#tolkien

I have claimed that Escape is one of the main functions of fairy-stories, and since I do not disapprove of them, it is plain that I do not accept the tone of scorn or pity with which 'Escape' is now so often used. Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls? ↗

— J.R.R. Tolkien

#fiction #on-fiction #tolkien #writing #story

He is a great enough magician to tap our most common nightmares, daydreams and twilight fancies, but he never invented them either: he found them a place to live, a green alternative to each day's madness here in a poisoned world. We are raised to honor all the wrong explorers and discoverers - thieves planting flags, murderers carrying crosses. Let us at last praise the colonizers of dreams. ↗

— Peter S. Beagle

#inspirational #tolkien #dreams

Well, you can go on looking forward," said Gandalf. "There may be many unexpected feasts ahead of you. ↗

— J.R.R. Tolkien

#tolkien #unexpected

It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish. ↗

— J.R.R. Tolkien

#gamgee #hobbit #samwise #tolkien #job

Some who have read the book, or at any rate have reviewed it, have found it boring, absurd, or contemptible, and I have no cause to complain, since I have similar opinions of their works, or of the kinds of writing that they evidently prefer. ↗

— J.R.R. Tolkien

#bad-reviews #boring #complain #literary-criticism #lotr

More often than not, however, the person who flatly states 'Elves aren't like that!' is hard pressed to describe how they really look.... as if Tolkien has summoned archetypes from so deep in our minds that we can only recall them incompletely. ↗

— John Howe

#deep #describe #elves #hard #how

When you succeed at creating your own world, whether it's in any realm - like Tolkien was able to do - and people are able to enter that world, it's a special thing. ↗

— David Selby

#any #creating #enter #like #own

My name is growing all the time, and I’ve lived a very long, long time; so my name is like a story. Real names tell you the story of the things they belong to in my language, in the Old Entish as you might say. It is a lovely language, but it takes a very long time to say anything in it, because we do not say anything in it, unless it is worth taking a long time to say, and to listen to. ↗

— J.R.R. Tolkien

#language #name #the-two-towers #tolkien #love

What would a racist call werewolves? Wargs? She kind of liked that one, but suspected that racist bastards didn't read Tolkien. ↗

— Patricia Briggs

#irony #racism #tolkien #werewolves #humor

A great dread fell on him, as if he was awaiting the pronouncement of some doom that he had long foreseen and vainly hoped might after all never be spoken. An overwhelming longing to rest and remain at peace by Bilbo's side in Rivendell filled all his heart. At last with an effort he spoke, and wondered to hear his own words, as if some other will was using his small voice. "I will take the Ring," he said, "though I do not know the way. ↗

— J.R.R. Tolkien

#inspirational #lord-of-the-rings #middle-earth #motivational #tolkien