J.R.R. Tolkien Expressed a "Heartfelt Loathing" for Walt Disney and Refused to Let Disney Studios Adapt His Work

"I've just start­ed read­ing J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hob­bit to my daugh­ter. While much of the nuance and the ref­er­ences to Tolkien­ian deep time are lost on her, she eas­i­ly grasps the dis­tinc­tive charms of the char­ac­ters, the nature of their jour­ney, and the per­ils, won­ders, and Elven friends they have met along the way so far. She is famil­iar with fairy tale dwarfs and myth­ic wiz­ards, though not with the typol­o­gy of insu­lar, mid­dle-class, adven­ture-averse coun­try gen­try, thus Hob­bits them­selves took a bit of explain­ing."

"In fact, Tolkien most­ly hat­ed Disney's cre­ations, and he made these feel­ings very clear. Snow White debuted only months after The Hob­bit 's pub­li­ca­tion in 1937. As it hap­pened, Tolkien went to see the film with lit­er­ary friend and some­time rival C.S. Lewis. Nei­ther liked it very much. In a 1939 let­ter, Lewis grant­ed that "the ter­ri­fy­ing bits were good, and the ani­mals real­ly most mov­ing." But he also called Dis­ney a "poor boob" and lament­ed "What might not have come of it if this man had been educated-or even brought up in a decent soci­ety?""

A parent reads The Hobbit aloud to a young child who readily appreciates the characters, journey, perils, wonders, and Elven allies, though the social type of Hobbits requires explanation. A comparison arises between Tolkien's dwarves and the dwarfs of Snow White and the Brothers Grimm, but any resemblance is limited. Tolkien reacted strongly against Walt Disney's creations and made his dislike clear. Snow White premiered months after The Hobbit's 1937 publication. Tolkien viewed the film with C.S. Lewis; both disliked it, and Lewis praised certain frightening moments and animated animals while criticizing Disney personally in a 1939 letter.

Read at Open Culture