Are you an EPFL student looking for a semester project?
Work with us on data science and visualisation projects, and deploy your project as an app on top of GraphSearch.
Concept
Leaf by Niggle
Summary
"Leaf by Niggle" is a short story written by J. R. R. Tolkien in 1938–39 and first published in the Dublin Review in January 1945. It was reprinted in Tolkien's book Tree and Leaf, and in several later collections. Contrary to Tolkien's claim that he despised allegory in any form, the story is an allegory of Tolkien's own creative process, and, to an extent, of his own life, following the structure of Dante's Purgatorio. It also expresses his philosophy of divine creation and human sub-creation. The story came to him in a dream.
J. R. R. Tolkien
J. R. R. Tolkien was a scholar of English literature, a philologist and medievalist interested in language and poetry from the Middle Ages, especially that of Anglo-Saxon England and Northern Europe. His professional knowledge of works such as Beowulf shaped his fictional world of Middle-earth, including his high fantasy novel The Lord of the Rings.
In this story, an artist named Niggle lives in a society that does not value art. Working only to please himself, he paints a canvas of a great tree with a forest in the distance. He invests each and every leaf of his tree with obsessive attention to detail, making every leaf uniquely beautiful. Niggle ends up discarding all his other artworks, or tacks them onto the main canvas, which becomes a single vast embodiment of his vision.
However, mundane duties constantly prevent Niggle from giving his work the attention it deserves, so it remains incomplete and is not fully realised. At the back of his head, Niggle knows that he has a great trip looming, and he must prepare for it, but Niggle's next door neighbour, a gardener named Parish, frequently drops by asking for assistance. Parish is lame, has a sick wife, and genuinely needs help. Niggle, having a good heart, takes time out to help—but he is also reluctant because he would rather work on his painting. Niggle has other pressing work duties as well that require his attention. Then Niggle himself catches a chill doing errands for Parish in the rain.
Official source
About this result
This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.