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Lalwendë · 11-01-2006, 12:36 PM

Well by happy coincidence the need to collect the car after repairs, an excess of worked hours and the opening times of the local post office all happened at the same time this afternoon so the books were retrieved.

I've spent the past few hours absorbed in them (have put them down now as their rightful owner will soon be home and he will want to read them

) and I can honestly say they are excellent. Thorough is the word that springs to mind right away. Fascinating is the second one. One volume is taken up with a day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's life (you may, if old and silly enough, be able to see what Tolkien was doing the day you were born) including who he was writing to, what he was lecturing in, who he visited etc, plus extensive information on his family, and a wallet-tingling bibliography of all his works (I hear eBay calling...).

The other volume is a huge A-Z of themes, people and places (and other things too) associated with Tolkien, e.g. sections on H Rider Haggard (and an interesting consideration of how LotR has echoes from She, a fave of Tolkien's), the Lancashire Fusiliers, Fairy Tales, GK Chesterton (Tolkien got fed up with Chesterton apparently), George MacDonald (likewise he got fed up with MacDonald and Phantastes 'afflicted me with profound dislike'). We also learn that Tolkien once played Thomas The Tank Engine in the street outside Merton College, wandered the streets of Oxford dressed in a bearskin rug and had a swimming race wearing a panama hat and smoking a pipe.

I see its on offer on Amazon so it could be a good time to buy it! It will keep you quiet for days, this one, and after that you will have lots of things to say.

11-01-2006, 12:36 PM	#59
Lalwendë A Mere Boggart Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: under the bed Posts: 4,737	Well by happy coincidence the need to collect the car after repairs, an excess of worked hours and the opening times of the local post office all happened at the same time this afternoon so the books were retrieved. I've spent the past few hours absorbed in them (have put them down now as their rightful owner will soon be home and he will want to read them ) and I can honestly say they are excellent. Thorough is the word that springs to mind right away. Fascinating is the second one. One volume is taken up with a day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's life (you may, if old and silly enough, be able to see what Tolkien was doing the day you were born) including who he was writing to, what he was lecturing in, who he visited etc, plus extensive information on his family, and a wallet-tingling bibliography of all his works (I hear eBay calling...). The other volume is a huge A-Z of themes, people and places (and other things too) associated with Tolkien, e.g. sections on H Rider Haggard (and an interesting consideration of how LotR has echoes from She, a fave of Tolkien's), the Lancashire Fusiliers, Fairy Tales, GK Chesterton (Tolkien got fed up with Chesterton apparently), George MacDonald (likewise he got fed up with MacDonald and Phantastes 'afflicted me with profound dislike'). We also learn that Tolkien once played Thomas The Tank Engine in the street outside Merton College, wandered the streets of Oxford dressed in a bearskin rug and had a swimming race wearing a panama hat and smoking a pipe. I see its on offer on Amazon so it could be a good time to buy it! It will keep you quiet for days, this one, and after that you will have lots of things to say. __________________ Gordon's alive!