Skip to main content

the lord of the rings - Why Did J.R.R. Tolkien Capitalize Certain Words Throughout His Books?


Why did J.R.R. Tolkien randomly capitalize various words throughout his books?


My husband asked me this question today and we were wondering if there's any rhyme or reason to Tolkien's capitalization process. These are examples taken from the LOTR trilogy and The Hobbit:



  • And there upon that hill they looked east to the Shadow and west to the Twilight, and they plighted their troth and were glad. (ROTK)

  • She shall not be the bridge of any Man less than the King of both Gondor and Arnor. To me then even our victory can bring only sorrow or parting -- but to you hope of joy for a while. Alas, my son! I fear that to Arwen the Doom of Man may seem hard at the ending. (ROTK)

  • In the Wide World the Wood-elves lingered in the twilight of our Sun and Moon, but loved best the stars; and they wandered in the great forests that grew tall in lands that are now lost. (THE HOBBIT)


  • It is fortunate that I could find it, for it is a healing plant that the Men of the West brought to Middle-earth. Athelas, they named it, and it grows now sparsely and only near places where they dwelt or camped of old; and it is not known in the North, except to some of those who wander in the Wild. (FOTR)

  • "Nob, you woolly-pated ninny! he cried. "Can't you give old friends their names? You shouldn't go scaring me like that, with times as they are. Well, well! And where have you come from? I never expected to see any of you folk, and that's a fact: going off into the Wild with that Strider, and all those Black Men about." (ROTK)

  • Yet hardy and full of wrath as he was, it is said that when he camed down from the Gate he looked grey in the face, as one who has felt great fear. (ROTK)


Are these kind of examples style choices? Did Tolkien give careful consideration to each word he used and how? Because I know Tolkien also developed his own Elvish languages, I wondered if perhaps he applied some of the rules from his Elvish languages to the way he wrote English. I feel confident in saying that I don't believe the random capitalizations are mistakes. And some of the words capitalized make total sense:



  • the One Ring, the Eye

  • the Nazgûl, the Mumakil

  • Théoden, Éowyn, Éomer

  • the Orcs, the Haradrim, the Elves, the Dúnedain, the Hobbits



Although "elves" and "hobbits" are not always capitalized in Tolkien's writing (This makes sense, as we don't capitalized "people" or "humans"; however, we do capitalize "American" or "British".).


Why did J.R.R. Tolkien randomly capitalize words?


I'm not asking this in English.se because I felt with the special languages associated with the Lord of the Rings trilogy, plus the existence of The Silmarillion (which I do not have access to), the answer might more easily be found at SFF.se.



Answer



These aren't random capitalizations: Tolkien is capitalizing words that refer to proper nouns or concepts that would unceremoniously get capitalization if expressed directly.




  • Shadow: the personification of Sauron. As described by Anita Miller Bell in "The Lord of the Rings" and the Emerging Generation: A Study of the Message and Medium. J. R. R. Tolkien and Peter Jackson:




    [L]et us consider Tolkien's use of the simple of image of shadow to explore the realities of evil. Tolkien often uses simple, everyday images to consider complex and at times paradoxical realities in life. [...] In LOTR, Tolkien often gives substance to the insubstantial reality of shadow by the simple capitalization of "S"; shadow becomes Shadow, the absence of light becomes the personification of Sauron.





  • Twilight: refers to the Undying Lands/Aman/Lands of the West, which were bathed in perpetual twilight.




  • Man: Mankind. As described by Tolkien in the postscript to a letter to C. A. Furth (so-called Letter 20):



    Men with a capital is, I think, used in text when 'human kind' are specifically intended; and man, men with a minuscule are occasionally and loosely used as 'adult male' and 'people'.






  • Doom of Man: This refers to the "gift" Men were given by Eru: mortality (doom in this sense is "fate").




  • Wide World: Arda as a whole.




  • Sun / Moon: we capitalize these in colloquial English as well, but in Tolkien's Legendarium, the Sun and Moon were also maiar.





  • Men of the West / Black Men: correctly capitalized, just as you would capitalize "European". They are, in effect, ethnic groups of Men.




  • North: Refers to Arnor, the northern frontier of the realm of Man in Middle-earth.




  • Wild: Refers to, well, the untamed parts of Middle-earth. It's the proper name people gave to those parts, like in the US with Unorganized Territory.





  • Gate: Refers to the Gate of Moria, which was a Dwarven landmark about as important, if not moreso, than the Statue of Liberty or the Gateway Arch.




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

harry potter - How could Expelliarmus beat Avada Kedavra?

I want to be very careful about how I ask this question – I am not asking How did Voldemort die? [CLOSED] Below the text is the relevant passages from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows if anyone wants to review them (I'm sorry for the amount of text). How did Expelliarmus beat Avada Kedavra and kill Voldemort? I feel the reason Harry's Expelliarmus overpowered Voldemort's Avada Kedavra curse has to do with who was master of the Elder Wand and how the Elder Wand works. I've always had trouble understanding fully how the Elder Wand works, though. How much did the fact that Voldemort never truly won or mastered the Elder Wand factor into how Expelliarmus reacted to Avada Kedavra and caused Avada Kedavra to rebound and kill Voldemort? An answer based in book canon would be especially welcome, but any canon source really is fine. Harry heard the high voice shriek as he, too, yelled his best hope to the heavens, pointing Draco’s wand: ‘ Avada Kedavra !’ ‘ Expelliarmus !...
Post a Comment
Read more

Is there good canon evidence for the "Nightmare Matrix"?

On the Matrix wiki, there's an article about the Nightmare Matrix which says: The Nightmare Matrix was the second prototype Matrix, designed by The Architect after the massive failure of the Paradise Matrix in the hope that human minds would more readily accept an imperfect world with suffering. Unlike the first version, this Matrix instituted a basic cause-and-effect programming and forcibly made those connected to it accept the program. Vamp Prime, a possible remnant of the Nightmare Matrix. It also featured programs that resembled mythical evil creatures in various human mythologies such as vampires, werewolves, zombies, aliens, etc. It also failed, but many of the programs who were designed for it survived deletion in exile. The Merovingian and his wife, Persephone may have had their roots in this version of the Matrix. Upon its failure, the Merovingian started a smuggling ring of programs and information to provide a haven for exiles that would last for 6 cycles in the final ...
Post a Comment
Read more

story identification - Anime with a boy hiring a creature from a stone, meets a man named Dante and starts a journey to collect crystals

I am from India, this anime or animated series (I can't remember this was made by the Japan or other countries) was aired between 2009 and 2012 probably in Jetix/Disney XD (but I'm not sure). This anime starts with a boy (the main character, I forgot his name) who find a stone (or crystal like thing) in his dad's property, his dad was missing that time. Some day he accidentally hire a creature/monster from that stone. Other day some creature attack him and he was saved by his creature and the story begins. In his journey to solve the mystery he meets a middle aged man 'Dante' (probably that was the name; this is the only character name I can remember). He had also some stone. After that they meet with one girl and a women (one of the girls is same age with the main boy character and probably will become his partner as the story goes on). Another women probably Dante's partner. Four of them started their journey to collect all the stone/crystal. They are collecti...
Post a Comment
Read more