Recent content by Timdalf

But will we ever care as much for Numenor or Eriador... realms of men or elves as much as we do for The Shire... can the Harfoots really take the place of all the Shirelings? Yes, they absolutely have to make us care... but so far I don't see or hear evidence... And I am not saying this...

This is in response to the video of the Full Panel of the SDCC... ignore the gymnastics of the over-acting violinist... More musicianship, luv, less Elvis gyrations, thank you... And what do I mean exactly by "poetry"... not the actual poems in LotR, although they are the concentrated...

Is there a forum for The Nature of Middle-earth book? Or is this it? Because I gave up on the live sessions last year.... I see now I have to review them on FB... and I have questions. After reviewing the first session about Time in M-e... one thing puzzles me. If one Valian day (one...

I remember CO (aka Prof Corey) reacted negatively to Serkis' reading of LotR... But I have to disagree. First, I always found the Rob Inglis reading stuffy, tedious and boring, with an annoyingly nasal voice. It is nothing more than a recitation, a bookish run through) So I very much...

OK Prof Corey and Smaug the Mighty are both quite off in their recall. Prof Corey a bit too early and Smaug t M a bit too late. Here is my response to the Session 214's question about pacing.... I have kept a detailed record of which paragraphs were covered in which Session. I have them all...

There is another interesting parallel that is not exact in stanzas 1 & 2 Note the position in each stanza of the "...in..." phrases. In Stanza 1 the "in summers that have been" is the last line. But in Stanza 2 the "in autumns that there were" is the already second line. This has to be...

Odola, luv, Your defense of our fav mad professor (who would not object to that appellation) is admirable and heroic. Moons around earth are one thing, going down the rabbit hole (anticipating our next Mythgard Reading) of modern science and astronomy and losing the mythos is another. To be...

I was alerted to this blog post.... and want to pass it on. I find myself in particular agreement with #10... i am still debating whether all the technicalities (so lacking in profundity) of "The Nature of Middle-earth" are worth reading. Trying to explain every aspect of a mythology is...

"There is also this brief text from the book's Prologue: Only the Elves still preserve any records of that vanished time, ... in which men appear seldom and Hobbits are not mentioned at all. It is clear that Hobbits had, in fact, lived quietly in Middle-earth for many long years before other...

Thanks Flamer... Yes, they are original to the screenwriters, but fully in the tone of the book. That second one is a help. The first sort of sums up this passage from the Prologue - Concerning Hobbits. .>>> . .Hobbits are an unobtrusive but very ancient people, more numerous formerly...

I have a couple of quotes from the scripts of those horrid, teen-age, blockbuster LotR movies (irony alert)... I know there is no exact quote behind them, but I am looking for passages that might have inspired them or that they sum up. The first is from the Fellowship prologue spoken by...

I have just finished reading another very insightful essay in Tolkien Studies... This time in the latest issue # XVIII 2021... which relates directly to the issue here. ' "This gift of freedom": The Gift of Iluvatar from Mythological Solution to Theological Problem' by Magne Berland. I...

Death is inevitable as an ontological reality (not a "curse") if one is doing something contrary to the will of iluvatar... like Kinslaying or harming the Second Children or even ignoring them. Worship of Iluvatar is not a weekend excursion into a compartmentalized box... Worship is living...

OK, so JRRT wrote this quote.... But it makes no sense! What does he mean by "fallen as a race"? Sinless? Committing no ethical or moral crimes? That is obviously not so. They are tainted by "the marring of Arda" another vague phrase. Those in Middle-earth do not return to Valinor...

I should probably not utter a word about all this as I cannot get through "The Silmarillion" of 1977. And I have not studied HOMe sufficiently, having only dipped into it here and there and listened sporadically to Prof Corey's discussions of it. Finally, I do not yet have a copy of "The...