Abstract
Both Aristotle and Tolkien are authors of short works seemingly concentrated on one form
of literary art. Both works contain references which seem to extend further than that single
art and offer insights into the worth and purpose of art more generally. Both men understand
the relevant processes of mind of the artist in a similar way, and both distinguish the
value of works of art based on their effect on the audience. But Tolkien figures the natural
human artistic bent as an elvish strain in us, and in his legends the elves are passing away
to make way for the new—human beings. The legendary tales are an image of the natural
pagan man giving place to the new man coming to be after Christ. This implies that what
Aristotle called the mimetic nature of man—the source of all artistic play and work—is
being given a new shape and orientation. Further, the master of those who know, in explicating
catharsis, must have been reaching for something that exceeded his grasp and he
did not know it. The aim of this essay is to explore the agreements (seeming and real) and
disagreements (seeming and real) between what can be built up as each author’s general
literary and aesthetic ideas—so, the relation between pagan and Tolkien’s Christian poetics.
This will include evaluating where each is more or less adequate to the task of a general
aesthetic, ending in an exploration of the purpose of art for the “new man.”