The J. R. R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Volume 1: Chronology. Christina Scull
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with Seinte Iuliene. He can now offer to produce an edition of Ancrene Wisse for the Society, but feels that he must explain about work he has already done. He has transcribed 75 of the 117 folios of the manuscript and has almost completed a verbal index. He has also spent time preparing a complete vocabulary and grammar of ‘AB’ (a variant of Middle English related to MS CCCC 402 and MS Bodley 34). Because he has been working from rotographs, he will need to collate his transcriptions with the original manuscript in Cambridge, and intends to begin that work soon. He can let the Society have four requested specimen pages in the following week. He asks what format and what accompanying material will be required for the Society edition. He suggests that the text be printed line by line, as Elaine Griffiths’ glossary is keyed to folio and line as in the original manuscript. As an example of what he would like, he sends a specimen proof of Seinte Iuliene. He inquires also if, after Ancrene Wisse, the EETS would be interested in an edition of the Middle English life of St Katherine (Seinte Katerine), for which he and Simonne d’Ardenne have already prepared the text.
By 14 January 1936 Tolkien assists *R.G. Collingwood, the Waynflete Professor of Metaphysical Philosophy at Oxford and a colleague at Pembroke College, ‘untiringly with problems of Celtic philology’, as Collingwood will write in the preface (dated 14 January 1936) to Books I–IV of Roman Britain and the English Settlements by Collingwood and J.N.L. Myres (1936; 2nd edn. 1937), p. vii. Collingwood will mention in a footnote regarding Sulis, the goddess of the hot springs at Bath, that ‘she is traditionally called Sul; but Professor Tolkien points out to me that the Celtic nominative can only be Sulis, and our authority for believing that even the Romans made a nominative Sul on the analogy of their own word sol – perhaps meaning the same – is not good. The Celtic sulis may mean ‘the eye”, and this again may mean the sun’ (p. 264).
14 January 1936 Tolkien writes to Mabel Day. Because he has not had time to type the promised specimen pages, he sends pages of manuscript transcription, from which printed specimens may be produced. He asks again about the general editorial policy of the Early English Text Society, and about matters of presentation.
15 January 1936 Mabel Day writes to Tolkien, acknowledging his two letters. She has sent the first to A.W. Pollard, Honorary Director of the Early English Text Society. She explains some points of the Society’s editorial policy, which will be better developed once all of the specimens for proposed editions of Ancrene Riwle manuscripts have been set up. She promises to send Tolkien specimens of the edition of the French manuscript of the Ancrene Riwle. – A.W. Pollard writes to Tolkien. While he can see advantages of reproducing a (prose) text in print line by line, he prefers a uniformity of style in printing editions of the five or six Ancrene Riwle texts, of which the Cambridge manuscript will be only one. It is still to be decided what editorial matter should accompany the texts.
16 January 1936 Tolkien replies to Mabel Day, thanking her for answering his queries and arguing against altering texts, for the sake of future editors who often will be obliged to reconstruct what has been altered, if not driven back to the original manuscripts. He will proceed with an edition of Ancrene Wisse as quickly as he can. – Probably on or soon after this date Tolkien also writes to A.W. Pollard; two versions of a letter survive, one certainly a draft. See note. Although he will bow to the Early English Text Society Committee’s decision, Tolkien puts forward a long and detailed argument in favour of line-by-line transcription. Such a transcription, preserving the arrangement in the original manuscript, has enormous advantages to the scholar. Also, as he has already transcribed most of the Cambridge manuscript by folio and line, and has prepared a nearly complete glossary and index according to this plan, he is reluctant to see this work upset. To follow the EETS plan would require a great deal of labour in recasting references already in being, and would set back other work on Ancrene Wisse and related texts.
19 January 1936 Hilary Full Term begins. Tolkien’s scheduled lectures for this term are: The Legend of Wayland the Smith, followed by a study of the text of Deor’s Lament and of Völundarkviða on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11.00 a.m. in the Examination Schools, beginning 21 January; and Atlakviða on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 12.00 noon in the Examination Schools, beginning 21 January. These are probably cancelled, however, after Tolkien injures his leg on 1 February; he will offer them as classes at his home in Northmoor Road in Trinity Term 1936. He will continue to supervise B.Litt. student M.E. Griffiths.
20 January 1936 Death of George V. Edward VIII succeeds to the throne.
22 January 1936 Tolkien attends a Pembroke College meeting.
23 January 1936 Members of Convocation (see *Oxford, University of) meet in the Sheldonian Theatre at 12.00 noon to hear the proclamation of Edward VIII, and then walk in procession, led by the Vice-Chancellor and the Proctors, to St Mary’s Church to witness the proclamation there by the City authorities. Lectures which would interfere with attendance at the ceremony are cancelled.
27 January 1936 A.W. Pollard writes to Tolkien. Robin Flower has been asked by the Early English Text Society Committee to take special charge of the Ancrene Riwle editions. Tolkien’s specimens are being forwarded to him.
28 January 1936 Day of mourning for the funeral of George V. Lectures are cancelled. The Vice-Chancellor, Proctors, and graduates, in academic dress, meet in the Divinity School by 11.35 a.m. and process to a Memorial Service at noon in the Church of St Mary the Virgin.
1 February 1936 Warren Lewis notes in his diary that Tolkien has torn a ligament in his leg playing squash and will be in bed for ten weeks. – C.S. Lewis visits Tolkien after tea.
7 February 1936 The Faculté de Philosophie et Lettres, Liège, authorizes publication of Simonne d’Ardenne’s thesis on Seinte Iuliene. Oxford University Press will print one thousand copies by early March. Librairie E. Droz of Paris will publish it under d’Ardenne’s name only, to satisfy requirements of her degree at Liège; but for this, the book would appear as a joint work by d’Ardenne and Tolkien. Simonne d’Ardenne herself privately refers to it as a joint effort, and some of Tolkien’s colleagues will recognize his contribution. The Seinte Iuliene probably contains more of his views on early Middle English than anything he will ever publish under his own name.
19 February 1936 C.H. Firth dies.
26 February 1936 Mabel Day sends Tolkien a list of possible amendments for A Middle English Vocabulary. She thinks that Robin Flower has seen Tolkien in Oxford to discuss the specimen pages for Ancrene Wisse.
Early March 1936 Tolkien reads The Place of the Lion by *Charles Williams, which C.S. Lewis has recommended.
1 March 1936 By this date Tolkien must have submitted his application for a Leverhulme Research Fellowship, which he will be granted from October 1936 for two years.
7 March 1936 Germany reoccupies the Rhineland.
9 March 1936 Simonne d’Ardenne writes to Tolkien, asking how he is recovering from his leg injury, and referring to his surgeon. She will tell him the date of her viva at Liège when she knows it. A copy of Seinte Iuliene has gone to Tolkien. She regrets that ‘our profit’ will be smaller than they had thought, because of the percentage demanded by Droz (Tolkien Papers, Bodleian Library, Oxford).
14 March 1936 Hilary Full Term ends.
30 March 1936 At the suggestion of Elaine Griffiths, C.A. Furth of George Allen & Unwin approaches Tolkien to ask if he would edit the new edition of Clark Hall’s Beowulf, or suggest someone else for the job. The context of his letter suggests that this is not the first time he has made this request. (See entry for ?Early 1936.)
26 April 1936 Trinity Full Term begins. Tolkien’s scheduled lectures for this term are: Outlines of Old English Phonology and Grammar on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 12.00 noon in the Examination Schools, beginning 28 April; and Introduction to Old