Oxonmoot 2024

"In this paper I will provide an overview for a book proposal on Tolkien's Dragons. I will begin by surveying Tolkien's deep knowledge of the history of Indo-European dragon lore drawing on his Lecture on Dragons and the Essays ""Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics"" and ""On Fairy Stories"". I will discuss Tolkien's most important dragons: Smaug, Glaurung, Chrysophylax, the Sea Serpent and White Dragon in Roverandom,
as well as his Undragons: the flying Nazgul in LOTR and the serpents of iron in the 1916 Fall of Gondolin. I will also look at Tolkien's main literary models, not only the Beowulf dragon and Fafnir, but also the Midgard Serpent, St. George, Spenser's dragon in FQ, Bk I; as well as the post medieval folklore traditions (""Here be Dragons"") and the comic treatment of dragons in the 20th C Children's Literature of Edith Nesbitt and
Kenneth Grahame."