The Faculty of Valuay has a very short list of creators it holds special contempt for. However, one individual in particular is an object of near universal hatred, despite his recent existence. A soul with an overactive Origin of Language, whose work redefined fantasy, and in doing so stripped a common practice of all its power. J.R.R. Tolkien.
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born on January 3, 1892, in present-day South Africa to parents Arthur and Mabel Tokien. While his mother, brother and himself were in England on vacation, his father passed away, leaving the family with no financial support. Due to this, Mabel chose to remain in England with her family rather than return. These lands that he grew up in would later come to be part of the inspiration for the landscapes featured in his works.
Thanks to the peculiarity of his soul, Tolkien learned to read and write fluently by the age of four and was an avid learner. His interest in languages could be described as borderline terrifying, and learned the foundations of Latin at a very young age. Furthermore, he even began to write his own stories and read the works of others. An important occurrence in this time was Tolkien reading the books of Andrew Lang. This formed his first interests in the origin of the fantasy genre. He also had an interest in botany that he shared with his mother and, after her death, made sure to forever hold close.
With the tragedy of his mothers death leaving them guardianless, he and his brother were sent to live with a trusted friend, Father Francis, who raised them as Roman Catholics at his mother’s request. It was also after coming into Father Francis' care that he encountered his first constructed language, Animalic. It was created by his cousins Mary and Marjorie Incledon, however they quickly lost interest.
Tolkien, didn’t. In fact, it was the opposite. He was so enamoured with it that he went on to invent a new language of greater complexity with a bit of help. This language was called Nevbosh. Driven by this interest, he would learn Esperanto and write the Book of Foxrook, which contained his first self constructed alphabet. From a mystical context, this work has another achievement. The first time that, through his imagination and skill in writing, his Origin imbued his words with power.
Tolkien fell in love with Edith Mary Bratt as a teenager but was forbidden from contacting her until he turned 21 because Father Francis believed their romance would affect his education. This was actually accurate, as the tensions caused by her protestant background and Father Francis caused Tolkien to mess up in his exams.
With an inhuman drive, inspired by his want to be with the woman he loved and the resonance of what he studied, that being English language and literature. Graduating with first class honours from Oxford’s Exeter College, he turned to pursue his love. Writing a letter and driving all his skill into it, his Origin once more affected the words and further imbued them with both power, and the contents of his mind. One could say that the letter became a manifestation of every drop of his love for her by the end.
Despite, as he would later find out, almost losing her to another man, the letter did its job perfectly. They married during World War I, and he enlisted for service as a second lieutenant shortly after their wedding in 1916. This last part may have impacted why there was so little bad blood left between the other man and Tolkien.
Much of his time in the military was spent in France as part of the 11th service battalion Lancashire Fusiliers. Working as a signal officer, he mainly found himself serving alongside the working class men under his command. While the rigours of military protocol prevented him from forming close relationships, he grew to feel an affinity with these men. The comes heavily from the ingenuity, creativity and imagination these men displayed in trying to follow the military doctrine of ‘hurry up and wait’ in the stressful environment.
He was involved in the Battle of the Somme and was placed at risk of death a number of times. In the end though, he was saved from such an unfortunate fate by the least likely ally. Lice. Specifically, he contracted trench foot and was sent back to England, surviving the war. However, he was a lucky one among his friends, with many of them losing their lives in the war. Truly, he probably would have joined them in death if he had remained much longer, as most of his battalion was wiped out in short order.
After his return, he spent a brief stint working at the Oxford English Dictionary. Despite his relatively short time spent here, less than three percent of his overall lifetime, Tolkien claimed he learned more in those two years than any other two years in his life. This is because of a sentiment that was formed here, one he would go on to partially publish in ‘On Fairy-Stories’ and can be summarised as this:
Fantasy is the interaction between human imagination and human language. Nothing more, nothing less. The inspirations effects on the process were null and void in a direct context, and only mattered, somewhat, in the indirect.
While he would go on to have an impressive career in academia, writing a number of works that would become course standards, the most important one for the existence of this servant, is the four first published works in middle earth. Each work he made were projects of his very soul, and the ultimate examples of his skill in the manipulation of language. All the while, his Origin poured thousands of concepts into his work.
Chief among them his opinion on the fantasy genre.
Each work used the power conferred upon them to become a pillar that separated the fantasy of the past from the now, acting upon the work left behind by others and the waves Tolkien had already made through the influence he had on the works of others and his own prior publications.
However, the effect wasn’t immediate, and if more stability had not been added to these pillars, it would have all come tumbling down. Had the publication gone like Tolkien expected, they would have. Yet despite writing them for himself, expecting little of their eventual release, his skill with words had other ideas. And so Tolkien created modern fantasy.
However, to truly understand the meaning of this event, we have to also explain why he is hated by the Department of Creation.
The Department of Creation focuses its research into magecraft in artistry, and while some of those artists focused on written works, the use of literature was widespread. This was because of a process that had been discovered that allowed mages to increase the stability of a product without decreasing the mystery through an abuse of the stabilising effect of knowledge.
By creating works that featured their creations, and used their properties, functions or effects as major themes of the story, mages could stabilise the foundation and formulas of the creation. And through including other themes and using misdirecting plots, they could ensure a minimal to no loss of mystery for the work. While this procedure had been weakened by things like the printing press, reducing the inherent mystery of written works by reducing their rarity, it was still in major use. While it was used by many mages, it was most pervasive in the Faculty of Valuay.
Good examples would be things like:
The woodcutter's tale: What would be a simple but efficient way of stabilising a tool.
The Picture of Dorian Gray: A more intricate defence for a useful piece.
The Jabberwocky: A masterwork of the process, used to stabilise a major, usually research defining creation.
It was effective due to the foundation of the fantasy genre putting heavy import on the influencing factors. However, when Tolkien redefined how the world saw fantasy, the effect of the process quickly dropped, until it was useless. The event caused a witch hunt in the Department, but by the time they found the one responsible, it was too late. The Department of Policies prevented them from exacting their desired revenge, and Tolkien was able to live the rest of his life, and pass away, in peace.
In the end, he was able to steal a basic tool of Valuay, reforge it anew so it could never serve its old purpose, and hand it to Norwich, and walk away scot free.
Originally Posted by Vididii
Funny you mention that! Been waylaid today because my family's doing July 4th a day early so we can sleep in tomorrow, so I gotta do the sheet before I sleep, but I just finished the design!
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