''The Notion Club Papers'' is an abandoned novel by

J. R. R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawlinson ...

, written in 1945 and published posthumously in ''

Sauron Defeated Sauron () is the title character and the main antagonist of J. R. R. Tolkien's ''The Lord of the Rings'', where he rules the land of Mordor. He has the ambition of ruling the whole of Middle-earth, using the power of the One Ring, which he ha ...

'', the 9th volume of ''

The History of Middle-earth ''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 by George Allen & Unwin in the UK and by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Houghton Mifflin in the US. They collect and analyse much of J. R. R. Tolkien' ...

''. It is a

time travel Time travel is the hypothetical activity of traveling into the past or future. Time travel is a concept in philosophy and fiction, particularly science fiction. In fiction, time travel is typically achieved through the use of a device known a ...

story, written while ''

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an Epic (genre), epic high fantasy novel written by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's book ''The Hobbit'' but eventually d ...

'' was being developed. The Notion Club is a fictionalization of Tolkien's own such club, the Inklings. Tolkien's mechanism for the exploration of time is through lucid dreams. These allow club members to experience events as far back as the destruction of the Atlantis-like island of Númenor, as narrated in '' The Silmarillion''. The unfinished text of ''The Notion Club Papers'' runs for some 120 pages in ''Sauron Defeated'', accompanied by 40 pages of

Christopher Tolkien Christopher John Reuel Tolkien (21 November 1924 – 16 January 2020) was an English and naturalised French academic editor and writer. The son of the author and academic J. R. R. Tolkien, Christopher edited 24 volumes based on his father's P ...

's commentary and notes, with examples of the pages hand-written by his father.

Context

was a scholar of English literature, a

philologist Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources. It is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics with strong ties to etymology. Philology is also defined as the study of ...

and a

medievalist The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star. Computer scientists and Mathematici ...

interested in language and poetry from the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, especially that of

Anglo-Saxon England Anglo-Saxon England or early medieval England covers the period from the end of Roman Empire, Roman imperial rule in Roman Britain, Britain in the 5th century until the Norman Conquest in 1066. Compared to modern England, the territory of the ...

and Northern Europe. His professional knowledge of ''

Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ) is an Old English poetry, Old English poem, an Epic poetry, epic in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 Alliterative verse, alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and List of translat ...

'', telling of a pagan world but with a Christian narrator, helped to shape his fictional world of Middle-earth. His intention to create what has been called " a mythology for England" led him to construct not only stories but a fully-formed world,

Middle-earth Middle-earth is the Setting (narrative), setting of much of the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy. The term is equivalent to the ''Midgard, Miðgarðr'' of Norse mythology and ''Middangeard'' in Old English works, including ''Beowulf'' ...

, with invented languages,

peoples The term "the people" refers to the public or common mass of people of a polity. As such it is a concept of human rights law, international law as well as constitutional law, particularly used for claims of popular sovereignty. In contrast, a ...

, cultures, and

history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...

. Among his many influences were his own

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

faith, medieval languages and literature, including Norse mythology. He is best known as the author of the

high fantasy High fantasy, or epic fantasy, is a subgenre of fantasy defined by the epic nature of its setting or by the epic stature of its characters, themes, or plot. Brian Stableford, ''The A to Z of Fantasy Literature'', (p. 198), Scarecrow Pres ...

works ''

The Hobbit ''The Hobbit, or There and Back Again'' is a children's fantasy novel by the English author J. R. R. Tolkien. It was published in 1937 to wide critical acclaim, being nominated for the Carnegie Medal and awarded a prize from the ...

'' (1937), ''

'' (1954–1955), and '' The Silmarillion'' (1977), all set in Middle-earth.

Structure and plot

The story revolves around the meetings of an

Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...

arts discussion group, the Notion Club. During these meetings, Alwin Arundel Lowdham discusses his lucid dreams about Númenor, a lost civilisation connected with Atlantis and with Tolkien's

. Through these dreams, he "discovers" much about the Númenor story and the languages of Middle-earth (notably

Quenya Quenya ()Tolkien wrote in his "Outline of Phonology" (in '' Parma Eldalamberon'' 19, p. 74) dedicated to the phonology of Quenya: is "a sound as in English ''new''". In Quenya is a combination of consonants, ibidem., p. 81. is a constructed l ...

, Sindarin, and Adûnaic). While not finished, at the end of the given story it becomes clear Lowdham himself is a reincarnation of sorts of Elendil, leader of the men who escaped the destruction of Númenor. Other members of the Club mention their vivid dreams of other times and places. ''The Notion Club Papers'' is elaborately constructed. The main story (the Notion Club, itself the frame of the Númenor story) is set within a

frame story A frame story (also known as a frame tale, frame narrative, sandwich narrative, or intercalation) is a literary technique that serves as a companion piece to a story within a story, where an introductory or main narrative sets the stage either fo ...

. Both are set in the future, after the actual time of writing, 1945. Embedded within the story are Tolkien's versions of European legends: '' King Sheave'', and '' The Death of St. Brendan'', a three-page poem also titled ' Imram'. In the frame story, a Mr. Howard Green finds documents in sacks of waste paper at Oxford in 2012. These documents, the Notion Club Papers of the title, are the incomplete notes of meetings of the Notion Club; these meetings are said to have occurred in the 1980s. The notes, written by one of the participants, include references to events that 'occurred' in the 1970s and 1980s. Green publishes a first edition containing excerpts from the documents. Two scholars read the first edition, ask to examine the documents, and then submit a full report. The "Notes to the Second Edition" mentions the contradictory evidence in dating the documents, and an alternative date is presented: they may have been written in the 1940s.

Writing and publication

wrote several unfinished drafts of ''The Notion Club Papers'' in 1945. The 120-page fragment was published posthumously by George Allen & Unwin in the UK and by

Houghton Mifflin The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often vocalize it as ...

in the US, within ''

'', the 9th volume of ''

'', in 1992. The book includes in addition some 40 pages of

's commentary and notes on the abandoned novel, and reproduces examples of pages hand-written by his father.

Analysis

Literary group

The text comments on

C. S. Lewis Clive Staples Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963) was a British writer, literary scholar and Anglican lay theologian. He held academic positions in English literature at both Magdalen College, Oxford (1925–1954), and Magdalen ...

's '' Space Trilogy''. Lewis and Tolkien were close friends and members of the Inklings literary club. The two men had agreed to write space travel (Lewis) and time travel (Tolkien) novels, since they agreed there were too few stories in existence that they really liked. Tolkien's remarks on the trilogy are similar in style to Lewis's commentary on Tolkien's poem '' The Lay of Leithian'', in which he created a fictional history of scholarship of the poem and even referred to other manuscript traditions to recommend changes to the poem. Tolkien's biographer, Humphrey Carpenter, describes ''The Notion Club'' as a "thinly disguised" version of the Inklings, noting that the time travellers are two Oxford dons who are members of the club. Jane Stanford links ''The Notion Club Papers'' to John O'Connor Power's 1899 ''The Johnson Club Papers''; the two books have a similar title page. The Johnson Club was a "Public House School" and met in taverns as the Inklings did. The purpose was "Fellowship and free Exchange of Mind". Both clubs presented papers "which were read before the members and discussed". The Johnson Club was named for

Samuel Johnson Samuel Johnson ( – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, literary critic, sermonist, biographer, editor, and lexicographer. The ''Oxford ...

, who like Tolkien, had a strong connection to

Pembroke College, Oxford Pembroke College, a constituent college of the University of Oxford, is located on Pembroke Square, Oxford. The college was founded in 1624 by King James I of England and VI of Scotland, using in part the endowment of merchant Thomas Tesdale ...

. Stanley Unwin, Tolkien's publisher, was a nephew of Fisher Unwin, the founding member of The Johnson Club.

Time travel

''The Notion Club Papers'' may be seen as an attempt to re-write the incomplete '' The Lost Road'' (written around 1936-1937), being another attempt to tie the Númenórean legend in with a more modern tale through

. It follows the then-popular theory of J. W. Dunne, who had suggested in his 1927 ''

An Experiment with Time ''An Experiment with Time'' is a book by the British soldier, aeronautical engineer and philosopher J. W. Dunne (1875–1949) about his precognitive dreams and a theory of time which he later called "Serialism". First published in March 1927 ...

'' that dreams could combine memories of both past and future events, and that time could flow differently for observers in different dimensions. The modern name "Alwin", the

Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...

name " Ælfwine", and the

name " Elendil" all mean "Elf-friend"; in ''The Lost Road'', the story involves father-son characters named Edwin/Elwin, Eadwine/Aelfwine, Audoin/Alboin, Amandil/Elendil, all meaning "Bliss-friend/Elf-friend", as the pair travel successively further back in time all the way through history to Númenor, just as the protagonists of ''The Notion Club Papers'' do in their lucid dreams. This situates Númenor, whose downfall is described in '' The Silmarillion'', as part of an invented mythology for England. Tolkien's biographer John Garth adds that ''The Notion Club Papers'' character Lowdham's middle name, Arundel, is both an English place-name and an echo of the legendarium's Éarendel (an ancestor of Elendil). Both stories however break off before much time-travelling takes place. Tolkien finally managed to incorporate literary explorations of time in ''The Lord of the Rings'', in the form of a visit to what seems to be the deep past in the Elvish land of Lothlorien, following a tradition that in Elfland, time is different; the stay lasts a month, but feels like only a few days. According to

, had his father continued ''The Notion Club Papers'', he would have linked the real world of Alwin Lowdham with his eponymous ancestor Ælfwine of England, the fictional compiler of '' The Book of Lost Tales'', and with Atlantis. One of the members of the Notion Club, Michael George Ramer, combines lucid dreams with time-travel and experiences the tsunami that sank Númenor. He cannot tell if it is history, or fantasy, or something in between. Verlyn Flieger writes that the journeying about of the protagonist recalls the Celtic Imram voyages, noting that Tolkien wrote a poem named "Imram" at the same time, and it was the only element published in his lifetime. Virginia Luling writes of ''The Notion Club Papers'' that "Tolkien had reason to abandon it: the existing chapters are unsuccessful, though with gleams." Flieger comments that had either ''The Lost Road'' or ''The Notion Club Papers'' been finished,

Prophecy

''The Notion Club Papers'' mentions a great storm in England, on 12 June 1987. The actual Great Storm of 1987 occurred in October of that year.''Great Storm 1987: The day 18 people were killed'' BBC News Online.
/ref>

drew attention to this, saying "my father's 'prevision' was only out by four months".

References

Sources

* * * * * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Notion Club Papers, The The History of Middle-earth Unfinished novels Novels about time travel Novels published posthumously Roman à clef novels