J.R.R. Tolkien's “Leaf by Niggle”
Niggle’s remembering that he has a journey is just one of many nuisances that he has to put up with and that takes him away from his painting; it is not the case that it is the only thing that takes him away from his painting. If it were the case, however, that Niggle had an infinite amount of time on his hands, would he cease to be bothered by them? It can be said that creative work may be partly the result of limited time. Niggle knows his time is finite, and as a result he does manage to spend a good deal of time on his painting. I suspect, however, that if one were not able to “forget about it” for stretches at a time, we would all, much like Niggle, “not paint very much,” and so there is a bit of irony involved.
It is the law that seems to forcibly remove Niggle from his house and sends him on his “journey.” Earlier, however, we learn that “The laws in his country were rather strict,” and so we get a sense early on that the laws are arrayed against Niggle. There is also “a tremendous crop of interruptions” and among them is a summons or order for Niggle “to go and to serve on a jury in the town.” It is precisely this kind of interruption that brings to the fore Niggle’s relationship with his community and how he understands it and interacts within it. Niggle regards jury duty as an inconvenience that takes him away from his painting. When the Driver shows up to take him away, “Niggle went, quite quietly.” Not only did he go, but he went “quite quietly.” This meekness, however, was not present in a preceding segment when the Inspector of houses came to visit Niggle, and Niggle became quite testy with him, at one point telling the Inspector, “But I’m not a builder. Parish ought to make a complaint to the Town Council…”
Looking at Parish, we see a man that is quite willing to help the state enforce the laws. Talking about Niggle’s garden, which is nothing more than a bunch of weeds, the narrator mentions that Parish “did not mind mentioning the weeds(a neighborly duty).” The phrase “a neighborly duty” seems, perhaps, a very subtle way of saying that the state expects people to rat on their neighbors if their houses are not up to code. The interesting thing, however, is that it may not be that at all, but rather simply Parish. That is, perhaps most neighbors would be like Niggle, and simply not care about what their neighbors are doing or not doing to their houses or gardens, so that Parish is in the minority and simply represents the proverbial busybody of the neighborhood. The problem is that the neighborhood consists of only three people: Niggle, Parish, and Parish’s wife, so it is difficult to draw any conclusions concerning the larger community that Niggle is in, although we do get a taste of the larger community later on in the story with Councillor Tompkins and the schoolmaster Atkins.
At any rate, we have a curious problem here. Is it the state that wants Niggle’s garden to be weed-free, or is it Parish that wants Niggle’s garden to be weed-free, or is it both? Or, does the state want Niggle’s garden to be weed-free because that is what Parish wants, or does Parish want Niggle’s garden to be weed-free because that is what the state wants? These questions get at the heart of what gives meaning to each citizen and how that meaning is aided and/or influenced by the power of the state and by the power of each citizen. We can, for example, suggest that Parish is concerned about the weeds in Niggle’s garden only because he wants to remind Niggle that it is the law to keep weeds out of your garden, and he wants to remind Niggle of the law simply because it is the law and doing so, perhaps, makes Parish feel important. Here we see the power of the state influencing Parish, although Parish does not seem concerned about the purpose of the law and, indeed, the story never mentions the purpose of keeping weeds out of one’s garden, although we can imagine that it may be because weeds are ugly or because if you have weeds then you do not have food.
The relationship between Niggle and his neighbor occupies much of the story, although there is the period of time on Niggle’s “journey” where he is separated from Parish. Niggle is not as independent from Parish as he would like to believe; he needs him. By extension, we can say that Niggle needs at least a modicum of society in order to survive and in order to be able to paint. We know, for example, that Niggle paints in a shed on a plot of his garden, “a plot where he had once grown potatoes.” We also know that what is left of his garden contains many weeds, and so we can surmise that the amount of food being produced by Niggle’s garden is very little to none. Later on in the story, while Niggle is on his journey and he is talking to the Voices, he reminds the First Voice that Parish, “was a very good neighbor, and let me have excellent potatoes very cheap, which saved me a lot of time.” Thus, we have Niggle, a man who once exclaimed, “Curse it!” as he got on his bicycle to fetch the doctor and builder for Parish, now saying that Parish was actually “a very good neighbor” who provided him with potatoes at an excellent price, which saved him a lot of time. Time, incidentally, that could now be spent on his painting.
We can now see what it was that kept Niggle in the neighborhood ― a man whom at first seemed like a rather good reason for moving out of the neighborhood. Each person, then, has some power over the other in a mutually beneficial way, although Niggle seems oblivious to this state of affairs in the beginning of the story, where he imagines himself as a solitary figure who must suffer constant interruptions, all the while not realizing that he is often getting something in return. The supreme example of this is the reunion of Niggle and Parish that occurs within Niggle’s painting. It is here that Niggle realizes that Parish was anything but an interruption, but rather a key component in helping him to finish his “painting.” "'Of course!’ he said, ‘What I need is Parish. There are lots of things about earth, plants, and trees that he knows and I don’t.”
Parish seems to view Niggle as a valuable resource that can help him in times of need, especially as Parish has a bad leg and back. How Parish sees himself in relation to Niggle is a little less clear, and had Niggle needed more favors from Parish, perhaps we could be more sure of his stance. At any rate, Niggle certainly needs things in order to survive, and likewise so does Parish. The story, however, is rather short on details concerning how each man makes his living, or how each contributes to the society. We know that Parish has a garden. Is that how he earns his income? As for Niggle, what does he do to earn money? Certainly not his painting. What kind of a society is the story creating? We know that Niggle went to fetch a doctor and a builder for Parish, so are we to assume that these services are free to the citizens of the state? And what is the exact relationship of the citizens to the state that makes this possible? The story does not seem to touch on these points. We know, however, that there are public pensions. Niggle imagines a state official walking in while he is painting and exclaiming, “Absolutely magnificent! I see exactly what you are getting at. Do get on with it, and don’t bother about anything else! We will arrange for a public pension, so that you need not.” The passage is really quite hilarious, and at the same time it does pose the question of the role of the artist in society, or the role of anyone engaged in a “non-productive” activity. Here, Niggle imagines his relationship to the state as one of provider of art, or provider of the beautiful. The state, which appreciates the artist’s art, immediately sets up a state pension so that Niggle can paint without interruption.
If this state of affairs were to come to fruition, however, it would effectively cut Parish out of Niggle’s life. This is what Niggle originally wants. In fact, he wants to cut out everyone, every interruption, out of his life so that he can finish the painting. Thus, the “glue” that binds Parish and Niggle together would be lost. Niggle would eventually realize that he no longer has any reason to help Parish ― the mutually beneficial relationship would be unnecessary since Niggle is being provided for by the state ― he no longer needs cheap potatoes from Parish. But the story, remember, brings Parish back into the story and Parish becomes a key element in helping Niggle achieve his vision, for it is Parish that helps him with the trees and plants. If the forces that bind Niggle and Parish together, therefore, were to be severed by the state via a pension for Niggle, then we can conclude that it would be that much harder for Niggle to recognize that he needs Parish. There is a problem with this interpretation, however, for while Niggle is living with Parish, Niggle never realizes how Parish can help with his painting. It is only after Niggle has left this world and gone somewhere else that he realizes he needs Parish. Thus, if we follow the story line, we might ask what has Niggle lost? After all, Niggle made out OK in the end, so what’s the problem? I am reminded of Dickens' A Christmas Carol where Niggles “journey” may be compared to the journey of Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas.
When Parish needs wood and canvas to patch up his roof, he goes to Niggle, and while looking at Niggle's painting, asks Niggle if he can spare some. The point that is made is that Niggle’s society really does not see any value in the work of the artist. The scene prompts a question: How far are we willing to go to sacrifice art in the name of practicality? The story makes a somewhat compelling case on behalf of Parish. After all, the builder was occupied helping out the flood victims in the valley and, as the Inspector of Houses tells Niggle, "You should have helped your neighbor to make temporary repairs and prevent the damage from getting more costly to mend than necessary. That is the law. There is plenty of material here: canvas, wood, waterproof paint." The Inspector of Houses makes it quite clear that while Parish’s house was slowly deteriorating, all the materials to mend it were right next door. Again, looking at Parish, we might ask if he supports the state simply because it is the state, or whether he would believe the same even if the state’s position was that paintings have value. We might even put it in another interesting way and put Niggle in the house with the broken roof and ask how much rain and damage he would be willing to put up with before he took his painting and repaired his own roof. Perhaps he would let the house fall down around him and perish in the elements before he took even one nail to the canvas.
It may even be argued that the story itself comes down on the side of practicality. While Niggle is in the Workhouse Infirmary, “in time he forgot what it was that he had wanted a week longer for,” and "began to have a feeling of ― well, satisfaction: bread rather than jam. He could take up a task the moment one bell rang, and lay it aside promptly the moment the next one went, all tidy and ready to be continued at the right time." It would appear then, that Niggle himself has distanced himself from, indeed has forgotten, his painting, in part due to the myriad tasks that keep him busy at the Infirmary. The expression “bread rather than jam” is a bit curious. One gets the sense that Niggle now regards painting as jam ― as icing on the cake, if you will, a tasty but not essential element, and that the simple, easy-to-do tasks are the bread, the real food, the real sustenance, the essential element.
The Niggle from the beginning of the story seemed a rather uptight fellow who could never seem to relax due in part to the fact that it seemed he would never finish his painting. Niggle had “a sort of kind heart,” the sort that “made him uncomfortable more than it made him do anything; and even when he did anything, it did not prevent him from grumbling, losing his temper, and swearing(mostly to himself).” He may, in fact, had a kind heart, and the new Niggle, that is the Niggle after the train ride, certainly seems to be more content and willing to show that kind heart than was the old Niggle, who was forever helping out his near and distant neighbors while all the while swearing under his breath because he really did not think he had any time to help anyone. If Niggle could somehow learn to live with the incompleteness of the work, then his kind heart would be allowed full room to breathe.
The voices are rather bizarre, but their purpose is to draw the reader’s attention to the debates surrounding Niggle’s actions and to offer insight into what Niggle does. Here is a sample of the exchange between the First Voice and the Second Voice.
There is no note in the Records of his pretending, even to himself, that it excused his neglect of things ordered by the law.”
“Then he should not have neglected so many,” said the First Voice.
“All the same, he did answer a good many Calls.”
“A small percentage, mostly of the easier sort, and he called those Interruptions. The Records are full of the word, together with a lot of complaints and silly imprecations.”
“True; but they looked like interruptions to him, of course, poor little man. and there is this: he never expected any Return, as so many of his sort call it.
There is a back and forth here between some seemingly powerful figures, and the rather interesting aspect to it all is that neither one of them seems to be able to convince the other one, and so there is this sense that there is no way of judging Niggle’s actions as either right or wrong, moral or immoral, for even the judges, if we can call them that, can not agree. Parish himself is most likely subjected to the same scrutiny and it would have been interesting to read how the Voices debated the actions of his life. At any rate, the Second Voice has the final say concerning Niggle, and he opts for some Gentle Treatment toward Niggle. Thus, the whole purpose of the segment seems to be in highlighting the impossible task of labeling someone as either “good” or “bad”. And, indeed, when we look at Niggle, it is quite easy to see ourselves doing and not doing the very same things as Niggle and for the very same reasons and thinking, “Well, I really do have a kind heart. Or do I?”
Niggle is a curious figure in that he spends a great amount of time painting, but does not seem to earn any money from it or, indeed, any money from anything. How then, does he have money to buy potatoes from Parish? It seems an impossible situation, really, but it is never explained. At any rate, when the Second Voice decides to move Niggle on, Niggle finds himself in his painting ― that is to say, it is Niggle’s vision of what he wanted to paint turned into an actual reality. Not only this, but “Some of the most beautiful ― and the most perfect examples of the Niggle style ― were seen to have been produced in collaboration with Mr. Parish: there was no other way of putting it.”
What are we to make of it? Niggle’s answer is that, “It’s a gift!," and we can, perhaps, make an argument for this. Niggle wanted so much to capture in paint the vision in his mind, and this vision is realized in the form of a gift, which is the “Gentle Treatment” being shown him. Additionally, Niggle discovers that his idea or vision needs the assistance of Parish, who is apparently quite good at things such as planting and landscaping. The early Niggle was never quite at home with the social niceties of his world, and perhaps that is why his painting was never up to snuff. The new Niggle, however, realizes perfectly well that it is essential to communicate with others, to help others, to be a social being, in order for your vision to be realized. We should all be so fortunate to realize this without the need for a "journey."
It is the law that seems to forcibly remove Niggle from his house and sends him on his “journey.” Earlier, however, we learn that “The laws in his country were rather strict,” and so we get a sense early on that the laws are arrayed against Niggle. There is also “a tremendous crop of interruptions” and among them is a summons or order for Niggle “to go and to serve on a jury in the town.” It is precisely this kind of interruption that brings to the fore Niggle’s relationship with his community and how he understands it and interacts within it. Niggle regards jury duty as an inconvenience that takes him away from his painting. When the Driver shows up to take him away, “Niggle went, quite quietly.” Not only did he go, but he went “quite quietly.” This meekness, however, was not present in a preceding segment when the Inspector of houses came to visit Niggle, and Niggle became quite testy with him, at one point telling the Inspector, “But I’m not a builder. Parish ought to make a complaint to the Town Council…”
Looking at Parish, we see a man that is quite willing to help the state enforce the laws. Talking about Niggle’s garden, which is nothing more than a bunch of weeds, the narrator mentions that Parish “did not mind mentioning the weeds(a neighborly duty).” The phrase “a neighborly duty” seems, perhaps, a very subtle way of saying that the state expects people to rat on their neighbors if their houses are not up to code. The interesting thing, however, is that it may not be that at all, but rather simply Parish. That is, perhaps most neighbors would be like Niggle, and simply not care about what their neighbors are doing or not doing to their houses or gardens, so that Parish is in the minority and simply represents the proverbial busybody of the neighborhood. The problem is that the neighborhood consists of only three people: Niggle, Parish, and Parish’s wife, so it is difficult to draw any conclusions concerning the larger community that Niggle is in, although we do get a taste of the larger community later on in the story with Councillor Tompkins and the schoolmaster Atkins.
At any rate, we have a curious problem here. Is it the state that wants Niggle’s garden to be weed-free, or is it Parish that wants Niggle’s garden to be weed-free, or is it both? Or, does the state want Niggle’s garden to be weed-free because that is what Parish wants, or does Parish want Niggle’s garden to be weed-free because that is what the state wants? These questions get at the heart of what gives meaning to each citizen and how that meaning is aided and/or influenced by the power of the state and by the power of each citizen. We can, for example, suggest that Parish is concerned about the weeds in Niggle’s garden only because he wants to remind Niggle that it is the law to keep weeds out of your garden, and he wants to remind Niggle of the law simply because it is the law and doing so, perhaps, makes Parish feel important. Here we see the power of the state influencing Parish, although Parish does not seem concerned about the purpose of the law and, indeed, the story never mentions the purpose of keeping weeds out of one’s garden, although we can imagine that it may be because weeds are ugly or because if you have weeds then you do not have food.
The relationship between Niggle and his neighbor occupies much of the story, although there is the period of time on Niggle’s “journey” where he is separated from Parish. Niggle is not as independent from Parish as he would like to believe; he needs him. By extension, we can say that Niggle needs at least a modicum of society in order to survive and in order to be able to paint. We know, for example, that Niggle paints in a shed on a plot of his garden, “a plot where he had once grown potatoes.” We also know that what is left of his garden contains many weeds, and so we can surmise that the amount of food being produced by Niggle’s garden is very little to none. Later on in the story, while Niggle is on his journey and he is talking to the Voices, he reminds the First Voice that Parish, “was a very good neighbor, and let me have excellent potatoes very cheap, which saved me a lot of time.” Thus, we have Niggle, a man who once exclaimed, “Curse it!” as he got on his bicycle to fetch the doctor and builder for Parish, now saying that Parish was actually “a very good neighbor” who provided him with potatoes at an excellent price, which saved him a lot of time. Time, incidentally, that could now be spent on his painting.
We can now see what it was that kept Niggle in the neighborhood ― a man whom at first seemed like a rather good reason for moving out of the neighborhood. Each person, then, has some power over the other in a mutually beneficial way, although Niggle seems oblivious to this state of affairs in the beginning of the story, where he imagines himself as a solitary figure who must suffer constant interruptions, all the while not realizing that he is often getting something in return. The supreme example of this is the reunion of Niggle and Parish that occurs within Niggle’s painting. It is here that Niggle realizes that Parish was anything but an interruption, but rather a key component in helping him to finish his “painting.” "'Of course!’ he said, ‘What I need is Parish. There are lots of things about earth, plants, and trees that he knows and I don’t.”
Parish seems to view Niggle as a valuable resource that can help him in times of need, especially as Parish has a bad leg and back. How Parish sees himself in relation to Niggle is a little less clear, and had Niggle needed more favors from Parish, perhaps we could be more sure of his stance. At any rate, Niggle certainly needs things in order to survive, and likewise so does Parish. The story, however, is rather short on details concerning how each man makes his living, or how each contributes to the society. We know that Parish has a garden. Is that how he earns his income? As for Niggle, what does he do to earn money? Certainly not his painting. What kind of a society is the story creating? We know that Niggle went to fetch a doctor and a builder for Parish, so are we to assume that these services are free to the citizens of the state? And what is the exact relationship of the citizens to the state that makes this possible? The story does not seem to touch on these points. We know, however, that there are public pensions. Niggle imagines a state official walking in while he is painting and exclaiming, “Absolutely magnificent! I see exactly what you are getting at. Do get on with it, and don’t bother about anything else! We will arrange for a public pension, so that you need not.” The passage is really quite hilarious, and at the same time it does pose the question of the role of the artist in society, or the role of anyone engaged in a “non-productive” activity. Here, Niggle imagines his relationship to the state as one of provider of art, or provider of the beautiful. The state, which appreciates the artist’s art, immediately sets up a state pension so that Niggle can paint without interruption.
If this state of affairs were to come to fruition, however, it would effectively cut Parish out of Niggle’s life. This is what Niggle originally wants. In fact, he wants to cut out everyone, every interruption, out of his life so that he can finish the painting. Thus, the “glue” that binds Parish and Niggle together would be lost. Niggle would eventually realize that he no longer has any reason to help Parish ― the mutually beneficial relationship would be unnecessary since Niggle is being provided for by the state ― he no longer needs cheap potatoes from Parish. But the story, remember, brings Parish back into the story and Parish becomes a key element in helping Niggle achieve his vision, for it is Parish that helps him with the trees and plants. If the forces that bind Niggle and Parish together, therefore, were to be severed by the state via a pension for Niggle, then we can conclude that it would be that much harder for Niggle to recognize that he needs Parish. There is a problem with this interpretation, however, for while Niggle is living with Parish, Niggle never realizes how Parish can help with his painting. It is only after Niggle has left this world and gone somewhere else that he realizes he needs Parish. Thus, if we follow the story line, we might ask what has Niggle lost? After all, Niggle made out OK in the end, so what’s the problem? I am reminded of Dickens' A Christmas Carol where Niggles “journey” may be compared to the journey of Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas.
When Parish needs wood and canvas to patch up his roof, he goes to Niggle, and while looking at Niggle's painting, asks Niggle if he can spare some. The point that is made is that Niggle’s society really does not see any value in the work of the artist. The scene prompts a question: How far are we willing to go to sacrifice art in the name of practicality? The story makes a somewhat compelling case on behalf of Parish. After all, the builder was occupied helping out the flood victims in the valley and, as the Inspector of Houses tells Niggle, "You should have helped your neighbor to make temporary repairs and prevent the damage from getting more costly to mend than necessary. That is the law. There is plenty of material here: canvas, wood, waterproof paint." The Inspector of Houses makes it quite clear that while Parish’s house was slowly deteriorating, all the materials to mend it were right next door. Again, looking at Parish, we might ask if he supports the state simply because it is the state, or whether he would believe the same even if the state’s position was that paintings have value. We might even put it in another interesting way and put Niggle in the house with the broken roof and ask how much rain and damage he would be willing to put up with before he took his painting and repaired his own roof. Perhaps he would let the house fall down around him and perish in the elements before he took even one nail to the canvas.
It may even be argued that the story itself comes down on the side of practicality. While Niggle is in the Workhouse Infirmary, “in time he forgot what it was that he had wanted a week longer for,” and "began to have a feeling of ― well, satisfaction: bread rather than jam. He could take up a task the moment one bell rang, and lay it aside promptly the moment the next one went, all tidy and ready to be continued at the right time." It would appear then, that Niggle himself has distanced himself from, indeed has forgotten, his painting, in part due to the myriad tasks that keep him busy at the Infirmary. The expression “bread rather than jam” is a bit curious. One gets the sense that Niggle now regards painting as jam ― as icing on the cake, if you will, a tasty but not essential element, and that the simple, easy-to-do tasks are the bread, the real food, the real sustenance, the essential element.
The Niggle from the beginning of the story seemed a rather uptight fellow who could never seem to relax due in part to the fact that it seemed he would never finish his painting. Niggle had “a sort of kind heart,” the sort that “made him uncomfortable more than it made him do anything; and even when he did anything, it did not prevent him from grumbling, losing his temper, and swearing(mostly to himself).” He may, in fact, had a kind heart, and the new Niggle, that is the Niggle after the train ride, certainly seems to be more content and willing to show that kind heart than was the old Niggle, who was forever helping out his near and distant neighbors while all the while swearing under his breath because he really did not think he had any time to help anyone. If Niggle could somehow learn to live with the incompleteness of the work, then his kind heart would be allowed full room to breathe.
The voices are rather bizarre, but their purpose is to draw the reader’s attention to the debates surrounding Niggle’s actions and to offer insight into what Niggle does. Here is a sample of the exchange between the First Voice and the Second Voice.
There is no note in the Records of his pretending, even to himself, that it excused his neglect of things ordered by the law.”
“Then he should not have neglected so many,” said the First Voice.
“All the same, he did answer a good many Calls.”
“A small percentage, mostly of the easier sort, and he called those Interruptions. The Records are full of the word, together with a lot of complaints and silly imprecations.”
“True; but they looked like interruptions to him, of course, poor little man. and there is this: he never expected any Return, as so many of his sort call it.
There is a back and forth here between some seemingly powerful figures, and the rather interesting aspect to it all is that neither one of them seems to be able to convince the other one, and so there is this sense that there is no way of judging Niggle’s actions as either right or wrong, moral or immoral, for even the judges, if we can call them that, can not agree. Parish himself is most likely subjected to the same scrutiny and it would have been interesting to read how the Voices debated the actions of his life. At any rate, the Second Voice has the final say concerning Niggle, and he opts for some Gentle Treatment toward Niggle. Thus, the whole purpose of the segment seems to be in highlighting the impossible task of labeling someone as either “good” or “bad”. And, indeed, when we look at Niggle, it is quite easy to see ourselves doing and not doing the very same things as Niggle and for the very same reasons and thinking, “Well, I really do have a kind heart. Or do I?”
Niggle is a curious figure in that he spends a great amount of time painting, but does not seem to earn any money from it or, indeed, any money from anything. How then, does he have money to buy potatoes from Parish? It seems an impossible situation, really, but it is never explained. At any rate, when the Second Voice decides to move Niggle on, Niggle finds himself in his painting ― that is to say, it is Niggle’s vision of what he wanted to paint turned into an actual reality. Not only this, but “Some of the most beautiful ― and the most perfect examples of the Niggle style ― were seen to have been produced in collaboration with Mr. Parish: there was no other way of putting it.”
What are we to make of it? Niggle’s answer is that, “It’s a gift!," and we can, perhaps, make an argument for this. Niggle wanted so much to capture in paint the vision in his mind, and this vision is realized in the form of a gift, which is the “Gentle Treatment” being shown him. Additionally, Niggle discovers that his idea or vision needs the assistance of Parish, who is apparently quite good at things such as planting and landscaping. The early Niggle was never quite at home with the social niceties of his world, and perhaps that is why his painting was never up to snuff. The new Niggle, however, realizes perfectly well that it is essential to communicate with others, to help others, to be a social being, in order for your vision to be realized. We should all be so fortunate to realize this without the need for a "journey."