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I think the key to understanding Legolas' athletic ability in running over snow is in how he introduces it - "for running light over grass and leaf, or over snow - an Elf". This immediately puts me in mind of the myths of the Fianna, a band of men of Irish legend. The Fianna famously had to pass...

In ep 227 there was an aside about the "Southern Star" breed of pipeweed, and for some strange reason this got discussed for only a minute before moving onto more "proper" story discussion. Well I can't help thinking about it more, so I did some digging and ended up down a crazy rabbit-hole...

In session 206 the carvings on Anduril (sun, moon, seven stars) were discussed as symbolic of Gondor restored. But it wasn't discussed as to why these are symbols of Gondor in the first place? Could the carvings be less directly about Gondor, and more about the underlying Numenorean symbology...

Recent discussion on ExLotR of Sauron's perspective on things and how long it would take the Nazgul to return to Mordor make me think about what the Dark Lord really knows throughout the events of the book. We get very little in the book of Sauron's point of view, and it's easy to forget just...

Apologies if this is now a little outdated, but I thought it was worth bringing up how in this chapter we now have what I believe to be the second in what is to be a trend of Gandalf-Pippin comedy duo segments. This is the specific pairing of Pippin saying/doing something stupid and Gandalf...

The topic of "the Strider" was considered at beautiful length in the last episode, but not why Strider is mentioned in the first place. Gandalf is talking about whether or not he should join the company, and says not to count on it as Elrond will have much to say on this, "and your friend the...

In Ep 189/190 the line was discussed about Frodo's desire to stay in Rivendell with Bilbo. In particular it was discussed how this likely isn't a Ring temptation, since it involves the company of Bilbo instead of striking out on his own as in other temptations. But that leaves the question - why...

The question has been raised of what Elrond is trying to accomplish with his squirrels aside. Can I suggest he's not trying to do anything? There is a presumption that he is somehow trying to push the hearts and minds of the Council in a particular direction, or set them up to a particular frame...

In episode 127 Corey states that Sauron left the Ring behind when he went to Numenor, and this explanation is kinda weak. Not sure if anyone has corrected this already, but Tolkien actually clarifies in letter 211 that Sauron took the One with him to Numenor, made use of it to conquer the minds...

The summeriness of Elrond was discussed recently, with the summer-light in his face at the Hall of Fire. It brought to mind how Galadriel is later (much later!) talked of by Gimli as being representative of morning, in contrast with Arwen of the evening. Is there something related here? The...

Much was made in ep 109 of the politeness of Frodo and Gloin in their interaction and hinting at secrets, but I wanted to bring up how this wonderfully foreshadows the next chapter and hooks the reader in. When Gloin says "Master Elrond will summon us all ere long, I believe, and then we shall...

I don't know what the results were of the MiddleMoot Weathertop reenactment, but I wanted to check if an important point had been considered. The text says of Sam "at that moment a black shadow rushed past him". Do we know what that black shadow is? The presumption seems to be that it's the...

(I'm slightly behind on classes, so forgive me if this has been covered.) Much has been made of Aragorn's chastising the Hobbits for making reference to Mordor. But he himself has used the name twice now. Firstly at Bree, when everyone else was too scared to say it ("From Mordor, Barliman, if...

The topic was brought up in class 66 of the types of insects that may be tormenting the hobbits in the Midgewater Marshes. As a frequent rambler of the UK countryside I thought I should pipe in with a few points. The flies mentioned are very unlikely to be deerflies or horseflies. These are...

The Aragorn/Strider thing got me thinking about characters with split sides to them in Tolkien's works. It's a bit of a theme in The Hobbit (with Bilbo's Took side and his Baggins side), and early drafts of LotR with Bingo Baggins have a touch of this same thing. We see it most obviously in LotR...

The Bodleian Library at Oxford has an exciting new Tolkien exhibition opening up this summer: https://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/bodley/news/2017/mar-17 It looks super cool! I want to go, but going with other Tolkien fans would be much preferred. So let's have a joint trip! I've made a doodle poll...

One interesting element that popped up in the discussion was how both Aragorn and Gandalf are known to Butterbur, but with very contrasting reputations. It got me thinking about the key differences: - Popping up vs barging in - Whilst Aragorn seems to pop up unexpectedly on Butterbur, Gandalf...

Corey brought up the important fact that "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence", which is a lovely phrase. And it got me thinking that on the subject of women in these tales we specifically have evidence not of their absence, but evidence for the absence of evidence. Ie. Tolkien tells...

Signum University is coming to Europe, with the first Mythgard London Speculative Fiction Symposium, aka LondonMoot: www.londonmoot.com This is a one day event focusing on science fiction, fantasy and classical literature. There is currently an open call for papers for people to submit...