Throughout “Leaf by Niggle,” Tolkien emphasizes the natural world as both an object of beauty and a source of pleasure, though it’s often overlooked by those who value productivity. Niggle fixates on his painting, which depicts a huge tree with a background of a forest and mountains. The tree, though a painting, seems to grow organically, “sending out innumerable branches, and thrusting out the most fantastic roots.” Even though Niggle has built his painting shed on top of the potato patch and doesn’t care very much about tending to the earth, nature has nevertheless found a way into his creative practice. Councillor Tompkins mocks Niggle’s preoccupation with leaves and flowers, which he refers to in a utilitarian way as the “digestive and genital organs of plants”—yet these are the things that furnish Niggle’s Parish and allow many people to recover their health after spending time in the Workhouse. What’s more, Niggle himself finds true happiness when the nature he strove to perfect in his painting meets his own care for the earth, and he takes the time to plant real flowers around the roots of his live tree. Tolkien suggests that nature’s beauty persists, whatever value humans may ascribe to it, and that it can bring great pleasure if properly tended and appreciated.
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The Natural World Quotes in Leaf by Niggle
He had a number of pictures on hand; most of them were too large and ambitious for his skill. He was the sort of painter who can paint leaves better than trees. He used to spend a long time on a single leaf, trying to catch its shape, and its sheen, and the glistening of dewdrops on its edges. Yet he wanted to paint a whole tree, with all of its leaves in the same style, and all of them different.
There was one picture in particular which bothered him. It had begun with a leaf caught in the wind, and it became a tree; and the tree grew, sending out innumerable branches, and thrusting out the most fantastic roots. Strange birds came and settled on the twigs and had to be attended to. Then all round the Tree, and behind it, through the gaps in the leaves and boughs, a country began to open out; and there were glimpses of a forest marching over the land, and of mountains tipped with snow.
When Parish looked at Niggle’s garden (which was often) he saw mostly weeds; and when he looked at Niggle’s picture (which was seldom) he saw only green and grey patches and black lines, which seemed to him nonsensical. He did not mind mentioning the weeds (a neighbourly duty), but he refrained from giving any opinion of the pictures. He thought this was very kind, and he did not realise that, even if it was kind, it was not kind enough. Help with the weeds (and perhaps praise for the pictures) would have been better.
Before him stood the Tree, his Tree, finished. If you could say that of a Tree that was alive, its leaves opening, its branches growing and bending in the wind that Niggle had so often felt or guessed, and had so often failed to catch. He gazed at the Tree, and slowly he lifted his arms and opened them wide.
“It’s a gift!” he said. He was referring to his art, and also to the result; but he was using the word quite literally.
One day Niggle was busy planting a quickset hedge, and Parish was lying on the grass near by, looking attentively at a beautiful and shapely little yellow flower growing in the green turf. Niggle had put a lot of them among the roots of his Tree long ago. Suddenly Parish looked up: his face was glistening in the sun, and he was smiling.
“Of course, painting has uses,” said Tompkins. “But you couldn’t make use of his painting. There is plenty of scope for bold young men not afraid of new ideas and new methods. None for this old-fashioned stuff. Private daydreaming. He could not have designed a telling poster to save his life. Always fiddling with leaves and flowers. I asked him why, once. He said he thought they were pretty. Can you believe it? He said pretty! ‘What, digestive and genital organs of plants?’ I said to him; and he had nothing to answer. Silly footler.”
