Those Little, Unimportant, and Unknown parts that we love...

[Sophia the Thunder Mistress]

The elegy to Snowmane (which is quoted from old memory and may not be 100% accurate) always makes me shiver. The irony is strong, I think.

Faithful servant yet Master's bane,
Lightfoot's foal was swift Snowmane.

Frodo's dream of the sea in Tom Bombadil's house is another piece that always moves me. The longing in that passage is so intense, and so intangible. Just as Frodo sees the clouds rolling back he wakes up and loses it again.

And my favorite, much quoted, passage is the one from "Journey to the cross roads" where Frodo and Sam see the old statue of the King which has been defaced and beheaded, yet around the old king's forehead a vine with golden flowers has grown. It is a powerful foreshadowing of the King's return, and Frodo comments "They cannot conquer forever". I find it one of the most evocative scenes in the whole book, because Frodo's despair rarely lifts from that point on, but you see in that instant such glowing hope.

Sophia