Inquiry about the 2014 edn. of The Adventures of Tom Bombadil

Hello all,

Prefatory remarks: I’m a long-time follower of TCG, first-time poster. I’m not actually sure how appropriate this topic is, as it has less to do with “collecting” per se than it does with tracing consistency across editions (though I know that such things have sometimes been discussed, as with the contents of the various “Father Christmas” editions). And I don’t think this particular topic has been dealt with before, so far as I could find by searching. In any case, my comments/inquiry are as follows.

Main remarks: My confusion has to do with the original ordering of the poems “Cat” (11) and “Fastitocalon” (12) in The Adventures of Tom Bombadil (hereinafter AoTB), their reversed order beginning in the second printing (respectively > 12, 11), and the alignment of these two poems with the references to numbers “11” and “12” in the preface to the various printings, particularly as regards their treatment in the 2014 edn. by Scull & Hammond (hereinafter “S&H”).

According to the commentary of the 2014 edn. (p.121, 232), in the 1st printing of AoTB “Fastitocalon” was originally no. 12 and “Cat” was originally no. 11 in the collection. When the order of these two poems was reversed in the 2nd printing, Tolkien’s preface was not updated to match the original referents of these numbers. Thus, contrary to all subsequent printings/editions, the preface of the 1st printing referred to “Fastitocalon” (12) as the poem marked “SG” (though derived from “comic bestiary lore”), whereas the 2nd printing onward assigns this attribution instead to “Cat” (being the new no. 12). Meanwhile, the 1st printing stated that the so-called “marginalia” poems were: 4 (=Princess Mee), 11 (=Cat), and 13 (=Shadow Bride), which makes good sense. With the change of the 2nd printing, the referents of these numbers became: Princess Mee (4), Fastitocalon (the new no. 11), and Shadow Bride (13), which S&H point out still makes sense but applies less “aptly” than the original referents (p.121). [I should note: I of course do not own or have available a first printing of AoTB but am simply going off of S&H’s description of it. For comparison to the 2014 edn., I’m using my copy in The Tolkien Reader, which should match the 2nd printing of AoTB in the relevant points.]

In the 2014 edn., however, the numbers as printed in Tolkien’s preface have actually been changed from the previous printings, not only in reference to the “marginalia” poems, but also in reference to the poem said to be marked “SG”. The former reference (on p.29 of the 2014 edn.) reads “4, 12, 13”, which actually corrects things back to the original 1st printing referents, namely: Princess Mee (4), Cat (2014 edn. “12” = orig. “11”), and Shadow Bride (13). For the reference to the poem attributed to “SG” (on p.30 of the 2014 edn.), where previous printings have the number “12”, the 2014 edn. prints “11” instead. This too corrects things back to the original referents of the 1st printing, namely that “Fastitocalon” was the poem marked with “SG” (2014 edn. “11” = orig. “12”), rather than “Cat”. Thus, the references are actually in line with their original 1st-printing referents (as explained correctly on p.232) although their numerical values have been changed, by amending the preface text precisely along the lines that S&H claim not to have chosen to do! They state plainly in their commentary (p.121) that, due to lack of any authorial statement in favor of modifying the numbers in the preface, the “original text has been allowed to stand.” Yet it is not the original text that they’ve ended up printing, making their commentary in this regard (pp.121 and 232) completely incoherent.

Now, in their Addenda and Corrigenda online, they say that the printed numbers “12, 13” are a late-stage error and should instead read “11, 12” [sic], which would restore the original text for “11” (now = “Fastitocalon”, per the 2nd printing onward) but, bafflingly, would change the reference of the “Shadow Bride” (13) to “Cat” (12), which as far as I know—and according to their description in the commentary—was in no printing a possibility. Worse still, such a correction would erase all reference to “Shadow Bride” in Tolkien’s preface, which would falsify their statement that “the only poem not cited...in the preface...is The Mewlips” (pp.118–19), since now there would be two unmentioned poems (“Mewlips” and “Shadow Bride”). Therefore the online correction must, as far as I can see, be a further mistake and should instead read “11, 13” (i.e., matching all prior printings, consisting of the “original text” they claim to have “allowed to stand”). With this change, the reference to “11” on p.30 (i.e., the “SG”/”bestiary lore” poem) should accordingly be changed back to the original “12” (now = “Cat”, per the 2nd printing onward), as in all prior printings. (Note that this latter discrepancy is nowhere mentioned in the online Addenda and Corrigenda.) With these two corrections to the 2014 text, the commentary would be rendered coherent, and the references to the poems in the preface would again refer as they do in all printings besides the 1st, namely to “Fastitocalon” (11) and “Cat” (12) respectively as “marginalia” and the “SG”/”bestiary lore” poem (i.e., opposite to the 1st printing). In particular, the statement in the 2014 commentary that the revised attribution applies albeit less “aptly” than in the 1st printing (where “Cat” was “marginalia” and “Fastitocalon” was the “SG”/”bestiary lore” poem) would be restored to the apt observation that it is.

Given the foregoing points, my question for you all is simply, does this seem correct? Have I overlooked something? Any comments/replies are most welcome. (And, if anyone has access to the printings that I do not, please let me know if my understanding of them is correct.)

Finally, I have one minor, unrelated question about p.123 of the 2014 edn. of AoTB. Here, the original 1934 version of the poem “The Adventures of Tom Bombadil” is printed. Line 2 of stanza 2 reads “a-chasing of the shadows”. Is this correct? It seems like “a-chasing off the shadows” would make better sense, but I don’t have the Oxford Magizine printing available to check, and of course the 1962 version of this poems reads “running after shadows”, so isn’t much help in this respect. (The online Addenda and Corrigenda does not mention this page.)

I conclude by stressing that I adore this edition, and I am especially grateful for all of the previously extremely-hard-to-acquire material that it reprints, which offers a fascinating “history of AoTB” to discover. My remarks on these few issues of detail are in no way meant to detract from my more general praise for the excellence of this edition, as with everything that S&H produce.