The J.r.r. Tolkien Thread

[icelandic_iceskater]

I'm not really hardcore enough to be posting in this thread, buuuuuuuut I just had to share these [url=http://recordbrother.typepad.com/imagesilike/2005/05/what_you_been_t.html]audio clips[/url] of Tolkien himself reading portions of LOTR. Gosh, to go so far as to call it "music" would still be insulting to these recordings... <3

[Innocent]

Welcome to Phatmass, Katherine of Aragon!


[quote name='Katherine of Aragon' date='27 June 2010 - 08:01 AM' timestamp='1277602274' post='2134691']
In my half-dozen daughters' names we have a Luthien, a Laurelin, and a Celebrindal.
[/quote]

[Innocent]

[quote name='icelandic_iceskater' date='27 June 2010 - 08:08 AM' timestamp='1277602693' post='2134695']
I'm not really hardcore enough to be posting in this thread, buuuuuuuut I just had to share these [url=http://recordbrother.typepad.com/imagesilike/2005/05/what_you_been_t.html]audio clips[/url] of Tolkien himself reading portions of LOTR. Gosh, to go so far as to call it "music" would still be insulting to these recordings... <3
[/quote]

Thank you! That's a great find.

[Innocent]

[quote name='Sternhauser' date='20 June 2010 - 08:08 AM' timestamp='1276997892' post='2131629']
Please tell me that's not Gwaihir.

~Sternhauser
[/quote]

Well, Thorondor from the First Age had "pinions thirty fathoms wide" and Gwaihir from the Third Age was persumably smaller, now that we're in (by Tolkien's own estimate in his Letters) the end of the Sixth or Seventh age, the eagles must logically have diminished in their glory to the sad state seen above.

[laetitia crucis]

Just came across this lovely gem.
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUtCtuZIAcE&feature=player_embedded[/media]

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='Katherine of Aragon' date='26 June 2010 - 09:31 PM' timestamp='1277602274' post='2134691']
Huge Tolkien fan here. I read the Silmarillion as a child so often that my parents, concerned that their 9-year-old was reading nothing else, took it away and hid it until I read four or five other books. I knocked them out in two days to get my Silmarillion back!

In my half-dozen daughters' names we have a Luthien, a Laurelin, and a Celebrindal.
[/quote]

[Tridenteen]

JMJ
I love Eowyn...she is so awesome, and has the coolest speeches. I taped up a few of quotes from her on our organ paneling. But I really get a kick out of the parallels Tolkein drew between Catholicism and his books...so many "clues", if you will[img]http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/public/style_emoticons/default/detective.gif[/img]

[sistersintigo]

The Lady Galadriel ought to have a heraldic device of her own, but where? Has anyone seen it?

[kafka]

just read Chapter One, the Departure of Boromir, and part of Chapter Two, The Riders of Rohan, last night for during the day off from the rat race. The sequence where Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas hunt for the group of Orcs who kidnapped Merry and Pippin is my favorite in all the books of Tolkien. The descriptions of the land and the chase are majestic and inspiring.

Me loves!

[sistersintigo]

[quote name='kafka' date='06 July 2010 - 12:33 PM' timestamp='1278430394' post='2138444']
just read Chapter One, the Departure of Boromir, and part of Chapter Two, The Riders of Rohan, last night for during the day off from the rat race. The sequence where Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas hunt for the group of Orcs who kidnapped Merry and Pippin is my favorite in all the books of Tolkien. The descriptions of the land and the chase are majestic and inspiring.

Me loves!
[/quote]
This would be The Two Towers?

Gotta love those Ents.

[ThePenciledOne]

[quote name='sistersintigo' date='07 July 2010 - 06:45 PM' timestamp='1278539113' post='2139047']
This would be The Two Towers?

Gotta love those Ents.
[/quote]

[img]http://chud.com/articles/content_images/5/treebeard.jpg[/img]

[fides quarens intellectum]

okay, time to fess up.

I've never liked Tolkien. I'd tried to read [i]The Hobbit[/i] several times, only to give up because his prose was so annoying.

This summer, though, i decided to give it all one last try, since so many Catholics just LOVE Tolkien. I made it through [i]The Hobbit[/i], grudgingly, and I am now on the third book of [i]Lord of the Rings[/i]. I guess reading LOTR is not so bad as [i]The Hobbit[/i] because I really like the movies - I've just never cared for Tolkien's writing. However, Tolkien did have quite an imagination - I will give the fans that. That's as far as I can go at this point, though - we'll see how the book series ends.



BTW, my husband gave up on LOTR because he was bored out of his mind by Tom Bombadil (ck spell) in the first book, then midway into the second book, he just lost interest. However, he also really likes the movies. Are we the only ones who are like this, I mean, really like the movies but aren't big fans of the books they came from?

[ThePenciledOne]

I would say it just relies on taste. Some people love fantasy or love the inner themes through it and some don't. I mean, I have a friend who never read the books, and always falls asleep during The Fellowship , but when he started watching The Two Towers he was totally engaged, because he picked up on all the small subtiles that are alive in the films. It's perfectly fine to like the movies and not the books of course, the films are great pieces of cinema. The literature on the other hand has a harder time reaching all audiences than movies do and tastes differ. So, Fides I think you are ok on that count.

[sistersintigo]

[quote name='fides quarens intellectum' date='08 July 2010 - 12:10 PM' timestamp='1278601856' post='2139310']
okay, time to fess up.

I've never liked Tolkien. I'd tried to read [i]The Hobbit[/i] several times, only to give up because his prose was so annoying.
[/quote]

Understandable, and no offense whatever taken. Tolkien always pleased me, but it is true that he has a style, and that he is awfully STUBBORN. He WILL just keep budging along through the muck and mud. Now, translate that into the dynamic of a well-made film, and you have transcended the barrier of Tolkien's prose.
A word to the wise: if The Hobbit annoys you, then stay away from the Silmarillion which reads like Holy Writ crossed with something oriental. Meat and drink to me, but it will drive you straight up the wall, I'm afraid.

[MithLuin]

[i]The Silmarillion[/i] is better on the second reading. The first time through, it is easy to be disappointed that it isn't written as a novel. And keeping all the names straight! Oy vey!

But once you get past that, it's heart-piercingly beautiful. I don't even know if that's a word, but I don't swoon for it; it slays me

[quote]From Sirion's Isle they passed away,
but on the hill alone there lay
a green grave, and a stone was set,
and there there lie the white bones yet
of Finrod fair, Finarfin's son,
unless that land be changed and gone,
or foundered in unfathomed seas,
while Finrod walks beneath the trees
in Eldamar and comes no more
to the grey world of tears and war.

'The Lay of Leithian'[/quote]

Finrod, however, I do swoon for He's fairly awesome. Taken, though. His beloved's name was Amarie, but they were never wed. His death was rather...messy.