J.R.R. Tolkien's Utopianism and the Classics - (Classical Receptions in Twentieth-Century Writing) by Hamish Williams

About the Book

"This book opens up new perspectives on the English fantasy writer J.R.R. Tolkien, arguing that he was an influential thinker of utopianism in 20th-century fiction and that his scrutiny of utopias can be assessed through his dialogue with antiquity. Tolkien's engagement with the ancient world often reflects an interest in retrotopianism: his fictional places - cities, forests, homes - draw on a rich (post-)classical narrative imagination of similar spaces. Importantly for Tolkien, such narratives entail 'eutopian' thought experiments: the decline and fall of distinctly 'classical' communities provide an utopian blueprint for future political restorations; the home as oikos becomes a space where an ideal ethical reciprocity between host and guest can be sought; the 'ancient forest' is an ambiguous, unsettling site where characters can experience necessary forms of awakening. From these perspectives, tokens of Platonic moderation, Augustan restoration, Homeric xenophilia, and the Ovidian material sublime are evident in Tolkien's writing. Likewise, his retrotopianism also always entails a rewriting of ancient narratives in post-classical and modern terms. This study then explores how Tolkien's use of the classical past can help us to align classical and utopian studies, and thus to reflect on the ranges and limits of utopianism in classical literature and thought"--

Book Synopsis

This book opens up new perspectives on the English fantasy writer J.R.R. Tolkien, arguing that he was an influential thinker of utopianism in 20th-century fiction and that his scrutiny of utopias can be assessed through his dialogue with antiquity. Tolkien's engagement with the ancient world often reflects an interest in retrotopianism: his fictional places - cities, forests, homes - draw on a rich (post-)classical narrative imagination of similar spaces.

Importantly for Tolkien, such narratives entail 'eutopian' thought experiments: the decline and fall of distinctly 'classical' communities provide an utopian blueprint for future political restorations; the home as oikos becomes a space where an ideal ethical reciprocity between host and guest can be sought; the 'ancient forest' is an ambiguous, unsettling site where characters can experience necessary forms of awakening. From these perspectives, tokens of Platonic moderation, Augustan restoration, Homeric xenophilia, and the Ovidian material sublime are evident in Tolkien's writing. Likewise, his retrotopianism also always entails a rewriting of ancient narratives in post-classical and modern terms. This study then explores how Tolkien's use of the classical past can help us to align classical and utopian studies, and thus to reflect on the ranges and limits of utopianism in classical literature and thought.

Review Quotes

Fascinating, erudite, timely, and theoretically informed, J.R.R. Tolkien's Utopianism and the Classics deftly traces Tolkien's classicism and its use to explore utopic possibilities and their elusiveness. Tolkien devotees and scholars of high fantasy, utopia studies, and classical reception in fantasy will find Williams' book essential reading.

Hamish Williams has succeeded with sound method and meticulous source work to highlight parallels to ancient writings ... This gives Williams' analysis a very sound basis, and the reading of the short book is altogether a great pleasure.
Bryn Mawr Classical Review

More than a simplistic sources-and-influences study of the classical origins of some of Tolkien's literary creations, this book dives deeply into material others have only skimmed or avoided altogether. Williams also does justice to the influence of Tolkien's Catholic beliefs on the philosophical/theological foundations upon which much of his legendarium rests, avoiding doctrinaire axe-grinding for or against Tolkien's religion. This book is essential.

About the Author

Hamish Williams is Lecturer in European Literature and Culture at the University of Groningen, The Netherlands. He has co-edited Tolkien and the Classical World (2021) and The Ancient Sea: The Utopian and Catastrophic in Classical Narratives and their Reception (2022).