Thursday, October 20, 2016

A Middle-earth romance

Amazing how, even from the Halls of Mandos, J.R.R. Tolkien continues to have books published.

Come, prepare for another journey to Middle-earth, this time during the First Age, to witness the tale of "Beren and Lúthien – a story of the perilous romance between a man and an elf, is one of a number of texts by the author brought 'together for the first time'" and published on May 4, 2017
Apparently Christopher Tolkien has attempted to extract the story of Beren and Lúthien from the The Silmarillion. Moreover, "to show something of the process whereby this legend of Middle-earth evolved over the years, he has told the story in his father's own words by giving, first, its original form, and then passages in prose and verse from later texts that illustrate the narrative as it changed. Presented together for the first time, they reveal aspects of the story, both in event and in narrative immediacy, that were afterwards lost." 
In any event, the romance between Beren of the House of Bëor and Lúthien Tinúviel makes the tale of Aragorn and Arwen look tame.

"Among the tales of sorrow and of ruin that came down to us from the darkness of those days there are yet some in which amid weeping there is joy and under the shadow of death light that endures. And of these histories most fair still in the ears of the Elves is the tale of Beren and Lúthien." - J.R.R. Tolkien

Tolkien often referred to his wife, Edith, as "my Luthien"
- for the Elf maiden in question was inspired from her

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