He (Robert Hardy) described
his favorite class with Tolkien: an evening at the Eagle and Child pub, when
the linguistic master described, without foreknowledge, where each student was
from and what influences had shaped each of their accents.
“He
went ‘round the six, and six jaws dropped,” Hardy told me. “And when he got to
me, he said, ‘Ah, interesting. A bit of border Welsh lilt there, but
sadly overlayed by smart London.’ And I said, ‘You’re absolutely on
target in every degree.’”
Tolkien
wanted his students to understand how much knowledge can be gleaned from the
details of language use. Hardy said that by the end of that class, he was able
to recite Chaucer in the original Middle English.
Then,
sitting across from me, his eyes brightened. With an intense stare and dubious
tone, Robert Hardy recited the opening words of the Canterbury Tales to me, as
he had learned them from J.R.R. Tolkien himself.
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