Tolkien and D&D: A ramble about two diametrically opposed world-views

There's a strong association in the public consciousness between Dungeons & Dragons, and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. Indeed, Tolkien's Middle Earth has come to be seen as the 'template' for a fantasy setting; the starting point from which other fantasy settings are birthed, the black hole at the centre of a galaxy of medieval fanatasy.

The late Sir Terry Pratchett sums this up far better than I could hope to:

"J.R.R. Tolkien has become a sort of mountain, appearing in all subsequent fantasy in the way that Mt. Fuji appears so often in Japanese prints. Sometimes it’s big and up close. Sometimes it’s a shape on the horizon. Sometimes it’s not there at all, which means that the artist either has made a deliberate decision against the mountain, which is interesting in itself, or is in fact standing on Mt. Fuji."

In some aspects, Tolkien's influence cannot be denied. Take elves, for example. While elves have a long history in Germanic folklore, stretching back as far as the historian can see, Tolkien's elves represented a major break with the common conception of an elf at the time. At the time that Tolkien was writing, the word 'elf' conjured images of tiny, mischievous sprites - more pixie than eladrin. The orc, meanwhile, is a more direct child of Tolkien, a creature that stems primarily from his imagination, with only the faintest of roots in Germanic folklore. 

However! While elves and orcs, in the Tolkienite mould, feature prominently in D&D, this is - in my view - more akin to Disney's roots in the works of the Brothers Grimm. Superficial, lifting names and appearances, but wholly different in spirit and in soul.

The Worldview of Tolkien

Middle Earth draws heavily upon Tolkien's knowledge of the early medieval period, of which he was a scholar. As such, it presents a world that is highly hierarchical, in which kin and fealty are key concepts in defining the way people think and act.

Tolkien's heroes are drawn from the upper echelons of society. In the Hobbit, Bilbo is a member of the landed gentry, who accompanies an exiled prince and his retainers - most of whom have at least some degree of royal blood. In the Lord of the Rings, three of the four hobbits in the Fellowship are gentry, and they are joined by four princes - Samwise stands out as the only 'commoner' across the two works. Their goals are, for the most part, either reactionary or conservative. Characters like Aragorn and Thorin want to put the world back to how it used to be, when their ancestors ruled benevolently. Other characters want to protect the world as it is against forces that seek to change it for the worse.

Tolkien's characters live in a world in which change is generally for the worse. This is seen both in the cycle of the ages, with each being a diminished shell of the last, and in the events of the Third Age; for example the dwarves' loss of Moria and the Misty Mountain, the exodus of the elves, and the scouring of the Shire. The face of this change for the worse is industrial. Saruman "has a mind of metal and wheels; and he does not care for growing things," while the goblins "invented some of the machines that have since troubled the world, especially the ingenious devices for killing large numbers of people at once, for wheels and engines and explosions always delighted them." This is set against the rural idyll of the shire, and the harmony with nature in which the elves live.

The acquisition of power, even in service of good ends, is seen as an evil deed. This point is made with characters like Boromir and Saruman, who each wish to use the ring against Sauron. Boromir realises his wrongs, and dies a heroic death; Saruman does not, and dies a pitiful death at the hands of his own right-hand man Grima Wormtongue. The solution instead is purity of heart and honesty of spirit; the triumph of good over evil.

Tolkien's comments on the suggestion that Lord of the Rings was an allegory for the Second World War reveal much of his mindset:

"The real war does not resemble the legendary war in its process or its conclusion. If it had inspired or directed the development of the legend, then certainly the Ring would have been seized and used against Sauron; he would not have been annihilated but en slaved, and Barad-dûr would not have been destroyed but occupied. Saruman, failing to get possession of the Ring, would in the confusion and treacheries of the time have found in Mordor the missing links in his own researches into Ring-lore, and before long he would have made a Great Ring of his own with which to challenge the self-styled Ruler of Middle-earth. In that conflict both sides would have held hobbits in hatred and contempt: they would not long have survived even as slaves."

The Worldview of Early Dungeons & Dragons

Where Tolkien's heroes are gentry, the player characters of 'old school' D&D are freebooters and rogues; connected to no one, driven by self-interest and the desire for gold. They exist in the 'borderlands' between civilisation and the wilderness, order and chaos; a space modelled moreso on the image of the American West, than of medieval Europe - and a space that replaces kin and fealty with freedom and opportunity.

Moving to high tier play, player characters becoming agents in the conflict between two diametrically opposed forces. However, rather than the good and evil of Tolkien, D&D focuses on Law and Chaos; civilisation and barbarism, in essence. The philosophy of 'manifest destiny' is visible here - as it was the American's destiny to civilise from sea to shining sea, so it is the destiny of player characters to civilise the 'borderlands' by clearing a wilderness hex and building a stronghold.

In a way, then, D&D inverts Tolkien's view of morality. Where Tolkien's antagonists despoil nature in the name of industry, D&D's protagonists claim untamed lands in the name of Law and progress. Where Tolkien's heroes seek to preserve the world as it is, or restore it to how it was, D&D's heroes seek to change the world.

One curiosity of the early D&D gameplay style, moreso than of the implied setting, is that antagonists in D&D do not, for the most part, go out and act against the protagonists. Rather, they stay in their dungeons, fighting among each other, waiting for the player characters to turn up. This further reinforces the role of the player-characters as the agents of change, rather than of preservation.

In such a setting, Tolkien's orcs do not fit. Their motives are too similar to those of the player to work as antagonists, or for them to be used as fodder in dungeon-crawls. Thus, the orc is redefined as a barbarous savage, an animalistic creature, a servant of Chaos in its war on Law. The AD&D orcs, for instance, are depicted with the heads of pigs, and are described as a tribal race of bullies and strongmen.

A logical antagonist for such a setting, perhaps. However, it is an antagonist that has uncomfortable associations. Where, historically, Europeans and Americans have sought to justify their conquests against black and native peoples, they have often done so by portraying those peoples as barbarous, animalistic savages - while portraying themselves as bringers of order and civilisation.

This is an association Tolkien's orcs avoided, for the most part - his orcs are cockney Londoners, if they're anyone. Saruman, in this view, is a robber baron. 

Another key difference is the treatment of power. The accumulation of power is, in many ways, the goal of D&D - level up, acquire magical artefacts, and face down increasingly powerful foes as an equal in power.