Lincoln Alpern
Active Member
Okay, I'm being a little facetious with that thread title, as Cleese wasn't specifically referencing Tolkien at all. Still, this observation he makes, in conversation with Iain McGilchrist at a recent How to Academy talk, resonates so much with discussions we've had that I must share it.
If that isn't textbook Hobbitry, I don't know what is.
If you go back a few years, the English upper class found it very embarrassing to say to someone that "I, uh, really love you, um, you touch me very deeply," because that would have been regarded as [gauche and unseemly]. But, I mean, what they did is they insulted their friends. Because it was the way that the upper class had of telling them that they loved them. Because they would never insult someone that they didn't love, because that would be rude and a breach of good manners, you see.
If that isn't textbook Hobbitry, I don't know what is.