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Tolkien 101

• Features, Legendarium, Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: Samwise Gamgee

  08.27.10 | Permalink | 2 Comments

  If you think it strange to devote an entire article to someone as small and insignificant in the Legendarium as Samwise Gamgee, then you have bought into Sam’s own view of himself, as nothing but a simple gardener from The Shire.

  But many have suggested that Sam, rather than Aragorn or Frodo, is the main hero of The Lord of the Rings; and this view was promulgated by no less an authority than JRR Tolkien himself…

• Features, Legendarium, Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: Fëanor

  07.14.10 | Permalink | 1 Comment

  Fëanor is one of the greatest characters of The Silmarillion; although Beren Erchamion, Lúthien Tinúviel and Túrin Turambar are more traditional heroes, it’s Fëanor’s choices for both good and evil that create the conflicts that drive the bulk of the story.

  The story of Fëanor (told here as briefly as possible) begins as the story of the earliest Elves…

• Legendarium, Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: Aragorn

  07.01.10 | Permalink | 3 Comments

  If your sole familiarity with The Lord of the Rings is with the Peter Jackson film trilogy, then you probably only know Aragorn son of Arathorn as the handsome, brooding, scruffy loner with the broken sword who looked so dorky in that crown at the end of the third movie, of which he is the titular character. But there’s a huge backstory behind Aragorn, and this article will fill you in on the basics.

• Features, Legendarium, Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: How to tell apart Saruman and Sauron

  04.13.10 | Permalink | 2 Comments

  As an aficionado of the original books, I find it strange that viewers of the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy have trouble telling the difference between the villain characters Sauron and Saruman. But I have heard from more than one intelligent, attentive moviegoer that they were confused on this issue. So let’s get this cleared up…

• Events, Tolkien 101

  Happy eleventy-eighth birthday to ‘Lord of the Rings’ author JRR Tolkien

  01.03.10 | Permalink | Comment?

  John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE, Oxford University professor, and author of the globally beloved fantasy epics The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, was born eleventy-seven years ago today, on January 3rd, 1892, in Bloemfontein in the Orange Free State, a British colony and a province of the Union of South Africa.

• Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: Ringwraiths

  09.30.09 | Permalink | 1 Comment

  …Men were the perfect victims for the rings. Nine heroes, sorcerers and kings of Men accepted the rings, gaining seeming power and unnaturally long life. But after a few centuries, it became clear the rings were a curse rather than a gift. The nine Men were enslaved by the rings, and by the Dark Lord wearing the One Ring. Their bodies faded away, until the Men were nothing but invisible, undead shades enslaved by Sauron. They became the Nazgûl or “Ringwraiths,” the greatest of Sauron’s servants.

• Features, Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: How does one pronounce ‘Tolkien?’

  08.06.09 | Permalink | Comment?

  Type “pronounce tolkien” into Google, and you’ll find a lively debate on how to pronounce the surname of the beloved author of The Lord of the Rings. There are two main camps. One insists on “tol-kenn.” The other will argue that “Tolkien” is a German name, properly pronounced “Tolk-een.”

  They’re both wrong.

• Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: Elrond Half-elven

  07.08.09 | Permalink | 3 Comments

  In Tolkien’s Legendarium, there were three great romances between and an Elf and a Man. (In Tolkien’s writing, “Man” is gender neutral, and is equivalent to “human.”) The first was Beren the Man and Lúthien Tinúviel; the second Tuor the Man and Idril Celebrindal; the third Elessar Telcontar (better known as Aragorn) and Arwen Undómiel, who marry at the end of The Lord of the Rings.

• Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: Sauron Gorthaur

  06.29.09 | Permalink | 3 Comments

  Sauron is the titular character and primary villain of The Lord of the Rings. He is introduced as The Necromancer in The Hobbit; and his origins and history are recounted in The Silmarillion. But who is Sauron? Why is he so evil? And how did he become so obsessed with locating missing jewelry?

• Features, Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: The Basic Cosmology of Tolkien’s World

  06.09.09 | Permalink | Comment?

  In order to give meaningful background information for characters like Gandalf, Sauron, Galadriel and Elrond, I will have to refer to cosmological and cosmogenic ideas laid out in The Silmarillion, which tells the early history of Tolkien’s world.

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