I see the Silmarillion (and really the entire legendarium) as partly true myth. I think Tolkien has gone far to create the illusion that we are reading the 'true story' behind Atlantis, the evil eye, the sidhe, the dwarves of the Edda, the greek gods etc etc etc. I think this is his great trick in fact. When i say true myth i mean that he has conserved enough of the myths and legends of the old Northwest of the old continents in his legendarium that the truth in them remains. I do believe mythology to be truer than any other form of literature. Consider for example the various 'Atlantis myths' and their lure among ppls living on the shores of the great ocean. They say something fundamental to us about how the ocean figures in our psyche. When I read Tolkien his stories speak to me at such a fundamental level about the ocean and about mortality/death. For me this is the power of true myth. That's enough for late night ranting....at some other time and occasion I would love to discuss how his dreams might have influenced his writing.

PS! Stu..i hope i havent strayed too far from the realm of sanity :)

The discussion here highlights what is so unique about The Silmarillion. It is not easily/neatly classified.

Christopher later stated that in retrospect he thought it was a mistake for the published Silmarillion to not have a "frame story" like Hobbit and LOTR, where the reader is reading a telling of what Bilbo/Frodo/Sam wrote in the "Red Book". For Sil, presumably this would have been Bilbo's translations of the Elven legends from Rivendell.