The Return of the Shadow: The History of Middle-Earth 6: Book 6

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Bilbo's Last Song [1974] • The Silmarillion [1977] • Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth [1980] We are able to bring this series to the public only through the generosity of everyone who supports the Mythgard Institute and Signum University through their generous donations, who nominate and vote on the books that we examine in these discussions. In 2016 alone, we’ve been fortunate enough to look at two other volumes in The History of Middle-earth series – The Shaping of Middle-earth and The Lost Road and Other Writings – as well as one of my favorite books ever, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and a book I had never read before, Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Dispossessed.

So, first, one thing that I found intensely telling was that none of the edits that Tolkien makes are explicitly on the basis of symbolism or any other codes left for sharp critics. I think this is significant, because I predict that literary critics will soon turn their chops to making Lord of the Rings (like Shakespeare and many other works of fiction) into nothing more than a bunch of ideas cleverly disguised as symbols, as decoded from the story. I think this will happen because people have overprotected Tolkien from this by over-emphasizing his aversion to allegory, when in fact it's as clear as day that Tolkien included what we could call symbolism: for instance, Frodo and the company leave on their journey on December 25th and the ring is destroyed on March 25th, which fits Easter. But there's no sign of that here, and so the critics should not make their interpretations idea-centric. Another interesting thing about these initial manuscripts is that some parts of them that were later rejected or changed were used in making of LOTR movies (e.g. farmer Maggot being angry and not helpful as in final LOTR version). The Monsters and the Critics, and Other Essays · Beowulf and the Critics · Tolkien On Fairy-stories ·

A Message from Dr. Corey Olsen

iv. The Shaping of Middle-earth · v. The Lost Road and Other Writings · vi. The Return of the Shadow · csillag között hezitáltam, de az öt talán túlzás lett volna, mert néha tényleg szinte rá kellett vennem magam, hogy olvassam. Masszívan fanoknak szól, de bevallom, amikor letettem, azonnal elkezdett hiányozni. Szuper visszaröppenni a Gyűrű Szövetsége világába, és rendkívül érdekes és izgalmas belelátni Tolkien fejébe, a regény keletkezéstörténetébe, a különböző vázlatokban kibontakozó ötletekbe (akár végül elvetett, akár végül kibontott-megvalósított ötletről van szó).

In The Treason of Isengard the story of the Fellowship of the Ring is traced from Rivendell through Moria and the Land of Lothlórien to the time of its ending at Salembel beside Anduin the Great river, then is told of the return of Gandalf Mithrandir, of the meeting of the hobbits with Fangorn and of the war upon the Riders of Rohan by the traitor Saruman.I don't think I can give this a star rating. I don't know if I've ever read anything that's simultaneously more boring and more fascinating than this set of books. [Here I'll review the whole History of the Lord of the Rings together: [book:The Return of the Shadow], The Treason of Isengard, The War of the Ring, and The End of the Third Age.] Tolkien wasn’t particularly keen on the writing a sequel to The Hobbit, but accepted to do it. He wrote the first chapter three times before he found any traction and in this first volume of the four dedicated to The Lord of the Rings we can read the first three drafts - the later one reaching Moria - that he wrote before braking out for a long time after WWII broke out.