Thank you all for the pictures. I wish I could attend in person. It's nice to see Baillie and Catherine McIlwaine again, this time in Oxford. Hope we can have the videos on YT.
DMRoberts wrote:
@Trotter Is that Christopher with his Bodley medal in the photo behind Baillie? At first glance, for an instant, it looked like someone was teaching him how to use a smart phone or tablet, but of course that was something I suspect would never have happened.
Yes it is, it is Richard Ovendenhttps://www.history.ox.ac.uk/people/richard-ovenden[1] presenting the medal to him. Ballie said that being given the medal meant a huge amount to him, and I'm very grateful to the Bodleian for awarding it to Christopher Tolkien.
Baillie said that Christopher hated computers and needed help with them, so a smart phone would have been a definite no 😄
If you read French, Baillie Tolkien writes about that and others things in her foreword to this new ebook in honor of Christopher Tolkien that is published today.
On what would have been Christopher Tolkien's 100th birthday, just a brief thanks to him for his long and dedicated work on his father's papers.
I am personally thankful for his work on The History of Middle-earth, especially 'You and Me and the Cottage of Lost Play' which has brought me much joy, and solace during tough times.
Happy birthday Christopher.
I am personally thankful for his work on The History of Middle-earth, especially 'You and Me and the Cottage of Lost Play' which has brought me much joy, and solace during tough times.
Happy birthday Christopher.
When I think of what Christopher accomplished, what his work meant — and means — for his father's work, I don't think I can ever do better than to quote, again, from Leaf by Niggle, as I did for the epigraph of Tolkien's Legendarium:
"After a time Niggle turned towards the Forest. Not because he was tired of the Tree, but he seemed to have got it all clear in his mind now, and was aware of it, and of its growth, even when he was not looking at it. As he walked away, he discovered an odd thing: the Forest, of course, was a distant Forest, yet he could approach it, even enter it, without its losing that particular charm. He had never before been able to walk into the distance without turning it into mere surroundings. It really added a considerable attraction to walking in the country, because, as you walked, new distances opened out; so that you now had double, treble, and quadruple distances, doubly, trebly, and quadruply enchanting. You could go on and on, and have a whole country in a garden, or in a picture (if you preferred to call it that). You could go on and on, but not perhaps for ever. There were the Mountains in the background. They did get nearer, very slowly. They did not seem to belong to the picture, or only as a link to something else, a glimpse through the trees of something different, a further stage: another picture.
"Niggle walked about, but he was not merely pottering. He was looking round carefully. The Tree was finished, though not finished with— 'Just the other way about to what it used to be,' he thought."
"After a time Niggle turned towards the Forest. Not because he was tired of the Tree, but he seemed to have got it all clear in his mind now, and was aware of it, and of its growth, even when he was not looking at it. As he walked away, he discovered an odd thing: the Forest, of course, was a distant Forest, yet he could approach it, even enter it, without its losing that particular charm. He had never before been able to walk into the distance without turning it into mere surroundings. It really added a considerable attraction to walking in the country, because, as you walked, new distances opened out; so that you now had double, treble, and quadruple distances, doubly, trebly, and quadruply enchanting. You could go on and on, and have a whole country in a garden, or in a picture (if you preferred to call it that). You could go on and on, but not perhaps for ever. There were the Mountains in the background. They did get nearer, very slowly. They did not seem to belong to the picture, or only as a link to something else, a glimpse through the trees of something different, a further stage: another picture.
"Niggle walked about, but he was not merely pottering. He was looking round carefully. The Tree was finished, though not finished with— 'Just the other way about to what it used to be,' he thought."
3 hours ago
(edited)
2024-11-21 5:00:42 PM UTC
Edited by Urulókë on 2024-11-21 5:22:07 PM UTC
2024-11-21 5:00:42 PM UTC
I'll also take this opportunity to point out something that I don't think I've stipulated publicly before:
As I say in my introduction to "The Rivers and Beacon-hills of Gondor" in The Nature of Middle-earth:
"Christopher Tolkien gave numerous excerpts from this essay as well in Unfinished Tales. He prepared a fuller presentation of the text for The Peoples of Middle-earth, but it was omitted from that volume on consideration of length. Christopher kindly provided me with both the full text of the essay and of his own edited version intended for The Peoples of Middle-earth. I have retained, with his gracious consent, as much of Christopher’s own commentary as practicable, clearly identified as such throughout."
And so I put this chapter featuring Christopher's own notes at the very end of NoMe quite deliberately, for one very specific reason: I wanted the last words of the contents (proper) of the last volume to collect Tolkien's unpublished writings on Middle-earthSo far as I know![1] to be Christopher's own.
Carl
As I say in my introduction to "The Rivers and Beacon-hills of Gondor" in The Nature of Middle-earth:
"Christopher Tolkien gave numerous excerpts from this essay as well in Unfinished Tales. He prepared a fuller presentation of the text for The Peoples of Middle-earth, but it was omitted from that volume on consideration of length. Christopher kindly provided me with both the full text of the essay and of his own edited version intended for The Peoples of Middle-earth. I have retained, with his gracious consent, as much of Christopher’s own commentary as practicable, clearly identified as such throughout."
And so I put this chapter featuring Christopher's own notes at the very end of NoMe quite deliberately, for one very specific reason: I wanted the last words of the contents (proper) of the last volume to collect Tolkien's unpublished writings on Middle-earthSo far as I know![1] to be Christopher's own.
Carl
1 So far as I know! ↩
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