Watching Gondor Gambolling 59, I'm amazed that Corey never mentions the OED. After all, he is the Tolkien Professor. Based on my expereince, it's sort of a let's look at the all that all they ways this word has been used through history and see if we can use all these sources to figure out what that word meant to all those folks who used it. That approach isn't so bad is it?
I found it amusing that he was so distressed by one usage of dwindle while in the same session he talked about his dog "agitating". I'm not sure what he meant by that. Did he mean that the dog was feeling agitated? Or that the dog was an active agitator. To me, that's like the confusion that happens when someone who is not a native english-speaker says that he is confusing when a native speaker would say that he is confused. What was the dog agitating? Or was it merely agitated? Is this confusion an evidence of the dwindling of our language? Perhaps Corey is the dwindler. (tongue in cheek)
To raise a question more in line with this forum, consider the following statement by Galadirel:
"Do you not see now wherefore your coming to us as the footstep of doom? For if you fail, then we are laid bare to the Enemy. Yet if you succeed, then our power is diminished, and Lothlorien will fade, and the tides of time will sweep it away. We must depart into the West, or dwindle to a rustic folk of dell and cave, slowly to forget and to be forgotten ."
If Frodo succeeds, he seems to be an active agent that brings about the dwindling of the elves. Is he therefore a dwindler? Or is Galadriel, as one who is dimished, a dwindler? And was Elrond's council the agency that caused that dwindling?
I found it amusing that he was so distressed by one usage of dwindle while in the same session he talked about his dog "agitating". I'm not sure what he meant by that. Did he mean that the dog was feeling agitated? Or that the dog was an active agitator. To me, that's like the confusion that happens when someone who is not a native english-speaker says that he is confusing when a native speaker would say that he is confused. What was the dog agitating? Or was it merely agitated? Is this confusion an evidence of the dwindling of our language? Perhaps Corey is the dwindler. (tongue in cheek)
To raise a question more in line with this forum, consider the following statement by Galadirel:
"Do you not see now wherefore your coming to us as the footstep of doom? For if you fail, then we are laid bare to the Enemy. Yet if you succeed, then our power is diminished, and Lothlorien will fade, and the tides of time will sweep it away. We must depart into the West, or dwindle to a rustic folk of dell and cave, slowly to forget and to be forgotten ."
If Frodo succeeds, he seems to be an active agent that brings about the dwindling of the elves. Is he therefore a dwindler? Or is Galadriel, as one who is dimished, a dwindler? And was Elrond's council the agency that caused that dwindling?
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