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The Red Book of Westmarch (Archives)

• News

  Tolkien’s career in espionage greatly exaggerated

  09.30.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

  In the wake of information released by a British government agency last week, news media globally have been reporting on the supposed “spy” career of author and philologist JRR Tolkien.

  If it’s hard to imagine the introverted, scholarly Oxford professor traveling the world, assassinating Nazis and bedding beautiful French Resistance fighters between swigs of a martini, shaken – not stirred, you are right to be skeptical.

• Features, Tolkien 101

  Tolkien 101: How does one pronounce ‘Tolkien?’

  08.06.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and 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.

• News

  Tolkien Heirs vs. New Line: Trial to Go Before Jury

  06.09.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | 1 Comment

  A suit filed against New Line Cinema, producers of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings film trilogy, by the heirs of author JRR Tolkien will be decided by a jury, a state court judge has ruled.

• Web Links

  A History of Invented Languages — Sans Tolkien?

  06.03.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

  On Salon today, a review by Andrew O’Hehir of Arika Okrent’s book In the Land of Invented Languages. The book seems very entertaining, but O’Hehir points out a bizarre flaw — it barely mentions Tolkien.

• News

  Finalists announced for Inklings Studies award

  06.02.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

  The Mythopoeic Society has announced its 2009 finalists for the The Mythopoeic Scholarship Award in Inklings Studies. The award is given to books on J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, or Charles Williams that make significant contributions to Inklings scholarship. The Inklings was an informal literary discussion group at the University of Oxford in the 1930s and 40s.

• News

  “Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun” Drops May 5th

  04.22.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | 1 Comment

  I got an email today, that I can pre-order the latest book written by the ghost of JRR Tolkien through the mediumship of Christopher Tolkien — The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun. It collects translations of “The Saga of the Völsungs” written while Tolkien was Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford in the 1920s and ‘30s.

• News

  Periannath.com returns from… um… sabbatical

  01.06.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

  Sorry I stopped posting for such a long time. I intend to get back to regular posting, both here and on Sauron’s Blog, as of today.

• Opinion

  Does anyone really want to collect pieces of Tolkien’s house?

  11.10.08 | Kunochan | Permalink | 4 Comments

  Now they’re ripping up the house and selling off the pieces. Of the house. Like they’re relics, and the proximity of this random piece of wood or rock has somehow been magically imbued with a Tolkienian essence. What’s next, finger bones?

• Web Links

  McKellen is gracious in face of anti-gay bigotry

  11.03.08 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

  On his web site, aclaimed British actor and prominent gay rights activist Ian McKellen, who of course portrays the cinematic Gandalf, answers email questions from fans. But one correspondent goes after McKellen for comments quoted on a right-wing Christian web site.

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Periannath.com

Aiya! Periannath.com is a weblog for the genuine Tolkien aficionado. There are no 13-year-old Orlando Bloom fans here. Get news and features about the writings, the legendarium, the languages, collectibles and games, and yes, the movies.

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