Michael D. C. Drout

There are any number of references to the life and works of J. R. R. Tolkien, from the thorough but specialized (Robert Foster's The Complete Guide to Middle-Earth) to the more general but a little slapdash (Colin Duriez's The J. R. R. Tolkien Handbook) to the worshipful but utterly dull-minded (anything by David Day).

This book is an altogether different kettle of footnotes. Exceptionally large (more than 700 eight and a half by eleven pages) and with a high-powered editorial board show more (including Tom Shippey, the greatest Tolkien expert of all time, and three other big names, Douglas A. Anderson, Marjorie Burns, and Verlyn Flieger), it covers Tolkien's writings, his life, his family and much of the material he published or studied in his academic career. It is intended as both a scholarly reference and as a readable general reference. It doesn't include every name and event in Tolkien's major works on Middle-Earth, as Foster's book does, but it covers all the major themes, and it also gives the context of Tolkien's life. Along with references to items used to compile the entries. More than one hundred scholars contributed articles, and all articles are signed by their authors (though there is no index of articles by each author, which I would have liked).

It is, without question, the most extensive and authoritative Tolkien reference now available, and probably always will be.

And I still have to urge some caution with it. I can't help but think that editor Drout and his board assigned the various articles to the numerous contributors -- and then paid no attention to what they submitted. I won't cite examples, but the number of sloppy items (numbers that don't add up, places where the text has become garbled) is significant -- not a huge number, but enough to make you really wonder what is going on. Didn't anyone read these things?

And while most of the articles, and most of the contributors, are distinguished, there are some of each that really should not have been accepted. To pick on just one particular author, Bradley J. Birzer is the author of a book that approves of Andrew Jackson. As in, the American president who committed genocide. Yes, Tolkien was a political reactionary -- but not a fundamentalist, and definitely not a racist; there is no meeting of minds there. As I was reading one of Birzer's articles, I started feeling as if I were sinking into slime -- and then I saw who wrote it, and understood. Birzer is the worst, but there are a few others who, I think, just don't "get it."

Also, some early Tolkien criticism was Freudian, and this early criticism created (e.g.) an idea that Shelob was a threatening mother-image, which is why she was larger than her mates. Ahem, people: very many spider species feature females that are much larger than their males, and who eat the males. Tolkien -- who was very knowledgeable about botany and zoology -- was not producing a Freudian image, he was following actual biology! The Shelob thing needs to be dropped right now -- psychology has realized that Freud was absolutely wrong, so why can't Tolkien studies?

So between the lack of editing and the inclusion of "scholars" who aren't really scholars, there are a few bad articles in here. How many? It's a small minority. If you want to do Tolkien research, this is a great place to start. But don't trust it absolutely; if you're going to cite it, be sure to check the original source first. That, plus, keep in mind that, if it looks ridiculous, it probably is ridiculous. show less

What a pleasure to listen to this series of lectures! Drout covers the history of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes, beginning with their migration into Britain. Drout’s love for this culture really shines through, and his excitement is both genuine and contagious. If his goal was to teach history, he succeeded; if his goal was to get people excited, well, he succeeded there, too. A few of the events he described were things I’d read about before, but he put a unique spin on them. For show more example, I had already read about the custom of passing a lyre around a hall so that people could take turns singing. But Drout made me laugh when he described this as “Medieval Karaoke Night” and then added the disclaimer, “I am not making this up.” What a fun way of looking at it! It’s so lovely when the author’s personality shines through.

He describes different facets of Anglo-Saxon life, from the extreme amount of labor that was involved in making a book, to the relatively poor living conditions of the masses, to the king who lamented that most of his people never bothered to learn a language other than English. Drout tells of the heroes and the idiots who shaped the course of British history, and he traces the development of certain ideas and practices across the centuries. He traces the fall of this culture, which was conquered and, in many respects, completely destroyed by William.

My two favorite elements of this lecture series are both literary. I enjoyed learning about King Alfred, who pushed for books in the vernacular, who fostered increased literacy among his subjects and his court, and who worked as both translator and author. And I absolutely adored Drout’s in-depth look at a variety of works of literature. Not just Beowulf—although that is, of course, the subject of one lecture—but also many of the great works of that period. “The Wanderer,” “The Seafarer,” “Judith” (he uses the phrase “Braveheart speech” to describe this warrior woman), religious poetry, wisdom poems, “The Dream of the Rood,” King Alfred’s writings, and more: Drout paints a vivid portrait of these and other writings, and he offers in-depth literary analysis. As if that weren’t enough, he also reads from these texts in the original Old English, which is such a beautiful and melodic language.

All in all, highly informative. A well-rounded picture of many different elements of this particular history and culture. show less

This is more a nerd sharing his hobby than a scholar's lecture series, but that's not necessarily bad. Drout is clearly very enthusiastic and this lecture series feels very off the cuff and non-technical. That makes it approachable and listenable. The downside is it's meandering and lacks the tight professional presentation of most Modern Scholar offerings.
We do get some insights into the literary criticism of Tolkien, and the strongest case he makes is that a lot of the criticism comes from show more a non-acceptance of the central premise regarding good and evil - that it's not about complex moral ambiguities, but that there is as much depth in the problem of knowing what the good is, but not knowing if you can do it. That's something that seems to jive very much with Tolkien's character and religious background, and is something done away with by those who seek to emulate him (think GRRMs comments about the tax policy).
Similarly he defends the view of LOTR as a mediated document (revised product of many hands) well, a view I'd never considered.
The pop culture reflections are fun, but less insightful. show less

Always enjoyable listening to Drout. I'm one of those people who studied engineering and are now really getting into the liberal arts for the first time as an adult. The liberal arts do have value, I'm sure of it, but it is the rare few who are still carrying on the tradition in academia. That is why Drout's work for "The Modern Scholar" is probably just as important, or more so, than his work as a professor. Mature adults can take a lot of interest in this stuff, but the majority of college show more students lack the maturity to really think about it, anyway.

I'm writing this as the scandal about Claudine Gay's plagiarism is all over the news. She's a member of the ruling class; she went to Phillips Exeter Academy where she was supposed to learn those skills to rule, those liberal arts, then Princeton and Stanford for undergraduate, then Harvard for her doctorate. Drout was warning about Critical Theory ten years ago, this is where we are now. show less