C.S. Lewis, the author of Narnia, was a frenemy of J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Hobbit and creator of the Lord of the Rings universe. The two fantasy writers had religious differences, and often got into nerdy spats as they argued about the minutiae of Middle Earth versus Narnia. They were in perfect agreement about one thing, however: hatred of Walt Disney. Lewis mellowed out a bit on the Disney hate as time went by, but as seen below, Tolkien had no chill, and held a grudge that lasted for the rest of his life.
J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis Were Frenemies United in Their Mutual Loathing of Walt Disney
J.R.R. Tolkien’s loathing of Disney began in 1938, when he and C.S. Lewis went to the cinema together to see Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Lewis did not think kindly of Disney and his movie. As he put it: “Dwarfs ought to be ugly of course, but not in that way. And the dwarfs’ jazz party was pretty bad. I suppose it never occurred to the poor boob that you could give them any other kind of music …
What might not have come of it if this man had been educated–or even brought up in a decent society?” All in all, Lewis thought the movie was lowbrow comedy. That was quite mild, compared to Tolkien’s take. He had published The Hobbit in 1937, only a few months before Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was released in the US. As seen below, both he and his good frenemy C.S. Lewis took fairy tales seriously. They were especially – Tolkien way more than Lewis – upset with Disney’s take on dwarves.
Fairy Tale Snobs
J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis had entire world views and philosophies and doctrines based on a reverence for fairy tales and their folk roots. In their view, Walt Disney had grossly oversimplified and cheapened something sacrosanct. While Tolkien’s dwarves were grim mythical creatures rooted in Nordic mythology, Disney’s dwarves were comic goofballs. Lewis eventually got over it, but Tolkien continued to get ever more bent out of shape about Disney and his ventures in the world of fairy tales. He complained until his dying day that Disney had commercialized and infantilized once-serious folklore fables, and “hopelessly corrupted” them.
In other words, Tolkien was mad that Disney had made folk stories accessible to the general public, instead of address himself to the scholars and nerds whom Tolkien thought were the only ones who could truly understand and appreciate such tales. The feud lasted until Tolkien’s dying day: he told everybody that his copyrights should never ever be sold to Disney. However, the feud seems to have been one-sided: there is no evidence that Walt Disney cared or even knew what Tolkien thought of him and his creations.
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Some Sources & Further Reading
Atlas Obscura – The Movie Date That Solidified J.R.R. Tolkien’s Dislike of Walt Disney
Comic Book Resources – Why the Creator of the Lord of the Rings Hated Disney
