Over at Oz and Ends...

...Susan Cooper and Diana Wynne Jones on Tolkien's professorial style -- they have completely different recollections of his lecturing ability.

(I had no idea that they both went to Oxford -- though I'm not at all surprised.)

Comments

[Elizabeth]

I'm more inclined to believe DWJ's account. I've read some of her autobiographical stuff and she seems to have an acute, vivid, Roald Dahl-caliber memory.

[Leila]

Same here -- and Roald Dahl-esque is totally right on the money.

[Aquafortis.blogspot.com]

Very cool. Thanks for the link! I agree with both of you--it seems like DWJ is spot-on about the details.

[rockinlibrarian]

Must read the article still, but it reminds me of Leonard Marcus's The Wand in the Word (or is it The Wand AND the Word?) book of interviews with children's fantasy writers (both Cooper and Jones included in that. To tell the truth, it's like a who's who of my favorite at-the-time-living authors, which was amazing in and of itself). He asks every author their impressions of Tolkien, and I was surprised and jealous of how many of them had met the man personally!

[Leila]

That's exactly where he pulled the quotes from -- I'm going to have to find that book!