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Originally Posted by davem
My own suspiscion is that when Tolkien came to read over what Christopher had written down (with the missing word) he wrote in what seemed the obviously 'correct' word, whatever his original idea had been.
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If this is true, then it shows how unimportant the change is. If the alteration was significant to his concept of the elves, I am sure he would have picked up on it and done something about it.
Also I think, that the many faceted little word 'do' is being given its strongest possible reading, whereas the fact that Tolkien did not pick up on Christopher's error suggests to me that his use of "do" is likely to have been such that the change is immaterial:elves do not count the passing years for themselves, because they don't need to. Legolas was not actually drafting the definitive Elvish world view, just giving a short explanation to friends.
Lalawende - you gave a fine example elsewhere of how LOTR might have been if written by a committee. May Eru save us from that. I was going to say more but I have a sudden and overwhelming feeling that, not being Elvish, my life is too short
