Does Aragorn Have A Beard And Other Questions Of Tolkien’s Canon
Ask a group of Tolkien fans what is canon and you’ll end up with an argument, weeks of Twitter beef, and countless articles written up on the subject by writers like me. So, here is said article.
JRR Tolkien wrote The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings in his lifetime. That’s the grand summation of his Middle-earth published writings. The latter includes exhaustive appendices - that’s what Amazon has the rights to for The Rings of Power - but no other Rings-related works were published in his lifetime. However, he was working on The Silmarillion until his death, which was subsequently published posthumously. He also wrote copious numbers of notes, which his son Christopher painstakingly gathered up and translated (Tolkien Sr’s handwriting is almost indecipherable). These notes, scribbled in margins or written as letters to fans, have all since been published in the 16 volume series The History of Middle-earth, expanded novelisations of the events of The Silmarillion, and books such as The Letters of JRR Tolkien. But how much of this is canon?
Related: If You’re Going To Be Mad About The Rings Of Power, At Least Get Your Quotes Right
I would personally argue that only The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion are canon, but the rest was still mostly written by JRR Tolkien, so what gives? The ‘friendly’ discussions, often based around or alluding to the people of colour cast in The Rings of Power since the trailer’s release a couple of weeks ago, have once again spiked due to Tolkien’s description of Aragorn.
Tolkien rarely described his characters in great detail. He was a master of doing just enough for you to draw an outline, but leaving the rest of the canvas empty for the reader to apply the paint of
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