The Red Book of Westmarch (Archives)

Events, Tolkien 101
Happy eleventy-eighth birthday to ‘Lord of the Rings’ author JRR Tolkien
01.03.10 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and 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.
Features
Ten new year’s resolutions for fans of ‘The Lord of the Rings’
12.31.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

Whether you were introduced to Tolkien by Orlando Bloom’s shield-surfing antics, or if you have read The Lord of the Rings every summer since the 3rd grade (guilty), there is always more you can do to become the Tolkien superfan you have always aspired to be.

Here are ten suggestions…
Humor, Web Links
Sauron’s Blog #56:That’s It, I QUIT!
12.14.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

With post #52, Sauron’s Blog began the story of Beren & Lúthien (told from Sauron’s point of view). Now, the epic tale continues, as Sauron learns that Beren and Lúthien have stolen a Silmaril from the Iron Crown of Morgoth…
Language, News
Oxford Dictionary’s 2009 Word of the Year: ‘Unfriend’
11.18.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | 2 Comments

The editors of the New Oxford American Dictionary have chosen “unfriend” as its “2009 Word of the Year,” beating out other Internet-oriented neologisms such as “hashtag,” “netbook,” “paywall” and “sexting.”

Tolkien aficionados may remember the word from The Silmarillion, where it is used twice (once in the form “unfriendship”).
News
‘The Hobbit’ first published 72 years ago this week
09.22.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

Seventy-two years ago yesterday, JRR Tolkien’s first novel, The Hobbit, was published by George Allen & Unwin, Ltd. of London.

The 1,500 copies of the first printing sold out by the end of that year, 1937.
Web Links
Sauron’s Blog #48: The Battle of Sudden Flame is ON!!!
07.10.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

As our first assault in the new war, I got to try out my patented Pyroclastic Attack. See, we dug so deep at Angband that we hit magma, so I designed a series of sluices that brought the magma up into giant reservoirs. Last night we blew the floodgates, and millions of metric tons of lava, ash and poisonous gas burst out onto Ard-galen, converting what was a hideous plain infested with bright green grasses and sickly white flowers into a beautiful wasteland of basalt and hyaloclastite. Yes!
Tolkien 101
Tolkien 101: Sauron Gorthaur
06.29.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | 1 Comment

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 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and 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.
Features
What Doesn’t Make Sense About the War of Wrath and the Breaking of Beleriand
04.20.09 | Kunochan | Permalink | 2 Comments

Unfortunately, the War of Wrath is so wrathful that the Beleriandian (is that a word?) sub-continent is almost completely destroyed, and sinks below the sea. The Valar invite all the Elves to Valinor, but lots of them refuse… The Edain follow Elros to Númenor, but lots of Men are left behind in Beleriand. So.. how did all the surviving Elves and Men get to Eriador?
Features
The final word on balrog “wings”
10.01.08 | Kunochan | Permalink | Speak, friend and comment!

…Likewise, we know for a fact that Tolkien’s balrogs did not have wings, for the same reason we know ents did not have wings – because Tolkien never said that they did. Let me repeat that – TOLKIEN NEVER SAID BALROGS HAD WINGS….