SOURCE: Shippey, T. A. “The Lord of the Rings (3): The Mythic Dimension.” In J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century, pp. 161-225. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001.

In the following essay, Shippey finds mythic-allegorical elements in The Lord of the Rings relating to events of the twentieth century, although contends that the trilogy is not an allegory of World War II.

Allegory and Applicability

In the ‘Foreword’ to the second edition of The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien wrote: ‘I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence’. As with the denial of any link between rabbits and hobbits (see chapter I), the evidence is rather against Tolkien here. He was perfectly capable of using allegory himself, and did so several times in his academic works, usually with devastating effect. In...