. Wagner put them there.
So they're both round and gold and give the possessor power to rule other
folk.
No previous ring does anything of the sort.
Tolkien disingenuously said this was a coincidence. It wasn't.
But he didn't like Wagner AT ALL and wasn't going to cite him as a source.
I don't know why so many Tolkien fans are upset by this. (I'd like to know;
they never explain.)
They're not upset by all the other stuff Tolkien ripped off from saga
material.
Every writer does this to some extent.
(Is anyone upset that nearly all Frank Herbert's original creation turned
out to be from Arabic culture?)
The question is: did the writer use the material he chose to take in a
highly original and artistic way, putting in his own inventions and
obsessions in a convincing, artistically satisfying manner?
The answer, for both Wagner and Tolkien, is surely Yes.
(F. Herbert too.)
(I wouldn't say this about P. Jackson. But we're fighting that battle on
other threads.)
Tsar Parmathule
James Hyder
"Stan Brown" <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote
A Tsar Is Born wrote:
> >none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> >people,
>
> Isn't there a magic Ring in one of the tales of the Arabian Nights,
> that controls a genie?
>
> Did Wagner actually invent the Ring he used? I thought he adapted it
> from earlier materials in German and Norse myths.
>
Well the Germanic myths (mostly) evolved from Norse myths, right? And most
of Middle Earth is Norse mythology drawn through an English and Continental
filter, more or less. I am new to this NG, but not by any means to Tolkien.
I trust most everyone here knows of the many, many connections between Norse
myth and LoTR. As to the One Ring idea, I am not certain. Odin certainly
had at least one ring - an important one - don't know that it was a "ruling
ring" but it seems there were other lesser rings associated with it,
correct?
JH
Stan Brown
>Did Wagner actually invent the Ring he used? I thought he adapted it
>from earlier materials in German and Norse myths.
Thanks to the several folks who answered this. Short answer: there
was a ring, but not one ring to rule the world.
In article <An%Be.5215$YS4....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net> in
rec.arts.books.tolkien, A Tsar Is Born wrote:
>Tolkien disingenuously said this was a coincidence. It wasn't.
I agree, it couldn't have been. "Both rings are round, and there the
resemblance ceases" is indeed disingenuous. Whether he liked Wagner
or not, as an educated man Tolkien could not possibly have been
unaware of Wagner's Ring cycle. That doesn't mean Tolkien was
rehashing Wagner, it just means Wagner was part of the cultural
milieu, which Tolkien inevitably drew from.
>But he didn't like Wagner AT ALL and wasn't going to cite him as a source.
>
>I don't know why so many Tolkien fans are upset by this.
As should be obvious from the FAQ of the Rings, I am not one of
those who become "upset" by comparisons between Tolkien's ring and
Wagner's. But then I was unaware that "many" did.
Aris Katsaris
"A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:An%Eb.5215$YS4....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net...
>
> So they're both round and gold and give the possessor power to rule other
> folk.
> No previous ring does anything of the sort.
> Tolkien disingenuously said this was a coincidence. It wasn't.
> But he didn't like Wagner AT ALL and wasn't going to cite him as a source.
>
> I don't know why so many Tolkien fans are upset by this. (I'd like to know;
> they never explain.)
Um... which Tolkien fans have been upset by such comparisons? I don't
remember one, let alone "many" of them in these newsgroups at least...
Aris Katsaris
Morgil
"A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> kirjoitti
viestissä:An%Eb.5215$YS4....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net...
> So they're both round and gold and give the possessor power to rule other
> folk.
> No previous ring does anything of the sort.
> Tolkien disingenuously said this was a coincidence. It wasn't.
> But he didn't like Wagner AT ALL and wasn't going to cite him as a source.
>
> I don't know why so many Tolkien fans are upset by this. (I'd like to
know;
> they never explain.)
Because it's a FILTHY LIE!! Tolkien stole the concept of
Ruling Ring from Robert E. Howard's "Phoenix in the Sword"
- along with the idea of Broken Sword. Hrrrmph!
Morgil
Hasmonean Tazmanian
A Tsar Is Born wrote:
It's like the problem creationists face. 'The earth was created only
6,000 years ago.' 'But what about the older fossils?' 'They must have
been created and destroyed on the nth day, or in the flood.'
Similarly, how can someone argue that Tolkien created the whole story in
his head, when you can clearly see older 'story forms' that existed
before he wrote it, and so closely (but not completely) resemble it?
No matter what the Bible purports to say, or what Tolkien says, the
truth of the fact remains, that there were other fairy tales with Ring
stories, before LOTR.
Hasan
Sue Bilstein
news:ZAoFb.40080$2We1...@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com...
> A Tsar Is Born wrote:
> > "Lord Jubjub" <jub...@ev1.net> wrote in message
> > news:jubjub-35F05B....@corp.supernews.com...
> >
invention,
> > and Tolkien found it there -- Wagnerian ideas being difficult to avoid
in
> > the half century before LotR began to be written, and we know that JRRT
saw
> > Wagner's Ring and disliked it. There are a lot of people who seem hurt
by
> > that, but none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> > people, and no one can deny that JRRT knew Wagner's work quite well.)
>
> It's like the problem creationists face. 'The earth was created only
> 6,000 years ago.' 'But what about the older fossils?' 'They must have
> been created and destroyed on the nth day, or in the flood.'
>
> Similarly, how can someone argue that Tolkien created the whole story in
> his head, when you can clearly see older 'story forms' that existed
> before he wrote it, and so closely (but not completely) resemble it?
>
> No matter what the Bible purports to say, or what Tolkien says, the
> truth of the fact remains, that there were other fairy tales with Ring
> stories, before LOTR.
>
What I want to know is, when will Peter Jackson give us a version of
Wagner's Ring cycle?
the softrat
<Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>(I'm one of those who insists that a Ring of Power was Wagner's invention,
>and Tolkien found it there -- Wagnerian ideas being difficult to avoid in
>the half century before LotR began to be written, and we know that JRRT saw
>Wagner's Ring and disliked it. There are a lot of people who seem hurt by
>that, but none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
>people, and no one can deny that JRRT knew Wagner's work quite well.)
Well, you are wrong. Tolkien got the concept of a Ring from the same
place that Wagner did, not from Wagner. Tolkien learned to read Old
Norse at a rather young age and he loved it. It is unclear whether he
was really an opera fan or not. (Yes, I know that he refers to at
least one in his letters.) And it is obvious from HoME and "Letters
..." that Tolkien began the LotR without any idea about the Ring at
all. However the Ring was the only open end that he could think of
from _The Hobbit_.
the softrat
"You've seen the epic. Now experience the Whole Story!"
mailto:sof...@pobox.com
--
Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to be
lazy. -- Steven Wright
the softrat
<the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
>
>As should be obvious from the FAQ of the Rings, I am not one of
>those who become "upset" by comparisons between Tolkien's ring and
>Wagner's. But then I was unaware that "many" did.
Well, *Tolkien* did, as was cited in this thread....
the softrat
"You've seen the epic. Now experience the Whole Story!"
mailto:sof...@pobox.com
--
Half the people you know are below average. -- Steven Wright
Stan Brown
<ZAoFb.40080$2We1...@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> in
>It's like the problem creationists face. 'The earth was created only
>6,000 years ago.' 'But what about the older fossils?' 'They must have
>been created and destroyed on the nth day, or in the flood.'
I thought the answer was that their god created the world 6000 years
ago but put in the fossils, the differential amounts of various
radioactive isotopes, and all the other evidence to test men's
faith.
Hasmonean Tazmanian
Sue Bilstein wrote:
>>No matter what the Bible purports to say, or what Tolkien says, the
>>truth of the fact remains, that there were other fairy tales with Ring
>>stories, before LOTR.
>>
>
>
> What I want to know is, when will Peter Jackson give us a version of
> Wagner's Ring cycle?
>
>
When he can get CGM (computer generated music) to cut down on the
expenses of a) translating the dialogue into all the languages and b)
rewriting the music to fit the translations. ;)
The first time I ever heard Wagner I couldn't stop listening to it for
hours, even during school time (which I missed for it) because it was
the most loud and bombastic and crass and crude and vulgar and
blathering thing I had ever heard in my entire life. But I knew nothing
about music back then, or even now. ;) I loved German opera and music,
just listening to the sound of the language was amazing for me.
Hasan
MasterDebater
"A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:An%Eb.5215$YS4....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net...
>
> It was ENTIRELY his idea to make this the world-ruling ring.
> There is no precedent whatever for any such thing.
> Wagner was at the pinnacle of culture (whether you loved him or hated him)
> for fifty years after his death. Forty of those years were Tolkien's first
> forty. No way you could be a scholar and an intellectual and interested in
> Norse myth and not be subjected to heavy doses of Wagner.
> Tolkien did not set out to create something Wagnerian (and it's NOT a
> Wagnerian creation), but when he needed the ring to have significance,
> that's where he turned, without even thinking about it. Rings of power
were
> in the air. Wagner put them there.
>
> So they're both round and gold and give the possessor power to rule other
> folk.
Agreed. I am often confused when Tolkien fans deny the Tolkien/Wagner
connection
> No previous ring does anything of the sort.
> Tolkien disingenuously said this was a coincidence. It wasn't.
> But he didn't like Wagner AT ALL and wasn't going to cite him as a source.
>
> I don't know why so many Tolkien fans are upset by this. (I'd like to
know;
> they never explain.)
I always assumed it was due to the negative image which Wagner got due to
German Nationalism and especially Nazism
MasterDebater
news:meGdndeas4U...@comcast.com...
>
> "Stan Brown" <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote
> myth and LoTR. As to the One Ring idea, I am not certain. Odin certainly
> had at least one ring - an important one - don't know that it was a
"ruling
> ring" but it seems there were other lesser rings associated with it,
> correct?
>
But Odin's ring Draupnir had no power to control the world, and the lesser
rings which it produced were merely golden rings, I don't remember them ever
having any significant power, or any power at all.
MasterDebater
news:l2gcuvku2e9ati598...@4ax.com...
> On Sat, 20 Dec 2003 02:53:43 GMT, "A Tsar Is Born"
> <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >(I'm one of those who insists that a Ring of Power was Wagner's
invention,
> >and Tolkien found it there -- Wagnerian ideas being difficult to avoid in
> >the half century before LotR began to be written, and we know that JRRT
saw
> >Wagner's Ring and disliked it. There are a lot of people who seem hurt by
> >that, but none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> >people, and no one can deny that JRRT knew Wagner's work quite well.)
>
> Well, you are wrong. Tolkien got the concept of a Ring from the same
> place that Wagner did, not from Wagner. Tolkien learned to read Old
> Norse at a rather young age and he loved it. It is unclear whether he
> was really an opera fan or not. (Yes, I know that he refers to at
> least one in his letters.) And it is obvious from HoME and "Letters
> ..." that Tolkien began the LotR without any idea about the Ring at
> all. However the Ring was the only open end that he could think of
> from _The Hobbit_.
>
Not sure what your point is. I believe it is clear from the thread and the
referred-to article that
1. There existed no 'world-ruling' rings prior to Wagner. If you can
demonstrate one, please do. I have always assumed that Tolkien got the
one-ring-to-rule-them-all, all-powerful, world-ruling-ring idea from Wagner,
since, though examples of magical and even powerful rings appear in earlier
Norse material, there exist, to my knowledge, no rings with the ability to
control the world.
2. Tolkien was well aware of Wagner's work.
Dean Hazelfan
Another possible source of inspiration is Edith Nesbit's story "The
Enchanted Castle", where characters find what they think is an
ordinary magic ring of invisibility, but it later turns out to be a
much more powerful ring and cursed by its creator so that all its
magic turns to evil unless its used by those who are pure of heart.
Tolkien just made his ring a little bit more powerful and a little bit
more evil...
(*retreats back into lurkdom again*)
Stan Brown
<I9sFb.40357$2We1....@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> in
>The first time I ever heard Wagner I couldn't stop listening to it for
>hours,
Well, yes, if you want to get through even the overture. :-)
> even during school time (which I missed for it) because it was
>the most loud and bombastic and crass and crude and vulgar and
>blathering thing I had ever heard in my entire life.
I think it was Mark Twain who said Wagner's music is much better
than it sounds.
Stan Brown
>Another possible source of inspiration is Edith Nesbit's story "The
>Enchanted Castle", where characters find what they think is an
>ordinary magic ring of invisibility, but it later turns out to be a
>much more powerful ring and cursed by its creator so that all its
>magic turns to evil unless its used by those who are pure of heart.
>
>Tolkien just made his ring a little bit more powerful and a little bit
>more evil...
I had forgotten about this.
E Nesbit's books were a staple for older children around the turn of
the preceding century. He certainly would have known of them, though
I don't believe he mentions her as one of his admired authors in
/Letters/.
Hasmonean Tazmanian
Stan Brown wrote:
> In article
> <I9sFb.40357$2We1....@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> in
> rec.arts.books.tolkien, Hasmonean Tazmanian wrote:
>
>>The first time I ever heard Wagner I couldn't stop listening to it for
>>hours,
>
>
> Well, yes, if you want to get through even the overture. :-)
>
>
>>even during school time (which I missed for it) because it was
>>the most loud and bombastic and crass and crude and vulgar and
>>blathering thing I had ever heard in my entire life.
>
>
> I think it was Mark Twain who said Wagner's music is much better
> than it sounds.
>
The first I ever heard of Wagner was in the scene in "King Solomon's
Mines" (an old movie) where the German on the expedition always carries
a gramphone and loved playing Wagner, and the Turkish guy in the
expedition hated it. When the gramophone get's lost in a mud pit one
day the guy says 'thank God I won't have to listen to that infernal
Wagner any more.' It was just a film, but in real life some people
can't stand his music. I just loved it though.
Hasan
Öjevind Lång
news:vucsakm...@news.supernews.com...
[snip]
> But Odin's ring Draupnir had no power to control the world, and the lesser
> rings which it produced were merely golden rings, I don't remember them
ever
> having any significant power, or any power at all.
No. They just made him very rich. "MINE! All mine! MY GOLDEN RINGS! HAA HAA
HAA!"
Öjevind
Crimson Castle
> Wagner any more.' It was just a film, but in real life some people
> can't stand his music. I just loved it though.
It depends. I can't stand Wagner when its being played on a crappy sound
system. But when its played on a good Hi-Fi Stereo its fantastic - I'm
referring to the productions with good performers and the sweeter voiced
female singers - not the women singers built like Panzer tanks.
Aris Katsaris
"MasterDebater" <mdb...@rttol.net> wrote in message
news:vucsrgh...@news.supernews.com...
>
> Not sure what your point is. I believe it is clear from the thread and the
> referred-to article that
> 1. There existed no 'world-ruling' rings prior to Wagner. If you can
> demonstrate one, please do. I have always assumed that Tolkien got the
> one-ring-to-rule-them-all, all-powerful, world-ruling-ring idea from Wagner,
> since, though examples of magical and even powerful rings appear in earlier
> Norse material, there exist, to my knowledge, no rings with the ability to
> control the world.
Seeing the drafts of the story, it seems as if Tolkien steadily moved his ring
to become more and more powerful, until it simply reached the role it
has in the finished work. And he made it into a ring, because as ring it
was already, when no such hints of power existed, when it's only
ability was to make the wearer invisible...
If Tolkien had *begun* with the concept of a ultra-powerful ring, that
might be a clue... but it seems to have simply ended up as one under
the normal course of Tolkien's creativity...
> 2. Tolkien was well aware of Wagner's work.
Which make unconscious influence a strong possibility, I'd say.
Aris Katsaris
AC
Aris Katsaris <kats...@otenet.gr> wrote:
>
> "MasterDebater" <mdb...@rttol.net> wrote in message
> news:vucsrgh...@news.supernews.com...
>
>
> Which make unconscious influence a strong possibility, I'd say.
I agree that Wagner likely influenced Tolkien. I do not think that it was a
conscious influence, but rather more of a background one, like all the
Northern European myths and legends.
Since the History of the Lord of the Rings shows this to be a natural
development based upon Tolkien using Bilbo's magic ring as an influence, I
see no reason to believe that Tolkien actually sat there and said "I'll use
Wagner's idea".
--
Aaron Clausen
tao_of_cow/\alberni.net (replace /\ with @)
A Tsar Is Born
> >
> > "MasterDebater" <mdb...@rttol.net> wrote in message
> > news:vucsrgh...@news.supernews.com...
> >
> >> 2. Tolkien was well aware of Wagner's work.
> >
> > Which make unconscious influence a strong possibility, I'd say.
Precisely.
> I agree that Wagner likely influenced Tolkien. I do not think that it was
a
> conscious influence, but rather more of a background one, like all the
> Northern European myths and legends.
>
> Since the History of the Lord of the Rings shows this to be a natural
> development based upon Tolkien using Bilbo's magic ring as an influence, I
> see no reason to believe that Tolkien actually sat there and said "I'll
use
> Wagner's idea".
I don't think anyone says he did.
Tsar Parmathule
the softrat
<Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>Sum,buddy said:
>> I agree that Wagner likely influenced Tolkien. I do not think that it was
>a
>> conscious influence, but rather more of a background one, like all the
>> Northern European myths and legends.
>>
>> Since the History of the Lord of the Rings shows this to be a natural
>> development based upon Tolkien using Bilbo's magic ring as an influence, I
>> see no reason to believe that Tolkien actually sat there and said "I'll
>use
>> Wagner's idea".
>
>I don't think anyone says he did.
>
read and listen to the Wagner operas countless times (Great Music!), I
do not believe that Wagner influenced Tolkien in any way. I believe
that the Norse Legends influenced BOTH of them (differently). BTW, I
see little evidence that Tolkien was influenced by _Das
Nibelungenlied_, the medieval German poem. Before you suggest a
connection between Wagner and Tolkien, please read _The Elder Edda_.
Tolkien did. (Allegedly he LOVED it.) Of course it wouldn't hurt to
read _The Kalevala_ either, but that has little bearing on the Wagner
question.
the softrat
"You've seen the epic. Now experience the Whole Story!"
mailto:sof...@pobox.com
--
If you cannot listen to the answers, why do you inconvenience me
with questions?
Caeruleo
"A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> "Lord Jubjub" <jub...@ev1.net> wrote in message
> news:jubjub-35F05B....@corp.supernews.com...
> > Interesting article in the New Yorker:
> >
> > http://www.newyorker.com/critics/atlarge/?031222crat_atlarge
>
> Ross is one of their best critics.
> But anyone who's hung around this ng for a while knows QUITE WELL that
> Ross's crack about a conspiracy of silence by Tolkien fans about Wagner's
> influence is nonsense -- we've gone on and on about it.
>
> (I'm one of those who insists that a Ring of Power was Wagner's invention,
> and Tolkien found it there -- Wagnerian ideas being difficult to avoid in
> the half century before LotR began to be written, and we know that JRRT saw
> Wagner's Ring and disliked it. There are a lot of people who seem hurt by
> that, but none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> people, and no one can deny that JRRT knew Wagner's work quite well.)
I think it could be "denied," since I am not aware of anything Tolkien
wrote in which he demonstrated much knowledge at all about Wagner. He
seems to have been quite familiar with the Northern European legends on
which Wagner's Ring was based, however. I am admittedly unclear as to
whether or not any ring made from the Rheingold, or indeed any ring at
all which posessed power, is present in those older legends of
Sigurd/Siegfried, or whether the ring forged by Alberich is an invention
of Wagner. Anyone?
Caeruleo
Stan Brown <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
> In article
> <I9sFb.40357$2We1....@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> in
> rec.arts.books.tolkien, Hasmonean Tazmanian wrote:
> >The first time I ever heard Wagner I couldn't stop listening to it for
> >hours,
>
> Well, yes, if you want to get through even the overture. :-)
Lol!
My musicology professor used to put it this way:
"Tristan & Isolde drink the love potion, & then they sing about that for
200 pages. Later, after she's been married to King Marke, they meet
illicitly & sing about that for 200 pages. Tristan later dies for 200
pages."
> > even during school time (which I missed for it) because it was
> >the most loud and bombastic and crass and crude and vulgar and
> >blathering thing I had ever heard in my entire life.
>
> I think it was Mark Twain who said Wagner's music is much better
> than it sounds.
Really? I'd say that it sounds much better than it is. ;-)
Caeruleo
"Crimson Castle" <deletethis_c...@hotmail.com> wrote:
With wobbly kilometer-wide vibratos.
For how Wagner *ought* to be sung by sopranos, listen to Kirsten
Flagstad, Elizabeth Grummer, & Elanor Steber.
TeaLady (Mari C.)
> read _The Elder Edda_.
> Tolkien did. (Allegedly he LOVED it.) Of course it wouldn't
> hurt to read _The Kalevala_ either, but that has little bearing
> on the Wagner question.
>
Do you know of any good english translations ? I have a yen to
read these, although not because of Tolkien, and not too many
people I know have ever heard of these tales, much less are able to
recommend good versions.
I am willing, and even eager, to read more than one translation, if
any are available. I would prefer to read translations that do
them justice, if possible.
--
mc
cassandras morgan mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges
<spres...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> the softrat <sof...@pobox.com> wrote in
> news:sd5luvclmu3ptto9r...@4ax.com:
>
> > read _The Elder Edda_.
> > Tolkien did. (Allegedly he LOVED it.) Of course it wouldn't
> > hurt to read _The Kalevala_ either, but that has little bearing
> > on the Wagner question.
> >
>
> Do you know of any good english translations ? I have a yen to
> read these, although not because of Tolkien, and not too many
> people I know have ever heard of these tales, much less are able to
> recommend good versions.
saf scandinavian-american-foundation has translations of both eddas
from about 1930 that get republished from time to time
they also have translations of other ancient and modern works
you can also find these in the dustier shelves of used book stores
the softrat
<spres...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>Do you know of any good english translations ? I have a yen to
>read these, although not because of Tolkien, and not too many
>people I know have ever heard of these tales, much less are able to
>recommend good versions.
>
>I am willing, and even eager, to read more than one translation, if
>any are available. I would prefer to read translations that do
>them justice, if possible.
There are several translations available of the Elder Edda. I
personally think that the one by Lee Hollander is best, but each has
its own merits. I have only seen one translation of the Kalevala and I
read no Finnish, so I cannot evaluate it for readability or accuracy.
It is the one sold under the Penguin Classics series. Both of these
are available on Amazon.com.
PS: Although I probably read more epic poetry than the average rat, I
still think that it has a boring tendency to go on, and on, and on,
and on.... I have not managed to force my way all the way through
either the Song of Roland or The Iliad. I never tried the
Nibelungenlied. I have not finnished the Kalevala yet.
the softrat
"LotR: You've seen the epic. Now experience the Whole Story!"
mailto:sof...@pobox.com
--
Of all the people I've met you're certainly one of them.
Bill O'Meally
"the softrat" <sof...@pobox.com> wrote in message
news:uqtpuvo7g8k37n4iq...@4ax.com...
> I have not finnished the Kalevala yet.
*Finnished*? Was that a pun Softy? :-)
--
Bill
"Wise fool"
Gandalf, THE TWO TOWERS
-- The Wise will remove 'se' to reply; the Foolish will not--
A Tsar Is Born
> Since I have BOTH read the Norse Legends (partly in Old Norse) AND
> read and listen to the Wagner operas countless times (Great Music!), I
> do not believe that Wagner influenced Tolkien in any way. I believe
> that the Norse Legends influenced BOTH of them (differently).
All right, big talker.
Give us
ONE example in Norse legend -- just ONE -- of a world-ruling Ring.
Nope. Wagner made it up, and Tolkien got the idea from him.
Tsar Parmathule
A Tsar Is Born
"Sue Bilstein" <sue_bi...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:3fe6...@clear.net.nz...
> What I want to know is, when will Peter Jackson give us a version of
> Wagner's Ring cycle?
There are far more monstrous defacements of Wagner being staged around the
world than Jackson ever dreamed of inflicting on Tolkien.
As long as he gets good singers and a good band, and doesn't CUT stuff (as
Zeffirelli's films cut Verdi to ribbons), I think he might do a decent job
at it. Anyway, no worse than every Wagner lover has seen on stage after
stage.
It would be nice to see a good dragon. I've never been to a Ring with a
tolerable dragon. Seattle used to have a real bear (in the Charles Ludlam
version, the bear went down on Siegfried), and lots of people do the birds,
frog and mermaid well, but I've never seen a decent dragon. The
Chereau/Bayreuth Ring (available on DVD) has a good dragon in Rheingold, but
not in Siegfried.
I've never seen a really good swan in Lohengrin either, though Seattle sort
of managed that. As I was leaving one performance, I heard a lady say to
another, "I never saw a swan that could paddle BACKWARDS before." I snarled,
"Well, you never saw a swan that was really a Duke before, did you?"
Tsar Parmathule
A Tsar Is Born
"Caeruleo" <caer...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:caeruleo-BAC1BE...@news.fu-berlin.de...
> > (I'm one of those who insists that a Ring of Power was Wagner's
invention,
> > and Tolkien found it there -- Wagnerian ideas being difficult to avoid
in
> > the half century before LotR began to be written, and we know that JRRT
saw
> > Wagner's Ring and disliked it. There are a lot of people who seem hurt
by
> > that, but none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> > people, and no one can deny that JRRT knew Wagner's work quite well.)
>
> I think it could be "denied," since I am not aware of anything Tolkien
> wrote in which he demonstrated much knowledge at all about Wagner. He
> seems to have been quite familiar with the Northern European legends on
> which Wagner's Ring was based, however. I am admittedly unclear as to
> whether or not any ring made from the Rheingold, or indeed any ring at
> all which posessed power, is present in those older legends of
> Sigurd/Siegfried, or whether the ring forged by Alberich is an invention
> of Wagner. Anyone?
Tolkien does not demonstrate much knowledge of Wagner, but Wagner was as
influential then as, say, rock music is today, but with intellectual class.
That is to say, even those who do not like rock, know a great deal about it
because it's impossible to avoid.
As it happens, Tolkien and C.S. Lewis attended an entire performance of the
Ring at Covent Garden (standing room) and studied the librettos very
carefully before they went. Tolkien hated what Wagner had done with the
myths. But he knew about Wagner very very very well. (Everyone who read a
book in a European language knew a lot about Wagner.)
In the Sagas:
There is a Ring belonging to the dwarf Andvari. It attracts gold. Loki
steals it, and is forced to give it to the Dwarf-King, who is then murdered
by his son Fafnir, who turns into a dragon. Fafnir's brother Reginn then
raises Sigurd to slay Fafnir, intending to kill him and take the ring. But
Sigurd kills Reginn too, and gives the ring to Brynhild. Later, disguised as
Gunnar, he takes it back and gives it to Gudrun. She shows it to Brynhild,
thus proving Sigurd and Gunnar have tricked her. Brynhild then arranges the
murder of Sigurd and kills herself. Gunnar hides the gold in the Rhine so
Attila the Hun can't get at it. The ring returns to Andvari.
It has NO other power.
Wagner invented the world-ruling Ring and Tolkien got it from Wagner.
Softrat denies this, but he's wrong wrong wrong and can't bring himself to
admit he has no evidence of any alternative.
Denials of this statement should mention other world-ruling rings before
Tolkien's time. (There are none.)
The Ring in Nesbit's Enchanted Castle is, of course, also derived from
Wagner's. She was a great friend and platonic lover of G.B. Shaw, the
leading Wagnerite in England, and knew the operas well. There are many
magical items in her stories (which I have always loved) but none of them
are rings that rule the world. Even if they were, she would have had to
admit she got it from Wagner, as Tolkien did.
Tsar Parmathule
Yuk Tang
news:fJlHb.7182$tY5....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net:
> news:3fe6...@clear.net.nz...
>> What I want to know is, when will Peter Jackson give us a version
>> of Wagner's Ring cycle?
>
> There are far more monstrous defacements of Wagner being staged
> around the world than Jackson ever dreamed of inflicting on
> Tolkien.
What's Opera, Doc?
> As long as he gets good singers and a good band, and doesn't CUT
> stuff (as Zeffirelli's films cut Verdi to ribbons), I think he
> might do a decent job at it. Anyway, no worse than every Wagner
> lover has seen on stage after stage.
Ideally there should be lots of carrots and a main chawacter who can't
enunciate pwoperly.
--
Cheers, ymt.
Email to: jim dot laker one at btopenworld dot com
Sue Bilstein
news:fJlHb.7182$tY5....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net...
>
> "Sue Bilstein" <sue_bi...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:3fe6...@clear.net.nz...
> > What I want to know is, when will Peter Jackson give us a version of
> > Wagner's Ring cycle?
>
> There are far more monstrous defacements of Wagner being staged around the
> world than Jackson ever dreamed of inflicting on Tolkien.
>
> As long as he gets good singers and a good band, and doesn't CUT stuff (as
> Zeffirelli's films cut Verdi to ribbons), I think he might do a decent job
> at it. Anyway, no worse than every Wagner lover has seen on stage after
> stage.
I was asking only semi-sarcastically. I'd love to see a Ring cycle with
really good, realistic effects. Real dragon, real rainbow bridge, Walkures
riding on the wind, all that.
Only thing is, surely PJ'd have to substitute something with wider general
appeal for all that screechy singing. Maybe he could get Andrew Lloyd
Webber to write a score.
>
> It would be nice to see a good dragon. I've never been to a Ring with a
> tolerable dragon. Seattle used to have a real bear (in the Charles Ludlam
> version, the bear went down on Siegfried), and lots of people do the
birds,
> frog and mermaid well, but I've never seen a decent dragon. The
> Chereau/Bayreuth Ring (available on DVD) has a good dragon in Rheingold,
but
> not in Siegfried.
Did Chereau do the 19th-century Ring, with Odin in a top-hat and the
Rhine-maidens as prostitutes? I haven't seen it, just looked at the covers
of the videos.
There was a very abstract Ring too, I vaguely recall. Most of the effects
done with lighting...?
TeaLady (Mari C.)
tomys des anges) wrote in
news:mair_fheal-26...@c129.ppp.tsoft.com:
Thanks. There are a few (or were a few) decent used stores in
Cleveland, I can see if they have any.
--
TeaLady / mari conroy
"Stated to me for a fact. I only tell it as I got it. I am willing
to believe it. I can believe anything." Sam Clemens
Spressobean at yahoo has a spam problem. A better address is
culcie at yahoo dot com.
TeaLady (Mari C.)
> PS: Although I probably read more epic poetry than the average
> rat, I still think that it has a boring tendency to go on, and
> on, and on, and on.... I have not managed to force my way all
> the way through either the Song of Roland or The Iliad. I never
> tried the Nibelungenlied. I have not finnished the Kalevala
> yet.
>
>
The Iliad wasn't so bad, for me at least. It did go on and on, but
I read it over a lazy summer vacation week (a few hours each day,
in the mid-day heat, under a tree; best way to read anything that
just goes on and on) and that was about the right "speed". The
Nibelungenlied was read the same way, later in the summer. I also
read a "prose" translation of it that wasn't too bad.
Thanks
--
mc
Stan Brown
>It would be nice to see a good dragon. I've never been to a Ring with a
>tolerable dragon.
I think it may be a mistake to try to get too realistic. The dragon
in Bergman's film of /The Magic Flute/ is obviously a person in a
dragon suit, and it never bothered me.
>Seattle used to have a real bear (in the Charles Ludlam
>version, the bear went down on Siegfried)
[leers] Does that mean what I think it does?
Matthew Bladen
<Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> says...
> As it happens, Tolkien and C.S. Lewis attended an entire performance of the
> Ring at Covent Garden (standing room) and studied the librettos very
> carefully before they went. Tolkien hated what Wagner had done with the
> myths. But he knew about Wagner very very very well. (Everyone who read a
> book in a European language knew a lot about Wagner.)
FWIW, I seem to recollect that Lewis was quite a Wagner fan. How much
this impinged on Tolkien-the-bandersnatch, I couldn't guess...
--
Matthew
A Tsar Is Born
> I was asking only semi-sarcastically. I'd love to see a Ring cycle with
> really good, realistic effects. Real dragon, real rainbow bridge,
Walkures
> riding on the wind, all that.
The Met's current staging (which has been televised and is available on
video) is close to that. The valkyries aren't mounted though (no, Stan, I
meant on horses -- you were right, however, about the bear). They WERE
mounted and flying on their horses in the Rochaix production in Seattle
which, alas, was never filmed. Their current production is moderately
realistic except that Valhalla looks like somebody's sand castle and how
they are supposed to have jimmied an entire wedding into Hunding's hut --
which is what it is -- is not clear.
> Only thing is, surely PJ'd have to substitute something with wider general
> appeal for all that screechy singing. Maybe he could get Andrew Lloyd
> Webber to write a score.
Shoot yourself before you make any such remark. (Elton John already did it
to Aida.)
I assume anyone who thinks Wagnerian singing is screechy or that the music
is bad hasn't really listened to either one. (I am usually right about
this.)
> Did Chereau do the 19th-century Ring, with Odin in a top-hat and the
> Rhine-maidens as prostitutes? I haven't seen it, just looked at the
covers
> of the videos.
The gods start out as 18th-century aristocrats (in Rheingold), become
19th-century upper class folk (no top hat, but an off-the-shoulder gown for
Fricka) in Valkyrie. The Rhinemaidens are bustier'd prostitutes. The
valkyries are World War I nurses. Chereau knew nothing about Wagner, but
he'd read Shaw's book, in which GBS claims the Ring is all about class
struggle and the industrial revolution and the triumph of socialism, and he
believed it. Or thought it would make a cool look anyway.
(GBS thought EVERYTHING was about class struggle and the rise of socialism.)
It's a very well acted and played Ring, but one does get distracted by all
the props they refer to and you don't actually get to see. (Swords? What
swords?)
> There was a very abstract Ring too, I vaguely recall. Most of the effects
> done with lighting...?
Wieland Wagner did several of those (starting the trend), and after his
death in 1966 his disciples carried on. Karajan's Ring was VERY DARK.
(Birgit Nilsson once wore a miner's helmet with wings attached into a dress
rehearsal, and Von K never even noticed.) After I saw the utterly realistic
(but kind of high school) first Seattle Ring, I understood what Von K had
been doing. It's good to start with a realistic one and then move on.
They've done everything with it. There was sci fi Ring in Kassel (was it?),
and several post-nuclear Rings. The SF Ring is sort of Caspar David
Friedrich-style. The Met's is called the Grand Canyon Rim Ring -- I think
New York ought to have a Hudson River School Ring, with Olana standing in
for Valhalla. In the one they have now, Valhalla is a bunch of kind of
featureless squarish towers. Looks a bit like the WTC. I'll probably get
more of a kick from Gotterdamerung this year than in past seasons.
At the City Opera Flying Dutchman, they had the rear of the stage rigged to
show a Norwegian inlet, and the film bobbed up and down, so it felt the
whole theater was on deck, rising and falling with the sea. VERY KEWL.
But then, during the Ghost Sailors Chorus, seven drag queens staggered
around the stage in blood-red frocks of various eras as the Dutchman's
former accursed brides.
NOT KEWL. In fact, stupid, at musically the dramatic high point of the
score. So you see why I think the modern school of opera staging is not
unrelated to Peter Jackson's interpretation of Tolkien and, indeed, often
goes WAY beyond him in disrespect.
Without the compensating excitement.
Tsar Parmathule
Matthew Bladen
<sof...@pobox.com> says...
> PS: Although I probably read more epic poetry than the average rat, I
> still think that it has a boring tendency to go on, and on, and on,
> and on.... I have not managed to force my way all the way through
> either the Song of Roland or The Iliad. I never tried the
> Nibelungenlied. I have not finnished the Kalevala yet.
I didn't have any real problems with the Iliad, but I very much
preferred the Odyssey. I just couldn't find it within me to care about
the events of the Iliad very much, except the bit at the end with Priam
and Achilles. The Greeks mostly preferred the Iliad (a copy of the poem
was supposed to have been Alexander's most precious possession).
I dabbled in the Kalevala (the ?Everyman translation by Kirby that
Tolkien read) a few years back, and I have the Song of Roland
somewhere... I really liked the epic of Gilgamesh, which came out in a
Penguin translation in 1999 -- quite a lot of good introductory
material, and various recensions (Babylonian and Sumerian). Well worth
getting hold of if you haven't read it.
--
Matthew
Bill O'Meally
"Stan Brown" <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote in message
news:MPG.1a57c24d1...@news.odyssey.net...
> >Seattle used to have a real bear (in the Charles Ludlam
> >version, the bear went down on Siegfried)
>
> [leers] Does that mean what I think it does?
Yes Stan. It is yet another example of Wagner's bastardization of the
Germanic myths. In the originals, Siegfried was never portrayed as being
into bestiality.
Stan Brown
>
>> >Seattle used to have a real bear (in the Charles Ludlam
>> >version, the bear went down on Siegfried)
>> [leers] Does that mean what I think it does?
>
>Yes Stan. It is yet another example of Wagner's bastardization of the
>Germanic myths. In the originals, Siegfried was never portrayed as being
>into bestiality.
That particular bastardization would seem due more to the director
of the production than to the composer of the opera, no?
On the other hand, Siegfried was in a bad way: every woman he met
was his aunt, except for Gutrune Gibich!
the softrat
<sue_bi...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>I was asking only semi-sarcastically. I'd love to see a Ring cycle with
>really good, realistic effects. Real dragon, real rainbow bridge,
Real blood? Real death? Real Götterdämmerung?
the softrat
"LotR: You've seen the epic. Now experience the Whole Story!"
mailto:sof...@pobox.com
--
Are you still here? The message is over. Shoo! Go away!
the softrat
<tami...@oohay.oc.ku> wrote:
>
>I didn't have any real problems with the Iliad, but I very much
>preferred the Odyssey. I just couldn't find it within me to care about
>the events of the Iliad very much, except the bit at the end with Priam
>and Achilles. The Greeks mostly preferred the Iliad (a copy of the poem
>was supposed to have been Alexander's most precious possession).
>
>I dabbled in the Kalevala (the ?Everyman translation by Kirby that
>Tolkien read) a few years back, and I have the Song of Roland
>somewhere... I really liked the epic of Gilgamesh, which came out in a
>Penguin translation in 1999 -- quite a lot of good introductory
>material, and various recensions (Babylonian and Sumerian). Well worth
>getting hold of if you haven't read it.
Been there; done that! (I think that I said that I read epics, didn't
I?) However I do need to read more Indian and Chinese epics.
the softrat
"LotR: You've seen the epic. Now experience the Whole Story!"
mailto:sof...@pobox.com
--
_The_ morally smug elitist snob
(and 'insufferably arrogant', too)
Sue Bilstein
news:pvqsuvg6f6i79peri...@4ax.com...
> On Sun, 28 Dec 2003 10:26:28 +1300, "Sue Bilstein"
> <sue_bi...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >I was asking only semi-sarcastically. I'd love to see a Ring cycle with
> >really good, realistic effects. Real dragon, real rainbow bridge,
>
> Real blood? Real death? Real Götterdämmerung?
>
Or a convincing semblance of the same.
Sue Bilstein
general
> > appeal for all that screechy singing. Maybe he could get Andrew Lloyd
> > Webber to write a score.
>
> Shoot yourself before you make any such remark. (Elton John already did it
> to Aida.)
(extracts tongue from cheek)
>
> I assume anyone who thinks Wagnerian singing is screechy or that the music
> is bad hasn't really listened to either one. (I am usually right about
> this.)
>
Would tend to agree with you. I got the bug pretty much on first hearing, &
it usually takes me a while to get the hang of a composer I haven't listened
to before. By all accounts he was a real shit, so how could he write such
amazing music? Life's not fair, fortunately.
> > Did Chereau do the 19th-century Ring, with Odin in a top-hat and the
> > Rhine-maidens as prostitutes? I haven't seen it, just looked at the
> covers
> > of the videos.
>
> The gods start out as 18th-century aristocrats (in Rheingold), become
> 19th-century upper class folk (no top hat, but an off-the-shoulder gown
for
> Fricka) in Valkyrie. The Rhinemaidens are bustier'd prostitutes. The
> valkyries are World War I nurses. Chereau knew nothing about Wagner, but
> he'd read Shaw's book, in which GBS claims the Ring is all about class
> struggle and the industrial revolution and the triumph of socialism, and
he
> believed it. Or thought it would make a cool look anyway.
>
> (GBS thought EVERYTHING was about class struggle and the rise of
socialism.)
>
> It's a very well acted and played Ring, but one does get distracted by all
> the props they refer to and you don't actually get to see. (Swords? What
> swords?)
Sounds like fun, I'll have to have a look.
...
>
> They've done everything with it. There was sci fi Ring in Kassel (was
it?),
> and several post-nuclear Rings. The SF Ring is sort of Caspar David
> Friedrich-style.
That would be rather mystical-romantic. But hard to visualise Brunnhilde as
a C19th maiden gazing at the moon.
...
>
> At the City Opera Flying Dutchman, they had the rear of the stage rigged
to
> show a Norwegian inlet, and the film bobbed up and down, so it felt the
> whole theater was on deck, rising and falling with the sea. VERY KEWL.
> But then, during the Ghost Sailors Chorus, seven drag queens staggered
> around the stage in blood-red frocks of various eras as the Dutchman's
> former accursed brides.
> NOT KEWL. In fact, stupid, at musically the dramatic high point of the
> score. So you see why I think the modern school of opera staging is not
> unrelated to Peter Jackson's interpretation of Tolkien and, indeed, often
> goes WAY beyond him in disrespect.
>
In general, I reckon operas / Shakespeare plays etc should be transposed to
different periods only for good reasons, by directors who are sure they can
pull it off. It seems to have become compulsory for third-raters to do so
now, as if modern times and political correctness make us unable to enjoy
appreciate works set in period (or wrt Wagner's Ring, in myth-space).
Some silly fellow on nz.general just explained to me that PJ had to insert
the Aragorn-Arwen stuff because the Lord of the Rings pays insufficient
attention to women and male-female relationships for modern PC audiences to
tolerate. Sheesh.
CC
Have you seen Peter Brooks version of The Mahabharata? You would like it if
you were into Epic poetry and ancient tales.
http://dvd-shop.yellowpages.pl/1488R14P2212_The-Mahabharata.html
Paul S. Person
Anna Russel has an excellent 15 minute summary of the entire Wagnerian
saga (I believe I have it on an LP called "Anna Russel Sings!
Again?").
She also has a piece where she attributes the amazing sound of
coloratura sopranos (of whom she is not a fan) to use of "the large
echo-chamber located between their ears".
--
The email above is invalid. All replies to the newsgroup, please.
Also: I still mostly download on Saturdays & upload on Sundays. Patience is a virtue.
A Tsar Is Born
> In general, I reckon operas / Shakespeare plays etc should be transposed
to
> different periods only for good reasons, by directors who are sure they
can
> pull it off. It seems to have become compulsory for third-raters to do so
> now, as if modern times and political correctness make us unable to enjoy
> appreciate works set in period (or wrt Wagner's Ring, in myth-space).
Spot on, Ms. B.
What one sees, again and again, is a director with a terrific idea for
setting Act II, scene 3 (or whatever) in an automat c. 1933. And it DOES
make an amusing commentary on the drama, whatever it is. But the rest of the
drama and music and story doesn't fit into an automat c. 1933 at all.
However, the director cannot bear to give up his idea, and so wrecks the
drama for that one moment.
They think it's about them. And actually, we've come to hear the music.
The director of the famously foul Ballo in Maschera in Barcelona (hired by
the City Council as a political statement) knew nothing of opera or the work
in question and was furious that they wouldn't let him cut the love duet
(crux of the opera) because it didn't fit with his notion of a story about
political power. He staged it all his way anyway. And hey, though booed by
audience after audience, the Copenhagen Opera picked it up and borrowed it
bodily. I've successfully avoided this director's work. I gather he can't
persuade major singers to appear in it.
(And yes, Wagner WAS a major league shit, but if human beings were
consistent, stories would be much less interesting.)
Tsar P
A Tsar Is Born
"the softrat" <sof...@pobox.com> wrote in message
news:p33tuvkg3dfnu873t...@4ax.com...
> Been there; done that! (I think that I said that I read epics, didn't
> I?) However I do need to read more Indian and Chinese epics.
Are there Chinese epics?
There are novels, after c. 1600 (perhaps earlier? not sure), but I've never
heard of a Chinese epic. Or is Monkey King's travels the Chinese epic? Is it
poetry? Is it folk poetry? I don't recall.
Tsar Parmathule
Bill O'Meally
"Stan Brown" <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote in message
news:MPG.1a5809d2f...@news.odyssey.net...
> In article <omqHb.14533$fq1....@twister.rdc-kc.rr.com> in
> rec.arts.books.tolkien, Bill O'Meally wrote:
> >
> >> >Seattle used to have a real bear (in the Charles Ludlam
> >> >version, the bear went down on Siegfried)
> >> [leers] Does that mean what I think it does?
> >
> >Yes Stan. It is yet another example of Wagner's bastardization of the
> >Germanic myths. In the originals, Siegfried was never portrayed as
being
> >into bestiality.
>
> That particular bastardization would seem due more to the director
> of the production than to the composer of the opera, no?
>
> On the other hand, Siegfried was in a bad way: every woman he met
> was his aunt, except for Gutrune Gibich!
Have you ever caught Anna Russell's routine on this? Hilarious!
"I'm not making this up, you know."
the softrat
only gives power according to the stature of its wielder. Note that in
500 years Gollum did not rise to be ruler of anything more than an
isolated cave buried far under the Misty Mountains. However Sauron's
Ring does tempt a potential wielder with delusions of grandeur, as it
did both Gollum and Samwise. There is no evidence that it really
delivers, except perhaps to Sauron or another Maia. Wagner's ring
delivers!
Andvari's ring didn't give the wielder World Power either. Just Death.
Just like Isildur, Boromir and Gollum got.
the softrat
"LotR: You've seen the epic. Now experience the Whole Story!"
mailto:sof...@pobox.com
--
Invalid thought detected. Close all mental processes and restart
body.
Stan Brown
Not quite. If all we wanted to do was hear the music, we'd listen to
the radio or the CDs.
Stan Brown
>The email above is invalid.
Then please follow standards and append ".invalid" to it.
Stan Brown
>"Stan Brown" <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote in message
>news:MPG.1a5809d2f...@news.odyssey.net...
>> On the other hand, Siegfried was in a bad way: every woman he met
>> was his aunt, except for Gutrune Gibich!
>
>Have you ever caught Anna Russell's routine on this? Hilarious!
Yes, definitely. I've brought her up in the group before, and I'm
not the only one.
In addition to her Ring analysis (in /The Anna Russell Album/ she
also did Verdi's "Hamletto" (in /Anna Russell Encore?/): "As you
know, Verdi has made operas out of many of the Shakespeare plays. He
has not, as a matter of fact, made one out of Hamlet, but I'm not
for a moment going to let that stand in my way."
She also did a treatment of Verdi's real-life opera "Nabucco" in
some of her concerts, but I've been unable to track down a
recording. Anyone have any leads?
>"I'm not making this up, you know."
The funniest line in her Ring analysis, and also the title of her
autobiography IIRC.
Morgil
"A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> kirjoitti
viestissä:fTlHb.6094$BJ4....@nwrdny03.gnilink.net...
> Wagner invented the world-ruling Ring and Tolkien got it from Wagner.
> Softrat denies this, but he's wrong wrong wrong and can't bring himself to
> admit he has no evidence of any alternative.
Exept that tiny, tiny, little detail that Tolkien's Ring
was not ORIGINALLY a world-ruling ring...
Morgil
A Tsar Is Born
"Morgil" <more...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:bsp18d$dr09s$1...@ID-81911.news.uni-berlin.de...
No, and the Ring in the Hobbit does not derive from Wagner.
But the LotR Ring is a very different matter, just as Gandalf is an entirely
different creature from the one in The Hobbit and Sauron is rather different
from the Necromancer.
Tsar Parmathule
AC
If, as Tolkien seems to hint (I believe in the Forward to LotR), the
Necromancer was the Thū/Sauron, then I would say, other than the middle
story between the First Age and Bilbo's quest, he was the one that changed
the least.
--
Aaron Clausen
tao_of_cow/\alberni.net (replace /\ with @)
Morgil
>
> "Morgil" <more...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:bsp18d$dr09s$1...@ID-81911.news.uni-berlin.de...
> >
> > "A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> kirjoitti
> > viestissä:fTlHb.6094$BJ4....@nwrdny03.gnilink.net...
> >
> > > Wagner invented the world-ruling Ring and Tolkien got it from Wagner.
> > > Softrat denies this, but he's wrong wrong wrong and can't bring
himself
> to
> > > admit he has no evidence of any alternative.
> >
> > Exept that tiny, tiny, little detail that Tolkien's Ring
> > was not ORIGINALLY a world-ruling ring...
>
> No, and the Ring in the Hobbit does not derive from Wagner.
So the only thing Tolkien could have got from Vagner was
the "world-ruling" part. But surely there have been powerful
magical objects like that even before Wagner. You know,
it's not totally unheard of that two people would come to
same conclusion through different paths, independently from
each other. So why not here as well?
Morgil
Justin Bacon
>Another possible source of inspiration is Edith Nesbit's story "The
>Enchanted Castle", where characters find what they think is an
>ordinary magic ring of invisibility, but it later turns out to be a
>much more powerful ring and cursed by its creator so that all its
>magic turns to evil unless its used by those who are pure of heart.
Coincidentally, this story can be found online:
http://arthurwendover.com/arthurs/child/enchnt10.html
Justin Bacon
tria...@aol.com
Gerry Snyder
> ....
>
>
> Anna Russel has an excellent 15 minute summary of the entire Wagnerian
> saga (I believe I have it on an LP called "Anna Russel Sings!
> Again?").
Also on CD, which I have given to several friends. (and no, I don't mean
copies, I mean boughten originals.)
To put this more on-topic, she talks about previous reviews of the ring
cycle being written "by Great Experts, for the edification of other
Great Experts." Rather like much of the discussion here, which I very
much enjoy.
Gerry, who was very moved by the flic RotK, despite the many differences
from the book
Gerry Snyder
> ....
> PS: Although I probably read more epic poetry than the average rat, I
> still think that it has a boring tendency to go on, and on, and on,
> and on.... I have not managed to force my way all the way through
> either the Song of Roland....
I remember reading Le Chanson de Roland in high school French, but I am
sure it was just a fraction of the original. Also, Le Cid (the original
gets the order of the first two letters backwards. ;-)
Gerry
Stan Brown
rec.arts.books.tolkien, Gerry Snyder wrote:
>Paul S. Person wrote:
>> Anna Russel has an excellent 15 minute summary of the entire Wagnerian
>> saga (I believe I have it on an LP called "Anna Russel Sings!
>> Again?").
>
>Also on CD, which I have given to several friends. (and no, I don't mean
>copies, I mean boughten originals.)
Any sightings of a recording of her analysis of /Nabucco/?
Caeruleo
"A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> "Caeruleo" <caer...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:caeruleo-BAC1BE...@news.fu-berlin.de...
> > > (I'm one of those who insists that a Ring of Power was Wagner's
> invention,
> > > and Tolkien found it there -- Wagnerian ideas being difficult to avoid
> in
> > > the half century before LotR began to be written, and we know that JRRT
> saw
> > > Wagner's Ring and disliked it. There are a lot of people who seem hurt
> by
> > > that, but none of them could cite an earlier Ring that controlled other
> > > people, and no one can deny that JRRT knew Wagner's work quite well.)
> >
> > I think it could be "denied," since I am not aware of anything Tolkien
> > wrote in which he demonstrated much knowledge at all about Wagner. He
> > seems to have been quite familiar with the Northern European legends on
> > which Wagner's Ring was based, however. I am admittedly unclear as to
> > whether or not any ring made from the Rheingold, or indeed any ring at
> > all which posessed power, is present in those older legends of
> > Sigurd/Siegfried, or whether the ring forged by Alberich is an invention
> > of Wagner. Anyone?
>
> Tolkien does not demonstrate much knowledge of Wagner, but Wagner was as
> influential then as, say, rock music is today, but with intellectual class.
> That is to say, even those who do not like rock, know a great deal about it
> because it's impossible to avoid.
>
> As it happens, Tolkien and C.S. Lewis attended an entire performance of the
> Ring at Covent Garden (standing room) and studied the librettos very
> carefully before they went. Tolkien hated what Wagner had done with the
> myths. But he knew about Wagner very very very well. (Everyone who read a
> book in a European language knew a lot about Wagner.)
>
> In the Sagas:
> There is a Ring belonging to the dwarf Andvari. It attracts gold. Loki
> steals it, and is forced to give it to the Dwarf-King, who is then murdered
> by his son Fafnir, who turns into a dragon. Fafnir's brother Reginn then
> raises Sigurd to slay Fafnir, intending to kill him and take the ring. But
> Sigurd kills Reginn too, and gives the ring to Brynhild. Later, disguised as
> Gunnar, he takes it back and gives it to Gudrun. She shows it to Brynhild,
> thus proving Sigurd and Gunnar have tricked her. Brynhild then arranges the
> murder of Sigurd and kills herself. Gunnar hides the gold in the Rhine so
> Attila the Hun can't get at it. The ring returns to Andvari.
>
> It has NO other power.
Ok, thanks for presenting this; I previously had little knowledge of
what mentions were & were not made of any ring in the original legends.
> Wagner invented the world-ruling Ring and Tolkien got it from Wagner.
> Softrat denies this, but he's wrong wrong wrong and can't bring himself to
> admit he has no evidence of any alternative.
>
> Denials of this statement should mention other world-ruling rings before
> Tolkien's time. (There are none.)
As far as what I've yet seen presented here, entirely true; I certainly
cannot think of another such example. I think the best explanation is
one that takes the "middle of the road," that it is most likely that the
general idea of such a powerful ring came from Wagner (along with,
possibly, the idea of a sword which is broken & is reforged), but that
also the similarities between Wagner's & Tolkien's stories are otherwise
fairly superficial.
Caeruleo
AC <mightym...@yahoo.ca> wrote:
> On Tue, 30 Dec 2003 18:00:02 GMT,
> A Tsar Is Born <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > "Morgil" <more...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> > news:bsp18d$dr09s$1...@ID-81911.news.uni-berlin.de...
> >>
> >> "A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> kirjoitti
> >> viestissä:fTlHb.6094$BJ4....@nwrdny03.gnilink.net...
> >>
> >> > Wagner invented the world-ruling Ring and Tolkien got it from Wagner.
> >> > Softrat denies this, but he's wrong wrong wrong and can't bring himself
> > to
> >> > admit he has no evidence of any alternative.
> >>
> >> Exept that tiny, tiny, little detail that Tolkien's Ring
> >> was not ORIGINALLY a world-ruling ring...
> >
> > No, and the Ring in the Hobbit does not derive from Wagner.
> >
> > But the LotR Ring is a very different matter, just as Gandalf is an entirely
> > different creature from the one in The Hobbit and Sauron is rather different
> > from the Necromancer.
>
> If, as Tolkien seems to hint (I believe in the Forward to LotR), the
> Necromancer was the Thû/Sauron, then I would say, other than the middle
> story between the First Age and Bilbo's quest, he was the one that changed
> the least.
I don't know, however, that this was in his mind when writing "The
Hobbit" in 1936, i.e., that the Necromancer was the same entity as the
Maia who became Sauron, although it could well be so.
Caeruleo
Paul S. Person <ppe...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> Caeruleo <caer...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >In article <MPG.1a50ed246...@news.odyssey.net>,
> > Stan Brown <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
> >
> >> In article
> >> <I9sFb.40357$2We1....@news04.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> in
> >> rec.arts.books.tolkien, Hasmonean Tazmanian wrote:
> >>
> >> > even during school time (which I missed for it) because it was
> >> >the most loud and bombastic and crass and crude and vulgar and
> >> >blathering thing I had ever heard in my entire life.
> >>
> >> I think it was Mark Twain who said Wagner's music is much better
> >> than it sounds.
> >
> >Really? I'd say that it sounds much better than it is. ;-)
>
> Anna Russel has an excellent 15 minute summary of the entire Wagnerian
> saga (I believe I have it on an LP called "Anna Russel Sings!
> Again?").
Yes, I know it well. The line about the Rheinmaidens being a "sort of
aquatic Andrews Sisters" is a classic, as are many others, such as
Russell's astute observation that except for Gutrune & the above-named
trio, all the women Siegfried encounters are his aunts, plus another
trio of women he doesn't meet, the Norns (the "dreary" aunts), & the
other 8 Valkyries (the "noisy" aunts). "She's his aunt, you know,"
Russell says, when speaking of Siegfried falling instantly in love with
Brunhilde, & it's either that line or another similar one which prompts
her to say to the audience, "I'm not making this up." ;-)
Caeruleo
Stan Brown <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
> In article <UZDIb.711301$Fm2.616324@attbi_s04> in
> rec.arts.books.tolkien, Gerry Snyder wrote:
> >Paul S. Person wrote:
> >> Anna Russel has an excellent 15 minute summary of the entire Wagnerian
> >> saga (I believe I have it on an LP called "Anna Russel Sings!
> >> Again?").
> >
> >Also on CD, which I have given to several friends. (and no, I don't mean
> >copies, I mean boughten originals.)
>
> Any sightings of a recording of her analysis of /Nabucco/?
Dunno about that, but on the same album she does a brilliant takeoff on
Gilbert & Sullivan. ;-)
Lord Jubjub
Caeruleo <caer...@yahoo.com> wrote:
LOL. I've got a recording of that. Looks like I'll me getting that out
sometime soon.
--
Lord Jubjub, ruler of the slithy toves.
If you want to contact me, remember I am a LORD.
Lord Jubjub
Caeruleo <caer...@yahoo.com> wrote:
From the 'Letters', he strongly suggests that Sauron might have been on
his mind when he was writing 'The Hobbit'.
Paul S. Person
>
>"Morgil" <more...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
>news:bsp18d$dr09s$1...@ID-81911.news.uni-berlin.de...
>>
>> "A Tsar Is Born" <Atsarisb...@hotmail.com> kirjoitti
>> viestissä:fTlHb.6094$BJ4....@nwrdny03.gnilink.net...
>>
>> > Wagner invented the world-ruling Ring and Tolkien got it from Wagner.
>> > Softrat denies this, but he's wrong wrong wrong and can't bring himself
>to
>> > admit he has no evidence of any alternative.
>>
>> Exept that tiny, tiny, little detail that Tolkien's Ring
>> was not ORIGINALLY a world-ruling ring...
>
>No, and the Ring in the Hobbit does not derive from Wagner.
Nor does the Ring in the first five drafts of what became Book I of
/LOTR/. It was only /after/ finally getting Frodo (then called Bingo)
to Rivendell and considering the suprising (to JRRT) actions of the
Nazgul that JRRT asked himself just what, exactly, Bilbo's magic ring
might be. HOME VI has the details.
--
Paul S. Person
>In article <e04uuv08iq4ftqne5...@4ax.com> in
>rec.arts.books.tolkien, Paul S. Person wrote:
>>The email above is invalid.
>
>Then please follow standards and append ".invalid" to it.
If this came from anyone else, I would feel aggrieved.
But you appear to be a reliable source on such matters. It has been
done. Thanks for advising me of this standard.
--