Long they laboured in the regions of Eä,

[chasmaniac]

Notice what Ilúvatar does with the braying and unharmonious music of Melkor. Variation, even in extremity, is turned to a larger value:

no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined.

One can read this as a version of Pangloss, but I prefer to relate it back to the originating tunesmithy, and like kinds of artifactual creation. In the longer course of things, the impurites introduced by theoretical, cultural, technological change strengthen and buff, if you will, the beauty of the whole, rather than diminishing it. I'm inclined to think that classicism and modernism, for example, make each other better, and that a history that includes both is more satisfying and productive than would be one that excluded either.

(I place great store in variation, clearly.) 

[Karl Henning]

Nor can any alter the music in my despite is one of those lines from Tolkien which have stuck tight in my mind from the first reading.

[eyeresist]

Please assure me that there are actually no people who get married "in Klingon garb" . . . .

In the same way there are no people who gather to read each other Elvish poetry...

[Karl Henning]

In the same way there are no people who gather to read each other Elvish poetry...

That is one scary vision.

[Karl Henning]

It is a long time since last I had read the book. This morning, I find myself touched anew by the loss of the Entwives.

I wonder if that is very nerdy . . . .

[Karl Henning]

Well, I've finished (again).  It's as good as ever, I find.

And now . . . making my leisurely way through the appendices.  The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen I am finding even richer than before.

[chasmaniac]

"Well, I'm back."

[Karl Henning]

I love it that Sam is granted to pass into the West.  He enjoyed a full life at home in the Shire, and will be restored to companionship with Frodo.

Extraordinary that Gimli is also so permitted. (That would not have been the case with Peter Jackson's vulgar caricature of the son of Glóin.)

[drogulus]

     I was young, too, when I read the books. I recognized then that this was a peculiar form of escapist literature, in some ways the opposite of the imagined worlds of science fiction, also escapist at times but often the opposite. The difference is that science fiction is open to the possibility of social transformation, which is often the subject. The fantasy of Tolkien imagines the world as static, a prior perfection from which any change is thought to be evil. As always with such irrational views magic fills the gap that hope and optimism for the future fills in life. In science fiction you have a range of possibilities, not always good but open to human discovery and invention, so good in that way. In pseudo medievalism possibilities are dreaded, the form itself rejects them. No one will grow up or discover a new way of doing things or change society or learn anything. Knowledge and technology are to be feared, oaths and spells and wizardry are in charge. I think this is worse than trash, it's a hateful, diminished view of life. At the time I enjoyed what I though good in the writing, today I would not subject myself to it.

[Karl Henning]

The fantasy of Tolkien imagines the world as static, a prior perfection from which any change is thought to be evil.

Um, no.

Yes; that would certainly be a no.

[North Star]

Um, no.

Yes; that would certainly be a no.

Indeed.
I don't think Tolkien's world is any different in this way from science fiction, for example. The story of the Silmarils, for example, could easily be adapted in to science fiction.
As for no-one growing up, etc, how did the hobbits survive the war, if not by learning, changing the society? Did they eat three breakfasts with the orcs at Mt. Doom?

[Karl Henning]

And change is in fact central to The Lord of the Rings — the destruction of the One Ring.  And the results of that change were immediate, and positive.

Of course, this great good was achieved through sacrifice and some suffering; and that, too, is a deep truth.

[North Star]

And change is in fact central to The Lord of the Rings — the destruction of the One Ring.  And the results of that change were immediate, and positive.

Of course, this great good was achieved through sacrifice and some suffering; and that, too, is a deep truth.

Yes!

[Karl Henning]

I think that, of the three movies, The Two Towers may be the most painful to endure.

Or, maybe 'tis, that I am finding that film the most vexatious, which I am currently viewing?

[Karl Henning]

OTOH, I can laugh about things like an apparent Dwarf Tossing motif by Howard Shore. It could be due to the distractions of the narrative/characterization "liberties" ... but I think that Shore did a markedly better job the second time around (always excepting the quasi-Enya reverb insta-choir).

[Karl Henning]

Now, so they're telling us (considering this superfluous traipse to Osgiliath) that Frodo stands plain before a winged Nazgûl, and just an arrow from Faramir's bow (which does not bring the winged creature down) prevents the Nazgûl from seizing Frodo and the Ring?

[North Star]

Well, it's not like the ring is so important for the Nazgûl that he'd risk getting hemorrhage...

[kishnevi]

Now, so they're telling us (considering this superfluous traipse to Osgiliath) that Frodo stands plain before a winged Nazgûl, and just an arrow from Faramir's bow (which does not bring the winged creature down) prevents the Nazgûl from seizing Frodo and the Ring?

What's more distressing is that this incident is extrapolated from an incident in the book,  which Jackon obviously decided wasn't "filmatic" enough (the Nazgul passing over Faramir's secret stronghold in Ithilien, and Faramir's observation of how Frodo reacts to its' presence).

Or, maybe 'tis, that I am finding that film the most vexatious, which I am currently viewing?

That's the probable explanation.  Present suffering always looms larger than past or future suffering, even though objectively considered it is not as bad.

[Karl Henning]

What's more distressing is that this incident is extrapolated from an incident in the book [....]

David St-Hubbins: It's such a fine line between stupid, and uh...
Nigel Tufnel: Clever.
David St-Hubbins: Yeah, and clever.

[Karl Henning]

No, don't like at all how J. rewrote Théoden's answer to Saruman.

The opening bit with Déagol & Sméagol was very well done, meseemed, though.