The Los Angeles Review of Books on The Bovadium Fragments, JRR Tolkien’s posthumous complete work, which was just recently published.
Anyone who has read Tolkien’s letters will know that he is at his funniest when filled with rage, and The Bovadium Fragments is a work brimming with Tolkien’s fury—specifically, ire over mankind’s obsession with motor vehicles. Tolkien’s anger is expressed through a playful satire told from the perspective of a group of future archaeologists who are studying the titular fragments, which tell of a civilization that asphyxiated itself on its own exhaust fumes. Tolkien’s fictional fragments use the language of ancient myth, reframing modern issues like traffic congestion and parking with a grandeur that highlights their total absurdity. It is Tolkien at his angriest and funniest, making The Bovadium Fragments a minor treasure in his ever-growing catalog.
Tolkien’s repulsion toward machines is well documented, with Isengard serving as the in-story metaphor for technology used wrongly. The canonical reference has always been the war machines used in World Wars I and II, which he witnessed with terror on the battlefield. I never imagined that he also glimpsed Isengard in his everyday life, and much closer to home: in the polluted streets of Oxford.