Timeline for Why do the trolls have civilized names?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
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| Jun 16, 2020 at 9:31 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
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| Sep 3, 2015 at 2:03 | comment | added | Lexible | @sumelic I think that is right on the money. The names presented in the Hobbit and LotR are, per the Appendix in RotK, selected to give Tolkien's impression of what contemporary name or contemporary-sounding name would correspond to the characters actual names. My impression is Tolkien was engaged in a bit a classism in representing the trolls (The "I'm afraid trolls really do behave like that" comment is telling...): unquestionably OK for Oxford academic fellows to bash on pseudo-Cockneys, I guess. :) | |
| Sep 2, 2015 at 3:04 | history | edited | Jason Baker | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Sep 1, 2015 at 22:09 | comment | added | wyvern | Just imagine "William" and the accents are translated for effect, like Frodo and Samwise's names. | |
| Sep 1, 2015 at 14:59 | history | edited | Jason Baker | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Sep 1, 2015 at 1:20 | comment | added | Ester Montague | This is what I'm trying to show you. In Transactions of the Philological Society 1934, pp. 3-4, Tolkien writes about Geoffrey Chaucer in a long paper which shows how Chaucer used the northern dialect of Middle English as a source of humor for his southern audience. In The Annotated Hobbit, Douglas A. Anderson points out how a similar thing could be said about Tolkien's writing in the trolls' conversation; their speech is presented in a "comic, lower-class dialect." But it is interesting what Tolkien says in your answer. | |
| Sep 1, 2015 at 1:09 | history | edited | Jason Baker | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Sep 1, 2015 at 1:06 | comment | added | Jason Baker | @EsterMontague You can only edit comments for five minutes after posting. I do agree with you regarding the names; the combination of relatively-common names and thick Cockney accents makes the trolls into rather comic figures, which I suspect was the point | |
| Sep 1, 2015 at 0:52 | comment | added | Ester Montague | My mom said it (sort of; I can't put it as well) this way: the time in which Tolkien lived had higher and lower classes of people, richer and poorer, and they had different styles of speech. The trolls' style of speech is based on a lower class of people, whose speech was not as elegant. Back when and where he lived, readers would have understood that the names and speech were from that class. "...not drawing room fashion at all, at all." onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi | |
| Sep 1, 2015 at 0:42 | vote | accept | Ester Montague | ||
| Sep 1, 2015 at 0:41 | history | answered | Jason Baker | CC BY-SA 3.0 |