Ooh la la, Lúthien...

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Originally Posted by Mithalwen

And may be it was short-hand for a complete absence of character ....

Do I hear a poll forming somewhere on the Downs?

about how Tolkien's attitude to women changed as he aged, I think Luthien was too much a product of his earlier attitude.

Speaking from the male side and from experience, if one's attitudes regarding the 'fairer half' don't change over time, one might want to examine one's toes to see if there be a little expiration tag attached.

Oh that Romeo and Juliet stuff ... silly way to carry on Beren is no Kester Woodseaves - he really was "a man to die for".

What adolescent didn't want to die for a love, at least once? I too may have been once benighted...

And, seeing my wife's mother lose her husband of nearly fifty years, she too has wanted to die, if only to be with him, to be by his side once more, and she is well beyond the years of adolescence, may mean that later years only change the forms, but not the intensity, of the expression.