The Letters of J.R.R Tolkien are a veritable treasure-trove of information; I heartily recommend this book to anyone interested in Tolkien. These letters, largely abridged of course, reveal a lot about the workings of his mind which you simply cannot deduce from his mythopoeic work. This letter always amuses me. In 1945, Tolkien wrote a letter to The Catholic Herald in response to a correspondent who wrote about the etymology of the word Coventry. The letter goes:
''I've wasted some precious time this week-end writing a letter to the Catholic Herald. One of their sentimentalist correspondents wrote about the etymology of the name Coventry, and seemed to think that unless you said it came from Convent, the answer was not 'in keeping with Catholic tradition.' 'I gather the convent of St Osburg was of no consequence' said he: boob. As convent did not enter English till after 1200 A.D. (and meant an 'assembly' at that) and the meaning 'nunnery' is not recorded before 1795, I felt annoyed. So I have asked whether he would like to change the name of Oxford to Doncaster; but he's probably too stupid to see even that mild quip.'' (The Letters of J.R.R Tolkien, no. 97).
I'd like to see that letter. Does anyone know where/how I can access the archives of The Catholic Herald? Their website only goes back to 2003. So far as Catholic periodicals go, Tolkien (to my knowledge at least) had nothing whatsoever to do with The Tablet...
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