[OT & rambling digression warning]

Yeah, I realize that was indeed a bit ‘out there’.   The obscure literary reference was in the context of the title character's tendency to get bogged down in minutia in his endlessly compulsive pursuit of artistic perfection.  

The obvious similarities hit me after spending a couple of days trying to get the single ideal displacement & texture mapping for a simple, ground level, panoramic view, stretching out  across a rolling field of grassy hills.  I felt that history indicates others here might also relate to Niggle’s “ailment”.  

Wikipeda does have a rather nice summary of Tolkien's short story:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaf_by_Niggle