The Reader Travels

Some people like to read more into the Middle-Earth tales than the author intended. They like to think that Lord of the Rings was about the evils of industrialism, just because the bad guys ripped up a few trees.

Well, in the spirit of reading more into something than was intended by the author, let’s talk about the mysoginy of J.R.R. Tolkien. For one thing, everything’s all about this male camaraderie, but that’s not even the half of it.

If you have read The Hobbit or Lord of the Rings, you may have noticed that the most treacherous adventures happened inside of caves. And what is a cave, but a big hole? And a big hole is all a mysoginist sees in women. Right?

So, when we follow poor Bilbo into the orc caves, where it’s dark, and he can’t see his way out, it’s really just a metaphor for losing himself in a relationship with a woman. Finally, he takes his ring and leaves the cave to find himself free and empowered in the light of day.

Many cave terrors happen throughout the course of the hobbit tales - a fight with a dragon, orcs, goblins, a mighty cow of a cave troll and the infamous balrog, that bitch from hell. All I’m saying is, it’s possible J.R.R. didn’t think too highly of women. See what I’m saying?

We’ve been skirting around Middle Earth for the past three weeks, and we’ve finally arrived. J.R.R. Tolkien took the stories of the mythical ring and turned them into a whole new genre of literature.

Like many fantasy adventure books, The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings include maps to help you with your journey. And while you’re traveling, you’re bound to run into people who speak different languages. Tolkien was a linguist, and he built his stories around the need to share his elven languages with the world.

What a wonder are these travels, rich with magic, culture and language, good food, drink and smoke. Oh, and the geography is fantastical - hills and mountains, plains, rivers, forests. Be wary of the caves, though.

The badger thought he would be defeated by a big burly blonde German warrior, not nerdy little Malcolm Fisher in his beat-up car. He really was Expecting Someone Taller.

Tom Holt brings the cursed Rhine gold ring to modern-day England by way of Ingolf the giant, disguised as a lowly badger to escape the greedy hands of Wotan and his army of valkyries. Malcolm’s life is turned upside down when he runs over the talking badger, inherits the ring of power and unleashes the wrath of gods who all think the ring is rightfully theirs.

Holt is a fan of Wagner, who composed a whole series of operas called The Ring of the Nibelung. He’s also quite the comedian, and Expecting Someone Taller will make you laugh out loud (if you’re one of those people who laughs out loud).

Of course, when I think of Wagner’s viking operas, I have another funny image in my head. The song goes, “Kill the wabbit, kill the wabbit…” I think Holt just had a thing for rabbits and decided to kill a badger instead.

I’ve got a supreme contact buzz right now. Everywhere I turn, people are getting stoned, and my head is swimming in a smoky haze.

In the past two weeks, I have…

1) … watched Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny in which starry eyed young JB meets the talented KG. They form a band the likes of which can only be seen if you’re really stoned.

2) … watched Grandma’s Boy, a Happy Madison production wherein those two guys that are in every funny Adam Sandler movie stay perpetually stoned and play video games.

3) … watched Happy Endings, where Maggie Gyllenhaal gets stoned with Tom Arnold with no question that this is something that everybody does.

4) … watched City of God, where poor Brazilian kids sit around getting stoned all the time because their lives are truly crappy.

5) … read Running with Scissors, introducing young Augusten Burroughs who self medicates with marijuana, among other things.

Come on. You know you want some. Everybody’s doing it.

Following the little people back to the Rhine, I find myself in Germany during World War II, picking Stones from the River. Trudi is a bitter dwarf with a good heart, and through her eyes, we can see what it must have been like to live under the fear of Hitler.

Since my heart doesn’t bleed, I was a little annoyed by Trudi and her sappy-ass story. Woe is Trudi. She’s short and stubby and her ma is loony and she can’t get laid and she’s living in troubled times and she can’t grow no matter how many times she hangs by her fingernails from the door frame. Poor, poor Trudi.

Don’t get me wrong. It was a great read, and I loved the picture it painted of a happy, little town turned into a land of paranoia and violence. I just found myself sighing in exasperation at how pathetic she was sometimes.

She’s kinda like Holden Caulfield. If you read Catcher in the Rye, try to count the number of times Holden says, “And then I got more depressed.” Trudi’s story has a whole lot more adventure, but see if you can count her woes. She’s a friggin’ drama queen.

Did you know that when you’re talking about mythical characters, the plural is “dwarves,” but when you’re talking about real humans, the plural is “dwarfs”? I’m not sure how accurate that is — it came straight from Wikipedia, which means somebody could very well have made it all up.

Still, I’m not sure the technical term “dwarfs” is even politically correct anymore. Even the preferred “little people” is being challenged by some who find it demeaning. Like the super-angry Maurice on Tiptoes played by Peter Dinklage, who’s really great in everything he does, and was probably the only redeeming thing about the movie, despite Gary Oldman, who I adore, and despite David Alan Grier banging a tiny skank on a pool table.

From seeing movies like Tiptoes and reading books like A Son of the Circus, I’ve learned that many dwarfs suffer from painful orthopedic problems all their lives. So when I saw my first Cirque de Soleil performance two weeks ago, I couldn’t help but be amazed at the small couple performing feats of acrobatics. It was a beautiful thing to see.

If you want to immerse yourself in the Norse myths, Thorarinn Gunnarson can take you travelling on the wings of valkyries, soaring from the heavens to the tree that gave birth to the gods on earth, to the Rhine river and beyond. His novels Song of the Dwarves and Revenge of the Valkyrie are a fun way to learn all about the origins of the world and the forging of that pesky ring, blessed with power and cursed with blood.

My first step in writing this entry was to retrieve these two books from my shelves so I could spell the author’s name. The second step was to look for a biography in the back of the books so I could maybe figure out if Thorarinn was a he or a she. That having failed, I looked it up on the Internet.

That’s where things got interesting. Every reference I’ve found refers to Thorarinn as “he,” but that’s about all anyone can say about this mysterious writer, other than the fact that “Thorarinn Gunnarsson” is, in fact, a pseudonym.

I really enjoyed this piece on the myth of Thorarinn Gunnarsson. He has not only rewritten the Norse myths, he has made of himself an all new mythology. And I am now convinced that Thorarinn is no mere Viking. He must truly be Odhinn himself.

From Avalon in the British isles, we travel across the North Sea to enter the mainland via the Rhine River. The river has a rich and magical history, whose mythologies gave birth to modern day fantasy fiction. If Middle Earth were a real place, this is where it would be.

Stephan Grundy’s Rhinegold takes us back in time and imagination, where we can take part in the wicked games of the Norse gods - Wodan and Loki and others. We learn the tale of the ring forged from gold found in the Rhine River. There are dragons and dwarves and gods making magic.

But this is no ordinary fantasy. In fact, it’s one of the most righteously violent books I have ever read. Sure there were wars and battles aplenty in Tolkein’s works, but that’s not what I’m talking about. This is man to man, man to beast, cutting to the bone.

Some of the best scenes are of the hunt, one man, one blade. It makes me think what wimpy sportsmen we have today, hunting with guns. If you can chase that animal down and grab it with both arms and wrestle it to the ground as your knife stabs into it, and your heart beats faster as you feel your prey’s heart stop, well then, you, my friend, are a sportsman.

My man often asks me, “If you went to church every Sunday as a kid, how come I know more about The Bible than you do?” The answer is simple to me. It’s because I was raised Catholic. Here are the facts:

1) Church was meant to teach us self-control and obedience. The idea was to sit still for an hour and pretend we were listening… or else!

2) We are not supposed to read The Bible. We are supposed to listen to the priest telling us about The Bible.

3) If we do read The Bible, we have to read a pre-approved Catholic version of The Bible.

Did you know that the majority of the Vatican’s banned book list is made up of different versions of The Bible? This was one of the interesting facts I learned during my two years of study in library science. I happen to believe this particular fact.

I don’t, however, believe the “facts” my ex-boyfriend’s roommate told me about the Vatican being a center of occult worship because of all the occult books in its basement and how the Roman Catholic Church secretly sainted Adolph Hitler. Not that it couldn’t happen. It’s just that the guy pretended he had been incarcerated in a penitentiary so his friends would think he was cool, and I just have to consider my source.

I loved The Brothers McMullen. With its indie appeal, the acting is crap, but the dialogue is brilliant. Ed Burns beautifully captures the Catholic American dilemma, reconciling American culture with sin and guilt, using religion as a motivator, an excuse, and the basis for some really screwed up logic.

The youngest brother, Patrick, is so afraid of commitment, he tells his girlfriend he can’t move in with her because of his religion, yet he admits to himself, “If I obeyed every rule that said I should wait until I got married, I’d still be a virgin.”

At one point Patrick is so consumed with guilt, he utters the statement, “I’m a Catholic. My life is over. I’m going to Hell.” I could completely relate to this feeling. At one point in my life I was convinced that marrying my abusive, illiterate, broke-tooth, inbred boyfriend was the only way I would be able to redeem my soul for the mortal sin of having sex with him before I got married. Thank God my reason finally overcame me.

But of all the things Patrick McMullen says, my favorite was a phrase that sums up his whole character. He says, “I don’t need any new ideas. I’m confused enough already.”