Favourite song or poem from lord of the rings or the hobbit
 

What is your favourite song or poem from lord of the rings or the hobbit ?

[ December 16, 2001: Message edited by: Serevian The Ranger ]

Definatley a tie between the song that Frodo sings in the Prancing Pony and the song about Gil Galad sung by Aragorn

I've always loved In Western Lands Beneath the Sun. Beautiful, moving and hopeful as well as sad.

The poem Gimli recites about Durin has been a favorite of mine.

Gotta be Bilbo's Aragorn theme: "Not all those who wander are lost..."

My favorite would have to be "A Elbereth Gilthonial".

Mine Is the one sam(i think it was sam)sings about the troll and the guy

That's a toss up between "The road goes ever on and on", and "All that is gold does not glitter" [img]smilies/redface.gif[/img]

[ December 08, 2001: Message edited by: Elrian ]

Definately anything by Bombadil. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

Tra-la-la-lally! That's from The Hobbit actually. Does it still count? [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

-réd

The one in my signature. Gotta love Gil-galad (AKA EREINION)

Bilbo's last song is my favourite. It doesn't appear in Lord of the Rings but it was used in the BBC radio adaptation.
Here's the last verse:

"Guided by the Lonely Star,
beyond the utmost harbour-bar,
I'll find the heavens fair and free,
and beaches of the Starlit Sea.
Ship, my ship! I seek the West,
and fields and mountains ever blest.
Farewell to Middle-earth at last.
I see the Star above my mast!"

[ December 12, 2001: Message edited by: Fenrir ]

Hi Fenrir, I love that song too. It's done so beautifully in the Radio version, don't you think?

I don't know where this is from actually, it's sung by Frodo:

"The Sea-Bell"

Then I saw a boat silently float
on the night-tide, empty and grey
"It is later than late! Why do we wait?"
I leapt in and cried: Bear me away!"

At last here came light in my lonely night,
And I saw my hair hanging grey
"Bent though I be, I must find the sea.
I have lost myself, and I know not the way
but let me be gone!" Then I stumbled on.

[ December 12, 2001: Message edited by: shieldmaiden ]

It would have to be the one sung by frodo when going to the grey havens.


Still round the corner there may wait
A new road or secrect gate;
And though I oft have passed them by,
A day will come at last when I
Shall take the hidden paths that run
West of the moon, East of the Sun.

The songs and poems are all good, but a favorite is the one of Bilbo's that starts 'The Road goes ever on and on'.

The (earlier mentioned) poem about Durin is one of my favourites. Too bad not very much is known about the Dwarves.

Jellinek

Really tough to pick..
I'll have to go with Sam's song in the Orc-Tower, followed very closely by The Road goes ever on.. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

Okay... as to the books, I am definitely siding with Frodo's Gandalf tribute. It would be best not to ask me why, as it would be a many-layered and much-meaningful response :P

But you remember the animated Hobbit movie? That song the Orcs sung was the greatest. "Where there's a whip... there's a way!" XD it was the way they sang it.

Hmmm..all that comes to mind from the film are the Orcs singing: «Funny little birds, they had no wings...» For reasons beyond my comprehension, that song is tattooed in my brain..
Bilbo's theme song from that animation was also kool.

And Fenrir:
i had totally forgotten about Bilbo's last song. It truly is a stellar one! *snif*

Ah! yes! What funny little birds, they had no wings, oh what should we do, with the funny little things? Or something like that. I do award my personal kudos to the movie for making the Orc-songs comedic relief. I adore that song. And now it will be firmly implanted into the depths of my thoughts for a week. I don't know whether to thank you or hit you -_-

LOL yes, yes, you know it too!! (is that a good thing? hmmm..)
Oh what should we dooooooo *ducks from Ionia's punch* with the funny little thiiiiiings!! Oh what should we doooo....

The elvish song Gildor sung in the Shire...

A Elbereth, Githoniel!
We still remember, we who dwell..

*****
Alas, I can't properly repeat, I loaned my copy of the FotR. I can hear the music of that song and their ringing bell-like, sylvan voices.. the same tune since I first read it. It's never changed.

Yes The Hobbit Counts

*Curses as her well-aimed punch meets thin air*

I also like all the elven poetry... even though I can't understand it, it is rather beautiful.

*stands at a safe distance, bemused* I saw it the animated Hobbit when I was 12, before I read the Lord of the Rings, long enough ago that I don't remember any of it! The BBC version, is that the audio series that's circulating now, a set of a dozen tapes?

Legolas' lament of the sea, followed closely by Tra La La Lally, and I have always been sort of partial to 'Water Hot!' [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

Gimli's song of Durin was always one of my favorites. It is strange and mysterious, and beautiful all the same. And the poems and songs by the Rohirrim are also high on my list. But I think the poem that lingers best is the Beren and Luthien poem, it fills me with a sadness whenever I read it. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

I forgot about Water Hot. XD! If they chop THAT one out of the movie I might have to axe some heads.

Crickhollow isn't in the film either, they go straight to Bree.

what nobody else likes the troll song

WHAT?? WHAT??? ARGHH! Itsssss not fair. . .preciousssss. Nt a bitssy fair it isn't preciousss. WATER HOT!! NO MORE!

Dunno what it is called,but the one that the dwarfes sing and play for Bilbo at Bag end, at the start of the hobbit.

It goes something like... (This is just out of memory, so it is probably wrong)

'Far over the misty mountains old,
To dugeons deep and caverns old,
We must away our brake of day.....

*jaw drops, a gape, a pause, and Ionia bursts into bitter wails and histrionic tears, sniffling and looking for her trusty axe*

Frodo's lament about Gandalf.

If I may begin with an aside, it intrigues me how so many of these recently necromanced threads (that's not a complaint, by the by--seriously, it's good to see activity on the forum and activity that gets the old Huorns active again. Besides, necromancy seems a fitting activity for Barrow-wights) here in the Books forum are the sort that, nowadays, would seem more suited to Novices & Newcomers. It's like looking at a layer of an archaeological dig...

Anyway, to the topic at hand--since I do have something to say about it--my personal favourite poem in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings is "Eärendil was a Mariner." Part of this is sheer technical dazzlement, since it takes me the better part of a day to compose a line of iambic pentameter, let alone anything more rhythmically complicated than that--to say nothing of rhyme scheme (my own best efforts would probably have a "limerick" effect).

But it's also a matter of topic. This poem is the latest treatment of the Eärendil legend in Tolkien's writings that can be said to be in a finished state, and possibly because of this, I find it to be especially effective as a glimpse into the remoteness of ancient legend. This is in contrast to Aragorn's poem on Beren meeting Lúthien, since we have numerous treatments of that story.

I would not say it's a favorite but it's one I do know of by memory, "Far over the Misty Mountains cold to dungeons deep and caverns old, we must away ere break of day to seek the pal enchanted gold."

I would say no poem from Tolkien has both a more profound or chilling effect than...

Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.

I will never forget it, nor the translation of the last few lines into Black Speech...

Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul,
Ash nazg thrakatulûk agh burzum-ishi krimpatul.

I love a good many of the poems and used to know a good chunk of them by heart in two languages (mark the "used to":(). If I had to choose an absolute winner, though, I'd go for Felagund's song: He chanted a song of wizardry, / Of piercing, opening, of treachery...