A Tolkien Compass, a 1975 collection of essays edited by Jared Lobdell, was one of the first books of Tolkien scholarship to be published; it was written without sight of The Silmarillion, published in 1977. Some of the essays have remained at the centre of such scholarship. Most were written by academics for fan-organised conferences. The collection was also the first place where Tolkien's own "Guide to the names in The Lord of the Rings" became widely available.
The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey described the essays as written in an innocent time before Tolkien studies became professionalised, and as such they offer "freshness, candor, and a sense of historical depth" that cannot be repeated. Other scholars have stated that two of the essays about The Hobbit have become frequently-cited classics in their field.
Context
J. R. R. Tolkien (1892–1973) was an English Roman Catholic writer, poet, philologist, and academic, best known as the author of the high fantasy works The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
The Lord of the Rings was published in 1954–55; it was awarded the International Fantasy Award in 1957. The publication of the Ace Books and Ballantine paperbacks in the United States helped it to become immensely popular with a new generation in the 1960s. It has remained so ever since, judged by both sales and reader surveys. The literary establishment was initially largely hostile to the book, attacking it in numerous reviews.
Synopsis
The first and second editions contain the following essays:
I. Jared Lobdell. "Introduction". Aside from introducing the essays, he notes that none of them attempt Quellenforschung, the search for Tolkien's sources, but suggests that the matter is worthy of study.
II. Bonniejean Christensen. "Gollum's character transformation in The Hobbit". She finds the "fallen hobbit" Gollum immediately interesting, even apart from Tolkien's changes to the second edition of the novel to make the story fit better with The Lord of the Rings, which make Gollum "fascinating". The key changes are to chapter 5, "Riddles in the Dark": Gollum becomes a far darker character, and the riddle competition becomes deadly serious, as Bilbo will be eaten if he loses.
III. Dorothy Matthews. "The Psychological Journey of Bilbo Baggins", provides an early Jungian approach to Tolkien, suggesting that Gandalf fits the Wise Old Man archetype, and Gollum the Devouring Mother, while Bilbo sets out on his quest "out of balance and far from integrated".
IV. Walter Scheps. "The Fairy-tale Morality of The Lord of the Rings". He argues that Tolkien's morality, revealed in his Middle-earth books, is "radically different from our own" and indeed much like that of fairy tales, so it is not a concern that orcs are black, that trolls are working class, or that enemies come from the south and east. Further, "nobility is inherited rather than acquired".
V. Agnes Perkins and Helen Hill. "The Corruption of Power" examines what power, especially that of the One Ring, does to those who have it. "And the answer is unequivocal: The desire for power corrupts." Of the three wise and ancient characters in The Lord of the Rings, Gandalf and Galadriel see the temptation, and reject it. Saruman succumbs to it. Of the men of Gondor, Boromir tries to seize the Ring; Faramir "understands the danger".
VI. Deborah Rogers. "Everyclod and Everyhero: the image of man in Tolkien" argues that both the Hobbits and Aragorn represent Man. Rogers notes that she knows Hobbits are important, as Tolkien wrote her a letter in 1958 confessing "I am in fact a hobbit." The Hobbits are in her view "small, provincial, and comfort-loving" but not John Bull English: in short, they are cloddish antiheroes. Aragorn, however, is definitely a hero; together, he and the Hobbits form a composite picture of man, a clod with a hero trying to get out.
VII. Richard C. West "The Interlace Structure of The Lord of the Rings" shows that the novel has a complex medieval organisation, in which story threads are interwoven to create a subtly cohesive narrative. It mirrors "the perception of the flux of events in the world around us, where everything is happening at once". The technique allows events to be seen, too, from different points of view. West notes that this is also modern, as writers like James Joyce and Marcel Proust "once again began experimenting" with the medieval technique.