Publications
Included below is the abstract and a short excerpt from my peer-reviewed article "Intertextuality and Iconography in Sergei Iukhimov’s Illustrations for The Lord of the Rings: Five Case Studies", recently published in the Journal of Tolkien Research.
The full piece can be accessed online at JTR here
J.R.R. Tolkien once remarked in a letter to his publisher that his friends had been so impressed by Pauline Baynes’ illustrations for Farmer Giles of Ham that they labelled his text a "commentary on the drawings". This apparently light-hearted anecdote conceals an interesting truth: the relationship between text and image can be problematic and the reading of an illustration depends largely on the culturally acquired discursive precedents which an individual viewer brings to the act of looking. This situation may be further complicated when account is taken of any incidences of visual borrowing present within an illustration. The primary purpose of this article therefore is to identify and evaluate such incidences of visual borrowing and, by extension, intertextual meaning in five of Sergei Iukhimov’s Soviet era illustrations for Natalya Grigor’eva and Vladimir Grushetskij’s 1993 Russian translation of The Lord of the Rings.
I begin by defining the two distinct types of visual borrowing detectable within the Iukhimov case studies: general correspondence and direct visual prototype. I then establish my methodological approach, describing how semiotic and iconographic elements are synthesised to form a new interpretive model. Subsequent analysis of the case studies reveals a diversity of borrowed motifs, derived from sources such as frescoes, hagiographic paintings and manuscript miniatures. I also demonstrate how, in several case studies, certain borrowed motifs retain enough of their original iconography that, when combined with the new Tolkienian motif, give rise to polysemy. To conclude, I hypothesise that Iukhimov’s corpus functions most effectively when viewed as a visual affirmation of the plurality of images which existed outside of Soviet totalitarianism.
Gandalf and the Wraith-king at the gate of Minas Tirith [sic]
Гэндальф и Король-Призрак у ворот Минас Тирита - Gandal'f i Korol’-Prizrak u vorot Minas Tirita (1987).
This image (Volume II. I. Plate 20) depicts a pivotal moment in the narrative of The Siege of Gondor (Book V Chapter IV of The Return of the King). To set the scene; the gate of Minas Tirith has been broken by Sauron’s forces, allowing the Lord of the Nazgûl to ride into the city, his shape grown to "a vast menace of despair". Only Gandalf, seated on Shadowfax, holds his ground. The Lord of the Nazgûl halts to face Gandalf and after a brief exchange with the wizard, raises his fiery sword to attack. Tolkien writes;
Gandalf did not move. And in that very moment, away behind in some courtyard of the city, a cock crowed. Shrill and clear he crowed, recking nothing of wizardry and war, welcoming only the morning that in the sky far above the shadows of death was coming with the dawn.[1]
The corresponding chapter of Grigor'eva and Grushetskij’s translation is entitled Осада Города (Osada Goroda "The Siege of the City"). Their version of the confrontation at the gate follows the original sequence of events, however, the language is less evocative, and Tolkien’s subtly ambiguous "shadows of death [my emphasis]" becomes something rather more defined in its meaning;
But Gandalf did not move. At that very moment, somewhere far away, in the center of the City, in a sonorous and clear voice a cock began to sing. For him there was no ancient magic; he felt there, high in the sky, the morning rising over the shadow of death.[2]
Iukhimov’s illustration depicts the two protagonists armed with swords and without their mounts. On the left stands Gandalf, with closely cropped hair and beard, clad in a purple chlamys (a form of Byzantine cloak) fastened with a fibula brooch.[3] On the right, stands the Lord of the Nazgûl, portrayed as a skeletal creature wearing a crown and wrapped in a black cloak and hood. The titulus M besides Gandalf most likely represents the first letter of Mithrandir (mith "grey + "randir "pilgrim, wandering man")[4], the Sindarin name for Gandalf.[5] Next to the Nazgûl stands the initial W, which could signify either the canonical title Witch-king or Grigor'eva, Grushetskij and Iukhimov’s more favoured Wraith-king (which I will use when referencing the subject of this case study).[6]
Above Gandalf’s head is a brightly coloured cockerel, an obvious visual reference to both the crowing bird of the text and a sunrise which will herald the arrival of the Rohirrim. Above the Wraith-king swoops a red and black dragon-like creature, suggestive of one of the Nazgûl’s winged steeds; primeval creatures referred to by Tolkien as being survivors of "older geological eras."[7] Below the two symbolic animals, Gandalf and the Wraith-king face each other across a simplified landscape containing a castle keep, (abutting a pyramid-shaped central mountain), surrounded by a triangular inner wall and a circular outer wall, all with crenellated battlements. The castle, complete with open gateway, symbolises Minas Tirith after Grond’s assault has broken the gate, and the mountain behind is representative of Mindolluin. Tolkien, however, describes the textual Minas Tirith as having been "built on seven levels, each delved into the hill" and makes it clear that each level possesses its own separate wall and gate.[8] Iukhimov’s outer wall does feature seven turrets, although only one displays a gate, and the two walls combined have nine individual turrets. It could be that the outer wall symbolises the Rammas Echor, the great defensive rampart enclosing the Pelennor Fields, in which case the outer turrets may be the Causeway Forts.[9]
The composition of Gandalf and the Wraith-king at the gate of Minas Tirith with its two monumental figures facing each other over a fortified settlement is reminiscent of works from the icon-painting tradition of the Solovetsky Monastery, a religious settlement situated on the Solovki Islands in the White Sea in Northern Russia. The founders of the original 15th century monastery, Saints Zosima and Savvatii were often included in paired iconographic images, depicting the two monks stood face-to-face, venerating a symbol such as the Holy Trinity or Transfiguration, which would be positioned above them. These images would then form the focal point of hagiography icons detailing the lives of the saints and their various associated miracles.[10]
[1] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King, 3rd revised reset edition. (London: HarperCollins, 2011), 829.
[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, Vlastelin Kolets (Vol II), trans. N.V.Grigor'eva and V.I Grushetkij (Moscow: TO Izdatel’, 1993), 164.
[3] Jennifer L. Ball, Byzantine Dress: Representations of Secular Dress in Eighth to Twelfth Century Painting (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 29-30.
[4] Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull, eds., The Lord of the Rings: A Reader’s Companion (London: HarperCollins, 2005), 320.
[5] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers, 670.
[6] Король-Призрак (Korol'-Prizrak) could also be interpreted as "Ghost-king".
[7] Carpenter and Tolkien, Letters, 282.
[8] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King, 751.
[9] Ibid., 817.
[10] E. S. Sisov, Treasures from the Kremlin (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1979), 134.
