We're currently walking our way through the Lord of the Rings. After that we'll work our way through the Silmarillion and the Hobbit and we'll just keep going from there!
He also made Orcs (somewhat) relateable. I think the truth lies in that the Orcs technically weren't created, but perverted men/elves. This means that there IS good in them, but the evil is ramped up to 200%. This leaves room for possible redemption, althought it is unlikely. The Orcs weren't "created" at all, they were always there, in form of those ugly enotions of wrath, pride etc etc The evil inside their hearts wasnt made, for everyonr has a dark side, but the light was made so dim that, by comparison, they were entirely "different" beings. I think this allows for the explanation that Orcs were not created, but corrupted, and also leaves room for his Christian beliefs of redemption abd forgiveness. I think that Orcs **COULD** be good, but it would take a looooong time.
I’d say his age is incalculable as we are still dealing with those ages of Valinoran time where we can only make the roughest assumptions of how long they were. I may have missed data available in letters, but most estimates are pretty rough. Add to that the changes JRRT made to calculating time and it’s possible to get answers that are an order of magnitude apart. Just my 2 pence!
Exactly! There is some math in nature of Middle Earth but some of it is super crazy and then the Valinorian year is different than the year outside Aman...So I used a big number. Thanks!
Im wondering if the phrase ‘tree to tree’ means something else. Maybe something to do with Will O Wisps. They’re more associated with bogs and such and better associated with the Dead Marshes scene, but not unheard of in woodlands too.
You never remarked on what is one of my favorite quotes from LOTR: 'Hill. Yes, that was it. But it is a hasty word for a thing that has stood here ever since this part of the world was shaped....' I'm not sure why, but it is perhaps my favorite line in all the books. It calls to mind how long the world has existed, and how short a time we live in it and are able to appreciate it. And of how dismissive we are of such things. Earlier, Treebeard appreciates the "hill," but we don't. We dismiss it with such a short word: hill. Treebeard uses almost a paragraph to describe the hill. "you know, the thing we are on, where I stand and look out on fine mornings, and think about the sun, and the grass beyond the wood, and the horses, and the clouds, and the unfolding of the world...." etc. (Notice that he thinks of the horses, which undoubtedly are the horses of Rohan, which are generally far from Fangorn.) But all this actually belongs in the previous chapter, not here.
I have read the entire Lord of the Rings dozens of times, yet when you read it here I uncover new things each time. I don't know how you do it, but I appreciate it. Great video, as usual!
Aragorn may have been aware that the secret of where the Ring was would have been seriously placed in jeopardy were Merry and Pippin captured by Sauruman. Better to die making sure the secret didn't get out, thereby maintaining the secrecy of Frodo's mission.
I like to think he is. My theory is when Tom says he is Eldest (or maybe Goldberry says it), it means he was the first genus loci to awaken on Arda, even before the Ainur arrived. But that is just how I see it.
I love their chant lol and you did it really well. Something really primal about it, you know exactly what it means without even knowing what the ‘words’ are
@@aureentuluva514 My guess too. Otherwise, where else? It's just funny that Frodo heard it, and Sam, who always hangs around Frodo (though not in Rivendell as much) didn't hear it.
Just so you know, when a predator is stalking its prey in the wild, all of nature silences. The birds stop singing, and so on. All of nature becomes tense. Or so I have read.
"Dangerous" seems to be an active and prevalent concept in Tolkien's work. As Gandalf later points out, to Gimli, he keeps meeting dangerous folk because he himself is dangerous, in a way. That seems to be at the root of every confrontation that takes place. In fact, it seems to me that in each confrontation, Tolkien has the two evenly matched, in a way. The Balrog and Galdalf. Eomer and that Orc whose name escapes me. Even Eowyn and the Witch king of Angmar. The Nazgul Lord stood quietly in doubt when confronted by a woman. Though I must admit, Eowyn and Merry were no match for the Witch king, yet they did him in anyway. And Sauron's forces way overmatched Aragorn's forces at the Black Gate. Yet they lost anyway. Well, it's food for thought.
I love this paragraph written about Bregalad "The hobbits fell asleep to the sound of the soft singing of Bregalad, that seemed to lament in many tongues the fall of trees that he had loved"
I think Tom is to Middle Earth what Father Christmas was to Narnia: an anomaly that the author inserted into the first book, before he knew what his final mythology would look like.
I am really going to miss this channel. It has provided me with pleasure and knowledge. I like the format; I like the pacing; I like the humour. Take care of yourself. You have to do that so that you can take care of others.
Excellent video, as usual! I seem to recall from my first reading of The Silmarillion some 40 years ago, that it said explicitly that there were five Istari. One thing that just occurred to me: why is it that people with good magic in Tolkien seem to be born with it: the Istari, the Elves, etc. But people with bad magic can either be born with it or learn it later, like Sauron, who was born with it; and the Mouth of Sauron, who learned magic.
@@McNab1986 I wonder if Tolkien would agree with that. But I see that when he mentioned the Mouth of Sauron, he does not say anything about black magic. Still, I reserve my judgment, as Tolkien wrote vast works, and somewhere he must have dealt with this.
@@mordechai- He ain't involved in the current conversation, so it would be kind of irrelevant. Magic and whether it's good or bad, isn't a lord of the rings exclusive subject material.
@McNab1986 Okay, look. If you make a spell using plants, let's say, you could choose to make good or bad maguc. But of you kill someone and use their blood for magic, it's black and evil magic.
He talks about magia and goetia in Letter 155 to Naomi Mitchison. "But I suppose that, for the purposes of the tale, some would say that there is a latent distinction such as once was called the distinction between magia and goeteia.1 Galadriel speaks of the ‘deceits of the Enemy’. Well enough, but magia could be, was, held good (per se), and goeteia bad. Neither is, in this tale, good or bad (per se), but only by motive or purpose or use. Both sides use both, but with different motives." neither seem to be bad or good but mostly it's dependent on the intention. However, he seems to say that the "good" guys never really use goetia in this story as it's too easily used for nefarious purposes (paraphrasing, of course). I'm simplifying the argument. It seems like the Professor is doing his classic "both and".
Looks like it's used twice in the Prologue under section 3 Of the Ordering of the Shire. He mentions the Thain of Buckland was master of the Shire-moot - "The Thain was the master of the Shire-moot, and captain of the Shire-muster and the Hobbitry-in-arms; but as muster and moot were only held in times of emergency, which no longer occurred, the Thainship had ceased to be more than a nominal dignity."
@@mordechai- Yes. He had stated that there were some videos uploaded and scheduled for publication in coming weeks. If today's isn't the last one, I think next week's will be.
