Hello, this is a video that had been on the new channel and I realised it hadn't been published on here yet. So many of you may have already seen this. It is an extended look at this topic, something I had covered on the Podcast a while ago. Enjoy! Edit - The "new channel" thing has confused some people. I temporarily had a new channel but I'm back on here. You haven't missed any videos :)
For me, The Silmarillion is the main feature and the books in The History of Middle-earth series are the bonus features. They’re extremely interesting and provide a wonderful window into Tolkien’s creative process over the decades, but they’re not things I’m going to revisit over and over again as I have with The Silmarillion for the last 40 years. I’ll stick with the completed work over fragments and scribblings in margins of notebooks, even if it was completed by Christopher. To each his own.
I believe that one of the goals of Tolkien in working out the elfin genealogies was to show that Galadriel had the right to rule (after Gil Galad) as queen, but for whatever reason remained merely a lady of the wood before she passed her test.
First? But I was here before the river and the trees: I remember the first raindrop and the first acorn. I made paths before the big channels, and saw the little channels arriving....
The algorithms have been overfed. They are slow and lazy. They need to get off their collective arses and start directing prospective viewers and subs this way.🙏🙂↕️
very well made video, and as a german, loving the scottish accent :) Obviously there was no primogeniture among the noldor, as always there have been descendants with a higher claim. like the sons of faenor. so one could assume, that birth wasn't everything when the elves considered who should be king.
Over the years I have wondered what influence the publisher may have had in pushing for The Silmarillion to be published when it was. I think it would be a very different book if Christopher took another decade, give or take, to dive deeper into what his father left behind before coming up with the "finished" Silmarillion.
You make a very good point. Christopher obviously didn't know that Gil-galad was not Fingon's son because it wasn't until later that he found the note/memo and realized he had published a mistake. There were so many notes, notebooks, papers, typed pages, stuff written in pieces of paper or napkins, etc. All that had to be sorted and organized. I guess they couldn't finish it all by 1977-78.
Thanks for remembering Guy Gavriel Kay who is, in his own right, one of my favorite fantasy authors. As for the High King's parentage, it occurs to me that he may not have "come into his majority" when his father died Not only might that be why his supposed uncle had to take the thrown, but why he was sent to the Havens in the first place, instead of marching off to war.
It seems strange to me that the High King of the Noldor in Tirion was of the House of Finarfin, while the High King of the Noldor in Middle-earth was of the House of Fingolfin. If Gil-galad, as the son of Fingon, had not died, it could have caused a conflict of claim to the throne when the Noldor of Middle-earth returned to Aman in the Fourth Age.
P.S. I’m fine with never actually knowing the answer. That’s the beauty of mythology and tales of old. The “real” truth is lost to time. I enjoy pondering the various options Tolkien considered.
Marvelously made video as always ❤ Though , I do think the listeners need to have read not just SIL but HoMe as well to fully comprehend it ( even though you explain the narrative from there well). It just reminds me when I was reading through the HoMe volumes and as Tolkien kept changing names and narratives ( and remembering names is my weakest point in general irl 😅). I honestly wanted to bang my head in the wall , so much name changes all the time 😱😭🥲😅. But yes , I also have accepted as Gilgalad’s lineage to be from Orodreth who comes from Angrod 🙂. And while I’d understand why some would prefer what they have read in SIL as is easier for them , I’m more confused by others who prefer to accept the earlier versions in HoMe .
Hopefully, it's easy to digest. I think going through the figures in chronological order seemed easiest. But it doesn't help as well that the HoMe books (which I love) are structured in such an insane way. They are difficult book to read not just for the content but the way it's written out. You really need to hone in on sections and focus on them rather than starting from page 1 and just reading through it. That's the way I read them nowadays anyway. I think few people accept the earlier traditions. I think it's usually what The Silmarillion says and then those who have read HoMe going with Tolkien's last thoughts. Many won't even though that there's another possibility than what is said in The Silmarillion!
@@TheRedBook if I gotta be super honest , I don’t always like Tolkien’s last change attempts , mainly those in vol12 . Because while this one with the lineage of Gil-galad from 1965 fixes the issues surrounding it , other later changes create unfixable discrepancies and there is the Chris’ warning about JRR’s state of mind for a lot of the final changes in his last years before his passing . If I have to be honest my favorite volume is vol10 I think it’s the most cohesive and some of the variants ( because there are ,as usual ,a lot ,sometimes directly opposing to one another ) , give the best info . Especially the essays of Laws and Customs and the debate between Andreth and Finrod as you mention ( and is also one of my absolute favorite materials ).
I definitely don't like all changes. I don't like all the revisions Galadriel went through and find her more flawed beginnings to be far more interesting than a saint-like figure. There was this tendency to make good characters absolute paragons of good through changes and I am not a fan of that. Yet, they are still Tolkien's changes so I will always discuss them. I also really like exploring that idea of mythology -> history with the change to the cosmology he was proposing. Too late in proceedings to write about it for Tolkien but I find that interesting. Comparing the very early pure myth stuff to more of a recorded history. Both have their place. Volume 10 is my favourite and I recommend it to everyone. It's the only volume of HoMe I think everyone must read to gain a better understanding of the Legendarium. Could argue 12 as well but if I had to pick just a single volume it would be 10.
@@TheRedBook I once ran into someone online who refused to consider anything published after The Silmarillion as being valid because it was all published posthumously. When I pointed out that The Silmarillion was also published posthumously, he stopped replying.
@@TheRedBook I think I will take your "advice" on how to approach the HoME publications. I have read some of them from the first page to the last page, but I have also combed through the pages looking for specific aspects of the Legendarium. That is a more enjoyable way to read the material.
My takeaway: "Goblin Feet" is canon. O! I hear the tiny horns! Of enchanted leprechauns! And the padded feet of many gnomes a-coming! I too would enjoy a video on the Ruin of Doriath, parsing what's J. R. R.'s and what's Chris's.
Tolkien fans need to be more willing to jump wholly into the conceit that what we read are imperfect reports of long-ago times that have been translated, copied, lost, found, translated again and finally ended up in our hands.
Most people want some sort of "truth" and that's not entirely possible with the Legendarium. Gaps aren't seen as interesting mysteries but problems that need solved. Not how I view it but it's not the same for everyone.
@@esjope yes. Christopher was his literary heir, successor, what have you, he had access to it all. We are a very lucky fandom. Who else would have done the work for The History of Middle-earth?
The Silmarillion was the first publication that was released after LotR. It seems to me that much of the HoME was Christopher showing us all the 💩(stuff😅) that he had to sift through in order to present to us the Silmarillion.
Yeah George Lucas is familiar with the idea of "head cannon " as well, where "fans" attempt to say something is true or false despite what the original creator says
I think he went in the direction Lovecraft started, where other authors could write in-world stories. But the Star Wars 'canon' being continued by Disney is absolute garbage compared to the EU stories Lucas doesn't like.
Errors in canon? Haven’t you heard what God said? 2 Timothy 3:”All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness.” There are no errors in Tolkien. ;)
