letter from a last traveler

I haven't written here since before my trip to Milwaukee for the Tolkien Conference. I left on the 20th, got back a week ago Tuesday, but have been too swamped with post-trip activities to write a proper report. Actually I did start to write one over the weekend, but it got eaten in a computer freeze. Bleh.

milwaukeesfs put a nice summary of the conference's intellectual content in his LJ. I got to see him and his wife, and a few other Mythopoeic Society folk who showed up, but most of my attending friends were the other presenters - almost all of whom I know, some quite well - and the bulk of the attendees were strangers to me, though interested and well-versed in Tolkien. When I began my paper by saying,

When I read The Lord of the Rings for the first time, at the age of twelve, the experience was overwhelming. But I could not find anyone who either knew or cared about Tolkien in the deepest suburbs where I made my home. My dream, my goal in life, was that some day, somehow, I would find myself in a room full of people who had all read The Lord of the Rings and wanted to talk about it.

it was interrupted at this point by applause. Clearly they felt the same way.

This was of course far from the first time I'd been in such a room, though this room was by far the greatest population of Tolkienists I'd ever addressed, and the first time I'd been specifically invited to do so. I have been at a few small gatherings of Tolkien scholars, where a dozen of us sit around a table and share our research, and this conference reminded me a little of what it'd be like if we'd invited 300 people to come and watch us do it.

As one of the presenters it was certainly interesting being a minor celebrity for a short period, and most relieving that I could stop being one. I have never been asked for my autograph so often, but at least I got the chance to practice the (theoretically) legible version of my signature I keep for such occasions. Most of my exchanges with my fellow wizards were hurried snatches of talk amid the crowds. Now I know how big-name pros (and big-name fans, too, no doubt) feel at Worldcons. The big challenge is being polite and courteous. I'm not particularly skilled at social interaction with people I don't know: it's less humiliating, but more challenging, when they want to talk with you. I had some very enriching conversations with people I didn't know, but I fear that I inadvertently snubbed as many more.

One satisfying aspect of this visit was the opportunity to pay homage to the fact that Wisconsin is, as I said in an earlier post, the Old Country for my family. Not only had the time to visit and have dinner with my cousins, but I got to both cemeteries where family members are buried. If you haven't been to a cemetery for a long time, the challenge is simply remembering where the tombs are that you're looking for. I hadn't been to my mother's cousin's grave since she was buried in it eight years ago. But I found it.

I hear that I missed a fair amount of rain at home. The weather was fair in Wisconsin, but the state was buried under a blizzard of politics. Driving out to Madison for a quick two-hour bookstore raid (sorry I missed you, juliebata - you were probably on the phone with holyoutlaw when I called), I watched the Bush and Michels [GOP senatorial candidate] signs of the small towns slowly give way to Kerry and Baldwin [local Dem. congresscritter] signs as I approached Madison. (Very few signs for Senator Feingold, though he's supposed to be unapproachably ahead.) Grabbed lunch at one of the Himalayan restaurants that decorate State Street, popped into Avol's and Paul's (say, I like Avol's new quarters - dark and roomy, just right for an academic used bookstore) and this thunderingly wonderful classical CD basement shop whose name I forget, then darted back to Chicago whence I originally came.

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