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I apologize for starting a fourth thread on Bilbo's song, but I want to acknowledge what has already been said by others while also looking at the song and the scene from the point of view of character development. I used to think that Bilbo had learned all about the danger of the Ring while in...

do you think that Sam’s comment about ‘where to live’ might best be understood as a moment when he lets his Gamgee side speak out (as he will do when he calls himself ’ninnyhammer’)? Despite the fact that he swore to Gildor that he would never leave Frodo, Sam still cares deeply about the Shire...

as is usual when I listen to (as opposed to read) Tolkien's poetry, some things come newly into my mind. I appreciate all the alliteration that was pointed out, but we all seem to have noticed the apparently 'out-of-metric' place phrase "stones crack." I heard, for the first time, an echo of the...

EXPANSE SPOILERS AND END OF MOON SPOILERS OK, right away I saw the influence of Moon on The Expanse series, first in the use of a patois for the outermost human civilization : the Moon/the Belt. Moon only has two political entities (Earth & Moon); Expanse has three (Earth, Mars & Belt). And...

Sorry for the last-minute post; I was only able to catch up last night. Do you think it possible that Sam almost volunteered himself when he saw how Frodo looked just before he spoke? I was reminded of the moment at the Forbidden Pool (another instance of Sam following uninvited) when Faramir...

I've been exchanging thoughts with Rachel Port on the Narnion thread, but I'd like a wider response. I want to know what y'all think an eye-opener is. I see two justifiable readings. Rachel seems to think that "eye-opener" refers to the story or story-teller that/who elicits a reaction of...

I think I also automatically mis-read Gloin’s words ’when will the day come of our revenge’, but hearing it read aright brought to mind two moments from the Nirnaeth Arnoediad. The first is when Fingon hears the trumpets of Turgon [Gondolin had come at last], and he cries out ‘‘Utúlie’n aurë! …...

The first thing that popped into my mind during the discussion of blessings was this moment at the Doors of Moria: “He laid his hand on the pony’s head, and spoke in a low voice. ‘Go with words of guard and guiding on you,’ he said. ‘You are a wise beast, and have learned much in...

I have been wondering about what sort of ring Saruman might make for himself. The Elven Rings are said to have been made to enhance their powers of "understanding, making, and healing, to preserve all things unstained." But the rings that went to Men and to Dwarves were not specifically meant...

I don't think I ever thought that the effect of Gandalf's use of Black Speech was something he intentionally produced. It always seemed to me to be inherent to the speech itself, that the language of Mordor cannot be spoken without damaging the person who speaks it and those who hear it. This...

As I said elsewhere, I was reading LotR for 10 years before the publication of The Silmarillion, so I spent a lot of time going over the Appendices and have built up a personal headcanon of what people were doing in the 'between times.' This I have gleaned from Appendix A: During the reign of...

Whenever we discuss when things happen, I feel compelled to turn to the Appendices (for ten years, the Appendices were all I had of the larger Legendarium -- I read them a lot). I am fully aware that the Appendices include a large amount of retconning -- Tolkien gives enough to enable the reader...

Thus spoke Saruman: “[The One] was round and unadorned, as it were one of the lesser rings…” (my emphasis) Hah! Clearly, during his seminar to the Council on The Development and Manufacture of Rings of Power, Saruman had taught that the beta versions of the rings -- the lesser rings -- were...

Listening to the talk of Saruman's lies, I was put in mind of C. S. Lewis' The Last Battle. When Tirian and Jill show the Dwarfs (yes, Lewis uses Dwarfs) that the Aslan they've been obeying is a fraud, they react by rejecting the entire concept of Aslan and refusing to believe that Tirian is, in...

Bilbo's comments to Frodo when he sits down put me in mind of a letter Tolkien wrote to his son Christopher during WW2, while he was training in South Africa. It's #66 May 6 1944: "Well, there you are: a hobbit amongst the Urukhai. Keep up your hobbitry in heart, and think that all stories feel...

I sometimes think that we read Boromir’s reactions in the light of Sam’s later comment to Faramir, that Boromir wanted the Ring from the moment he first saw it. But Sam also says that Boromir didn’t or couldn’t acknowledge that desire in himself until Lorien. I think we also need to take into...

The earliest moment when Bilbo could have met Aragorn was in The Hobbit when 10-year-old Aragorn was living there with his mother. But Aragorn did not then know his true identity: he was Estel, and I don't think anyone in Rivendell would have told the truth about the boy to a hobbit passing...

This is for thoughts that won’t be applicable until 2030 or so. I had a thought during the discussion about Boromir‘s story about the fight on the bridge. Clearly, Boromir would have left his brother (the other heir) in charge of destroying the bridge behind the defenders. Clearly, Faramir...

As I listened to the latest episode, it suddenly struck me how outnumbered the non-elves must have felt. There seem to have been 2 dwarves, 2 men, 2 (official) hobbits and 1 wizard, in the midst of a whole slew of elves from various realms, strange and stranger. I don’t blame Boromir for feeling...

I'm listening to the theories of why Bilbo's presence at Rivendell was kept secret from Frodo, and someone suggested that Bilbo absented himself in order that Frodo might have 'his' chair. It suddenly struck me that perhaps the poem of Earendil's journey to Elvenhome was meant to be in honor of...