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Old 10-19-2017, 06:20 PM   #50
Aiwendil
Late Istar
 
Join Date: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,224
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Quote:
Vala-04.5: All the more I am inclined to reinstal this passage. At least I should explain my reasoning it bit more clear: From the discussion we had about Vala-06 I had the impression that we all were symphatic with the idea of Christopher Tolkien to strenght the character description of Eönwë, but that we found his addition 'out of blue' unuseable in the scope of our project. Now this sentence can do this, in a way. Yes, JRR Tolkien rejected it, so we do not get any reason. And we reinstalled other skipt passages. But I am not adamant on reinstalling it. Would it be a possibility to take it up some where else?
True, there are passages rejected by JRRT that we have nonetheless included, for various reasons, but we have (I think) done so rather sparingly. In this case, I don't see a pressing reason to second-guess Tolkien. And apart from the question of disregarding Tolkien's textual edits, one can ask the standard question: was this element merely omitted or was it rejected? I think it's likely the latter - indeed, I suspect that it might be the change from Fionwe son of Manwe to Eonwe herald of Manwe that led Tolkien to eliminate the special fondness of Tulkas for him.

Quote:
Vala-07.2: I am okay with your editing. Only in the case of 'sc. the greatest created power' I don't agree. I doesn't matter if Tolkien does writte this phrase as explaination for himself or for any other propose, it can serve as explainaiton for our readers. And in that function it might even make more sense.
OK, that's reasonable. I do think that the passage works better if the two phrases are reversed, though: "he was the greatest created power, the greatest power under Eru". But this may cross the line between permitted outline expansion and forbidden stylistic editing.
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