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There And Back Again

That Time That J.R.R. Tolkien Told Off the Third Reich

by Susana Polo | 12:31 pm, March 13th, 2012


The Hobbit was published in 1937, the first work of fiction from Oxford professor John Ronald Reuel Tolkien whose only previous claim to fame was writing one of the (still!) most influential essays on the interpretation of the Old English epic Beowulf. It was an overnight success, and it’s safe to say that the fantasy genre was never quite the same. But at the same time, in 1937, Adolf Hitler was consolidating his power as leader of the Third Reich. By May of the next year Germany had already annexed Austria, and Hitler announced his intention to use the utmost military force to subdue Czechoslovakia.

This was the climate in which publishing house Rütten & Loening, while attempting to secure the rights to publish a translated The Hobbit in German, asked J.R.R. Tolkien if he could provide proof that he was of Aryan descent.

This implication infuriated Tolkien, as it might many people, not because of the assumption that he might be Jewish but because R&L were implying that it mattered to their transaction. He told his own publisher that if it were up to him he would flat out refuse to be published under any system that made a point of using or declaring his or anyone’s non-Jewish status as a part of the vetting process. “I do not regard the (probable) absence of all Jewish blood as necessarily honourable; and I have many Jewish friends, and should regret giving any colour to the notion that I subscribed to the wholly pernicious and unscientific race-doctrine.”

However, he understood that it was his publisher’s livelihood that was primarily concerned, not his, and so left the decision of whether to dump the deal outright with Stanley Unwin of George Allen and Unwin. However, he did provide two letters of response for Unwin to send in place of the Bestätigung that would have confirmed the lack of Jewish blood in his descent. One sidestepped the question entirely, while the other lashed out a the entire idea that it should be necessary in the first place, as only a master linguist can:

Dear Sirs,

Thank you for your letter. I regret that I am not clear as to what you intend by arisch. I am not of Aryan extraction: that is Indo-Iranian; as far as I am aware none of my ancestors spoke Hindustani, Persian, Gypsy, or any related dialects. But if I am to understand that you are enquiring whether I am of Jewish origin, I can only reply that I regret that I appear to have no ancestors of that gifted people. My great-great-grandfather came to England in the eighteenth century from Germany: the main part of my descent is therefore purely English, and I am an English subject — which should be sufficient. I have been accustomed, nonetheless, to regard my German name with pride, and continued to do so throughout the period of the late regrettable war, in which I served in the English army. I cannot, however, forbear to comment that if impertinent and irrelevant inquiries of this sort are to become the rule in matters of literature, then the time is not far distant when a German name will no longer be a source of pride.

Your enquiry is doubtless made in order to comply with the laws of your own country, but that this should be held to apply to the subjects of another state would be improper, even if it had (as it has not) any bearing whatsoever on the merits of my work or its sustainability for publication, of which you appear to have satisfied yourselves without reference to my Abstammung.

While nobody knows which letter Tolkien’s publisher wound up sending to Rütten & Loening, according to Wikipedia, The Hobbit was not published in German until 1957.

(via io9.)

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  • http://ladymercury-10.livejournal.com/ Maiasaura

    I didn’t realize Tolkien could get that much more awesome.  Eloquent anti-Nazi snark?  SO AWESOME.

  • Joy P

    Pure epicness :)

  • Anonymous

    I would pay a significant amount of money to hear Alan Rickman read that letter.

  • Anonymous

    And what a fitting name he got :)
    Tolkien is the english pronunciation of the german Word: ”Tollkühn”, roughly translated : “Overbold” (could also mean: rash, daredevil, daring or foolhardy)

  • http://www.facebook.com/jocelynplease Jocelyn Dugan

    The guy behind Gandalf looks like he has a stump. It confused me for most of the article. But yes, well done Tolkien.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=625547467 Maranie Alonso Warren

    And I would chip in some more. 

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Hannah-Paige-Woodard/100003224964929 Hannah Paige Woodard

    We should see if we can get him on board if we can raise money for charity or something. :P

  • Anonymous

     That actually sounds like a good front page for the campaign to make online debates more civil – “THIS, dear YouTube trolls, is how you do it!”.

  • Anonymous

    I see now.  Gandalf opening a can of whoopass on the Balrog was actually an autobiographical account of Tolkien’s own life, not unlike James Joyce when he scribed Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.  It all makes sense now!

  • http://www.facebook.com/eric.lindberg3 Eric Lindberg

    And suddenly, I love him even more. Leave it to an expert on the evolution of cultures and languages to call the Nazis on their BS.

  • Timothy Tankersley

    It is highly probable that the other letter was the one which was sent, as this one was kept on file and the other wasn’t, presumably because it was sent. Still, it wasn’t Tolkien who made the choice. I suggest that anyone interested in Tolkien should read his letters as there’s a lot of other cool rad stuff he says as well.

  • John Wao

    Wow. That is badasssss.

  • Life Lessons

    Oh SNAP! I love you JRR!!!!!

  • Anonymous

    This has been fairly common knowledge for quite a while, but it’s still heartening all the same.

  • http://ladymercury-10.livejournal.com/ Maiasaura

    I would love to hear it read by Stephen Fry.  He’s a master of that particularly British blend of disapproval and impeccable politeness.

  • http://lotesse.dreamwidth.org/ lotesse

    not to mention the awesome time – also in a letter – when he described Hitler as a “vulgar ignorant little cad.” no one brings the smack like JRRT!

  • Anonymous

    Tolkien’s attitudes toward the Nazi regime pervade his Lord of the Rings trilogy. Look at the map if nothing else. Where is Mordor? Where is The Shire? Where was Gondor where the great battles were fought? Through the 1930s everyone in Europe knew they were going to war. Wagner’s ring cycle and the festival in Bayreuth were a major focus of Nazi propaganda. Tolkien captured the sense of impending conflict very nicely in his tale.

    The British always considered themselves as domestic sorts, not warriors, despite running the world’s largest empire, ever. Their battle poetry isn’t big on victories, but rather accounts of heroes getting their bums (as they call them) handed to them. Read ‘The Charge of the Light Brigade’. It’s stirring. It’s magnificent. It demonstrates why cavalry cannot take on artillery.

    The movies, and particularly the first one, really capture this. You have the extremely domestic hobbits emerging from their sheltered world. They travel to places of legend and meet heroic elves, wizards, dwarves, and even sons of human kings. They learn ring, to them a device for dodging one’s in-laws, must be destroyed, but who was to do it?  Who could even try? It was the hobbits. (Oh yeah, and a couple of armies.)

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