Prologue 2: Concerning Pipe-weed

. Concerning Pipe-weed.

I’ve always considered this the one of the least essential bits in the entire series. Here Tolkien devotes a couple of pages describing pipe-weed, which the hobbits (and Men) of the Shire (and Bree) smoke. It’s nothing more than good old fashioned nicotine; it is indigenous to the South and apparently, (like potatoes?) was brought from overseas from Numenor by the Dunedain. Why they brought it over when they didn’t even smoke it is a mystery.

There follows a long-winded bit written by a hobbit-scholar named Meriodoc Brandybuck, Master of Buckland. This is no other than Merry Brandybuck, a major character in the story to come. Introducing a major character in this way is rather odd; it does present a side of Merry that is only glimpsed in his younger character: a professorial big-hearted side. In fact, we see this side of Merry when he meets Theoden in Flotsam and Jetsam, during which he expounds on pipe-weed much in the style(indeed, using some of the exact same language) of this extract from his book. Until Gandalf interrupts him.

Tolkien was a pipe-smoker. The first edition of the Fellowship of the Ring which I read had a picture of him holding a pipe and laughing heartily the back of it.

Look at that adorable old man and his fur collar! Those big, unkempt eyebrows! The most successful author of the twentieth century, I believe.

I recently read a biography of a very obscure author who wrote some books in the late seventies and early eighties which I just think are gorgeous. His name was Richard Monaco. He died in July, of cancer. Richard Monaco was briefly almost-famous, as two of the three books in his Grail trilogy were short-listed for the Pulitzer Price. And according to his biography, would have won the Prize if there hadn’t been an unwritten rule on the Pulitzer comittee that said that the characters and/or the setting must be American. (Which, actually, is how I see the Pulitzer Prize: as a statement on current America. But All the Light We Cannot See from a few years back kind of bucked that trend.)

Anyway, on reading the highly interesting biography of this almost-famous author, I was struck at just how much of Monaco’s biography and attitudes and thoughts towards life went into his fiction books. That, in fact, everything you needed to know about him was pretty much there, laid down in the first book of his trilogy. Albeit in disjointed, rearranged, fictionalized form. And lest I be misunderstood, the books were not semi-autobiagraphical, a la Jack Kerouac’s book. They were, in fact, fantasies, retellings of ancient Arthurian legends. yet Monaco’s character: his highly-sexualized, hyper-curious, spiritual, slightly arrogant, overwhelmingly sensual and physical character is all actually laid down in the fiction book — so much so that nothing in his memoirs was particularly surprising.

What can we learn about Tolkien as a human from the Lord of the Rings? Well, we’ve already seen that he loved history and had a dramatic and colorful way of looking at it, a way that belies great imaginative power. He likes pipe-smoking so much that he actually has an entire sub-chapter devoted to the art. I see him as a great, expansive joyous character, a man who loved a good pipe at the local pub and a deep conversation about matters taht interested him; but with a hidden, inner side of darkness, fear, and deep, deep pessimism that is leavened mainly by his Christianity.

Because Tolkien’s works are actually very dark and he did experience horrific trauma in the First World War that I think somehow does permeate his works with sorrow.

The pipe-weed thing is Very strange, though, isn’t it? We all hate the devil Nicotine here in the 21st century; addiction is a dirty word. Back in 1954, though, it was a cherished habit, one that brought only pleasure to the imbiber. While there is a bit of world-building in this sub-chapter, it really doesn’t seem particularly essential.

And to all the hippies and to Peter Jackson who seem to view the weed as, well, weed, pot, marijuana. It’s not. Why did Jackson imply it was marijuana? Is it simply because smoking tobacco is relatively taboo? Did Tolkien make such a big deal about it to emphasize that it was not marijuana? But that seems unlikely. Marijuana surely was not much on the radar in 1940s and 1950s academic circles in Britain. (Although I bet it is now.)

Still to me, there has always been something comforting about pipe-smoke…something grandfatherly. My grandfather may have smoked a pipe; I know one of my uncles did, though I think he has since quit. But the smell is so lovely and homely, unlike the smell of cigarettes or, worse, cigars.

Pipe-smoking conjures up images of rainy days spent inside with a cup of warm coffee or tea and a nice book; in a room made for solitary pleasures; warm as the womb, with rain pattering on the roof and beading on the windows; while outside the trees blow in the wind.

It’s a detail of hobbit-life that could have been left out. But it’s also a beloved quirk.