Sad news, that my friend and the distinguished Tolkien scholar Richard West died on 29 November in Madison, Wisconsin. He was 76 and retired from the University of Wisconsin, where he’d been an engineering librarian. He had been in hospital with another chronic illness and contracted the covid. His wife, Perri, was also in the […]
Barbara Remington has died, at 90. Really old-time Tolkienists will remember her name as that of the artist who created the covers for the first issue of the Ballantine paperbacks of The Lord of the Rings, which may be seen pictured in her obituary here. (Note they’re all actually one painting split into three parts, […]
I’ve seen the new biographical movie about Tolkien twice, once at a preview back in March, for which public comment was embargoed, and again upon its release this week, to refresh my memory and not really for any other reason, because otherwise once was enough. Now it’s out so I may speak, and this comes […]
So here’s a list of what its author, Derek Draven, claims are “8 things that make no sense about the entire quest,” you know, the one in The Lord of the Rings. Actually, the complaints are more about the movies than the book, but I might be able to shed a little enlightenment here. Mind, […]
A potentially misleading entry in the contents list for Tolkien Studies 16, for instance as displayed here [ed: since fixed in this location], has been brought to my attention. In this display, the separated sub-entry for most of the article entries is the author of the article. Thus, Richard C. West is the author of […]
Of all the negative reviews that The Lord of the Rings ever received, the most infamous is “Oo, Those Awful Orcs,” by the renowned American critic Edmund Wilson. It was published in the journal The Nation in 1956, and reappeared in Wilson’s collection The Bit Between My Teeth (1965) and various other sources, earning a […]
Sad news, that my friend and the distinguished Tolkien scholar Richard West died on 29 November in Madison, Wisconsin. He was 76 and retired from the University of Wisconsin, where he’d been an engineering librarian. He had been in hospital with another chronic illness and contracted the covid. His wife, Perri, was also in the […]
So here’s a list of what its author, Derek Draven, claims are “8 things that make no sense about the entire quest,” you know, the one in The Lord of the Rings. Actually, the complaints are more about the movies than the book, but I might be able to shed a little enlightenment here. Mind, […]
Barbara Remington has died, at 90. Really old-time Tolkienists will remember her name as that of the artist who created the covers for the first issue of the Ballantine paperbacks of The Lord of the Rings, which may be seen pictured in her obituary here. (Note they’re all actually one painting split into three parts, […]
A potentially misleading entry in the contents list for Tolkien Studies 16, for instance as displayed here [ed: since fixed in this location], has been brought to my attention. In this display, the separated sub-entry for most of the article entries is the author of the article. Thus, Richard C. West is the author of […]
I’ve seen the new biographical movie about Tolkien twice, once at a preview back in March, for which public comment was embargoed, and again upon its release this week, to refresh my memory and not really for any other reason, because otherwise once was enough. Now it’s out so I may speak, and this comes […]
Of all the negative reviews that The Lord of the Rings ever received, the most infamous is “Oo, Those Awful Orcs,” by the renowned American critic Edmund Wilson. It was published in the journal The Nation in 1956, and reappeared in Wilson’s collection The Bit Between My Teeth (1965) and various other sources, earning a […]
