Mixed Tolkienophilia
Essays, comics, pictures and Java tools to praise Tolkien

 

A Guide to Hell
The truth about Dante

The sun in Middle-earth was static
An essay

Tolkien's Friends Name Generator
Get a Tolkien-related name based on his real life friends, students and enemies!

The Noeletubbies
A modest proposal how to bring the message to the youngest children

The Noeletubbies

I have been worrying for quite a while how children could be brought to Tolkien at an earlier age. There is nothing wrong, of course, with people being converted later in life. But reading Tolkien is like learning a language: The earlier one starts, the better.

There is, however, a minimum age for this. I am absolutely convinced that, with good education and loving, but rigid discipline, every child can learn to read, enjoy and understand the Hobbit at age 3 and LotR at 4. But it will be hard to push these limits back even further. So how to appeal to babies and toddlers? Obviously you need something visual, and even more obviously, you should not start by showing Bakshi's or Jackson's movies to your kids, unless you want to breed blasphemers and heretics.

I hereby present the result of my thoughts on this matter: a children TV series called The Noeletubbies. Based on this other popular TV series, I would introduce the kiddies to Tolkien's world in a playful way, with Bombadil sing-alongs and... um, well, I guess probably mainly with Bombadil sing-alongs.

I would play all the leading roles, of course. Can't let amateur actors ruin my scripts! On second thought, maybe I'll give Bqggz a little role, if he promises to behave. Perhaps he could be this obnoxious vacuum cleaner, that would fit his character perfectly. Also, Tolkien will smile upon our set from this weird sun-thing. I'm not sure yet who is worthy to play him. I'm leaning towards Sir Michael Caine.

I sent the sketch below to several TV production companies in the past six months. They probably liked it very much, though I have not yet received any of the enthusiastic answers they must have sent by now. I guess my enemies are stealing my mail again.