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Old 09-12-2004, 05:33 PM   #89
Findegil
King's Writer
 
Join Date: Jul 2002
Posts: 1,694
Findegil is a guest of Tom Bombadil.
VE-02: Posted by Aiwendil:
Quote:
I don't see the need to eliminate "and multiplied". I do understand your concern, but Tolkien clearly thought it was okay in AB2.
Accepted.
Concerning the blessing brought by the Silmaril: Maybe I did not make my argument clear enough. What I meant was not the general fate the Silmaril brought to any possesor, i meant that this special Silmaril was bound up with the Naglamir. And that Necklace was really crused by Mīm to bring woe to anybody who possesed it. Now that does not mean that the Silmaril could not bring blessing to the Folk of Sirion while the Nauglamir brought (in the end) woe to Elwing who possesed it. If both of you think the sentence can stand we will keep it.

VE-11: Posted by Aiwendil:
Quote:
Well, it's going to be a bit awkward any way. Maybe we could use a "there" to smooth things out:
I am okay with that editorial bridge.

Concerning "Gondobar": Okay, if the destination of the journey that the Sleeper did (rightly?) ascribe to the Mariners is the Door of Night as it is discribed in LT, my argument is clearly not valid. But then that does not fit any cosmology what so ever. Since that Door is further west then the "grey Islands" (and anythink else) however can Gondobar then lay between the Sleeper and the destination he did ascribe to the mariners?
But how then can the load of the ships can be named "sparks of orient fire"? The "orient fire" must be found in the east! This is also told in LT in The Hiding of Valinor:
Quote:
... and much precious radiance was spilled in their attemps about the deepest waters, and escaped to linger as secret sparks in many an unknown ocean cavern. These have many elfin divers, and divers of the faxs, long time sought beyond the outmost East, even as is sung in the song of the Sleeper in the Tower of Pearl.
Thus the door discribed could be the one that is needed in the haven of the sun in the east (seen in the Akalabeth even by the Numenoreans) after the Wall of the World became globe-shaped. But all this was changed later when the Chasem of Ilmen appeared. So what we can take as conclusion is: The destination of the mariners was in the east, since they sought "sparks of orient fire". Gondobar was taken into the poem in the revision of 1940. What ever Tolkien meant by it, I don't see a good reason to change it, since by doing so we would correct him without a indication by himself.
The same goes for the "sparks of orient fire": The words are still part of the revised poem, when the story that motivated them had gone but Tolkien retained the words than the meaning he intended for these words must have changed. We could speculat about the new meaning as I have done in my last post but that was not meant to be mentioned anywhere, it was just meant to be an example of how it could be interpreted in the new circumstances Tolkien put them.

Respectfully
Findegil
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