Light on a very strange personality: Review of Charles Williams' letters to his wife 1939-45

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To Michal from Serge: Letters from Charles Williams to his wife Florence 1939-1945

Edited by Roma A King. Kent State University Press: Ohio, USA. 2002. pp 315

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I have spent a leisurely couple of weeks reading these letters - selected from almost-daily missives over nearly six years - having at last found a not-wildly-overpriced secondhand copy after a few years of waiting.

These letters are very well worth reading for the scholar of Charles Williams life and works - somebody such as myself; but would be almost totally without interest for anybody else.

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(Note: Michal and Serge were pet names: Michal for Florence and Serge for Charles.)

The reason for their limited appeal is that there is very little in these pages of letters except:

1. Microscopic discussions of money - down to the level of shillings earned and spent.

2. Repeated and prolonged (and un-convincing) praise of Michal by Serge.

3.  Complaints of misery, discomfort, loneliness etc.

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There is almost nothing about The Inklings, or even CS Lewis - who Williams was in real life often meeting (with Tolkien, Warnie, Havard and others) for a few hours on Monday mornings (in various places, to read and be read to by Lewis and Tolkien) rooms, Tuesday lunchtimes (at the Bird and Baby pub) and Thursday evenings (for Inklings meetings in Lewis's rooms at Magdalen College).

There is almost nothing about Williams' incessant socialising and conversing with his wide circles of 'disciples', admirers, acolytes - such as his future biographer Alice Mary Hadfield; and almost nothing of his actual work at his employers: the Oxford University Press.

If indeed he was doing any significant work at the OUP. CW did so much of his own book and essay writing (for money), reviewing other people's books (for money), tutorial work and lecturing in Oxford (for money) and around the country (usually free) - not to mention the socialising - it seems that the OUP position by this time was simply a sinecure!

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So what about the focus on money? This goes way beyond anything reasonable or sensible - indeed, it is an act of self-justification. Williams is telling his wife, over and over again, that he is working to get her money - which he sends in dribs and drabs enclosed with most of the letters - ten shilling notes (that is half a pound), mostly pounds, the occasional two pounds... meticulously documented in terms of their provenance.

My interpretation is partly that these were a bribe for the continued affection and attention of Michal, and partly a displacement activity - by writing about money all the time and everyday, CW was able NOT to write about a lot of other things.

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What about the over-the-top praise of Michal?

One might initially suppose that for a husband to write wild overpraise of his wife day after day for six years - he would have to mean what he said... but on reflection I think almost the opposite was the case.

What kind of wife demands to be called a genius, compared with a goddess, credited with superhuman powers of goodness, intuition, inspiration and so on; day after day, year after year?... what reasonable wife could endure it?

My firm conclusion (consistent with other sources of information I have found in memoirs) is that Charles Williams wife was a Psycho Hose Beast^, a High Maintenance Woman, an hysteric, an extremely unstable neurotic.

Therefore Michal apparently demanded incessant, ludicrous over-praise, and was so jealous that Williams could not write positively about anybody - not even his best men friends such as CS Lewis and TS Eliot - without immediately denying his affection for them, denigrating them, stating that he would always rather be with his wife instead.

Indeed, I infer that CW was completely sincere in his wish to live with Michal (if in almost nothing else); he stated, and I believe, that it was the only way he could find rest in this life; lacking which his life was always a matter of being 'on show', and with a mask in place, and unsettled, and not-at-home.

Williams really, really wanted to live with Michal - as husband and wife (and also, he very powerfully missed the physical side of marriage - especially sleeping next to each other and entwined, as well as sex).

Yet Michal would not be with him. What kind of wife lives apart from her husband for six years - living here and there, in London and out of it, sometimes with people she loathes - because she doesn't like Oxford? Answer: the kind of woman who does not want to live with her husband, and who will seize upon any excuse NOT to live with her husband.

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Why this terribly sad situation?

Obviously there were faults on both sides, and especially Charles' previous infatuation with the secretary Phyllis Jones, which he never completely broke free from; plus presumably his weirdly ritualistic 'use' of young women as a source of energy to sublimate into his writing...

I infer that Michal was already, by nature, extremely unstable and neurotic; and the Phyllis Jones business unleashed this with extraordinary and permanent force - one observer said that it made the main topic of her conversation for many years after Charles died.

So there was probably a considerable element of Michal punishing Charles, and punishing him day after day for year after year; but also this behaviour probably came naturally to her as a mixture of her dependence on him with her anger and revulsion at his betrayal.

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The modern reaction to CW's situation - is why did he put up with it? Why did he not just 'dump' Michal? Perhaps to take-up with one/ several/ many of his young female admirers - who would have been only too willing to oblige.

There are many reasons (including morality) but at root Williams did not want to - he wanted Michal back, and that was the only thing he wanted because it was an absolute necessity to his psychological survival.

Thus the tedious harping on the money he brings in and sends to her, the wild overpraise, the pandering to her jealousy by including many spiteful (and dishonest) remarks about the people he lives among; and the massive act of self-censorship going on in these letters - which represent a real but tiny minority chunk of CW's Oxford life, such that the reality of 90 percent of his waking life as seen by everybody around him including those very close to him; is utterly excluded from these letters.

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Another factor is CW's son Michael (note the 'e' in the name). It is one of the most disappointing aspects of this not-very-well-edited volume that there is almost no information about Michael Williams (1922-2000) who is a major focus of CWs concern, indeed his desperate worry over the whole period of these letters - but especially the early years.

In fact, CW's evident and active concern for his son is one of his most likeable and 'human' qualities; any father can empathize with this, and it is greatly to CW's credit.

It is clear that Michael had some undefined psychological problems, and also that he had suffered some kind of illness in his teens which threatened his eyesight - and perhaps caused or threatened some kind of permanent problem either of mental handicap or psychotic or neurological type.

But although this is my own area of medical expertise, there just isn't enough information provided here to give more than the vaguest idea about what the problem was. Charles and Michal obviously knew what the problem was, so it never gets spelled-out in correspondence - but the editor should have found-out and told us!

The fact that in the last couple of years of this book, Michael was reviewing books for the prestigious (and paying) magazine Time and Tide, shows that he must have been intelligent and had considerable ability as a writer - yet he is always talked-of as being unstable, irritable, prone to outbursts of bad manners, lacking in application, prone to unreasonably strong dislikes (of Oxford, for example), and so on.

The editor needed to tell us about this - but he didn't; and I can't discover anything anywhere else. Yet Michael seems like he was probably some kind of missing 'key' to Charles Williams personality and behaviour.

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So these letters provide vital information for the Charles Williams scholar - albeit mostly indirectly and by omission.

For me, the letters demonstrate that Charles Williams is not to be trusted in his evaluations of his life, since his behaviour is not consistent with his statements.

Indeed, there is very little in these letters which can be trusted because the content has been so selected, slanted and distorted for the consumption of Michal/ Florence: they are fundamentally evasive, and they 'ring false' at many or most points throughout.

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Also these letters are of near-zero literary value; and this is related to their falseness, and their extreme degree of self-censorship.

They reveal a fundamental problem with Charles Williams as a person, which spills over into Williams as a writer; which is that Williams' personality was compartmentalised, un-integrated.

So that while Lewis and Tolkien are the same person in their fiction, non-fiction and letters - and both were among the greatest of letter writers, from a literary perspective - Williams was by contrast a collection of hermetically-sealed masks (!), and his work is therefore extremely uneven in quality - according to which mask he is wearing; often lacks depth (because of the partiality of perspective); and almost-never attains the heights of either Lewis or Tolkien.

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Yet it is hard to blame Williams for this; indeed after reading these letters I do not really blame him. He had great gifts - as were apparent to men of genius such as Eliot, Auden, Lewis and others; and he helped many people greatly; but he found life terribly difficult; almost a minute-by-minute struggle to find the energy and motivation to keep going.

I don't know whether many people would have done much better than CW did, given his inner trials.

All in all, I feel very sorry for Charles Williams. 

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But Williams' fundamental flaw (for which I do blame him) was dishonesty - not by making up lies, but in the more insidious form of incomplete and misleading factuality.

At some point (and perhaps under intense and sustained pressure from Michal?) he took a step into a life of deception, and compartmentalisation; and this infected his work, and severely-limited his achievement so that Charles Williams will never be popular, nor indeed readable outside of a small 'cult'.

To Michal from Serge documents the end stage of this process - but although it was the end, with Charles dying suddenly, during a 'routine' abdominal operation to treat 'adhesions' from a previous operation, I did not detect any sense that his life's work was complete, or that he was 'ready to die'.

Quite the opposite - Williams' life was opening-out, with a delayed flowering and general success - many opportunities ranging from a Readership or Tutorship at Oxford, or a Professorship at Birmingham University (offered him, but turned-down)...

Had he lived, who knows what he might have gone-on to do?

But in the event, he didn't; and we must make what we can, of what we have: which is a lot.

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^Note: the term 'psycho hose beast' comes from the brilliant 1992 movie Wayne's World, and is self-defining in that context.

Review of the new Hobbit movie - The Desolation of Smaug

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There is no review of the second Hobbit movie - The Desolation of Smaug.

I'm sorry, but I just can't face it.

I'll take a look when it comes onto TV; and I can use fast-forward.

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Tolkien's stinking Nazgul-pterodactyl in Lord of the Rings (probably) came from Charles Williams' Place of the Lion

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I was always puzzled why the pterodactyl-bred, fell, winged beast upon which the King of the Nazgul rode should smell foul - since I would not expect a reptile to smell overpoweringly bad.

But I suspect that the idea of a reeking pterodactyl came from Charles Williams novel - The Place of the Lion - which Tolkien read in 1936

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/tolkien-and-lewiss-annus-divertium-of.html

In the following excerpt it can be seen that the Nazgul's steed is indeed implied to be a pterodactyl (or some kind of dinosaur bird) and also that it stinks.

From The Battle of Pelennor Fields - The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien - 1955.

The great shadow descended like a falling cloud. And behold! it was a winged creature: if bird, then greater than all other birds, and it was naked, and neither quill nor feather did it bear, and its vast pinions were as webs of hide between horned fingers; and it stank. A creature of an older world maybe it was, whose kind, fingering in forgotten mountains cold beneath the Moon, outstayed their day, and in hideous eyrie bred this last untimely brood, apt to evil. And the Dark Lord took it, and nursed it with fell meats, until it grew beyond the measure of all other things that fly; and he gave it to his servant to be his steed. Down, down it came, and then, folding its fingered webs, it gave a croaking cry, and settled upon the body of Snowmane, digging in its claws, stooping its long naked neck... Suddenly the great beast beat its hideous wings, and the wind of them was foul. Again it leaped into the air, and then swiftly fell down upon Éowyn, shrieking, striking with beak and claw.

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And in the following excerpt can be seen the stinking pterodactyl making its earlier appearance:

From The Place of the Lion by Charles Williams - 1933.

As she gazed she heard another sound above, and looked up to see the earlier horror flying round in circles high over her. There she stood on the edge of a swampy pool, with the pterodactyl wheeling round in the sky, and one remote companion. ... Her voice failed; she heard herself making grotesque noises in her throat, and suddenly over him there fell the ominous shadow of the pterodactyl.

(...)

It was five minutes to eight. She thought abruptly, as she very often
did, "O I must get it." Doctor of Philosophy--how hard she had worked
for it! The...O the smell!

In full strength it took her, so violently that she stepped backward and
made an involuntary gesture outward. The horror of it nearly made her
faint. It must, she thought, be something to do with these new houses;
some corrupt material had been used. The smell was corruption. Something
would have to be done; the Council Surveyor must be called in. Perhaps
it wouldn't be so bad downstairs. Her window faced the fallen houses;
the dining-room looked the other way. She would go down and see.

As she moved the sunlight that was over her papers, except for the light
shadow that she herself cast, was totally obscured. A heavy blackness
obliterated it in an instant; the papers, the table, all that part of
the room lay in gloom. The change was so immediate that even Damaris's
attention was caught, and, still wrinkling her nose at the appalling
smell, she glanced half round to see what dark cloud had suddenly filled
the sky. And then she did come much nearer to fainting than ever before
in her life.

Outside the window something was...was. That was the only certainty her
startled senses conveyed. There was a terrific beak protruding through
the open window into the room, there was the most appalling body she had
ever conceived possible; there were two huge flapping wings; there were
two horrible red eyes. And there was the smell. Damaris stood stock
still, gasping at it, thinking desperately, "I'm dreaming." The beastly
apparition remained. It seemed to be perched there, on the window-sill
or the pear-tree or something. Its eyes held her; its wings moved, as
if uncertainly opening; its whole repulsive body shook and stirred; its
beak--not three yards distant--jerked at her, as if the thing were
stabbing; then it opened. She had a vision of great teeth; incapable of
thought, she stumbled backward against the table, and remained fixed.

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Wanted: A group portrait of an Inklings meeting

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It seems extraordinary, almost unbelievable, but so far as I know - nobody has yet done a group portrait of an Inklings meeting.

But if anyone could do this - whether a detailed drawing, or a painting; and do it reasonably well, reasonably authentically - then I think it would be used all over the place.

Certainly I'd love to put any such attempts onto this blog - as I did with some pictures of The Notion Club:

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/notion-club-visualized-by-afalstein.html

Get to it - you artists!

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I was thinking of something along the lines of Poet's Pub - below; by Alexander Moffat - showing the circle of writers associated with Hugh MacDiarmid in an amalgum of their Edinburgh Rose Street 'watering holes' such as the Cafe Royal, Milne's Bar or the Abbotford:

Myth turning into History - Tolkien and Christianity

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http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/disenchantment-and-myth-turning-into.html

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Numenor as a nation of Elf-Friends

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The concept of Numenor entered Tolkien's Legendarium in 1936 (according to the introduction to The Lost Road, by Christopher Tolkien) - a couple of decades after the world was first conceived in the Lost Tales - during Tolkien's military years of World War One.

This entailed inserting a Second Age into the chronology of Tolkien's world - which was a lot of work and added many complications including a 'Second Fall' of Man - as he called it. The First Fall of Man was a fall into worshipping Morgoth as if he was The One God, and that came before the Elves met Men, and thus before the recorded history of the Simarillion).

So I think it is reasonable to assume that Numenor served some very important function (or functions) for Tolkien - brought something or some-things he had come to regard as vitally important.

So, the question is what was the function of Numenor in Tolkien's world - why did he feel a need to insert a 'Second Age' into his chronology?

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My answer is that in essence Numenor served as a bridge between Elves and Men (the relationship of which is the main underlying theme of Tolkien's stories - taken as a whole).

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1. Geography

In the first place, Numenor is physically situated between Elfland and England (or The British Isles) - much closer to Elfland (Tol Erresea) but a 'half-way-house' nonetheless.

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2. Racial characteristics

Numenorean-Men are mid-way between Elves and Men, share characteristics of both; in a sense Numenoreans are 'mortal Elves' since they combine (almost) High Elven artistic and scientific skills and 'magic' (healing, intuition, far-sight, fore-sight etc) with Man's mortality; regarded as the Gift to Men from Eru - that gift being the privilege to leave the confines of the world after death (therefore with the hope of true immortality, rather than the Elvish prospect of life in this world serially continued, but until the end of the world only).

Indeed, it seems that the Valar may have been hoping that the Numenoreans would have been better than either Elves or Men - the best of both worlds, in effect!

And perhaps in a sense Numenoreans were the best-of-both, at first; although they ended-up being the worst of both worlds (High Elvish power with Mannish greed and impatience...) - since neither Elves nor ordinary Men ever did anything of such appalling blasphemy as to make war upon the Valar in their own domain.

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3. Ennoblement of Men

The Numenoreans were the basis for the ennoblement of Men by Elves - both by blood and by blessing.

By blood because of the infusions from those rare marriages between Men and High Elves - Beren and Luthien (half High Elf, half Maia - minor god), Tuor and Idril, and much later Aragorn and Arwen.

(Perhaps of relevance is the union of a Numenorean Prince of Dol Amroth with a Silvan Elf - but from the rather casual and indifferent way this is mentioned and its vaguely legendary status, it seems that marraiges between Men and Silvan Elves may have been bother commoner and less much significant than when High Elves were involved - http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Princes_of_Dol_Amroth ).

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But also by blessing.

I have commented that High Elves seem able to make a Man (or Hobbit) into an Elf-Friend by simply pronouncing it:

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/i-name-you-elf-friend-blessing-of-frodo.html

To be an Elf-Friend is to be a partly Elven in terms of certain 'magical' enhancements, and to have a partially Elven nature implanted.

Similarly, but much more powerfully, the Numenoreans seem to have been given a blessing by the Valar - to make them into a race of (as it were) permanent Elf-Friends.

This seems to be a necessary explanation because it seems very unlikely, almost inconceivable, that all the Numenoreans get their Elvish enhancements by genetic descent from Elros - the brother of Elrond and original Half-Elven Founding Father King of Numenor.

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Also, Tolkien once said (I think in one of his Letters) that the union of Aragorn and Arwen and the residual Numenorean lineage of Arnor and Gondor was (fictively) how later, modern man had been ennobled (somewhat) with an Elvish strain.

My feeling is that this was not meant to be a direct genetic kind of inheritance, but a more diffuse and spiritual kind of blood relationship; which also involved some kind of 'blessing' conferred by the greater on the lesser - analogous to Gildor and Frodo.

But that notion is very speculative indeed!

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Lord of the Rings: "Deeply sad, almost without hope..." True - but only in a literary sense

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On page 200 of his (indispensable!) collection of essays Roots and Branches the greatest ever Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey describes The Lord of the Rings as "deeply sad, almost without hope".

Of course he is correct, right down to the 'almost' - but this quality is, to a very significant extent:

1. A contingent artifact of the publication history of Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion of 1977.

2. True of LotR as a literary work, but not true of Tolkien the man.

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A. The sadness and almost-hope-less-ness of LotR is a contingent artifact of the last-minute deletion of the Epilogue

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/the-epilogue-to-lord-of-rings-what.html

which would, to my mind, have left the reader with a most positive and less pessimistic sense of the story.

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B. Furthermore, the original frame for the LotR - which involved some English (or proto-English) person receiving the legends of the Elves (or Numenoreans) by travel to Elfland, Faery or Numenor, was a more positive frame - in the sense of implying some special role or destiny for these legends.

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/i-name-you-elf-friend-blessing-of-frodo.html

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C. When LotR is interpreted in the light of the Silmarillion, then the fact that the transcendentally hopeful Second Prophecy of Mandos was omitted from the Silmarillion of 1977 makes it an almost wholly sad story.

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/what-is-point-of-tale-of-turin-turambar.html

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D. Also, the decision to omit The debate of Finrod and Andreth from The Simarillion of 1977, robbed it not only of what would have been perhaps its most moving piece of writing, but of its strongly implicit link to the incarnation of Jesus; and the ultimate optimism of Christianity.

http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2008/09/tolkiens-marring-of-men.html

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And finally, Tolkien's works can be seen as exemplars of his philosophy of subcreation described in On Fairy Stories, which essay ends with a tremendous expression of Christian hope:

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2010/11/epilogue-to-on-fairy-stories.html

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In conclusion, The Lord of the Rings, as published, and considered as a literary work, is indeed 'deeply sad, almost without hope; furthermore the available biographical information suggests that Tolkien was himself often deeply sad, and also pessimistic about the future of this world; but although both sad and pessimistic, Tolkien-the-man was not 'without hope' - and was quite the opposite - Tolkien was profoundly hopeful, convinced in his hope.

http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/was-jrr-tolkien-pessimist-no-not-really.html

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The wind siezes them and drives them away... Failing to get to Faery: Tolkien's strangely lame recurrent plot idea

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For a period of about thirty years - stretching from his earliest sketched and planned stories published in Lost Tales all the way down to The Notion Club Papers - Tolkien recurrently noted what seems like a very bad idea for a plot, which is that someone has a long and hazardous voyage to the land of the elves - and then just as it comes into sight, sound or smell they get driven back to mortal shores.

I present three excepts, with bold emphasis added to the relevant passage:

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From 1920 - The History of Eriol or AElfwine, Book of Lost Tales Volume 2 - page 327:

The night-flowers are opening in Faery,' said AElfwine; 'and behold,' said Bior," 'the Elves are kindling candles in their silver dusk,' and all looked whither his long hand pointed over their dark stern.

Then none spoke for wonder and amaze, seeing deep in the gloaming of the West a blue shadow, and in the blue shadow many glittering lights, and ever more and more of them came twinkling out, until ten thousand points of flickering radiance were splintered far away as if a dust of the jewels self-luminous that Feanor made were scattered on the lap of the Ocean.

'Then is that the Harbour of the Lights of Many Hues,' said AElfheah, 'that many a little-heeded tale has told of in our homes.' Then saying no more they shot out their oars and swung about their ship in haste, and pulled towards the never- dying shore. Near had they come to abandoning it when hardly won. Little did they make of that long pull, as they thrust the water strongly by them, and the long night of Faerie held on, and the horned moon of Elfinesse rode over them.

Then came there music very gently over the waters and it was laden with unimagined longing, that AElfwine and his comrades leant upon their oars and wept softly each for his heart's half- remembered hurts, and memory of fair things long lost, and each for the thirst that is in every child of Men for the flawless loveliness they seek and do not find.

And one said: 'It is the harps that are thrumming, and the songs they are singing of fair things; and the windows that look upon the sea are full of light.' And another said: 'Their stringed violins complain the ancient woes of the immortal folk of Earth, but there is a joy therein.' 'Ah me,' said AElfwine, 'I hear the horns of the Fairies shimmer- ing in magic woods -- such music as I once dimly guessed long years ago beneath the elms of Mindon Gwar.'

And lo! as they spoke thus musing the moon hid himself, and the stars were clouded, and the mists of time veiled the shore, and nothing could they see and nought more hear, save the sound of the surf of the seas in the far-off pebbles of the Lonely Isle; and soon the wind blew even that faint rustle far away.

But AElfwine stood forward with wide-open eyes unspeaking, and suddenly with a great cry he sprang forward into the dark sea, and the waters that filled him were warm, and a kindly death it seemed enveloped him.

Then it seemed to the others that they awakened at his voice as from a dream; but the wind now suddenly grown fierce filled all their sails, and they saw him never again, but were driven back with hearts all broken with regret and longing.

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From 1936 - The Lost Road (HOME Volume 5) - page 80

The  Straight  Road.....  water (island  of   Azores?)..... off.

AElfwine [?restores?restrains] Eadwine. Thinks it a vision of delirium.

The vision of Eressea and the sound of voices.

Resigns himself to die but prays for Eadwine.

Sensation  of  falling.

They come down in [?real] sea and west wind blows them back.

Land in Ireland

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From 1946 - The Notion Club Papers (From HOME Volume 9) - page 278

Treowine sees the round world [?curve] below, and straight ahead a shining land before the wind siezes them and drives them away.

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So - what is going on?

I noticed this passage because it seems so clearly inadequate as a plot climax: to endure long voyages and great hardship, to get within sight of Faery - but to fail to land there!

(Unless AElfwine did not actually drown but reached the shore alive - but this then leaves the needless complication of explaining how he returned to the British Isles without a boat.)

Furthermore, the rationale behind these stories was (apparently) Tolkien's need to explain how it was that the knowledge of the elves had come down to modern men. The whole reason (it seems to me) for these Western voyages in search of Elfland was so that men could meet the elves and discover from them their legends.

So the West-voyaging character - initially called Eriol (one who dreams alone), then AElfwine (Elf-Friend), and later seemingly Arundel (Elf-Friend) Lowdham and his friend Jeremy from the Notion Club - was supposed to be the link between modern England and the ancient myths of Faery.

Why then do these drafts have this character apparently failing to land?

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I suspect the reason would, if known, be enlightening of Tolkien's motivations in writing his legendarium - perhaps of his ambivalence about the project, or an anxiety - so that he had a tendency to shy-away from the necessary plot at the last moment. That, at least, is what it looks or feels like, to me.

I have a theory. My theory is that Tolkien had himself visited Faery - presumably in vivid and memorable and true-seeming dreams, of the kind which are all over his works - but he was ambivalent about revealing either this fact or the information he derived in any direct way.

Of course, we eventually got to hear about the history of Erresea and Valinor withot menition of any intermediary Man such as Eriol. AElfwine or Lowdham - all mention of which was deleted from the Lord of the Rings as it appeared, without this kind of framing device.

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The actually-used fictive framing device is that Bilbo and Frodo (plus Sam and Merry) supposedly wrote the information used in the Hobbit and LotR in The Red Book of Westmarch, having consulted with Elrond and other experts; and the Red Book had reached Tolkien by unexplained routes, and he was merely an editor who made stories from this source.

But before Tolkien reached this partial-solution, his last attempt at the Eriol/ AElfwine explanation was in The Notion Club Papers - and it may be that the Saint Brendan poem 'Iram' included in the NCPs contains the answer, encoded:

‘O! stay now father! There’s more to say.
But two things you have told:
The Tree, the Cloud; but you spoke of three.
The Star in mind you hold?’
‘The Star? Yes, I saw it, high and far,
at the parting of the ways,
a light on the edge of the Outer Night
like silver set ablaze,
where the round world plunges steeply down,
but on the old road goes,
as an unseen bridge that on the arches runs
to coasts than no man knows.’

‘But men say, father that ere the end
you went where none have been.
I would here you tell me, father dear,
of the last land you have seen.’

‘In my mind the Star I still can find,
and the parting of the seas,
and the breath as sweet and keen as death
that was borne upon the breeze.
But where they they bloom those flowers fair,
in what air or land they grow,
what words beyond the world I heard,
if you would seek to know,
in a boat then, brother, far afloat
you must labour in the sea,
and find for yourself things out of mind:
you will learn no more of me.’

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It may be that, like St Brendan, Tolkien knew from 'direct' personal experience (I mean, by vivid visionary dreams) what was in the Lands of the Gods and Elves - but that he felt he could not, or should not, speak of it - and his message was that if we would seek to know, then in a dream-boat far afloat we must labour in the sea of myth, and find for ourselves these things out of mind; because we will 'learn no more of' Tolkien.

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The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun - JRR Tolkien

Written 1930, Published 1945

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In Britain's land beyond the seas

the wind blows ever through the trees;

in Britain's land beyond the waves

are stony shores and stony caves.



There stands a ruined toft now green

where lords and ladies once were seen,

where towers were piled above the trees

and watchmen scanned the sailing seas.

Of old a lord in arched hall

with standing stones yet grey and tall

there dwelt, till dark his doom befell,

as still the Briton harpers tell.

No child he had his house to cheer,

to fill his courts with laughter clear;

though wife he wooed and wed with ring,

who love to board and bed did bring,

his pride was empty, vain his hoard,

without an heir to land and sword.

Thus pondering oft at night awake

his darkened mind would visions make

of lonely age and death; his tomb

unkept, while strangers in his room

with other names and other shields

were masters of his halls and fields.

Thus counsel cold he took at last;

his hope from light to darkness passed.

A witch there was, who webs could weave

to snare the heart and wits to reave,

who span dark spells with spider-craft,

and as she span she softly laughed;

a drink she brewed of strength and dread

to bind the quick and stir the dead;

In a cave she housed where winging bats

their harbour sought, and owls and cats

from hunting came with mournful cries,

night-stalking near with needle-eyes.



In the homeless hills was her hollow dale,

black was its bowl, its brink was pale;

there silent on a seat of stone

before her cave she sat alone.

Dark was her door, and few there came,

whether man, or beast that man doth tame.



In Britain's land beyond the waves

are stony hills and stony caves;

the wind blows ever over hills

and hollow caves with wailing fills.



The sun was fallen low and red,

behind the hills the day was dead,

and in the valley formless lay

the misty shadows long and grey.

Alone between the dark and light

there rode into the mouth of night

the Briton lord, and creeping fear

about him closed. Dismounting near

he slowly then with lagging feet

went halting to the stony seat.

His words came faltering on the wind,

while silent sat the crone and grinned.

Few words he needed; for her eyes

were dark and piercing, filled with lies,

yet needle-keen all lies to probe.

He shuddered in his sable robe.

His name she knew, his need, his thought,

the hunger that thither him had brought;

while yet he spoke she laughed aloud,

and rose and nodded; head she bowed,'

and stooped into her darkening cave,

like ghost returning to the grave.

Thence swift she came. In his hand she laid

a phial of glass so fairly made

'twas wonder in that houseless place

to see its cold and gleaming grace;

and therewithin a philter lay

as pale as water thin and grey

that spills from stony fountains frore

in hollow pools in caverns hoar.



He thanked her, trembling, offering gold

to withered fingers shrunk and old.

The thanks she took not, nor the fee,

but laughing croaked: "Nay, we shall see!

Let thanks abide till thanks be earned!

Such potions oft, men say, have burned

the heart and brain, or else are nought,

only cold water dearly bought.

Such lies you shall not tell of me;

Till it is earned I'll have no fee.

But we shall meet again one day,

and rich reward then you shall pay,

whate'er I ask: it may be gold,

it may be other wealth you hold."




In Britain ways are wild and long,

and woods are dark with danger strong;

and sound of seas is in the leaves,

and wonder walks the forest-eaves.



The way was long, the woods were dark;

at last the lord beheld the spark

of living light from window high,

and knew his halls and towers were nigh.

At last he slept in weary sleep

beside his wife, and dreaming deep,

he walked with children yet unborn

in gardens fair, until the morn

came slowly through the windows tall,

and shadows moved across the wall.



Then sprang the day with weather fair,

for windy rain had washed the air,

and blue and cloudless, clean and high,

above the hills was arched the sky,

and foaming in the northern breeze

beneath the sky there shone the seas.

Arising then to greet the sun,

and day with a new thought begun,

that lord in guise of joy him clad,

and masked his mind in manner glad;

his mouth unwonted laughter used

and words of mirth. He oft had mused,

walking alone with furrowed brow;

a feast he bade prepare him now.

And "Itroun mine," he said, "my life,

'tis long that thou hast been my wife.

Too swiftly by in love do slip

our gentle years, and as a ship

returns to port, we soon shall find,

once more that day of spring we mind,

when we were wed, and bells were rung.

But still we love, and still are young:

A merry feast we'll make this year,

and there shall come no sigh nor tear;

and we will feign our love begun

in joy anew, anew to run

down happy paths-and yet, maybe,

we'll pray that this year we may see

our heart's desire more quick draw nigh

than yet we have seen it, thou and I;

for virtue is in hope and prayer."


So spake he gravely, seeming-fair.



In Britain's land across the seas

the spring is merry in the trees;

the birds in Britain's woodlands pair

when leaves are long and flowers are fair.



A merry feast that year they made,

when blossom white on bush was laid;

there minstrels sang and wine was poured,

as it were the marriage of a lord.

A cup of silver wrought he raised

and smiling on the lady gazed:

"I drink to thee for health and bliss,

fair love," he said, "and with this kiss

the pledge I pass. Come, drink it deep!

The wine is sweet, the cup is steep!"




The wine was red, the cup was grey;

but blended there a potion lay

as pale as water thin and frore

in hollow pools of caverns hoar.

She drank it, laughing with her eyes.

"Aotrou, lord and love" she cries,

all hail and life both long and sweet,

wherein desire at last to meet!"




Now days ran on in great delight

with hope at morn and mirth at night;

and in the garden of his dream

the lord would walk, and there would deem

he saw two children, boy and maid,

that fair as flowers danced and played

on lawns of sunlight without hedge

save a dark shadow at their edge.



Though spring and summer wear and fade,

though flowers fall and leaves are laid,

and winter winds his trumpet loud,

and snows both fell and forest shroud,

though roaring seas upon the shore

go long and white, and neath the door

the wind cries with houseless voice,

in fire and song yet men rejoice,

till as a ship returns to port

the spring comes back to field and court.



A song now falls from windows high,

like silver dropping from the sky,

soft in the early eve of spring.



"Why do they play? Why do they sing?"




"Light may she lie, our lady fair!

Too long hath been her cradle bare.

Yestreve there came as I passed by

the cry of babes from windows high.

Twin children, I am told there be.

Light may they lie and sleep, all three !"




"Would every prayer were answered twice!

the half or nought must oft suffice

for humbler men, who wear their knees

more bare than lords, as oft one sees."

"Not every lord wins such fair grace.

Come wish them speed with kinder face!

Light may she lie, my lady fair;

long live her lord her joy to share!"




A manchild and an infant maid

as fair as flowers in bed were laid.

Her joy was come, her pain was passed;

in mirth and ease Itroun at last



in her fair chamber softly lay

singing to her babes lullay.

Glad was her lord, as grave he stood

beside her bed of carven wood.



"Now full" he said, "is granted me

both hope and prayer, and what of thee?

Is 't not, fair love, most passing sweet

the heart's desire at last to meet?

Yet if thy heart still longing hold,

or lightest wish remain untold,

that will I find and bring to thee,

though I should ride both land and sea!"




"Aotrou mine," she said, " 'tis sweet

at last the heart's desire to meet,

thus after waiting, after prayer,

thus after hope and nigh despair.

I would not have, thee run nor ride

to-day nor ever from my side;

yet after sickness, after pain,

oft cometh hunger sharp again."




"Nay, love, if thirst or hunger strange

for bird or beast on earth that range,

for wine, or water from what well

in any secret fount or dell,

vex thee," he smiled, "now swift declare!

If more than gold or jewel rare,

from greenwood, haply, fallow deer,

or fowl that swims the shallow mere

thou cravest, I will bring it thee,

though I should hunt o'er land and lea.

No gold nor silk nor jewel bright

can match my gladness and delight,

the boy and maiden lily-fair

that here do lie and thou did'st bear."




"Aotrou, lord," she said, " 'tis, true,

a longing strong and sharp I knew

in dream for water cool and clear,

and venison of the greenwood deer

for waters crystal-clear and cold

and deer no earthly forests hold,

and still in waking comes unsought

the foolish wish to vex my thought.

But I would not have thee run nor ride

to-day nor ever from my side"




In Brittany beyond the seas

the wind blows ever through the trees;

in Brittany the forest pale

marches slow over hill and dale.

There seldom far the horns were wound,

and seldom hunted horse and hound.



The lord his lance of ashwood caught,

the wine was to his stirrup brought;

with bow and horn he rode alone,

and iron smote the fire from stone,

as his horse bore him o'er the land

to the green boughs of Broceliande,

to the green dales where listening deer

seldom a mortal hunter hear:

there startling now they stare and stand,

as his horn winds in Broceliande.



Beneath the woodland's hanging eaves

a white doe startled under leaves;

strangely she glistered in the sun

as she leaped forth and turned to run.

Then reckless after her he spurred;

dim laughter in the woods he heard,

but heeded not, a longing strange

for deer that fair and fearless range

vexed him, for venison of the beast

whereon no mortal hunt shall feast,

for waters crystal-clear and cold

that never in holy fountain rolled.

He hunted her from the forest-eaves

into the twilight under leaves;

the earth was shaken under hoof,

till the boughs were bent into a roof,

and the sun was woven in a snare;

and laughter still was on the air.



The sun was falling. In the dell

deep in the forest silence fell.

No sight nor slot of doe he found

but roots of trees upon the ground,

and trees like shadows waiting stood

for night to come upon the wood.



The sun was lost, all green was grey.

There twinkled the fountain of the fay,

before a cave, on silver sand,

under dark boughs in Broceliande.

Soft was the grass and clear the pool;

he laved his face in water cool.

He saw her then, on silver chair

before her cavern, pale her hair,

slow was her smile, and white her hand

beckoning in Broceliande.



The moonlight falling clear and cold

her long hair lit; through comb of gold

she drew each lock, and down it fell

like the fountain falling in the dell.

He heard her voice, and it was cold

as echo from the world of old,

ere fire was found or iron hewn,

when young was mountain under moon.

He heard her voice like water falling

or wind upon a long shore calling,

yet sweet the words: "We meet again

here after waiting, after pain!

Aotrou! Lo! thou hast returned-

perchance some kindness I have earned?

What hast thou, lord, to give to me

whom thou hast come thus far to see,"




"I know thee not, I know thee not,

nor ever saw thy darkling grot.

O Corrigan! 'twas not for thee

I hither came a-hunting free!"



"How darest, then, my water wan

to trouble thus, or look me on?

For this of least I claim my fee,

if ever thou wouldst wander free.

With love thou shall me here requite,

for here to long and sweet the night;

in druery dear thou here shall deal,

in bliss more deep than mortals feel."



"I gave no love. My love is wed;

my wife now lieth in child-bed,

and I curse the beast that cheated me

and drew me to this dell to thee."




Her smiling ceased, and slow she said:

"Forget thy wife; for thou shall wed

anew with me, or stand as stone

and wither lifeless and alone,

as stone beside the fountain stand

forgotten in Broceliande."




"I will not stand here turned to stone;

but I will leave thee cold, alone,

and I will ride to mine own home

and the waters blest of Christendome."




"But three days then and thou shall die;

In three days on thy bier lie!"




"In three days I shall live at ease,

and die but when it God doth please

in eld, or in some time to come

in the brave wars of Christendom."




In Britain's land beyond the waves

are forests dim and secret caves;

in Britain's land the breezes bear

the sound of bells along the air

to mingle with the sound of seas

for ever moving in the trees.



The wandering way was long and wild;

and hastening home to wife and child

at last the hunter heard the knell

at morning of the sacring-bell;

escaped from thicket and from fen

at last he saw the tilth of men;

the hoar and houseless hills he passed,

and weary at his gates him cast.

"Good steward, if thou love me well,

bid make my bed! My heart doth swell;

my limbs are numb with heavy sleep,

and drowsy poisons in them creep.

All night, as in a fevered maze,

I have ridden dark and winding ways."


To bed they brought him and to sleep:

in sunless thickets tangled deep

he dreamed, and wandering found no more

the garden green, but on the shore

the seas, were moaning in the wind;

a face before him leered and grinned:

"Now it is earned, come bring to me

my fee," a voice said, "bring my feel"

Beside a fountain falling cold

the Corrigan now shrunk and old

was sitting singing; in her claw

a comb of bony teeth he saw,

with which she raked her tresses grey,

but in her other hand there lay

a phial of glass with water filled

that from the bitter fountain spilled.



At eve he waked and murmured: "Ringing

of bells within my ears, and singing,

a singing is beneath the moon.

Grieve not my wife! Grieve not Itroun!

My death is near-but do not tell,

though I am wounded with a spell!

But two days more, and then I die-

and I would have had her sweetly lie

and sweet arise; and live yet long,

and see our children hale and strong."


His words they little understood,

but cursed the fevers of the wood,

and to their lady no word spoke.

Ere second morn was old she woke,

and to her women standing near

gave greeting with a merry cheer:



"Good people, lo! the morn is bright!

Say, did my lord return ere night,

and tarries now with hunting worn?"




"Nay, lady, he came not with the morn;

but ere men candles set on board,

thou wilt have tidings of thy lord;

or hear his feet to thee returning,

ere candles in the eve are burning."




Ere the third morn was wide she woke,

and eager greeted them, and spoke:



"Behold the morn is cold and grey,

and why is my lord so long away?

I do not hear his feet returning

neither at evening nor at morning"




"We do not know, we cannot say"


they answered and they turned away.



Her gentle babes in swaddling white,

now seven days had seen the light,

and she arose and left her bed,

and called her maidens and she said:

"My lord must soon return. Come, bring

my fairest raiment, stone on ring,

and pearl on thread; for him 'twill please

to see his wife abroad at ease."




She looked from window tall and high,

and felt a breeze go coldly by;

she saw it pass from tree to tree;

the clouds were laid from hill to sea.

She heard no horn and heard no hoof,

but rain came pattering on the roof;

in Brittany she heard the waves

on sounding shore in hollow caves.



The day wore on till it was old;

she heard the bells that slowly tolled.

"Good folk, why do they mourning make?

In tower I hear the slow bells shake,

and Dirige the white priests sing.

Whom to the churchyard do they bring?"




"A man unhappy here there came

a while agone. His horse was lame;

sickness was on him, and he fell

before our gates, or so they tell.

Here he was harboured, but to-day

he died, and passeth now the way

we all must go, to church to lie

on bier before the altar high."




She looked upon them, dark and deep,

and saw them in the shadows weep.

"Then tall, and fair, and brave was he,

or tale of sorrow there must be

concerning him, that still ye keep,

if for a stranger thus ye weep!

What know ye more? Ah, say! ah, say!"


They answered not, and turned away.

"Ah me," she said, "that I could sleep

this night, or least that I could weep!"


But all night long she tossed and turned,.

and in her limbs a fever burned:

and yet when sudden under sun

a fairer morning was begun,

"Good folk, to church I wend," she said.

"My raiment choose, or robe of red,

or robe of blue, or white and fair,

silver and gold-I do not care."

"Nay, lady," said they, "none of these.

The custom used, as now one sees,

for women that to churching go

is robe of black and walking slow."




In robe of black and walking bent

the lady to her churching went,

in hand a candle small and white,

her face so pale, her hair so bright.

They passed beneath the western door;

there dark within on stony floor

a bier was covered with a pall,

and by it yellow candles tall.

The watchful tapers still and bright

upon his blazon cast their light:

the arms and banner of her lord;

his pride was ended, vain his hoard.



To bed they brought her, swift to sleep

for ever cold, though there might weep

her women by her dark bedside,

or babes in cradle waked and cried.





There was singing slow at dead of night,

and many feet, and taper-light.

At morn there rang the sacring knell;

and far men heard a single bell

toll, while the sun lay on the land;

while deep in dim Broceliande

a silver fountain flowed and fell

within a darkly woven dell,

and in the homeless hills a dale

was filled with laughter cold and pale.



Beside her lord at last she lay

in their long home beneath the clay;

and if their children lived yet long,

or played in garden hale and strong,

they saw it not, nor found it sweet

their heart's desire at last to meet



In Brittany beyond the waves

are sounding shores and hollow caves;

in Brittany beyond the seas

the wind blows ever through the trees.



Of lord and lady all is said:

God rest their souls, who now are dead!

Sad is the note and sad the lay,

but mirth we meet not every day.

God keep us all in hope and prayer

from evil rede and from despair,

by waters blest of Christendom

to dwell, until at last we come

to joy of Heaven where is queen

the maiden Mary pure and clean.