Deadnight Chanter
Posts: 1528
Tear it up, as I expected. Alas. I loved it
Yet you should have noticed the words 'speculation' and 'intuition' in the post above. From your own post it's clear that Professor's mind on the subject changed so many times (balrogs created/corrupted, Morgoth's will imposed/not imposed, ability to recreate/no such ability, thousands/ 3 to 7) that it, well… hm, left the space for such improvisations.
Indeed, why rely only on later writings (part of those is presumably lost anyway, and noone can claim that with them was not lost the theory of two different types of balrogs
), if a whole lot, from the beginning to the end brings opportunity not to omitt nor the note 3 to 7, simply naming those Valaraukar, or
Balrogs, and the rest lesser, or merely
balrogs, nor the beautiful passages involving thousand of them dying on the battlefield. For, in the long run, all the revising done down here is a fiction, though very qualified one (for who may guess what would the thing look like if JRRT himself finished it?). My contribution is only modest in the project, not in the least due to the above named reasoning, and I myself claimed not to have a vote in the final decision, contenting myself with a role of an advisor. You are of course free to accept (if you find them useful) or reject (if they are of no use) theories provided, still more our methods seem to differ a bit – you relying precisely on textual evidence, me intuitevly filling the gaps, even sometimes I can come to contradict some of the above named textual evidence. I don’t think each of them is inferior to another.
I had a great pleasure composing those 'neobalrogizms', and spent a beautiful evening on it
, for which I'm grateful to Bob Wehadababyitsaboy, who made it possible (and he still may be capable of providing the theory with more evidence , ability which, alas, I lack for now)
Remainig convinced in two balrog types theory, still always at your service