post by Ben Apland
I enjoyed reading this story, though I was confused by it. It started off kind of dull with the Narrator describing Niggle and his ideas about painting. He is also described as a kind hearted man. He goes out of his way from preparing for a journey (which I want to say is to some sort of afterlife but that idea never just popped out at me) to help Parish out with his wife and house since he has a bad leg.
It should be noted that Parish is a decent gardener and comments on the messiness of Niggle’s garden whenever he stops by. Then he finally goes on this journey and it seems like he is in a psych ward (to go along with my previous comment about the journey maybe this is some sort of purgatory where he waits to go to the next place) because he didn’t prepare for the journey at all and looked awful.
On page 113 of the story(247 in course pack) Niggle rides a bike through a gate which on the other side said it had spring sunshine. I think that could be a sort of paradise. He meets up with Parish again here and they end up creating this beautiful place. Niggle would create leaves and flowers and stuff and Parish would place them in the right spot. The story ends with the region they are in being called Niggle’s Parish in the bay.
I know stories don’t always have a definite theme to them but most of the time you can find one and get a feeling that, yep that is a good theme here. I never felt that with this story. I mean I think I got a semblance of one with the journey being an afterlife and the mystery place with the voice’s being some sort of purgatory.
The question I want to pose is what is the theme of this story? Leaf by Niggle seemed hard to find unlike the two stories by Oscar Wilde, The Happy Prince and The Selfish Giant where there seemed to be an obvious theme. I think the themes of all three could have something to do with returning to paradise.
I think the theme (maybe even the Catholic or Christian theme) of this story is this idea that we should put others before ourselves. Niggle is constantly doing things for others, unable to rid himself of his "kind heart" (I forget how this was actually put in the story and don't have my coursepack with me...). Anyways, even though Niggle is not always happy or excited to do the things he does for others, he still always puts other's needs before his own. I think this makes him a very relatable character, because we have most likely all had the experience of doing something we didn't want to do because we felt it was what we should do or what was the right thing to do.
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ReplyDeleteI know of a few themes. :)
ReplyDeletebeing ready for death, power of grace to transform, the possibility of reconciliation, and inherent value of each person to name a few.
I think one of the main themes the relationship between usefulness and worth. Another related theme is the importance of rightly prioritizing: putting things of greater value first.
At the beginning, Niggle's life and priorities are not perfect (whose priorities are?). The Voices later comment about how he often neglected other people (like Parish) and his other duties to work on his painting. He sometimes put more importance on the painting than he did people. :/
There are others on the opposite extreme, namely Tompkins. He calls Niggle a silly, useless man, who had "no use to society at all." Tompkins also calls Niggle's painting useless and worthless. He is not able to appreciate Niggle's painting at all. He values usefulness more than beauty and people. Tompkins equates usefulness to worth. This story challenges this way of thinking. In reality, some of the most useless things are actually the most valuable things because they are loved for their own sake and not for some other purpose. Niggle painting is an example of this. Friends are another example. Certainly good comes out friendships (recall Niggle's and Parish's friendship which created Niggle's Parish), but those goods are secondary to the friends themselves. People should not be used and treated as means to an end,but should be loved simply for their own sake. Each person is unique, irreplaceable, and inherently valuable. I think this story has a lot to say about the value of every person: Even some one as seemingly insignificant as Niggle is important and valuable.
I think that Niggle's "journey" is definitely allegorical for death. Tolkien is using his hospital-workhouse-purgatory to address the changes Niggle needed to make in his life in order to be truly happy, or to reach his personal paradise (which is literally his finished painting come to life). One of these lessons (among others) is to let go of the influence/pressure of time. In life, Niggle constantly felt he did not have enough time to devote to his painting, and struggled with sparing his time for others he knew needed it. It is only after he allows himself to cease worrying about time during his stay at the hospital that he is able to move on to the next part of his journey.
ReplyDeleteI know there are a lot of other themes in this story as well (as Katy and Timothy pointed out-selflessness, self-worth, and learning to appreciate the intricacies of existence as well as the big picture), but this evaluation of time stood out to me the most (perhaps because we Americans tend to struggle with time management...).
You mentioned in your post, Ben, that Tolkien was a fan of Norse mythology. I think that's really relevant to this story. Much of their folklore centers around time. They believed Gods and humans existed simultaneously in alternate realities. Tolkien replicates this in "leaf by Niggle" by depicting different levels of existence that are seemingly happening at once. He ends the story with the councillor, schoolmaster, and museum of Niggle's "old country", implying that these earthly things are still happening while Niggle is spending his time in another life...I just thought this was an interesting parallel.
It's been interesting to read the blog and the comments because while I agree with Ben that it is a very quiet story, on the other hand there is a lot of tension between the desires and wants of the characters. Katy pointed out that one of the themes could be putting others before yourself and that is something that both Niggle and Parish learn. What makes the situation of Niggle and Parish even curiouser though is that neither ever explicitly asks for what they want. Parish may bother Niggle for assistance, but he never directly asks, and Niggle never asks for Parish to leave him alone. Neither bother to communicates to the other because they don't believe that the other would understand, and they are right because neither understands until they work together in Niggle's Parish by the bay.
ReplyDeleteI apologize if I'm repeating anyone here, but you all had such good things to say! I definitely agree that Niggle's journey was allegorical of death. I realized this early on because of the tone I was getting from the story and because of Niggle's rush to finish his work. I think that one of the messages here, and perhaps why Niggle was punished upon his death, is that while he always did the right thing, he did not have the right reasons. He acted out of a sense of moral responsibility rather than the desire to be kind to others. He also was ignorant of "the greater whole" of the world. This was evidenced by the fact that he can make a wonderful leaf (a detail) but not a very good tree. His "good acts" were all details, but he was missing the great picture- the motivations behind them.
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