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Comment by fastball | Hacker News Reader

Man, this guy really doesn't want Elves to have pointy ears.

He so very much doesn't. Back in the days of Usenet, Michael was one of the best-read experts in our discussions, and I admired him for that a lot. There weren't that many of us who could go toe to toe with him in a debate about Middle-earth lore. (There certainly were a few! And honestly, intense debates with him did a lot to hone my own expertise in this stuff: it was fun, especially if you could avoid provoking too many flames.)

That said, he also had a strong tendency to reach some conclusion on a controversial topic and then defend it to the death, even when most of us felt that the ultimate answer seemed unknowable or even fairly firmly different than what he claimed. His arguments were based on immense textual knowledge, followed up with emphatic assertions of truth if you dared disagree, and intense flames if you gave him the slightest excuse to get personal. He said, at times, that the rest of the newsgroup had a grudge against him and that people arguing against him were rejecting Tolkien's words or not arguing in good faith. For quite a while I remained on cordial terms with him and with everyone else, but at some point he decided that doing that constituted me enabling what he viewed as their toxic behavior, and we haven't interacted as friends since. All that is to say: the guy knows his stuff, and unless you're a top-tier expert he'll argue circles around you, but I still don't trust his conclusions on controversial topics.

If anyone wants a more balanced look at the Elf-ears question (from the same era when Michael wrote this FAQ, I think, or at least compatible with it), I've got an essay by Conrad Dunkerson on my site: http://tolkien.slimy.com/essays/Ears.html

It's funny to me that anyone cares either way. It makes zero difference to the story unless you take LOTR so seriously that it may be unhealthy.

Well there is a whole journal dedicated to the study of the works of Tolkien [0]. So getting things correct can be very important :)

[0]: https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/299

Tolkien's works are not just interesting for the plot. They are about world building, linguistics, mythology building.

I think it's more just that because everyone assumes they have pointy ears, it's good to point out that the text doesn't say so. It's good to point out common assumptions, as it helps us realize the unconscious biases we bring to a text.

So literary criticism is unhealthy now? This level of hair splitting is par per course for any undergrad English class.

Wonder what his thoughts on balrog wings are.

I mean, Tolkien was very clear as to if Balrogs had wings or not: yes.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100621200005/http://www.xenite...

No need for the archive.org link: https://www.xenite.org/special/do-balrogs-have-wings-do-balr...

I don't find that argument very convincing. I don't know if Balrog's have wings, but I do know they fall off high stuff a lot.

His analysis of the line, "it was LIKE a great shadow, in the middle of which was a dark form, of man-shape maybe yet greater" is deeply flawed. He argues that since a simile was used to describe the Balrog's darkness (and it has darkness), then the simile used to describe its wings means it has wings. Tolkien says "like a shadow" because it's dark like a shadow but it's not a shadow because shadows don't have physicality like the Balrog's darkness. We're clearly talking about a supernatural phenomenon that the english language can only describe via simile. Tolkien's abandonment of simile in later passages is to simplify the language. Repeating the exact same simile over and over drags the writing down.

Here's what we do know about balrogs, their essential characteristics are darkness, fire, speed, strength and magic. Flying is not an essential characteristic. It's never mentioned directly, and description of their rapid movement tends to be very metaphorical. We also know that if they do fly, they don't fly like dragons or eagles because they played no part in the conflict between the dragon and eagles. Balrogs were tossed aside with all of Morgoth's unflying creations. Only flying dragons specifically posed any threat to the Valar, and that was because of their flight.

Back in our Usenet days (wow, around 20 years ago now), Michael was firmly in the pro-wing camp: he insisted that Tolkien was using a rhetorical technique where vagueness gave way to clarity, and there were definitely wings, and anyone who said otherwise was flat out rejecting Tolkien's words on the matter (or entirely failing to understand plain English). After years of lengthy debate, I eventually recognized that much of the argument boiled down to nothing but different definitions of "wing", and I championed a consensus position (as described here: http://tolkien.slimy.com/faq/Creatures.html#BalWings). As I recall, Michael's response was to say more or less "Yes, that's obviously what I mean, but you're misrepresenting everyone on the 'no wings' side, who would never agree to such a statement." Of course, most of the 'no wings' folks also said, "Yes, that's what I've meant all along" (and yeah, some of them said, "But I know Michael would never agree with that"). It was pretty satisfying!

(And all these years later, it's nice to see that Michael is being reasonably explicit about that issue in his own writing on the topic. It's interesting to compare this 2010 archive link to the current version on his site: after he says "Yes, the Balrog had wings", he's now added a clarification that "The wings were simply shapes made of darkness." Though in the link later in this thread, he evidently can't resist one final jab at anyone who disagrees with him: "I like the book the way it is without all the rewriting and propaganda". And he describes other people trying to discuss the topic as "long-winded nonsense essays". Honestly, I haven't missed those bits of interacting with him.)

Growing up reading LOTR, Silmarillion, etc and ignoring the portrayal of Balrogs in LOTR movies, In the actual text I see: "and its wings were spread from wall to wall" (referring to the Balrog confronting Gandalf). Wings in the sense that gliders have wings, they can float/glide down but don't expect them to fly into the sky. If they could fly why didn't the Balrog that fought with Gandalf in Moria at Khazad Dum fly upwards when Gandalf broke the bridge? They ended up both falling, tumbling down to the abyss.

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