Eucatastrophe – my new favourite word

Part of the enduring appeal of Tolkien’s works is hope. The inevitable turn in events that changes a dire situation where all hope seems lost into a positive outcome. The eagles arrive in the battle of the five armies, Gollum attacks Frodo and falls into Mount Doom, Tom Bombadil sings into the Barrows. What you might not know is that Tolkien coined a word for this turn in fortune; ‘eucatastrophe’.

Eucatastrophe

A eucatastrophe is a sudden turn of events where the situation changes from dark, doomed and disastrous to the hero passing from danger or achieving their goal. Tolkien’s tales are packed full of innumerable examples of this turn of narrative. It is how he keeps it exciting (using peril) but it also pervades his storytelling with a sense of hope and optimism. It also gives us a sense of whimsy and familiarity, because this concept of eucatastrophe is borrowed from a very familiar source; fairytales. Tolkien coined the phrase in his famous lecture and essay ‘On Fairy-Stories’.

Far more powerful and poignant is the effect [of joy] in a serious tale of Faërie. In such stories, when the sudden ‘turn’ comes we get a piercing glimpse of joy, and heart’s desire, that for a moment passes outside the frame, rends indeed the very web of story, and lets a gleam come through.

JRR Tolkien, On Fairy-Stories

This sense of familiarity and the comparison of Tolkien’s works to traditional fairy stories is important for the analysis of Tolkien. Tolkien should be understood as a continuation of the tradition of fairy-stories. We call Tolkien a fantasy author now, but this genre is born out of Tolkien, he saw his stories as the genre of mythopoeia, that is creating a myth for fiction to be contained. In On Fairy-Stories Tolkien states that for a story to be a fairy-story it must present itself as ‘true’. To be read as true by the reader it must take place within coherent rules of its world. This is explicitly distinct from stories which take place in dreams which thus renders the world of the story untrue.

Fantasy, Recovery, Escape and Consolation

Clyde Northrup describes four qualities by which we should interpret Tolkien. These are fantasy (the contrast of enchantment and ordinariness), recovery (as the reader sees the “magic” of simple things in daily life), escape (from the primary world), and consolation (the “happy ending” or ultimate eucatastrophe). These qualities give us a method for fantasy, fairy stories, and general escapist fiction also.

Tolkien uses these concepts in a cyclical way. He has repeated moments of revealing the wonder of nature; trees, flowers and landscape; and the hope and persistence of kindness, friendship and loyalty. He also drives his stories with repeated dark moments where all seems lost only for the heroes to be rescued by a seemingly miraculous turn of fortune. And yet, we do not lose disbelief, we do not lose plausibility. This is where Tolkien’s mastery matters; with such grand turns of fortune it would be easy to fall into the trap of many children’s stories and the change seem too implausible and therefore spoil the story. Tolkien, however, treads this line and thus we are taken from the primary world (escape) and can see the contrast between the ordinary and the enchantment (fantasy).

Does your escapist fiction give you fantasy, recovery, escape and consolation?

Darren Ellis is a teacher, creative and owner of Rotten Poetry. He reads classic literature, fantasy, sci-fi, literary fiction and history.