The Internet is abuzz about the one fantasy author to rule them all, J.R.R. Tolkien. Over Superbowl weekend, Amazon released the first trailer for their new Tolkien adaptation, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. As with any highly-anticipated media property, the trailer (and the still shots released earlier this year) have sparked considerable debate about the nature of Tolkien’s work, the process of adaptation, and, in particular, Amazon’s decision to feature more diversity than we have seen in previous adaptations of Tolkien’s work (or, indeed, in much of the public conversation of his work).
The last of these debate topics would be disheartening if it weren’t so utterly predictable — both because it’s a talking point we’ve seen before in this same community and because it’s a talking point that has been used as a response to diversity in basically all media going back long enough that it’s essentially tradition. While there may be value in discussing these attitudes of (sometimes racist) rejection in particular terms, I think it’s more fruitful to consider the root assumptions which make these debates even possible.
The core of this centers on how fantasy has been conceived as a genre in its modern incarnation. Since Tolkien, we’ve seen the genre treated as a platform for Eurocentric ideals, most notably in its interpretations of what I’d call the “medieval Europe myth,” which largely presents some version of medieval Europe in ways that more accurately reflect the social dynamics of the period following scientific racism (especially its intellectual justifications for slavery) than they do the actual makeup of cultures in much of medieval Europe.1 This myth is most apparent in historical conversations about the racial and ethnic makeup of Europe in relation to media representation; if a work of modern art presents people of color in a medieval context, one might hear someone complain that this is unrealistic or doesn’t reflect the reality of the period (i.e., Europe was basically white), etc.23 Some part of this is the self-fulfilling prophecy of fantasy, which has historically presented either explicitly white or de facto white societies modeled after European societies (sometimes quite loosely), thereby reinforcing existing biases about the makeup of such societies. Those biases have been part of U.S. culture in particular for as long as the country as existed, and while all of the people involved in the debate against diversity in fantasy (or, rather, “forced” diversity) cannot be fairly accused of deliberately participating in the reinforcement of such biases, their uncritical repetition of the medieval Europe myth enacts that reinforcement nonetheless.
Among the variations of the medieval Europe myth is the uncritically accepted notion of racially homogenous societies. This is hardly surprising. If we accept the myth, then we must accept that such societies are possible. Yet, the bulk of fantasy imbued with this myth at least hints at the trade and interaction between a wide range of peoples and cultures; in some cases, those interactions are extensive, involve substantial amounts of trade, and sometimes include “foreign meddling.” If these are meant to be European analogues, then it follows that what occurs in actuality should be present in the work of the fantastic. After all, we know that medieval Europe was not closed to interactions with its neighbors in North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia (though that one might not be a literal neighbor depending on your particular map). There were black Romans, Persian Greeks, brown Spaniards, and on and on and on. Anyone with a cursory knowledge of medieval Europe knows that it was not racially homogenous even if it historically screamed its way into increasingly more racist territory over the centuries.
Fantasy almost never addresses this — or, if it does, it provides no explanation that makes much sense. What reason is there for an entire culture to genetically remain “the same”? Wouldn’t the peoples they trade with also stay in a foreign territory, have children, and become part of that culture (insofar as they are allowed)? In the real world, we know this happened. In fantasy worlds, it sometimes doesn’t without explanation. For most readers in the West, this isn’t a problem. Our default assumptions about whose stories are being told means we can more easily slip into a new world. But when we take those assumptions and expand them outward to other interpretations of the Eurocentric fantasy or, worse, to adaptations of the real world, our default assumptions become something more: a narrative of (usually European) whiteness which erases people of color from, in many cases, their own history; it likewise excludes them from being part of the history of nations to which they are now a part, thereby making history a de facto “white” venture or, at least, a venture whose long tail is “white” and whose short tail is punctuated by supremacy. After all, if the only historical referent you’re allowed within the medieval Europe myth is being descended from slaves (for example) while you’re also denied access to the root history of your ancestral (and perhaps current) culture (by historical oppression, by rejection within educational systems, by being taught “not your history”), it becomes impossible to ignore the legacies of oppression in historical production. Reproducing that same rhetoric in fantasy, therefore, becomes a kind of continual cultural violence made exceptionally absurd by the imaginative realm in which the genre resides.
The recent furor over Amazon’s Tolkien adaptation is absolutely rooted in this medieval Europe myth.4 Or, to put it more bluntly, a willful misreading of Tolkien (there being a lot of that going around because why not…) as a consequence of the myth’s lasting damage on our conceptions of race in fantasy. Tolkien’s work is certainly more complicated than a simple binary (good/bad) would hold, in part because of the work to which he responds, the complicated racial politics of his day, and even the narrative choices made throughout his work to challenge our default assumptions about entire groups of people being “the same.”
The Hobbits, for example, feature three distinct groupings notable for their specific physical and character features, though here I am concerned with racial markers (the Harfoots are “browner,” the Stoors are not described in skin tones as far as I can tell, and the Fallohides are “fairer” in skin and hair). Variations can be found elsewhere, too, and some races, such as the Dwarves, aren’t described in this manner at all. The groups of Men are a different matter. Some groups are described as fair (but only mostly) while others aren’t racially described at all. Negative descriptions of other groups also exist, including the Easterlings (“swarthy”) and the orcs (“black-skinned” with “slant eyes”), though it is important to recognize that Tolkien’s characters and narratives often challenge the assumptions people make about these groups.5 The existence of variation in one place, of course, implies variation elsewhere, and the absence of a description at all should make us wonder why our default is “white” when it could just as well be something else entirely.
But even here, we often rely on assumptions about what words mean. A friend of mine who happens to be a medieval studies and Tolkien scholar pointed out that “fair” or “fair-skinned” often (or can) mean “beautiful” rather than “of white skin,” especially when we take into account its meaning in Old English, from which Tolkien absolutely drew inspiration. This might hint at the influence of modern language on our understanding of Tolkien, who frequently pulled from medieval and ancient references rather than contemporary ones.6 Even if we don’t accept this as the default interpretation, it cannot be discounted outright, thereby opening us up to the possibility that many of Tolkien’s races may just be stunners. Perhaps the Elves, who are sometimes seen as “fair-skinned” and frequently interpreted as white just have a really good skincare regimen7. In fairness, my scholar friend admits that the Elves are probably white or lighter in skin tone, but even they suggested that this does not automatically exclude all actors of color. After all, “lighter in skin tone” can mean a variety of things depending on your default starting point. Furthermore, what holds for elves doesn’t necessarily hold for other Tolkien races because the word “fair” may need to be understand within a different context given the volume of Tolkien’s medieval references. Basically, any 1-to-1, all encompassing mapping of Tolkien is bound for trouble.
There is a plethoraofscholarshipof Tolkien’s treatment of race and ethnicity throughout his work (and in his letters), and while I would love to explore those here, they’re beyond the purview of this particular post and should be discussed by more well-versed Tolkien-ites than me. I simply wanted to note that even with some of his races that are described in terms of skin tones, Tolkien does sometimes remind us that there is potential for variation AND that our assumptions about entire groups of people can sometimes be completely wrong (within the context of the story and its mythical narrative frame). In other cases, the portrayals are certainly questionable, such as his treatment of the Easterlings and the orcs, though they are more complicated than some of the cruder treatments that followed in the post-Tolkien “boom.” I mention these things not to absolve Tolkien of criticism, which any healthy debate of a literary work should include. If I were writing more about Tolkien here, I might take a middle position in the debate, in large part because of the influence of his work on fantasy as a whole.
Rather, I want to get to an understanding of adaptation and Tolkien that doesn’t rely on the medieval Europe myth as a founding principle. If fantasy shouldn’t adhere to this myth because there is little justification for doing so, then it holds, too, that Tolkien’s work should make room for reinterpretations of the lore to grant a wider variety of expressions. Indeed, there’s no reason that our common ideas of elves cannot apply to a black person. The ethereal and fair nature of elves could just as easily be applied to any person of color. I can think of many actors and actresses who might as well be elves if not for the absence of one of the common fantasy stereotypes that isn’t even explicitly mentioned in the main texts of Middle Earth (I’m talking about pointy ears; you have to dig for the references outside the main ME texts, and they’re all pretty ambiguous or open to interpretation; additionally, any reading of an ambiguous statement has to justify an adjacent reading of ambiguity, thereby leading us to the odd realization that Samwise Gamgee was described as having “brown hands.” Are they dirty, or is Sam perhaps not as white as we previously assumed?).
There’s no rule that says an elf CANNOT be black or brown. There are (faulty) ASSUMPTIONS that an elf cannot be black or brown. Even if we allow for concerns about elves of color based in textual referents, we’re left with no recourse for other Tolkien races which aren’t even described in racial terms, such as the dwarves.8 And if one rejects, as you should, the notion of homogenous societies (remaining so indefinitely), it follows that we might need to reconsider our expectations for Tolkien’s “races.” Brown or darker-hued faces can just as easily be shown to us as fair and wondrous and angelic with the same visual trickery used for whiter faces. Am I to honestly believe that only Cate Blanchett’s face can become angelic in the right lighting but the same cannot be done for Ismael Cruz Córdova (the goal for the show may be otherwise, but you get my point)?
Tolkien’s Middle Earth wasn’t as homogenous as certain people believe, and the cultural referents from which it draws weren’t as homogenous as the medieval Europe myth would have us believe either. More importantly, the question of adaptation should always allow for the social shifts of the times, both so we can continually advance our understanding of ourselves and so we can invite new readings of a work. Middle Earth isn’t real, after all, and so deviations from the original work should be considered based on their impact on the structure of a given story and on the meanings of the original content. We’ve not seen this version of Tolkien’s world yet, and so we have little to say about the changes it makes to the original work beyond the superficial visuals. Until we know what this story will be, we’re forced to wait and see what changes will come and what those changes will do to our reading of the original work.
But we absolutely don’t need to hold on to this notion that Tolkien’s “races” must be X or Y way or that any work of fantasy should remain so. There are better things to do with our time, and there are better arguments to be made about the nature of adaptation. If the medieval world was more diverse than most people realize, then the same can hold for Tolkien or any fantasy series. And while I don’t know if creating a space in Tolkien’s world explicitly open to fans of color will soften the racism within fandom, I hope it will let more people see themselves in the stories that still matter in our conversations about literature. We shall see…
Slavery is not always present in modern fantasy, though many Eurocentric fantasies feature the practice. However, the logic which justified the modern equivalent of slavery certainly appears to be present in the genre’s fascination with fantasy races as distinct-yet-connected biological groups who would otherwise be considered of the same species if not for the deliberate framing of the “race” as a distinctly separate group. ↩
In thinking about this, I stumbled upon this Reddit thread asking about this exact thing, which I find amusing because it was written 7 months ago and, thus, confirms that we’re still having this same conversation again and again. ↩
I will note that this is also a white supremacist talking point. However, I think it’s important to recognize that people who are not white supremacists — or, at least, are not actively trying to be so — also apply the medieval Europe myth in their arguments. I suspect this indicates that white supremacist talking points have infiltrated wider “fandom,” though I need more information before holding firm to that idea. ↩
In all fairness, I was also not impressed by the trailer, though this had more to do with the general look than with the racial makeup of the characters. Hence this post… ↩
There is also quite a lot of discussion of Tolkien’s treatment of “race,” which appears to have more to do with medieval conceptions of the term than modern ones. ↩
This is supported by Tolkien’s opinions on allegory. There are obvious parallels between Lord of the Rings and the World Wars, but Tolkien firmly stated that his works were not allegories of those events. You can find his views on the web or in introductions to some editions of the books. ↩
A previous version of this used the word “regiment.” Robert MacAnthony kindly made me aware of the error, but I do want you to imagine a regiment of elven skincare experts in Middle Earth. You’re welcome. ↩
Tolkien does link them to the Jewish diaspora, albeit in some quotes that can be unfavorably read. There is a good chunk of scholarship on this. ↩
Reading Time
The Unbearable Weight of Fantasy, Tolkien, and Race (or, Eh, Black Elves Are Fine)
The Internet is abuzz about the one fantasy author to rule them all, J.R.R. Tolkien. Over Superbowl weekend, Amazon released the first trailer for their new Tolkien adaptation, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. As with any highly-anticipated media property, the trailer (and the still shots released earlier this year) have sparked considerable debate about the nature of Tolkien’s work, the process of adaptation, and, in particular, Amazon’s decision to feature more diversity than we have seen in previous adaptations of Tolkien’s work (or, indeed, in much of the public conversation of his work).
The last of these debate topics would be disheartening if it weren’t so utterly predictable — both because it’s a talking point we’ve seen before in this same community and because it’s a talking point that has been used as a response to diversity in basically all media going back long enough that it’s essentially tradition. While there may be value in discussing these attitudes of (sometimes racist) rejection in particular terms, I think it’s more fruitful to consider the root assumptions which make these debates even possible.
The core of this centers on how fantasy has been conceived as a genre in its modern incarnation. Since Tolkien, we’ve seen the genre treated as a platform for Eurocentric ideals, most notably in its interpretations of what I’d call the “medieval Europe myth,” which largely presents some version of medieval Europe in ways that more accurately reflect the social dynamics of the period following scientific racism (especially its intellectual justifications for slavery) than they do the actual makeup of cultures in much of medieval Europe.1 This myth is most apparent in historical conversations about the racial and ethnic makeup of Europe in relation to media representation; if a work of modern art presents people of color in a medieval context, one might hear someone complain that this is unrealistic or doesn’t reflect the reality of the period (i.e., Europe was basically white), etc.23 Some part of this is the self-fulfilling prophecy of fantasy, which has historically presented either explicitly white or de facto white societies modeled after European societies (sometimes quite loosely), thereby reinforcing existing biases about the makeup of such societies. Those biases have been part of U.S. culture in particular for as long as the country as existed, and while all of the people involved in the debate against diversity in fantasy (or, rather, “forced” diversity) cannot be fairly accused of deliberately participating in the reinforcement of such biases, their uncritical repetition of the medieval Europe myth enacts that reinforcement nonetheless.
Among the variations of the medieval Europe myth is the uncritically accepted notion of racially homogenous societies. This is hardly surprising. If we accept the myth, then we must accept that such societies are possible. Yet, the bulk of fantasy imbued with this myth at least hints at the trade and interaction between a wide range of peoples and cultures; in some cases, those interactions are extensive, involve substantial amounts of trade, and sometimes include “foreign meddling.” If these are meant to be European analogues, then it follows that what occurs in actuality should be present in the work of the fantastic. After all, we know that medieval Europe was not closed to interactions with its neighbors in North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia (though that one might not be a literal neighbor depending on your particular map). There were black Romans, Persian Greeks, brown Spaniards, and on and on and on. Anyone with a cursory knowledge of medieval Europe knows that it was not racially homogenous even if it historically screamed its way into increasingly more racist territory over the centuries.
Fantasy almost never addresses this — or, if it does, it provides no explanation that makes much sense. What reason is there for an entire culture to genetically remain “the same”? Wouldn’t the peoples they trade with also stay in a foreign territory, have children, and become part of that culture (insofar as they are allowed)? In the real world, we know this happened. In fantasy worlds, it sometimes doesn’t without explanation. For most readers in the West, this isn’t a problem. Our default assumptions about whose stories are being told means we can more easily slip into a new world. But when we take those assumptions and expand them outward to other interpretations of the Eurocentric fantasy or, worse, to adaptations of the real world, our default assumptions become something more: a narrative of (usually European) whiteness which erases people of color from, in many cases, their own history; it likewise excludes them from being part of the history of nations to which they are now a part, thereby making history a de facto “white” venture or, at least, a venture whose long tail is “white” and whose short tail is punctuated by supremacy. After all, if the only historical referent you’re allowed within the medieval Europe myth is being descended from slaves (for example) while you’re also denied access to the root history of your ancestral (and perhaps current) culture (by historical oppression, by rejection within educational systems, by being taught “not your history”), it becomes impossible to ignore the legacies of oppression in historical production. Reproducing that same rhetoric in fantasy, therefore, becomes a kind of continual cultural violence made exceptionally absurd by the imaginative realm in which the genre resides.
The recent furor over Amazon’s Tolkien adaptation is absolutely rooted in this medieval Europe myth.4 Or, to put it more bluntly, a willful misreading of Tolkien (there being a lot of that going around because why not…) as a consequence of the myth’s lasting damage on our conceptions of race in fantasy. Tolkien’s work is certainly more complicated than a simple binary (good/bad) would hold, in part because of the work to which he responds, the complicated racial politics of his day, and even the narrative choices made throughout his work to challenge our default assumptions about entire groups of people being “the same.”
The Hobbits, for example, feature three distinct groupings notable for their specific physical and character features, though here I am concerned with racial markers (the Harfoots are “browner,” the Stoors are not described in skin tones as far as I can tell, and the Fallohides are “fairer” in skin and hair). Variations can be found elsewhere, too, and some races, such as the Dwarves, aren’t described in this manner at all. The groups of Men are a different matter. Some groups are described as fair (but only mostly) while others aren’t racially described at all. Negative descriptions of other groups also exist, including the Easterlings (“swarthy”) and the orcs (“black-skinned” with “slant eyes”), though it is important to recognize that Tolkien’s characters and narratives often challenge the assumptions people make about these groups.5 The existence of variation in one place, of course, implies variation elsewhere, and the absence of a description at all should make us wonder why our default is “white” when it could just as well be something else entirely.
But even here, we often rely on assumptions about what words mean. A friend of mine who happens to be a medieval studies and Tolkien scholar pointed out that “fair” or “fair-skinned” often (or can) mean “beautiful” rather than “of white skin,” especially when we take into account its meaning in Old English, from which Tolkien absolutely drew inspiration. This might hint at the influence of modern language on our understanding of Tolkien, who frequently pulled from medieval and ancient references rather than contemporary ones.6 Even if we don’t accept this as the default interpretation, it cannot be discounted outright, thereby opening us up to the possibility that many of Tolkien’s races may just be stunners. Perhaps the Elves, who are sometimes seen as “fair-skinned” and frequently interpreted as white just have a really good skincare regimen7. In fairness, my scholar friend admits that the Elves are probably white or lighter in skin tone, but even they suggested that this does not automatically exclude all actors of color. After all, “lighter in skin tone” can mean a variety of things depending on your default starting point. Furthermore, what holds for elves doesn’t necessarily hold for other Tolkien races because the word “fair” may need to be understand within a different context given the volume of Tolkien’s medieval references. Basically, any 1-to-1, all encompassing mapping of Tolkien is bound for trouble.
There is a plethora of scholarship of Tolkien’s treatment of race and ethnicity throughout his work (and in his letters), and while I would love to explore those here, they’re beyond the purview of this particular post and should be discussed by more well-versed Tolkien-ites than me. I simply wanted to note that even with some of his races that are described in terms of skin tones, Tolkien does sometimes remind us that there is potential for variation AND that our assumptions about entire groups of people can sometimes be completely wrong (within the context of the story and its mythical narrative frame). In other cases, the portrayals are certainly questionable, such as his treatment of the Easterlings and the orcs, though they are more complicated than some of the cruder treatments that followed in the post-Tolkien “boom.” I mention these things not to absolve Tolkien of criticism, which any healthy debate of a literary work should include. If I were writing more about Tolkien here, I might take a middle position in the debate, in large part because of the influence of his work on fantasy as a whole.
Rather, I want to get to an understanding of adaptation and Tolkien that doesn’t rely on the medieval Europe myth as a founding principle. If fantasy shouldn’t adhere to this myth because there is little justification for doing so, then it holds, too, that Tolkien’s work should make room for reinterpretations of the lore to grant a wider variety of expressions. Indeed, there’s no reason that our common ideas of elves cannot apply to a black person. The ethereal and fair nature of elves could just as easily be applied to any person of color. I can think of many actors and actresses who might as well be elves if not for the absence of one of the common fantasy stereotypes that isn’t even explicitly mentioned in the main texts of Middle Earth (I’m talking about pointy ears; you have to dig for the references outside the main ME texts, and they’re all pretty ambiguous or open to interpretation; additionally, any reading of an ambiguous statement has to justify an adjacent reading of ambiguity, thereby leading us to the odd realization that Samwise Gamgee was described as having “brown hands.” Are they dirty, or is Sam perhaps not as white as we previously assumed?).
There’s no rule that says an elf CANNOT be black or brown. There are (faulty) ASSUMPTIONS that an elf cannot be black or brown. Even if we allow for concerns about elves of color based in textual referents, we’re left with no recourse for other Tolkien races which aren’t even described in racial terms, such as the dwarves.8 And if one rejects, as you should, the notion of homogenous societies (remaining so indefinitely), it follows that we might need to reconsider our expectations for Tolkien’s “races.” Brown or darker-hued faces can just as easily be shown to us as fair and wondrous and angelic with the same visual trickery used for whiter faces. Am I to honestly believe that only Cate Blanchett’s face can become angelic in the right lighting but the same cannot be done for Ismael Cruz Córdova (the goal for the show may be otherwise, but you get my point)?
Tolkien’s Middle Earth wasn’t as homogenous as certain people believe, and the cultural referents from which it draws weren’t as homogenous as the medieval Europe myth would have us believe either. More importantly, the question of adaptation should always allow for the social shifts of the times, both so we can continually advance our understanding of ourselves and so we can invite new readings of a work. Middle Earth isn’t real, after all, and so deviations from the original work should be considered based on their impact on the structure of a given story and on the meanings of the original content. We’ve not seen this version of Tolkien’s world yet, and so we have little to say about the changes it makes to the original work beyond the superficial visuals. Until we know what this story will be, we’re forced to wait and see what changes will come and what those changes will do to our reading of the original work.
But we absolutely don’t need to hold on to this notion that Tolkien’s “races” must be X or Y way or that any work of fantasy should remain so. There are better things to do with our time, and there are better arguments to be made about the nature of adaptation. If the medieval world was more diverse than most people realize, then the same can hold for Tolkien or any fantasy series. And while I don’t know if creating a space in Tolkien’s world explicitly open to fans of color will soften the racism within fandom, I hope it will let more people see themselves in the stories that still matter in our conversations about literature. We shall see…
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