It is an acknowledged fact that while Tolkien was a genius, and very detailed when it came to landscapes, however, his character descriptions are rather vague.
Legolas:
“He was tall as a young tree, lithe, immensely strong, able swiftly to draw a great war-bow and shoot down a Nazgûl, endowed with the tremendous vitality of Elvish bodies, so hard and resistant to hurt that he went only in light shoes over rock or through snow, the most tireless of all the fellowship.”
Gimli:
“Gimli the dwarf alone wore openly a short shirt of steel-rings, for dwarves make light of burdens; and in his belt was a broad-bladed axe.”
Aragorn:
“a shaggy head of dark hair flecked with grey, and in a pale stern face a pair of keen grey eyes.”
Some writers show gender dysmorphism in descriptions, meaning they describe men and women in a drastically different way. Tolkien does show some of this.
Arwen:
“Young she was and yet not so. The braids of her dark hair were touched by no frost, her white arms and clear face were flawless and smooth, and the light of stars was in her bright eyes, grey as a cloudless night; yet queenly she looked, and thought and knowledge were in her glance, as of one who has known many things that the years bring. Above her brow her head was covered with a cap of silver lace netted with small gems, glittering white; but her soft grey raiment had no ornament save a girdle of leaves wrought in silver.”
Galadriel:
“…she grew to be tall beyond the measure even of the women of the Noldor; she was strong of body, mind and will, a match for both the loremasters and the athletes of the Eldar in the days of their youth. Even among the Eldar she was accounted beautiful, and her hair was held a marvel unmatched. It was golden like the hair of her father and of her foremother Indis, but richer and more radiant, of its gold was touched by some memory of the starlike silver of her mother; and the Eldar said that the light of the Two Trees… had been snared in her tresses.”
Eowyn:
“Grave and thoughtful was her glance, as she looked on the king with cool pity in her eyes. Very fair was her face, and her long hair was like a river of gold. Slender and tall she was in her white robe girt with silver; but strong she seemed and stern as steel, a daughter of kings. Thus Aragorn for the first time in the full light of day beheld Eowyn, lady of Rohan, and thought her fair, fair and cold, like a morning of pale spring that is not yet come to womanhood.”
I read that last one out to Gordon and he was like, “Do what now?” Morning of pale spring that is not yet come to womanhood is a bit out there.
Interesting, no?
Update: Hey guys, I’m locking comments on this post. It’s a shame because there are such interesting discussions in the comments. The topic for this was the genius of Tolkien and his descriptions. I didn’t mind Chekhov at all, or other discussions of classics, but we keep getting recommendations for completely unrelated authors. Not to mention that it’s the weekend, and Mod R is supposed to be off.
I have to say I’m honestly a little bit exasperated. Any time we mention books on the blog, we get bombarded with book recommendations that have nothing to do with the subject of the post. Then we pull the comments, and there are hurt feelings.
We have dedicated book recommendation threads. Please respect our blog policy.
While I can appreciate the option to view characters however they are in my head, I prefer more descriptions. 😄
I didn’t realize that he didn’t really give them though. Thanks for sharing! 😊
I once decided to read A Christmas Carol to my elementary school boys. I got thru the first chapter. I firmly believe that the opening line of ACC is the best opening line ever.
“Marley was dead, to begin with.”
what? I want to know more!
They were with me thru the first chapter. Then we got to the many many many pages of description of Victorian England.
…and they were gone. I enjoyed the poetry of the piece but to kids raised on graphic novels and Harry Dresden, too much description. My older son said “mom! is someone going to die in that fountain? no? why do we care?”
and truthfully… he’s right. Dickens got paid by the word
Sounds like things I would write for university essays at 2 am the morning they were due. It may not make the most sense, but it sounds poetic so it gets a pass. ;P
I’m now pondering describing women of varying ages according to seasonal mornings. I guess I’ve progressed to an overcast and frozen winter morning, having left womanhood behind to emerge as a full crone.
YES! Embrace the Crone!
As a Crone, I personally embrace a late spring morning, May for preference, low to mid 70s Fahrenheit. Sunny with light winds would be favorite.
Everyone knows it’s April 25th 😜. Because it’s not too hot, not too cold. All you need is a light jacket.
classic
Hilarious! “Describe your perfect date” … 😉
Yeah, late May might actually be more of an early summer morning. I’ve been blown over in late April though. Sometimes Mother Nature ignores the schedule. Because she can.
😂😂🤣 it never gets old.
And don’t forget … world peace …
My husband references the “perfect day” ALL THE TIME. Of course, he was born on April 25.
Hear hear!
+1
What is a group of crones called? A quarrel?
Officially, it’s a cackle of crones mwahahahaha.
I am not surprised. It’s been a long time since I reread “Lord of the Rings” and I have always preferred to imagine the characters myself.
I always felt that LOTR was the ultimate plot driven book. The people of Middle Earth were simply there to push the story along. IMO, what happened was what interested Tolkien and the “actors” were secondary.
If I remember correctly, “The Hobbit” had more description in it, but I could be imagining things…
Fully agree!
He is the undisputed daddy of worldbuilding (official title 😜). His plots obviously heard about the “no unnecessary scenes” rule and decided it was cute but not applicable (and what fun we’ve had because of it!).
The characters were a bit harder to digest for me too. The vocabulary registers jump around, the characterisation often dives into purple prose as we see here, the motivations and reactions a bit shakey sometimes.
But it’s all in the style and clearly hasn’t harmed the popularly and appeal of the books much!
Reading the Hobbit was fun. Reading Lord of the Rings was a slough. That is why I was so surprised when they made the movies, much better than the books.
I’m always curious to ask people when it comes to classics like these: have you read them in the original or translation?
We all know about translations that go badly and fail to capture the magic of the original, but sometimes the opposite is true and they can resonate so much better. It’s amazing how transformative it can be, really.
I wish I could read Chekhov in the original, for example. I read him in Romanian and he’s hilarious, like giggle out loud at 3 am under the blankets funny.
I read the same piece by him in English, and he’s heart-wrenchingly tragic. Always wondered where the truth is.
Hmmm…. That’s very interesting! I wonder if Ilona would mind weighing in on if they are comedies or tragedies in Russian? I will confess that I’m not familiar with his work, but now feel like I need to go read some to find out.
I imagine a bad translation to be like reading bad subtitles. They may have tried, but you just know that wasn’t what they were meaning to say. I often find subtitles funny. 😄
I think at least partly it’s to do with the stereotype that exists in the West that Eastern Europeans and Russians in particular have to be Soulful and Tragic and Very Serious Indeed.
Chekhov himself saw them as comedies, even farces. They always have a dimension of wooden language, and overly-officious people, absurdly funny details. You’re laughing AT these people, not with them. Stanislavski (THE Stanislavski, of the acting technique) who was the first to direct his plays in Moscow, saw much more in them and focused on the realism and psychological subtext, to the point where even the author himself felt re-inspired.
As Jewelwing rightly says, the reader brings a lot of themselves into each book experience 🙂.
Ok, wow, Chekhov himself saw his books as comedy/farce. It must be the English translation that takes all the interest out of it!
How good is the translation is something I never actually wondered about when I was forced to read them in school.
I personally believe that if you see the humour in Bulgakov, you will see the funny in Chekhov. They’re tapping the same vein, for me.
Then again, I’ve never read The Master and Margarita in English and now I’m afraid to!
I read the English translation of Master and Margarita as an adult and it was a slog. Also baffling. I figured it was a Russian thing that wasn’t translated well.
It’s one of the most fascinating and hilarious and gripping books I ever read. I devoured it in one afternoon the first time I found it when I was 15. It might be vastly different tastes, but I am *very* tempted to believe it’s the fault of a humdrum translation.
I didn’t realize he considered them comedies. I guess I associate realism with more drama than funny, but yes, it truly is in all how you look at it.
You can find humor even in dark situations. My sister and I made some jokes when we were burying our grandma’s ashes, which others might have found inappropriate, but it’s how we dealt with it.
I borrowed an English translation with “award winning translators”, so we’ll see how it goes. 😊
My recollection is that Chekhov could not convince even his Russian producers that his dramas were comedies. But over half a century ago in college I once attended a dramatic reading (in English translation) that played the drama as comedy and it worked for me.
The Russian TV mini-series from Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita retains a lot of the novel’s dialog, and employs a lot of comedy. Works for me. Though I think Bulgakov is less subtle about the comedy than Chekhov.
Hehehe, you could say that. Chekhov didn’t go the way of huge demon cats with a penchant for sarcasm, vodka and good pickled forest mushrooms 😂
Edit: now I want pickled mushrooms and it’s 4 am and the wrong end of the continent for them 😅
You know, it’s not just the translation. Angela’s Ashes is typically described as hilarious. I almost couldn’t finish the thing because it was truly heart-breaking, right from the start. I kept waiting for it to get funny and it never did. Most of my friends who read it thought it was a comedy. My FIL was the only person I knew who had the same reaction I did. The sequel was almost as tragic, to me as a reader. But all you ever hear about is how funny Frank McCourt is. In some ways, every reader reads a different book.
Boy, that’s interesting. Like you, I didn’t find Angela’s Ashes at all humorous. It’s not something I ever thought to reread, but now I’m curious.
I thought it was sad too. I didn’t finish it because it bothered me too much.
Frank McCourt also did a child’s Christmas picture book called Angela And The Baby Jesus. I kind of teared up when I read it. It is based on an anecdote in Angela’s Ashes. It is a lovely book!
Seconding this – a grim read
A Russian once congratulated me for having read ‘great Russian writers’. Then he went on to tell me that reading the Russian ‘classic’ pieces like War and Peace, Dr. Zhivago, Brothers Karamnov (sp), Uncle Vanya and others, even with a great translator, something was lost in the story. I feel this is true of other languages where I read ‘classics’ in French – translation of Guy de Maupassant (sp)- or Camus (primarily because they have easier grammar etc.) and then was set the task of translating from the original French back into English. It was eye opening in that regards. You could catch the flavor, but yet not the exact meaning in a way. Maupassant in particular as he was so fussy about his word choices and wrote and re-wrote sentences to find the right wording. For Tolkien I love his descriptions as they did not burden me with a ‘preconception’ of the character and they could be any way I wanted them to appear. Even the female characters (of which there were few). I confess the movie did much to make it impossible to see Aragon as anything other than Viggo’s portrayal. And that for me made the books better than the movies.
Mod R, which story are you referring to? It seems like as good of a place to start as any. 😊
Sidebar: Did you know you can make yarn from dog hair? And Textiles?
It is called Chiengora—the art of turning dog hair into textiles.
Great article about it. https://time.com/6330351/dog-hair-sustainable-textile-fabric/?utm_source=pocket-newtab-en-us
Amazing.
Read an anecdote years ago by a woman who had spun her dog’s fur into yarn and then knitted a cardigan out of it. Everything was lovely and luxurious until she got caught in the rain while wearing it…. 😅
Hear a very similar story regarding a lady who collect buffalo hair from a local petting zoo.
However in real life the people creating the yarn and later the fabric would resolve “smell” issues. After all no one smells like sheep when wool gets wet.
Although I must say that you don’t want to be around a lot of tweed when it’s raining 😅
Especially not tweed made from fleeces treated in the old way!
I was in a medieval re-enactment group and one of the other ladies was into spinning yarn. She also had a very long haired dog and would comb him and gather the hair for that very purpose. Unfortunately she moved away so I never saw the end result.
You are supposed to get the undercoat preferably the chest hair, Lhasa apso is a good dog for this because of the length of the hair.
Samoyed dogs – the fur makes beautiful sweaters and gloves. But. Wash that dog fur many times you must, or you will smell like wet dog. Still, lovely long silky fur- reminding me of Angora. I think they’ve got like 12 layers of fur? And they shed like 30 lbs when they blow their winter coats. My friend Heidi had one, and made a sweater when her beloved doggo passed.
I found it rather poetic. 🙂
I always read Tolkien’s descriptions as a conveying of feelings, impressions, observations, and ideas, rather than a specific description.
This particular line made perfect sense to me, but it could be that I read it around age 12 during a cold spring in rural Canada.
An island where the sun shines palely through the mists, and the spring sun lacks the warmth and strength of summer afternoons.
Just as a shy young girl may lack the warmth and strength of a mature woman.
I looked out at the misty morning, and the pale sun trying to warm land that had only recently lost its frost … beautiful, but cold … so cold …
And I knew there was no point planting seeds that day. The land and sun had no warmth to nurture them … not yet …
So, too, did I understand that Tolkien was indicating that the season had not yet come for this character to shine with her full strength …
It is a moment in time, a place on a journey toward maturity. I thought it fit well with the arc of character development for Eowyn.
JRRT: “… like a morning of pale spring that is not yet come to womanhood …”
Of course, the description also resonates with the restraint and cool formality that comes with rigorous schooling in manners and deportment … seen in some parts of British society and diaspora, and in other cultures too … and which one might imagine to have been applied to a “daughter of kings” …
+1 Thanks, voicing my thoughts so articulately.
Thanks, Kalina 🙂
So glad my humble thoughts were enjoyed 🙂
Thanks for the feedback 🙂
I have no problems with the lack of visual descriptions, because I don’t visualize the content of books while reading them (I learned that it is called afantasy, and people view it as an illness – I think it’s normal).
I can relate more to “a morning of pale spring that is not yet come to womanhood” and “strong she seemed and stern as steel” as to (imagined) 1,70 m tall, slender figure with pale skin and long golden hair.
I tent to ignore descriptions of people and focus on their character.
If we check the list of famous people with aphantasia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia , and read about several authors and artists who have admitted they had it, I would say it definitely hasn’t stopped them from being creative and producing masterpieces!
I didn’t know about the Wikipedia article – I will definitely try a book by one of the authors to see if it’s easier for me to read.
Thank you.
Never knew what that was called, thank you! I rarely can visualize, and I, too, skip descriptions, which makes me feel like I know a character’s heart, but wouldn’t recognize them in real life.
“Do what now?” Thanks for this morning’s belly laugh; I scared the dog.
JRRT got a little carried away with the phrasing, I always felt. It distracted, and thereby detracted for me, from the story at times. Same with Robin McKinley’s The Hero And The Crown/The Blue Sword duology, although they’re two of my favorite books. Too many ands!
But her books are much more character-driven, and the female characters much more real, for a fantasy value of real anyway. I go back to them way more often than I do to Tolkien. That investment in the characters makes McKinley’s books comfort reads for me.
Thanks for reminding me about Tolkien though! He was a mainstay for me back in the day.
I live very close to Jonkers Rare Books. I walk by their window 2-3 times a week and always stop to look at their books on display. I’ve picked up a few treasures over the years. I was surprised to learn that they had such an on-line following.
For better or worse, the depiction of the character on the first cover is how I imagine that character to look.
The last Kate model best fits what I think she should look like, but the first is the one I picture while reading.
“… describe men and women in a drastically different way …”
Ah, I figured he just found the women more interesting. 🙂
And they were, really. Arwen riding against the Nazgul …
Eowyn facing the Nazgul …
Only Gandalf and Aragorn even began to be as interesting …
I found Frodo’s whining rather tedious.
That was Glorfindel at the fords!
Arwen doesn’t appear in the books very much at all, mostly in the Appendices.
The movies added her in to have more female characters, I guess, which is valid… but I admit I was a bit taken aback when she turned up in that scene lol.
the book goes into who the characters are a lot more than that movies, necessarily, since the movies only have a limited amount of time.
you get to know them a lot better in the books.
I read these books in my 20s, so I pretty much uncritically just accepted them. Poetic, pretty, epic etc. 50 years later, I’ve thought about rereading, but there’s so much new out there to enjoy!
Love that first pic! The Swedish illustration pretty much leaves me cold tho.
I had read LoTR first time when I was 12 – the whole trilogy was printed in one big book, A4 format (translated into Polish), and had wonderful ilustrations by Alan Lee. I remember loving the ilustrations – I had always imagined the characters after those ilustrations and never even realized how sparse the orginal descriptions were (but I do love the description of Eowyn – it speaks to me) …and I still grave for loseing this wonderful book to a “friend” who never gave it back and lost contact after I trusted her with “my tresure” 😢
My husband had a male relative who read LoTR with voices every night as a child. When he married me, he passed on the tradition to my 5 year old son. Now grandpa who was an actor before I met him will read when they get older too. Books pass on heirloom memories.
I LOVED LOVED LOVED Tolkien in my teens and early 20s. The Silmarillion came out when I was in college and I just couldn’t make it thru. Then when my kid got of age, we read the Hobbit together, ok, a little….but mostly as I remembered. Then I tired to reread the trilogy, all I could think is OMG!! this man needed a MUCH stronger {or any?} story editor.
You have to remember, different time. Different audience, different core values, and most importantly, different purposes. Tolkien wasn’t a working commercial writer in the traditional sense of the word, meaning that being a university lecturer was his primary employment. He was a perfectionist, building his beloved world word by word, so if he felt he needed to spend 3 pages on a description of a tree or lay out someone’s lineage in great detail, he could.
Meanwhile our generation is like, “Do I really need these two paragraphs describing this building? Am I slowing down too much?”
I remember someone once really taking objection that you had one sentence describing a floral arrangement in a dramatic scene.
We are used to everything being so fast and to the point, and we’re careening towards more of this short attention span. Even watching things from the early 2000s, the long intros with the theme tunes and each character shown in detail feel interminable.
I think that is what I often love about old books (and non-American movies), that they take their time. Sure, it’s nice to inhale books from time to time, but I like commitment. I love Tolkien’s tree descriptions for example, because they make me feel like I’m breaking the same air as the characters. Like Ilona said, different times different writing styles.
I also enjoy reading Westerns, mostly older ones and this situation is very obvious with them. Compare a passage by Zane Grey, one of the earliest popular Western writers, with one by Louis L’Amour, who wrote later at the height of the Western novels’ popularity:
As Zane Grey’s hero is riding through the countryside into an ambush, the hero’s physical appearance, clothing, saddle and horse are described, the sunrise is described, the scent of the breeze is described, the colour of the dirt is described, the striations in the nearby rocky bluff are described, every spine on every nearby cactus is described … and five pages later Zane Grey describes the sound as the first bullet zings past the hero’s ear…
One of his early popular novels was “Riders of the Purple Sage”. I think the word “Prose” was accidentally omitted after Purple…
Contrast Louis L’Amour: the hero has eaten traildust for a week and is looking forward to a bath at the next town. As he passes a rocky bluff, a bullet zips past his ear. Aaand… we’re off… Total description of hero, countryside, and physical layout for the ambush is maybe about three paragraphs.
How interesting!
Hehehe, Riders of the Purple Prose applies to many books I could name.
I read Tolkien aloud to my sons when they were in Elementary school. I think it is best read aloud.
+1
Magic happens when TLoR is read out loud. Each day a chapter or so. Give up on just reading it through.
It is transformed into Art.
That’s because as a medieval scholar immersed in epic verse like Beowulf, Tolkien wrote in epic verse. I firmly believe epic verse, which was developed for the oral/aural delivery, must be heard, not seen, to be appreciated! 😀
My favourite is the meme reframing of Tolkien and C.S. Lewis’ frenemy relationship by modern audiences and social media.
Showing the meticulous, scholarly, purist Tolkien, who as you say paid homage to the epic sources and was immersed in showing them off to expansive detail, almost ending his friendship with Lewis because he mixed Santa Claus with fauns in Narnia 😂 https://www.crossway.org/articles/the-birth-of-narnia-and-why-tolkien-hated-it/ .
And Lewis taking him to task about all the elves and all the trees.
I’m reading the On Stories collection of short Lewis pieces (including his reviews of the Hobbit and LOTR!) It’s wonderful to see how the two men influenced and encouraged each other.
The Prologue notes how Tolkien credits Lewis with making him write LOTR, and Lewis credits Tolkien with helping him regain his faith…
There is a recording on YouTube of Tolkien reading the ride of the Rohirrim and it is amazing 😍
The first lotr movie came out when I was 12(ish – I think) I adored it and absolutely *had* to know what happened next. So, I read the books. The first one was a slog, mainly because it went over ground I knew. Then I devoured the others and was disappointed by the later movies because I had the story in my head 🤷♀️
TLDR, I never noticed the lack of character description, because I’d seen them on film!
“TLDR, I never noticed the lack of character description, because I’d seen them on film!”
And that is a core factor. Tolkien wrote for the audience that mostly read, while our generation writes for the audience that mostly watches. 🙂
I actually like his descriptions of people. I’m visually impaired, so The Impressions they give me are what I use to describe people more than what they actually look like. I especially like the last one. it makes me think of a person who is seemingly cold to strangers but warm to those who know her.
Someone above in the comments said that Tokien’s descriptions were more about feeling than appearance, and that is an interesting and valid point.
Thanks, Ilona 🙂
I love your writing so much!!!!
So delighted and honoured that my humble thoughts found approval. 🙂
Made my day, week, etc. Much joy! 🙂
Thank you again for your writing: all the good feelings, and so much comfort … and thoughts … and everything … Thank you.
A feminist he was not.
Very much a man of his time and social context: boarding school and career in male dominated and male-centering, antiquated system academia.
I think he probably tried his best to write “strong women”, but he simply misunderstood us from
the get-go.
Here is an excerpt from a letter he wrote to his son in the 1940s, for example :
“ The sexual impulse makes women (naturally when unspoiled more unselfish) very sympathetic and understanding, or specially desirous of being so (or seeming so), and very ready to enter into all the interests, as far as they can, from ties to religion, of the young man they are attracted to. No intent necessarily to deceive: sheer instinct; the servient, helpmeet instinct, generously warmed by desire and young blood. Under this impulse they can in fact often achieve very remarkable insight and understanding, even of things otherwise outside their natural range: for it is their gift to be receptive, stimulated, fertilized (in many other matters than the physical) by the male. Every teacher knows that. How quickly an intelligent woman can be taught, grasp his ideas, see his point – and how (with rare exceptions) they can go no further, when they leave his hand, or when they cease to take a personal interest in him.”
Letters of JRR Tolkien, ed. H Carpenter & C Tolkien, Harper Collins, 1995, pp. 48-54
Good grief, I knew he was bad, but that is truly awful.
He lived down the road from us when I was a child, and was a mysterious figure to us children I suspect because, like my father, most of the time he took no notice of us at all, but when he did you jolly well knew it.
I discovered the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings in College. It was a revelation. Tolkien created a total world. I had never read or thought of such an idea. Revolutionary. Are there shortcomings, yes but what a world ❤️
I read LOTR when I was a teen thanks to my mom and older brother. The part in Return of the King where Aragon and company were at the black gate, and Faithless and Accursed came out on his horse was a very interesting description of why he looked the way he did.
No wonder it took Peter Jackson and company so long to create the movies.
Off topic, but I just finished rereading “Magic Slays” and was totally surprised when Kate told the rabbi the story of Arez/Enkidu . . . the first Preceptor of the Iron Dogs!?
I thought there were only two preceptors, Voron and Hugh. Is Arez simply a person so lost in history that virtually nobody remembers him? Or is Kate misinformed? And why don’t I remember ever reading that before?
Voron and Hugh were the modern day Perceptors, the only ones of this era, since Roland woke up 🙂.
Ok, I’m a huge LOTR fan – I’ve read the trilogy over 100 times – including the appendices!
So I see the Fellowship ship image above and am immediately drawn in – only to realize that it’s not a post from Fans of Middle Earth, but from the creators of Kate Daniels, Dina DeMille, Cerise Mar, Audrey Callahan, Catalina Baylor, etc.
Two of my worlds collide!
I appreciate your worlds for their women who are whole people, who have drives, desires, and responsibilities. My grandmother and two of my aunts lost their husbands while their children were still young. My great aunts never married. Not everyone finds their ideal partner, and sometimes life is a “bitter b*tch” to quote George.
It’s the complete characters, action, and witty dialogue that sets House Andrews books apart
Thank you for
Tolkien was a genius. 😛
I love Tolkien’s writings and his descriptions. When I read his books, the characters come to life from what he writes. I find that they make a lot of sense, and I love the beauty in his writing.
For that matter, I really like your descriptions. You give enough to let me visualize the characters but not enough that it interferes with my own concept and imagination. The one time I was thrown was when you first introduced Jim. I had this whole image of him in my mind but totally missed that his skin was dark brown. It wasn’t till a chapter or two later that I caught, and went back to the first look at him and realized I had missed that. It took me a while to wrap my head around but finally got his revised look back in my head. 🙂
I’m stoked on the fact that someone else uses, “do what now?” to express incredulity.
Do we only use this expression in Texas?
Do any of y’all in other states say, “do what now?”😂
I love your descriptions. I loved Tolkien when I read it, but I admit to skipping over much of the descriptions. Some of them are so long and tangled they bored me. Yes, I have the attention span of a gnat. But as a reader, I need the barest of descriptions to orient me. I have been called an action junkie reader before!
I haven’t read Tolkien in years and years so this was quite interesting. I remember skipping many times in that book. Pale morning…not yet quite bright morning so still young…I guess. But I would have skipped right past that line as being too tangled for me!
“Do what now?” is an apt comment on many of Tolkien’s descriptions. He tended to wax poetic. Yet I read and re-read The Hobbit, and the Lord of the Rings Trilogy when I was in high school because I found them to be better than most other available fantasy. Besides, they were in the library and I could borrow them often.