Interesting Tolkien-related links

New issue of Journal of Tolkien Research (free online journal featuring some scholars who are of had been associated with Tolkien Studies)

http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/

Year-end update from Douglas A. Anderson's 'Tolkien and Fantasy' blog:
http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2015/12/end-of-year-chatter.html?utm_sourc...

re Tolkien Studies 12 (etc) on the Lingwe blog:
http://lingwe.blogspot.com/

https://wayneandchristina.wordpress.com

The mostly Tolkien related blog of Tolkien scholars Wayne G Hammond and Christina Scull...

Review of 'Tolkien and Sanskrit'
http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol3/iss3/6/

Somewhat incestuous, but I've recently run across these (intermittently) interesting Tolkien threads over on LT's Folio Society group:

The Tolkien Thread (1) http://www.librarything.com/topic/155649

The Tolkien Thread (2) http://www.librarything.com/topic/157761

The Tolkien Thread (3) http://www.librarything.com/topic/193664

The link in the now-defunct post >12 indbabes: was indeed interesting. I wonder what Tolkien and/or his Middle Earth characters would have made of Indian escorts at USD 500 per night?

I think this one is freely accessible:
Laughter in the Middle-earth: Humour in and around the Works of JRRT
https://www.academia.edu/30069444/Laughter_in_Middle-earth_Humour_in_and_around_...

Tolkien's grandson Simon on how Word War I 'inspired' The Lord of the Rings - and also a plug for his own new book.

http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20161223-tolkiens-grandson-on-how-ww1-inspired-...

>16 John5918: Thanks for sharing the link to this article. I really enjoyed reading it and am planning on picking his book up which sounds very interesting to me.

>17 Tolkienfan:
Also worth checking out Tolkien and the Great War by Tolkien scholar John Garth.

>19 Crypto-Willobie:

Very interesting, I've read some of Tolkien's essays but never that one (in fact, had never heard of it). Would love to get your take on it if you choose to read it.

Fantasy (etc) books by Tolkien (etc) acholars...
http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2017/02/tolkien-scholars-write-fantasy.htm...

An acholar, is that a scholar with a cold? ;)

Aha! my menu nickname at a previous job was "Typo"...

I wonder how he determined that Wales is the old kingdom of Gondor.

Convenience, probably.
His surname, Evans, is Welsh.
The King who returned reigned in Gondor.

http://www.thebookseller.com/news/bodleian-library-unearths-new-tolkien-507701

Not sure how 'unprecedented' all of this is except in the eyes of the exhibit mounter. A great deal of the Hobbit drafts have been published http://www.librarything.com/work/15184137/book/47564771 , same with Tolkien's illustrations http://www.librarything.com/work/346531 , and correspondence http://www.librarything.com/work/3203545. But no doubt they have even more special stuff...

>27 Crypto-Willobie:

I wonder what material was from Marquette University (Wisconsin) and its provenance. No doubt I'll have to buy the book to find out!

2017 Tolkien Society Awards, and other links

https://www.tolkiensociety.org/

Doug Anderson's NODENS BOOKS to be publishing some Tolkien-related titles as well as some other fantasy...

http://www.nodensbooks.com/2017/05/nodens-books-revival.html?utm_source=feedburn...

https://www.academia.edu/32488574/Note_concerning_the_Influence_of_Tolkiens_scho...

Tolkien, Eucatastrophe, and the Re-Creation of Medieval Legend

http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol4/iss1/8/

Recent papers available for reading or download at The Journal of Tolkien Research:
http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/

Riders, Chivalry, and Knighthood in Tolkien
Thomas Honegger Department of English, Friedrich-Schiller-University

Tolkien, Self and Other: "This Queer Creature" (2016) by Jane Chance
Kristine Larsen Central Connecticut State University

Tolkien’s Sub-Creation and Secondary Worlds: Implications for a Robust Moral Psychology. Nathan S. Lefler University of Scranton

I've only just discovered this interview with Tolkien on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFexwNCYenI

Middle-Earth vs. the Duniverse

http://www.quarterly-review.org/middle-earth-v-duniverse/

Hobbits and Maps!

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2017/10/whither-river-running.html?utm_sou...

New reviews at Journal of Tolkien Research

Aotrou and Itroun by Thomas Honegger
http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol4/iss2/4/

Beren and Luthien by D C Kane
http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol4/iss2/5/

Publication on November 2 (but now slightly delayed) of the new revised edition of Wayne G. Hammond's and Christina Scull's J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide. It was two volumes in 2006, now it's three! For one thing quite a number of 'new' Tolkien works have been published in the meantime. See what Hammond & Scull have to say about it here:
https://wayneandchristina.wordpress.com/2017/11/03/publication-day-plus-one/

Christopher Tolkien resigns...
http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2017/11/15/104426-in-historic-move-christopher-t...

Publications: Journal of Tolkien Research

Guinevere, Grímhild, and the Corrigan: Witches and Bitches in Tolkien’s Medieval Narrative Verse. Kristine Larsen Central Connecticut State University
http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol4/iss2/8/

Tolkien’s Theology of Beauty: Majesty, Splendor, and Transcendence in Middle-earth (2016) by Lisa Coutras. John Wm. Houghton The Hill School
http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol4/iss2/7/

The Great Tower of Elfland: The Mythopoeic Worldview of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, G.K. Chesterton and George MacDonald (2017) by Zachary A. Rhone.
Mike Foster retired
http://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol4/iss2/6/

Book review of' Flora of Middle-earth (2017)' by Walter S. Judd and Graham A. Judd

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol4/iss2/9/

Elvish Practitioners of the 'Secret Vice'

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol5/iss1/1/

Only read the abstract, so maybe a full reading would clarify this question: is the author claiming Tolkien was building into the Legendarium the idea that Elves were aware of (and perhaps even influenced by) the English tradition of language invention?

That doesn't fit with my understanding of the Legendarium. Tolkien was not positing that we live in the Fourth Age, was he? Rather, there are parallels between the Age of Men in Middle-earth and our own history on Earth. But these histories are not of the same world.

It certainly is the same world. However, Tolkien left the gap between the Third Age and our age hazy on purpose. I think he speculates briefly in a letter that ours might be the seventh age, or something like that.

I've been thinking of it all wrong! -- though I admit, it's not central to my appreciation to think on that aspect of the world, at all. Still, a new insight for me.

I don't think it matters very much. Regardless of Tolkien's own thoughts on the matter, Middle-earth and Arda are in effect secondary worlds.

Language as Communication vs. Language as Art: J.R.R. Tolkien and early 20th-century radical linguistic experimentation

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol5/iss1/2/

I have not yet read Tolkien's "A Secret Vice" and >47 Crypto-Willobie: reminds me I want to do that eventually.

Tolkien, Aquinas...

https://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1093&context=journalof...

New publications from Nodens Press and Tolkien scholar Douglas A. Anderson.

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2018/04/my-new-book-and-two-others-from-no...

Tolkien Notes 15

https://wayneandchristina.wordpress.com/2018/04/30/tolkien-notes-15/

>53 Crypto-Willobie:

That's precisely the sort of autobiographical tidbit it's fun to learn and wonder about.

Music for the Lay of Aotrou and Itroun?

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2018/08/the-lay-of-aotrou-and-itroun-breto...

“In Search of Doors”: V.E. Schwab’s 2018 J.R.R. Tolkien Lecture on Fantasy Literature

https://www.tor.com/2018/08/13/in-search-of-doors-read-v-e-schwabs-2018-j-r-r-to...

>56 Crypto-Willobie:

Bold, to deliver a Tolkien Lecture without having read Tolkien. I agree with her stance, though.

I like the distinction she makes between Tolkien and Lewis:

Because a fantasy set entirely in another world is an escapism with limits. You can read about it, sure, but you can never really get there. A fantasy with a door, a portal, a way in, that breeds a different kind of belief.

It can be argued that Tolkien provides a door, it's simply much better hidden: see >43 elenchus: - >46 anglemark:

Got a hill? have your own Bag End installed! (etc)

https://wayneandchristina.wordpress.com/2018/09/02/tolkien-notes-16/

Volume 6 of the online Journal of Tolkien Research

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol6/iss1/

Deluxe Easton Press Children of Hurin
https://www.eastonpress.com/prod/DC9/1840/J-R-R--TOLKIEN-S-THE-CHILDREN-OF-H%C3%...

>63 Crypto-Willobie: Personally I could do without the illustrations, Alan Lee is not at all to my taste, gifted as he is (yeah, I know, I'm weird that way), but a beautiful binding nevertheless.

If you are in New York or are going to be...
http://www.openculture.com/2019/01/the-largest-j-r-r-tolkien-exhibit-in-generati...

Wot the dickens?

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/aug/11/tolkien-dickens-descendants-collab...

New papers posted at the online Journal of Tolkien Research:

‘Hel-heime!’: The Daring Love Between Men in Dome Karukoski’s "Tolkien"
Christopher Vaccaro, The University of Vermont
Abstract: This article briefly summarizes the homo-amorous connections between members of the T.C.B.S. in Karukoski's film, "Tolkien".
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol6/iss2/11/

Beyond The Hobbit: J.R.R. Tolkien’s Other Works for Children
Janet Brennan Croft, Rutgers University - New Brunswick/Piscataway
Abstract: John Ronald Reuel Tolkien is best known to the world as the author of the classic fantasies The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. In his professional life, he was a superb philologist, a skilled translator, the author of a seminal essay on Beowulf, and a contributor to the Oxford English Dictionary. But Tolkien was also a father who loved to make up stories for his four children, write them down, and in many cases, as we’ve seen in the exhibit at the Morgan, illustrate them himself. Tolkien was an enthusiastic amateur artist with a unique style, loved color and line and repetitive decoration, but he was rather better at depicting landscapes than people. He usually worked in pen and ink, chalk, or colored pencil. In addition to The Hobbit, widely considered a classic of children’s literature, he also wrote four shorter works specifically for children, two published during his lifetime (Farmer Giles of Ham and Smith of Wootton Major) and two posthumously (Roverrandom and Mr. Bliss), as well as many poems and a delightful collection of annual illustrated letters from Father Christmas.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol6/iss2/9/

Aside from the four works mentioned in the abstract, Croft also touches on The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, Bilbo's Last Song and Letters from Father Christmas.

For what it's worth, I don't consider Smith of Wootton Major to be a 'children's story'. A fairy story, yes; but for adults.

A bit of Tolkien in this story:
https://phys.org/news/2019-04-beowulf-statistical-technique-evidence-english.htm...

More new papers from the online Journal of Tolkien Research:

= = = = =

Review of 'Binding Them All' (2017), ed. by Monika Kirner-Ludwig, Stephan Köser, and Sebastian Streitberger
Abstract: Book review by Anna Smol, Mount Saint Vincent University, of 'Binding Them All' (2017), ed. by Monika Kirner-Ludwig, Stephan Köser and Sebastian Streitberger
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/2/

= = = = =

'Intertextuality and Iconography in Sergei Iukhimov's Illustrations for The Lord of the Rings: Five Case Studies' by Joel Merriner, University of Plymouth
Abstract: J.R.R. Tolkien once remarked in a letter to his publisher that his friends had been so impressed by Pauline Baynes’ illustrations for Farmer Giles of Ham that they labelled his text a “commentary on the drawings”. This apparently light-hearted anecdote conceals an interesting truth: the relationship between text and image can be problematic and the reading of an illustration depends largely on the culturally acquired discursive precedents which an individual viewer brings to the act of looking. This situation may be further complicated when account is taken of any incidences of visual borrowing present within an illustration. The primary purpose of this article therefore is to identify and evaluate such incidences of visual borrowing and, by extension, intertextual meaning in five of Sergei Iukhimov’s Soviet era illustrations for Natalya Grigor’eva and Vladimir Grushetskij’s 1993 Russian translation of The Lord of the Rings.
I begin by defining the two distinct types of visual borrowing detectable within the Iukhimov case studies: general correspondence and direct visual prototype. I then establish my methodological approach, describing how semiotic and iconographic elements are synthesised to form a new interpretive model. Subsequent analysis of the case studies reveals a diversity of borrowed motifs, derived from sources such as frescoes, hagiographic paintings and manuscript miniatures. I also demonstrate how, in several case studies, certain borrowed motifs retain enough of their original iconography that, when combined with the new Tolkienian motif, give rise to polysemy. To conclude, I hypothesise that Iukhimov’s corpus functions most effectively when viewed as a visual affirmation of the plurality of images which existed outside of Soviet totalitarianism.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/1/

From the NY Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/opinion/what-tolkien-knew-about-love.html?em_...

ETA/FYI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Darger

Copious mentions of JRRT in this new dissertation: "The Semiospheres of Prejudice in the Fantastic Arts : The Inherited Racism of Irrealia and Their Translation"

This study discusses the evolution of racialized concepts in the genres of the fantastic, especially fantasy, science fiction, and supernatural horror. It provides the first detailed interpretation of how such concepts are constructed and how they develop based on their interaction with the evolving cultural landscapes, thus showing how characteristics are borrowed from real world cultural stereotypes. The analysis concentrates on fantastic renderings of racialized stereotypes based on real world cultural fears. The concepts are examined both in their source cultures and through the lenses of transmediality and translation. As the fantastic arts have always been heavily transmedial in nature, the study is not limited to a certain art form, but views all media as complementary in producing concepts of the fantastic, either by adding new facets to the concepts, or by changing them on a temporal basis.

....

The study argues that the inclusion of properties of racialized stereotypes from real world cultures to fantastic concepts is widespread and that especially negative racialized allusions often survive in texts of the fantastic, even after they have been perceived as offensive in the real world cultures from which they stem. It displays how racialized narratives can change when fantastic concepts inherit properties from new real world racialized stereotypes, and how inheriting signifiers from a “positive” real world racialization can affect the negative properties of fantastic concepts.

https://helda.helsinki.fi/handle/10138/299080

>71 anglemark:
Very interesting, thanks.

I wish it had an index, as I probably won't have time to plow thru all 174 pages. And word-search yields no instances of Cabell, Rider Haggard, Machen and others who might figure in a discussion of the racial in the fantastic. But I should be satisfied with what he wrote instead of what I wish he wrote...

From The Guardian: Tolkien estate disavows forthcoming film starring Nicholas Hoult

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/apr/23/tolkien-estate-disavows-forthcomin...

I'm looking forward to the Hoult film, even as I assume it takes liberties with the facts to further the story it wants to tell.

The estate's disavowal is worded such that it doesn't object explicitly to any aspect of the film. It merely states it wasn't involved in the film's production and does not lend the film it's imprimatur. I wonder then about the motivation for the statement: an indication of the estate's growing savvy regarding what could happen when others control the narrative, and so putting up clear boundaries? Or a reaction to some specific thing? Or, which sits less comfortably with me: a specific concern for the success of its own interests relative to the Amazon television series, i.e. the profit motive?

Isn't there some homo-erotic content that the relatively strait-laced (and Catholic) Tolkien family might object to? One of his school/army buddies had a crush on our Ronnie? Or am I misremembering what I read about it a while back?

“While the World Lasted”: Eschatology in Tolkien’s 1930s Writings"
by Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University

Abstract: this is a much-abridged version of a paper that was first delivered at the New York Tolkien Conference, Baruch College, New York City, NY, June 13, 2015.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/4/

More from the online Journal of Toliien Research:

Fore and Aft: Abstraction in Tolkien’s “Ishness” Designs
John R. Holmes, Franciscan University of Steubenville
ABSTRACT: Though Tolkien's artwork tended toward the figural, there was a period during his undergraduate years in which he created abstracts under the name of "Ishnesses." This essay examines the nature of abstraction, how it relates to medieval concepts of art, and how it relates to Tolkien's "visionary" painting of subjects not in the primary world but in the Middle-earth of his vast imagination.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/8/

=====================================

Pagan Saints in Middle-earth (2018) by Claudio A. Testi
Book review by Jonathan Evans (University of Georgia) of Pagan Saints in Middle-earth (2018) by Claudio A. Testi
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/3/

=================================

Sub-creating Arda (2019), edited by Dimitra Fimi and Thomas Honegger
Book review by Dennis Wilson Wise (University of Arizona) of Sub-creating Arda (2019), edited by Dimitra Fimi and Thomas Honegger
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/6/

================================
Inklings of Truth (2018), edited by Paul Shrimpton
Book review by Mike Foster of Inklings of Truth (2018), by Michael Ward, Stratford Caldecott, Walter Hooper, Simon Stacey, edited by Paul Shrimpton
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/5/

A Journey Down the Rabbit Hole of the OED in Search of the Meaning of “Master” Elrond
Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University

Abstract: An editorial commentary on the use of the title “Master” to describe Elrond, with heavy reliance on the Oxford English Dictionary.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/9/

New Tolkien-related book...

Tolkien's Lost Chaucer
John M. Bowers

Reveals the story of J. R. Tolkien's unpublished and previously unknown book hidden in the Oxford University Press archives
Explores Tolkien's annotated proofs and accompanying notes for the 'Clarendon Chaucer' edition that he abandoned in 1951 after almost 30 years of work
Draws upon a number of previously unpublished writings by Tolkien including unpublished letters and lectures
Shows Tolkien as a brilliant, insightful thinker about Chaucer's language and storytelling and shows the ways that his decades-long work on Chaucer inspired key episodes in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/tolkiens-lost-chaucer-9780198842675?cc=u...

https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0198842678/ref=nosim/addallcom-20
(although I'll probably buy it from Alibris or Book Depository rather than Amazombie)

I've got a lot of other Tolkien reading to do, but >79 Crypto-Willobie: sounds like one of the more interesting readings in the "writing of" corpus. Thirty years of work! But misleading, I'm guessing: so much of what he was doing was caught up in everything else he was doing, so he might very well have thought his efforts weren't abandoned so much as shunted in other directions.

Yeh, he was almost as bad as me at not finishing stuff...

This review presents a number of caveats to Oronzo Cilli's recent book Tolkien's Library.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol7/iss1/10/

Latest from the Journal of Tolkien Research:

Ofermod and Aristocratic Chivalry in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings

Abstract: This paper explores connections between J.R.R. Tolkien’s 1953 Essays and Studies publication The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm’s Son and representations of ofermod and aristocratic “chivalry” in The Lord of the Rings. Focusing on the motivations and leadership-related decisions of Denethor and Faramir in The Lord of the Rings, this paper argues that Faramir's behavior and motivations, despite Denethor’s implications to the contrary, cannot be described in terms of ofermod regardless of the risk that his choice to reject the Ring appears to pose to Gondor. By contrast, Denethor and his son Boromir represent the pride-motivated decision-making and rash heroics that Tolkien ties to ofermod and aristocratic “chivalry” in Homecoming. This becomes particularly apparent through close linguistic analysis of Denethor’s speeches to Faramir and Gandalf in The Return of the King. Ultimately, this paper argues that Denethor’s behavior leading up to and during the siege of Minas Tirith draws out a prominent danger of ofermod in Tolkien’s literature: the ability of the privileged leader to abandon hope on behalf of subordinates. By contrast, Tolkien’s protagonists represent the opposite impulse: they embrace hope on behalf of others, setting the stage for Tolkien’s eucatastrophic interventions.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol8/iss1/1/

Yikes. I bought this volume as a reference book, and while it's self-evidently "broad" in its approach, it's disappointing to see evidence of scholarly lapses throughout.

To me, the abstract sounds like, "yeah, duh". Of course, textual analysis is always a good thing, but isn't the conclusion obvious from even a cursory reading of the text? Glaringly obvious, even.

Is post 84 responding to 82,
and 85 to 83?

I did mean 84 to reply to 82. I didn't realize the "reply" button wouldn't refer back to 82.

>87 jfclark: The reply button just adds a comment to the bottom. To refer to a post, you must manually type a > followed by the post number.

>88 anglemark: Thanks!

Deconstructing Durin’s Day: Science, Scientific Fan Fiction, and the Fan-Scholar
by Kristine Larsen

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol8/iss1/3/

Well! this latest entry from the Journal of Tolkien Research... instead of just being an article it's a book (pdf) 243 pages long!

The entire entry at JoTR: https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol8/iss1/4/

Down the Withywindle and into the Barrow: Seeking Answers to Mewlip Mayhem and Other Middle-earth Mysteries by William G. Korver, Oklahoma Wesleyan University

Abstract: After the opening “Introduction” chapter that explains my reasoning and goals for this collection, the subsequent chapter titles for this collection are the following: “In Memory of the House of Finrod and the Realm of Nargothrond: Gildor of (Near) Rivendell, The Reluctant Warrior,” “Goldberry, the River-Elf,” “‘Elf-friend’ and ‘elf-friend’: An Alternative to Some of Hammond and Scull’s Alterations to J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings,” “The Third Order, Lesser Spirits of Middle-earth: Tom Bombadil, the Master Blue Sprite,” “Other Lesser, Third Order Spirits,” and “Addendum: An Earthly Inspiration for ‘The Mewlips’?” Within the work concerning Gildor, I theorize about the Elf’s identity, his motives, and his actions, as well as his relationship with Galadriel. Within the article regarding Goldberry, I mention theories about Goldberry’s heritage, the death of her father, and observe the evidence supporting Goldberry’s Elven ancestry in several of Tolkien’s works. The third article, meanwhile, questions Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull’s alteration of “Elf-friend” to “elf-friend” in their edition of LotR while arguing for the restoration of “elf-friend” (as well as “elf-country”) to Tolkien’s masterpiece. In the fourth article, I present theories regarding Bombadil’s rank among the Third Order Spirits and his position as a vassal spirit to one of the powerful Valar spirits while also noting how Bombadil’s position among the spirits relates to Goldberry’s heritage as well. This fourth article ends with my quibbling with past scholarship regarding the identities of Bombadil and Goldberry. In the fifth article, I include various theories regarding the identities of other lesser Middle-earth spirits—including the Mewlips and the lintips; this article also includes theories about the names of the Mewlips and the lintips and possible Middle-earth sources for “The Mewlips” poem as well. The collection ends with an “Addendum” detailing a theory concerning the notion that the Mendip region in England served as one of the earthly inspirations for Tolkien’s poem “The Mewlips.” While each of the aforementioned chapters could be read separately, I think that there is “something more” gained by reading the articles in the context of the other works.

Recommended Citation: Korver, William G. (2019) "Down the Withywindle and into the Barrow: Seeking Answers to Mewlip Mayhem and Other Middle-earth Mysteries," Journal of Tolkien Research: Vol. 8 : Iss. 1 , Article 4.

The PDF:
https://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1148&context=journalof...

===============================================

Whoa! and here's the same guy's 581 page Ph.D. dissertation, open access:
The Ecophilosophy of J.R.R. Tolkien: Rural and Urban Roads to Conscientious Living through Environmental Guardianship.
PDF: https://search.proquest.com/openview/a9699b9bd75377ab52f60482b11be251/1?pq-origs...

Yikes. It's not too often that you see a scholar admitting to "quibbling" with other scholarship, particularly with respect to such fanboy trivia as the (putative) taxonomic status of Goldberry. I can't wait for his next article about where the Mouth of Sauron fits in the hierarchy of Sauron's servants.

>92 jfclark:

lol

Something Has Gone Crack: New Perspectives on J.R.R. Tolkien in the Great War

Book review by Will Sherwood of "Something has Gone Crack" (2019) edited by Janet Brennan Croft and Annika Röttinger

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol8/iss1/5/

"Did Tolkien Write The Lord of the Rings Because He Was Avoiding His Academic Work?"

https://lithub.com/did-tolkien-write-the-lord-of-the-rings-because-he-was-avoidi...

>95 Crypto-Willobie:

Before the Internet, people had to resort to desperate expedients to waste their time.

Latest review from the online Journal of Tolkien Research:

Tolkien and the Classics (2019)
edited by Roberto Arduini, Giampaolo Canzonieri and Claudio A. Testi
Reviewed by Luke Shelton, The University of Glasgow

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol8/iss1/7/

"To me, and to many American and British readers, the title Tolkien and the Classics conveys the idea that the text will exclusively cover older texts (usually from ea rlier Latin, Greek, and Roman sources). The title, then, is an unfortunate oversight because I suspect that a title like Tolkien and the Canon would have broader appeal in America and Britain, and would be a more accurate description of the book’s content to audiences there. The book is concerned with comparing J.R.R. Tolkien’s writing with the work of notable authors across literary periods and cultural boundaries. This is an admirable goal and one which will help situate Tolkien within a larger literary framework..."

from the Journal of Tolkien Research...

Book review, by Will Sherwood of "Music in Tolkien's Works and Beyond" (2019), edited by Julian Eilmann and Friedhelm Schneidewind

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol8/iss1/8/

from the Journal of Tolkien Research...

On Ways of Studying Tolkien: Notes Toward a Better (Epic) Fantasy Criticism
by Dennis Wilson Wise, University of Arizona

Abstract: This article examines major academic approaches used in the study of J.R.R. Tolkien. It argues that certain themes from political philosopher Leo Strauss, by helping us to develop a new theoretical lens, can elucidate several politically salient aspects of Tolkien's work, including thymos and his dialectic between ancient and modern. Four previous (though flawed) Straussian interpretations of Tolkien are highlighted. Finally, by analyzing the tensions that arise when pairing critical theory and its attendant bias against nature with Tolkien and epic fantasy, this article argues for the timeliness of a Straussian lens for studying fantasy and Tolkien alike.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss1/2/

A review of the book mentioned above at >79 Crypto-Willobie:

Tolkien's Lost Chaucer (2019) by John M. Bowers
reviewed by Nelson Goering, University of Oxford

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss1/3/

Really interesting review. I'm unlikely to read the book, or for that matter "the book that wasn't" (the book so many apparently thought Bowers was publishing), but this review gives a meaty sense of both the book and the context to appreciate it. I, for example, wasn't expecting anything specific from Bowers but it seems clear many others were.

I also appreciated the review. I had begun reading the book a few weeks ago, but found it rough going: too "meta," if that makes any sense: a detailed examination of Tolkien's process for developing a commentary (but not providing a reader-friendly version of the commentary itself) of another author's work (but not providing that work itself either), all while trying to parse Tolkien's relations with prior commentators on that work.

>102 jfclark:

It looks like some of the later chapters are more meaty in revealing exactly what the edition would have been like, now that you've done the drudge work...

Tolkien was right: giant trees have towering role in protecting forests (Guardian)

Scientists have shown to be true what JRR Tolkien only imagined in the Lord of the Rings: giant, slow-reproducing trees play an outsized role in the growth and health of old forests.

In the 1930s, the writer gave his towering trees the name Ents. Today, a paper in the journal Science says these “long-lived pioneers” contribute more than previously believed to carbon sequestration and biomass increase...

Hroooooooooom!!!

Fellowship news...

https://thehardtimes.net/culture/middle-earth-temporarily-bans-fellowships-of-mo...

(by the way, JoTR is a free resource, all you have to do it give your email to follow it.)

from the online Journal of Tolkien Research Volume 9, Issue 1, Article 4, 2020

'Uncle me no uncle!’ Or Why Bilbo Is and Isn’t Frodo’s Uncle.
by Thomas Honegger
Department of English, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Germany
tm.honegger@uni-jena.de

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss1/4/

>107 Crypto-Willobie:

Thanks. I read it with interest because here on the African continent relationships such as uncle, cousin and nephew (and aunt and niece) are also much more complex than the strict technical genealogical definitions. Even terms such as father, mother, son and daughter can be applied to those who are not genealogically so. These relationships can also entail responsibilities.

from The Journal of Tolkien Research...

"The Flat Earth Made Round and Tolkien’s Failure to Finish The Silmarillion"
by John D. Rateliff, independent scholar

Abstract: Towards the end of his career, J. R. R. Tolkien faced many obstacles both internal and external that stood in the way of his finishing and publishing The Silmarillion. This paper explores the various elements that contributed to his dilemma and concludes that the key factors were twofold.

First came the traumatic breakdown of his efforts to publish the book through Collins, leading to a catastrophic interruption of his work on the book.

In addition, by this time Tolkien had concluded that many of the most iconic elements in his mythology could no longer command evoke secondary belief in modern-day readers. His unique cosmology inspired some of his finest writing, yet in the end the Flat Earth/Round Earth dichotomy became the most intractable of the problems facing him as he strove to find a way to finish The Silmarillion.

In the end, this led him to an impasse wherein on the one hand he had concluded he must make a major change without being able to bring himself to do so.

Read the entire 14-page article here:
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss1/5/

I've not read the full article, but the abstract itself prompts a conversation I'm happy to pick up.

I read here on LT (in a review I think but can't recall for which book) a characterization of Tolkien's writing path as:
1 - Publisher declines Tolkien's proposal to publish various legendarium stories following mediaeval verse forms
2 - Publisher counters with proposal that Tolkien instead complete the Silmarillion
3 - Tolkien despairs of that, and instead proposes (and indeed writes) LOTR

Fitting the claims of the above abstract into this schematic, then:
A - Publisher declines Tolkien's proposal to publish various legendarium stories following mediaeval verse forms
B - Publisher counters with proposal that Tolkien instead complete the Silmarillion
C - The Silmarillion's Flat Earth / Round Earth dichotomy led to Tolkien's realisation he must make a major change to his cosmology in order that his modern audience accept his stories
D - Tolkien despairs of that change, and instead proposes (and indeed writes) LOTR

So in what way(s) is the above misleading or false? For example, perhaps Tolkien's Flat Earth impasse did not follow the chronology as listed in A - D.

Leaving flat-earth aside, those chronologies aren't accurate.

1. Tolkien begins during WW1 to write the various texts that eventually become The Silmarillion. He's not good at completing things but tends to keep starting over on different tales in different forms. He works on these for the rest of his life.

2. in the mid 1930s The Hobbit grows out of stories told to his children and in 1937 it is published as a children's book. It is a big hit. Fans clamour for more "stories about Hobbits". It's not reeeeally part of the Legendarium (Silmarillion etc) but it does borrow some material from it, e.g. the dwarves, the Necromancer, etc.

3. His publishers pressure JRRT for More Stories About Hobbits. Instead he offers them other material he has already written or is writing, including Farmer Giles of Ham, and a lot of not-really-finished Silmarillion material. Publisher doesn't want this, doesn't seem very marketable -- for one thing it's an incomplete mess of different drafts. Even if he buckled down and finished it, it's not really what they want. They want More Stories About Hobbits!

4. Tolkien gave in and made a slow start on a Hobbit sequel in 1937-38 (featuring Bilbo's nephew, originally called Bingo Bolger-Baggins!) but didn't really get into gear until the 40s and then didn't finish up until the early '50s (if you include the Appendices). LotR is of course not a trilogy but a single novel that was so long the publisher insisted on issuing it in three volumes. Its initial sales were modest but of course (the rest is history).

5. Then our Ronald got back to the Legendarium and at first made speedy progress, but soon became bogged down. Rateliff argues that the flat/round earth question was one of the things that distracted him. I suppose so.

>111 Crypto-Willobie:

Thanks for that. It all strikes me as familiar as I read it, but clearly I could not have written it out that completely, on my own, let alone in that chronology, or with any confidence of the particulars. I'm beginning to read (and in some cases, re-read) Tolkien's works outside of The Hobbit or LOTR. Still, each work is read more-or-less in isolation, and I don't have the recall to keep facts straight between one reading and another.

The English towers and landmarks that inspired Tolkien's hobbit sagas (Guardian)

Now an extensive new study of the author’s work is to reveal the likely sources of key scenes. The idea for Saruman’s nightmarish tower, argues leading Tolkien expert John Garth, was prompted by Faringdon Folly in Berkshire...

Garth’s book, The Worlds of JRR Tolkien, is published next month by Frances Lincoln and is to be translated into nine languages. It will argue that many assumptions previously made about the origins of scenes from the sagas are wrong...

And FOUR more from the Journal of Tolkien Research:

---------------------------------------------------------------

Elessar Telcontar Magnus, Rex Pater Gondor, Restitutor Imperii

Richard Z. Gallant, Friedrich Schiller Universitat, Jena

Abstract: The nature of the heroic-ethos changes in the late Third Age of J. R. R. Tolkien’s Legendarium. At the beginning of the First Age, a Germanic ethos that Tolkien called the theory of Northern courage accompanied the exile of the Noldor. However, at the dawn of the dominion of Men, a new ethos emerges. It is an ethos of hope rather than the “sad light of fatalism” of the “long defeat.” This ethos is exemplified, ad bono exemplum, in the character of Aragorn who fuses the old ethos and tradition into a new ‘pseudo-chivalry’ appropriate for the Age of Men. Examining Aragorn’s inherited core traditions and his great deeds in contrast to our own historical examples helps us to understand the nature of the changing heroic ethos in Tolkien’s Legendarium. By contrasting Aragorn, his coronation and kingship with our own literary and historical Charlemagne and Carolingian heroic poetry, the role of the Renewal King becomes clearer and we may understand this ‘fusion’ of new and old within Tolkien’s illustrative narrative of Middle-earth.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss2/1/

===========================================

"The Sweet and the Bitter": Death and Dying in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings (2018) by Amy Amendt-Raduege; and Fantasies of Time and Death: Dunsany, Eddison, Tolkien (2020) by Anna Vaninskaya

Kris Swank, University of Glasgow

Abstract: Book reviews by Kris Swank of "The Sweet and the Bitter": Death and Dying in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings (2018) by Amy Amendt-Raduege; and Fantasies of Time and Death: Dunsany, Eddison, Tolkien (2020) by Anna Vaninskaya

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss1/8/

=================================================

Bombadil and Bible Stories: A Biblical Function for Tom Bombadil within Frodo’s Quest

Clive Shergold, Independent scholar

Abstract: This essay probes the purpose of the encounter between Tom Bombadil and Frodo and his friends, within the overall narrative of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. It asks: Why do the hobbits encounter Tom at this point in their journey? Why does Tom rescue, care for, equip and send them on? Why does Tom not accompany them further, and why does he never meet them again? Then it proposes an explanation based on comparisons with Bible stories that include theophanies and angelic appearances, and shown to provide answers to the questions, and suggestions for Tom Bombadil’s wider function. Finally, possible parallels between Bombadil and God are considered.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss1/7/

=============================================

Ladies of the Forest: Melian and Mielikki

Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University

Abstract: In this roundtable paper the author compares Melian, the Lady of Doriath, with the mysterious Mielikki of the Kalevala and The Story of Kullervo. (This paper was originally given as part of a Tolkien roundtable at the International Medieval Congress, University of Leeds, UK, in 2016.)

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss1/6/

=============================================

from Doug Anderson's "Tolkien and Fantasy" blog:

Tolkien and Sterling Lanier: the "Lord of the Rings" Figurines

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2020/06/tolkien-and-sterling-lanier-lord-o...

Two more from the Journal of Tolkien Research:

Utopian and Dystopian Themes in Tolkien's Legendarium (2020), by Mark Doyle
Abstract: Book review by John D. Rateliff of Utopian and Dystopian Themes in Tolkien's Legendarium (2020) by Mark Doyle
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss2/3/

'Where many paths and errands meet': Travel Writing in The Lord of the Rings
Will Glover, Boston University
Abstract:In this paper I examine The Lord of the Rings through the lens of genre criticism. I take issue with the commonplace characterisation of the work as an ‘epic’ or a ‘romance’, a tendency that has restricted interpretations of the work and tied criticism of it too exclusively to that of medieval literature. I argue that the work should be viewed as a modern novel: an open-ended and capacious text comprised of numerous generic traditions, including the previously overlooked genre of travel literature. After establishing a working definition of travel writing, I analyse The Lord of the Rings's paratextual materials (such as maps and appendices), the focalisation and construction of its narrative, its attempts to ‘authenticate’ itself through the inclusion of pictorial artefacts, and its depiction of foreign peoples, all the while comparing it with a range of travel texts (factual and fictional) from the Middle Ages to the present day. I conclude by suggesting that the tropes and techniques of travel writing enabled Tolkien to work towards his ultimate aim in The Lord of the Rings of creating an internally consistent secondary world, as outlined in his essay On Fairy-Stories.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol9/iss2/2/

More from Doug Anderson's "Tolkien and Fantasy" blog:

Tolkien Media: Tolkien Himself on Film
(includes many links to video and audio clips)

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2020/06/tolkien-media-tolkien-himself-on-f...

Tolkien Notes 18
==============================

Well Known?

The Spring number of the journal The Book Collector refers (p. 135) to a ‘well known’ story ‘about Tolkien being advised by a friend to whom he showed his first manuscript to stick to teaching Anglo-Saxon’. Well known to whom? Not to us. And what was the ‘first manuscript’?

The same number, and same page, tells a story about Anthony Price, who as a young reporter on the Oxford Mail was asked to review The Fellowship of the Ring. His editor thought that the book looked ‘a bit dull’ and was worth only 400 words maximum. Price ‘disagreed and arranged an interview with Tolkien, who thereupon handed over proofs for the next two volumes, with handwritten annotations’. Price asked if he could write a feature article on Tolkien for the Mail; no, replied his editor, because Tolkien had written ‘a very odd book’, and the editor had talked with ‘some dons about Tolkien – they say he’s a real weirdo. But do the 400.’ Price’s review of The Fellowship of the Ring was published on 16 September 1954, as ‘Fairy Story for Grownups Too’; its length, however, is closer to 800 words than to 400. We know that Price spoke with Tolkien in September 1954, as Tolkien mentions it in a letter, but his interview was not published until 27 January 1956, and in the Oxford Times rather than the Mail. In the meantime, Price also reviewed for the Mail, in January and October 1955, The Two Towers (comparatively briefly) and The Return of the King.

plus... Addenda and Corrigenda Updates

https://wayneandchristina.wordpress.com/2020/07/15/tolkien-notes-18/

And more from Wayne Hammond and Christina Scull's blog...

Lord of the Rings Comparison 4, July 17, 2020.

"Two new boxed sets of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, the latter in three volumes, were published this year by HarperCollins, London..."

https://wayneandchristina.wordpress.com/2020/07/17/lord-of-the-rings-comparison-...

Wow! a ton of new material from the free online Journal of Tolkien Research.

Ten articles and reviews from 10.1. Instead of detailing each one as I sometimes do, here's the entire issue, Volume 10 Number 1. Then there's one article from 10.2.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss1/

Introduction to Special issue: J.R.R. Tolkien and the Works of Joss Whedon
Janet Brennan Croft University of Northern Iowa, Kristine Larsen Central Connecticut State University

Simon & Samwise: Big Damn Heroes
Andrew Peterson Independent Scholar

“Ever-Defeated Never Altogether Subdued”: Fighting the Long Defeat in Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and Whedon's Angel. Katherine Sas Independent scholar, Curtis Weyant Independent scholar

Death as a Gift in J.R.R Tolkien's Work and Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Gaelle Abalea Independant Scholar

Peril and Possibility: Wilderness as a Space of Becoming in Tolkien's The Children of Húrin and Whedon's Firefly and Serenity. Philip J. Vogel, Kenton L. Sena

“They’re something nightmares are from”: The Notion Club Papers and The Cabin in the Woods. Kristine Larsen Central Connecticut State University

Why Do Villains Insist on a Ring? Greed and Fetishism from Sauron to Spike
Valerie Estelle Frankel Mission College, San Jose City College

The Girl in the Woods: On Fairy Stories and the Virgin Horror
Brendan Anderson University of Vermont

BINDING WITH ANCIENT LOGICS: THE IN/PER/SUB-VERSION OF FAËRIAN DRAMA IN THE CABIN IN THE WOODS
Janet Brennan Croft Rutgers University - New Brunswick/Piscataway

========================

And from 10.2:
Galadriel and Wyrd: Interlace, Exempla and the Passing of Northern Courage in the History of the Eldar. Richard Z. Gallant, Friedrich Schiller Universitat, Jena
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/1/

Thanks for all these interesting links. Let me make a remark about "uninteresting" links.

My phone seems to have worked out things it thinks I'm interested in and it displays alerts about certain stories which it assumes I will want to read. It has correctly discerned that I'm interested in Lord of the Rings, and it has started alerting me to articles with titles like "10 Things That Make No Sense About Merry & Pippin" and "Aragorn's 10 Most Badass Moments". They're from a website called Screen Rant, and I suppose that alone should have warned me. They are just click-bait, but I thought I'd at least have a look in case there was anything interesting in them. There isn't. They're all absolute bollocks. Superficial, ignorant, full of errors, aimed at fans of the films rather than followers of Tolkien, and pitched at the "young adult" audience by the look of it. Some of the things which they flag as "making no sense" are due to changes and omissions in the films - if you read the books, of course those things do make sense. OK, that's my screen rant, but if you do come across any of these things, I wouldn't bother clicking on them.

For all the inadequacies of the films, I thought they would at least expose a new and wider audience to the joys of Tolkien. I suppose they have done so in a way, but many people seem to focus only on the films as if they stand alone and to forget that there is a whole body of literature behind them.

I echo my thanks, and especially (this time) for the ready reference to "The Sweet and the Bitter" -- which in itself was interesting, but most pleasing was that it brought me to an insightful and compelling article on ER Eddison's The Worm Ouroboros (on my shelf but not yet read). I saved the article, for reading later when eventually I get 'round to Eddison myself. He seems as rich a writer as Cabell.

I've never warmed to Eddison though I have his books. I should keep trying. My Silver Stallion co-editor John Thorne is a big fan.

Must correct my overhasty summary in >123 elenchus:: Though The Worm Ouroboros was discussed, the focus of the article is another novel, A Fish Dinner in Memison.

Journal of Tolkien Research

The Inklings, the Victorians and the Moderns: Reconciling Tradition in the Modern Age (2020), by Christopher Butynskyi.
Review by Thomas Honegger Department of English, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Germany
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/3/

"Saint Galadriel?: J.R.R. Tolkien as the Hagiographer of Middle-earth"
Jane Beal PhD University of La Verne
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/2/

Publications

Journal of Tolkien Research

The Tale of the Old Forest: The Damaging Effects of Forestry in J. R. R. Tolkien’s Written Works
Katrine L. A. Hjulstad University of York
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/7/

Re-Enchanted: The Rise of Children's Fantasy Literature in the Twentieth Century (2019) by Maria Sachiko Cecire
Andrew Higgins
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/6/

Bibliographic Resources for Literature Searches on J.R.R Tolkien
Janet Brennan Croft Rutgers University - New Brunswick/Piscataway
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol3/iss1/2/

Galadriel and Wyrd: Interlace, Exempla and the Passing of Northern Courage in the History of the Eldar
Richard Z. Gallant Friedrich Schiller Universitat, Jena
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/5/

Beyond The Hobbit: J.R.R. Tolkien’s Other Works for Children
Janet Brennan Croft Rutgers University - New Brunswick/Piscataway
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol6/iss2/9/

Journal of Tolkien Research
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/

Tolkien's Work on the Oxford English Dictionary: Some New Evidence From Quotation Slips. Rachel A. Fletcher University of Glasgow
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/9/

‘Written in a Fair Hand’: The Living Tradition of Medieval Scripts in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Calligraphy. Eduardo B. Kumamoto Independent scholar
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/8/

The Journal of Tolkien Research
Current Issue: Volume 11, Issue 1

Translating Tolkien. The thin line between translation and misrepresentation. An italian case-study
Marcantonio Savelli
Article https://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1198&context=journalof...

Tolkien and the Zeppelins
Seamus Hamill-Keays
Book Review
https://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1195&context=journalof...

A Wilderness of Dragons: Essays in Honor of Verlyn Flieger (2018), edited by John D. Rateliff
reviewed by Deidre A. Dawson
https://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1200&context=journalof...

Journal of Tolkien Research

Tolkien's Cosmology: Divine Beings and Middle-earth (2020) by Sam McBride

book review by Matthew Dickerson Middlebury College

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol11/iss1/5/

Tolkien Notes 19
The Weblog of Wayne G. Hammond & Christina Scull
December 21, 2020

Richard C. West, 1944–2020

Richard West Minnesota 1993One of our oldest friends, Richard West, died on 29 November from Covid-19. We first met him in the nineteen-eighties, and were awed by his knowledge, kindness, and humility. When asked by a Tolkien fan if he was the Richard West, he replied that he was only a Richard West. But as one of the leading figures in Tolkien studies, he was indeed the Richard West, noted bibliographer of Tolkien, a founder (in 1966) of the University of Wisconsin Tolkien Society (which itself this year became a victim of the pandemic), editor of its journal Orcrist, and author of one of the best essays on Tolkien even to this day, ‘The Interlace Structure of The Lord of the Rings’ (1975). For nearly four decades we have been honoured to see Richard from time to time at Tolkien-related gatherings and to read, and hear, his occasional essays. His scholarship was always full of insight, well informed, and well argued. We cite many examples in our own books.

Richard did not shy from considering aspects of Tolkien’s legendarium less studied by other scholars, such as mythology in the story of Beren and Lúthien (2003) and ‘tragedy and divine comedy’ in the tale of Aragorn and Arwen (2006). Recalling his B.A. and M.A. studies in English language and literature at Boston College and the University of Wisconsin–Madison, he explored Old English elements in Tolkien’s story of Túrin (2000) and The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth (2018). He also (in 1997) gave Warren Lewis the attention he long deserved, as a historian and scholar in his own right, not merely the brother of C.S. Lewis and a diarist through whose eyes one could view the Inklings. A list of Richard’s writings was compiled by Douglas A. Anderson for Tolkien Studies 2 (2005), and will be updated in next year’s volume.

In our work we often consult both editions of Richard’s Tolkien Criticism – the first (1970) marked writings he thought ‘especially valuable or that ought to be read for some reason’, the second (1981) was expanded but, perhaps necessarily, omitted critical recommendations. A brief addendum appeared in 2004 in the journal Modern Fiction Studies. Tolkien Criticism influenced Wayne’s early efforts as a Tolkien bibliographer, and was essential to Christina when, in her first years as a collector, it served as a vade mecum as she sought out books and articles to read and copy. When we came to edit The Lord of the Rings, we looked for guidance into Richard’s ambitious but unrealized plans in the nineteen-seventies to create a variorum edition of that work.

Richard was a librarian by profession, by the time of his retirement a few years ago the Senior Academic Librarian at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He was also active in the annual International Congress on Medieval Studies symposia at Kalamazoo, Michigan, and in the Dorothy L. Sayers Society. His interests extended far beyond Tolkien, and he could speak just as expertly about comic books, animated films, and classic detective fiction. He leaves his wife, Perri, and many friends and admirers.

Addenda and Corrigenda

We have updated some of our web pages providing additions and corrections to some of our books:
(go to this link for the live links of the following updates
https://wayneandchristina.wordpress.com/2020/12/21/tolkien-notes-19/ )

· The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide (2017)

· The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide (2017) supplemental bibliography

· The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Chronology (2017)

· The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Chronology (2017) by date

· The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Reader’s Guide (2017)

· The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Reader’s Guide (2017) by date

· The Lord of the Rings (2004–5)

· The Lord of the Rings: A Reader’s Companion (2014)

· The Lord of the Rings: A Reader’s Companion (2014) by date


The New College School Hobbit

On 14–17 December 1967, students of the New College School, Oxford, performed a dramatic adaptation of The Hobbit (‘a play for children and adults’) prepared by Humphrey Carpenter, with music by Paul Drayton. Tolkien himself was present on the final night, and reportedly was pleased as long as the text followed his own words. Carpenter was then an Oxford undergraduate, and played double-bass in the show’s orchestra.

Remarkably, two copies of the printed programme for the production are simultaneously for sale (at the time of writing). One is offered by Maggs Bros., London, in their Christmas catalogue (Catalogue 1511), as item 121: autographed by Tolkien, with light creasing to the outer margin, ‘the odd spot’, and a rust mark to the lower cover, ‘otherwise near fine’, it is listed at £8,500. The second copy, in the December 2020 catalogue (no. 169) of Peter Harrington, London, item 170, is likewise autographed by Tolkien, as well as by Carpenter, Drayton, and nine of the actors, and contains hand-colouring by Andrew J.A. Sharp, a student at New College School who played First Goblin in the production; with binder holes punched in its margins, and ‘very faint soiling’, it is nevertheless ‘remarkably well-preserved’.

Peter Harrington earlier listed (at £3,000, apparently since sold) Andrew Sharp’s marked copy of the script for the production, with his own illustrations and the signatures of ten of his fellow student actors. The work was described as having wear to its edges, light foxing and minor soiling, and a small early tape repair, though generally ‘remarkably clean and bright’.

Outstanding Contribution Award
Wayne and Christina with Tolkien Society award

At the Tolkien Society’s annual Oxonmoot gathering in September – this year, held expertly over Zoom – we were given the Society’s Outstanding Contribution Award, for our body of work on Tolkien rather than any specific book or essay. (We won’t look on it as an award for lifetime achievement, hoping that there is much more life, and achievement, to come!) The physical award is a heavy metal statuette of a winged dragon. An interview we gave during Oxonmoot with our friend Mike Percival was videoed but has not (yet, at least) been made available on the Tolkien Society’s YouTube channel; currently it can be seen, through 31 December, only through paid access. (Those who had paid memberships for Oxonmoot have free, password access for the same period.)

Another, audio-only interview, however, which we gave to the German Tolkien Society, can be heard as a podcast on YouTube. Please keep in mind that we both had bad colds at the time!


Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH), for many years Tolkien’s primary American publisher, are exploring the sale of their trade division. HMH have had declining income since 2019, and are now focused on a ‘digital-first, connected strategy’ and educational technology. It is not clear what this would mean for HMH Tolkien titles, which presumably would be a desirable property in any sale.

>132 Crypto-Willobie:

Interesting tidbit about HMH there at the end. I hope it doesn't come to calamity for Tolkien works (I'm not even sure what I mean by that, only that my hackles were raised by the corporate machinations behind this development).

I've not read any West, that I readily recall. The 1975 essay on the "Interlaced Structure" seems as good as any place to start. I pause to reflect that should I ever be moved to read it, I might choose instead to read more of the Tolkien on my shelves, as yet unread. And yet! -- though it was decades ago, the shreds of detail I recall from the Carpenter biography prove remarkably interesting to me, so maybe my pleasure of the Legendarium would deepen from reading West as much if not more than from reading more Tolkien.

>133 elenchus:

Have you read any of Tom Shippey's Tolkien books? Road to Middle-earth or Author of the Century. Both very informative as to Tolkien's whole project, more so than the conventional and somewhat flawed Carpenter biography.

Not yet read Shippey, though I've added his works to my recon list. He introduced an edition of Tales from the Perilous Realm and I take him to be someone worth reading. Of the two titles you mention, do you recommend starting with one over the other? A view of Tolkien's whole project is what I'd be after, more than specifically any part of it (or of Tolkien's biography).

It's been a while since I read them. I'd take them in order -- I think Century is the earlier? There is a bit of overlap between the two but not too much. Shippey now (or recently until retirement?) has the same position Tolkien once had at Oxford, and is generally considered, if one person had to be chosen, to be the dean of Tolkien studies. There are other important scholars of course but he's the grand old man.

FWIW, I quite enjoyed Author of Century way back when.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol11/iss1/7/

Tolkien’s Penchant for Alliteration: Using XML to Analyze The Lay of Leithian by Rebecca Power

Abstract
This analysis of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lay of Leithian focuses on the inclusion of alliteration in the poem, aided by the encoding of the poem in XML and the creation of accompanying XSLT documents that transform and represent the data encoded. Tolkien’s unfinished poem The Lay of Leithian, totaling 4223 lines across 14 cantos, exists in various drafts compiled by Christopher Tolkien and published in The Lays of Beleriand. The Lay of Leithian is written in octosyllabic couplets, following the form of the lay, and is organized into stanzas and cantos of varying length that divide the narrative action. Although written in the style of a lay, a non-alliterative poetic form, The Lay of Leithian contains a considerable amount of alliteration. The data from this analysis provides a basis for further exploration into how and why Tolkien uses alliteration within the poem, and what effect it creates throughout. Because The Lay of Leithian is a 4223 line poem, encoding it allows for the charting of alliterative pattern types, and the percentage of alliterating lines throughout. By representing the data in more objective ways while looking at the poem as a whole, it becomes possible to identify overarching patterns that may not be discernible at the line or stanza level, considering the substantial length of the poem. This analysis reveals three significant findings: passages with positive descriptions often contain alliteration; narratively significant words alliterate the most; and passages with alliteration that describe Beren and Lúthien use plosive and liquid consonants respectively.

>138 Crypto-Willobie:

Great abstract. I don't have the Lay to read myself, but even if I did this is probably all I'd need (be interested in) reading. The significant findings are certainly interesting to me, and always makes me wonder how much of those were consciously intentional on the part of Tolkien.

Having found time to actually look at the piece, but I can't help wonder to what extent the Beren-stop / Lúthien-liquid thing is simply due to anything alliterating with the names themselves necessarily beginning with a stop and a liquid respectively.

Latest post from the 'Tolkien and Fantasy' blog:

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2021/02/a-few-random-notes.html?utm_source...

Middle-earth, or There and Back Again (2020) edited by Łukasz Neubauer
Book review, by Marjorie Burns, Portland State University.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol11/iss2/2/

Looks like an interesting book...

>142 Crypto-Willobie:

The review is probably all I need, but it was indeed interesting. I was amused by both the observation that the essays tended to be short but have long titles, and Burns's admission that she admired all those Polish diacriticals.

from the Tolkien and Fantasy blog:

Tolkien Scholars Write Fantasy: a Follow-up
http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2021/02/tolkien-scholars-write-fantasy-fol...

from the Journal of Tolkien Research

Númenor and the “Devouring Wave”: Literary, Historical, and Psychological Sources for Tolkien’s Self-Described “Atlantis Complex”
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol11/iss2/5/
Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University
Abstract: Invited talk delivered to the Hobbit Society at the Honors College of the University of New Mexico on February 10, 2016, expanded from a keynote address delivered at the Tolkien Conference of the University of Vermont on April 15, 2014

Tolkien and the Classical World (2021), edited by Hamish Williams
book review by John Wm. Houghton
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol11/iss2/4/

Tolkien and languages from Lithub...

https://lithub.com/imaginary-history-how-tolkiens-fascination-with-languages-sha...

Journal of Tolkien Research

Hear, O Númenor!: The Covenantal Relationship of the Dúnedain with Ilúvatar
by Caryn L. Cooper (University of British Columbia) and Kevin S. Whetter

Abstract: Tolkien deliberately left most of his Middle-earth cultures without any form of organized religion. However, the Dúnedain culture, which descends from Númenorean and Edain culture, is exceptional in this regard, characterized as monotheists with a religion dedicated to Eru Ilúvatar and marked, through both cultural and narrative similarities, as sharing a special relationship with him that echoes the covenantal relationship of Biblical Israel with God. These parallels are particularly visible in shared motifs of the Akallabêth and Exodus, the invocation of Ilúvatar in oaths, the Númenorean pilgrimage festivals, and the designation of the Meneltarma and Halifirien as sacred mountains in the order of Sinai and Zion.

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol11/iss2/6/

Free article from Mythlore

"Surely You Don't Disbelieve": Tolkien and Pius X: Anti-Modernism in Middle-earth in Middle-earth
by A. R. Bossert University of Maryland, College Park

https://dc.swosu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1289&context=mythlore

Journal of Tolkien Research

Tolkien's Calques of Classicisms: Who Knew Elvish Latin, What Did the Rohirrim Read, and Why Was Bilbo Cheeky?

By John Wm. Houghton, The Hill School, emeritus.
(Keynote Address for the 17th Annual Tolkien at the University of Vermont Conference, April 10, 2021)

Abstract: In his legendarium, Tolkien presents four variants of what would be considered "classicism" in the Primary World: but the presence of all-but-immortal elves creates situations in which a classicizing devotion to ancient exemplars might not arise.
Comments

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol11/iss2/7/

Journal of Tolkien Research
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/

Frodo and Sam’s Relationship in the Light of Aristotle’s Philia
by Martina Juričková (University of Constantine the Philosopher in Nitra). Presented at "Tolkien in Vermont" conference on April 10, 2021.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss1/2/
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to analyse the relationship of the two major characters of Tolkien’s novel The Lord of the Rings, Frodo and Sam. It tries to find out whether their relationship can be regarded as friendship and what kind of friendship it is. It analyses the relationship of Frodo and Sam and its development according to Aristotle’s teaching on friendship as this was the first and most complex analysis of friendship as a social and philosophical phenomenon. This work comes to the conclusion that Frodo and Sam’s relationship can be understood as an example of perfect, virtuous friendship.

Faith, Hope, and Despair in Tolkien’s Works
by Martina Juričková (University of Constantine the Philosopher in Nitra). Presented at Middle-moot conference on October 10, 2020.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss1/1/
Abstract: This paper explores how Tolkien depicts the two of the hierarchically most important Christian virtues—the theological virtues—faith and hope, and the opposing vice to hope, despair, in his Middle-earth tales. Knowing that Tolkien was a devout Catholic who acknowledged implementing elements of his faith into his work, it can be assumed that in the depiction of virtues he was also inspired by their religious understanding. The aim of this paper is to determine to what extent is his depiction of the chosen virtues concordant with their Christian definitions and what purpose they serve plot-wise.

from the Journal of Tolkien Research

The Lost Road as Faërian Drama,
by John D. Rateliff, independent scholar
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss2/3/

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The Poetry of Geoffrey Bache Smith with Special Note of Tolkienian Contexts, by Kris Swank, University of Glasgow
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss2/2/

from the Journal of Tolkien Research

The Science of Middle-earth (2021), edited by Roland Lehoucq, Loïc Mangin, and Jean-Sébastien Steyer. Translated by Tina Kover. Illustrated by Arnaud Rafaelian.
by Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University
Abstract: Book review, by Kristine Larsen, of The Science of Middle-earth (2021), edited by Roland Lehoucq, Loïc Mangin, and Jean-Sébastien Steyer. Translated by Tina Kover. Illustrated by Arnaud Rafaelian.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss2/5/

An Unexpected Study: A Response to Ordway's "Tolkien’s Modern Reading" by Maureen F. Mann, retired
Abstract: This essay review interrogates the polemical style of rhetoric in Holly Ordway’s Tolkien’s Modern Reading. It critiques her use of a fictional narrative to represent an adolescent Tolkien, her intertextual criteria, and her dating of Victorian fantasists and their historical moment. It questions her claims about entrenched notions concerning Tolkien, her use of evidence, and her assumptions about her audience. It concludes that Ordway is less interested in Tolkien’s contemporary reading and more interested in creating a new narrative about Tolkien the author.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss2/6/

Tolkienian Glôssology: Or A Study of the Primitive Elvish Vocabulary of Tolkien’s Qenya Lexicon and Gnomish Lexicon from the Late 1910’s, the Precursors of Quenya and Sindarin (2020), by Mark T. Hooker
by Andrew Higgins
Abstract: Book review, by Andrew Higgins, of Tolkienian Glôssology (2020) by Mark T. Hooker
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss2/7/

Journal of Tolkien Research

Guþcwen and Ides Ellenrof – The Old English Warrior Woman as Role Model for Female Characters in Tolkien’s Works
by Flora Sophie Lemburg, University of Göttingen, Göttingen

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol12/iss2/8/

Abstract: This paper examines the connection between the motif of the Old English warrior woman and Tolkien’s female characters. It provides a critique of Leslie Donovan’s paper “The valkyrie reflex in J. R. R. Tolkien´s The Lord of the Rings: Galadriel, Shelob, Éowyn and Arwen” and contrasts previous research on Tolkien’s female characters focussed either on gender-studies or on a “Germanic” influence with a more direct and specific connection between Medieval English and his works. The motif of the Old English warrior woman is established by investigating the female characters Judith, Elene, and Juliana from the Old English poems Judith, Elene, Juliana. The main character traits of the motif are beauty, radiance and leadership in combat. Tolkien’s characters Lúthien, Idril, Galadriel, and Éowyn are modelled on this motif.

THERE AND BACK AGAIN (1932) by C.H. Dodd: Any Influence on THE HOBBIT?
http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2021/09/there-and-back-again-1932-by-ch-do...

Journal of Tolkien Research
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/
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Cynewulf, Copernicus, and Conjunctions: The Problems of Cytherean Motions in Tolkien’s Cosmology. by Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University
Abstract: An abridged version of this paper was presented at the 2019 International Congress on Medieval Studies, Western Michigan University. It is the first of three related conference papers focusing on cosmological themes in Tolkien’s works.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol13/iss1/2/
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“What have I got in my pocket?” – Tolkien and the Tradition of the Rings of Power. By Thomas Honegger, Department of English, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Germany
Abstract: The question of where Tolkien found his inspiration for the One Ring has occupied fans and scholars alike for decades, and many rings real, fictional or legendary have been proposed. My paper takes a fresh look at the evidence and provides an overview of possible sources of inspiration from contemporary literature and archaeology. My research suggests that there was not one single source of inspiration but rather three rings that served as models, each of which contributed an important element to Tolkien’s concept of his One Ring. These models are: The Ring of Gyges, the Ring of Charlemagne, and Wagner’s Ring. The last of these is of central importance since Tolkien seems to have developed his One Ring in opposition to and as a critical ‘re-write’ of Wagner’s Ring of Power.
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol13/iss1/1/
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from the latest Journal of Tolkien Research...

review of The Nature of Middle-earth (2021) by J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Carl F. Hostetter; by Douglas C. Kane, Independent Scholar

https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol13/iss1/5/

Journal of Tolkien Research

A Publication History of The Complete Guide to Middle-earth by Robert Foster
Kevin P. Edgecomb University of Oxford
https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol14/iss1/1/

From the Beeb, a very brief glance at some of Tolkien's influences - Nordic, Celtic, Alexander the Great, Egypt, Plato, Atlantis - a "master synthesist".

The surprising ancient roots of The Lord of the Rings

Two stories which popped up on my phone this morning.

The Real Story Behind How C.S. Lewis Helped J. R. R. Tolkien Shape The Lord of the Rings (Town and Country)

Tolkien was part of the Inklings, alongside Oxford tutor and friend C. S. Lewis, and it is impossible to overstate how much this relationship impacted the shape of fantasy literature...

‘The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power’ Is Bringing Out The Worst In Tolkien Fandom (Forbes)

If you go online right now and read about The Rings Of Power you’ll find opinions sharply divided, often along cultural and political lines. Sometimes it’s hard to wrap your head around the latest online controversy... there’s just a nasty streak to all of it, a mean-spiritedness tinged with bigotry and resentment and misplaced self-righteousness that gets under my skin. Perhaps it isn’t even the racism that irks me most, but the sheer quantity of people engaging in No True Scotsman fallacies, acting high and mighty as though they are the sole arbiters of What Is Tolkien and who qualifies as a True Fan and imparting upon us how the Professor himself would surely feel about all of this. It gets tiresome not because it’s a critique of the work, but because the art is so flagrantly secondary to the politics of it all... Typing out “this show is woke trash” is not a critique...

This second one is all about online reactions, fandom and gaming, things which have no real interest for me, and I wasn't aware that there was such a controversy. Or perhaps there isn't, and this is just an online commentator trying to create one? Who knows?

>159 John5918:

I've been mildly curious about The Inklings but not enough to have a go at it yet. Thanks for the article, presumably a precis of the material covered in Carpenter's book.