I feel that Tolkien did not revise and add to [The Silmarillion] over the years as an escape, though it does seem in one way to belong to a deep, almost childlike need to fix and possess for ever a part of the English countryside (and in this sense it could be said to bear the same relation to his practical life as "The Wind in the Willows" bore to Kenneth Grahame's.) The clue to reading it can be found, perhaps, in Leaf by Niggle. The Silmarillion is the creation of what Tolkien called a Secondary World, just as much as Lord of the Rings though in a different style. It is a piece of literary invention which depends on semantics rather than on social morality. It is true that the whole work reflects the rise of aggression in gods, elves and men, the effects of greed and the lust for power on races created as generous and civilised beings. Tolkien's experience of the world from the '20's onwards cannot but have affected the book in some measure. But ultimately the struggle for the Silmarils and the Rings of Power exists without moral comment, as the necessary impulse for a story, a work of continuous craftsmanship by which Tolkien earned a place in a long line of story-tellers.
The Silmarillion is a bardic work. Whatever it supplies of background to his other tales, it is narrated as if to a receptive and practised audience. The manner is not unlike that-of Beowulf: the tone is one of celebrating, even of reminding, rather than of explaining. (pp. 3257-58)
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