JRR Tolkien Book 'Beren and Luthien' Published After 100 Years (bbc.com) 94
seoras quotes a report from BBC: A new book by Lord of the Rings author JRR Tolkien is going on sale -- 100 years after it was first conceived. Beren and Luthien has been described as a "very personal story" that the Oxford professor thought up after returning from the Battle of the Somme. It was edited by his son Christopher Tolkien and contains versions of a tale that became part of The Silmarillion. The book features illustrations by Alan Lee, who won an Academy Award for his work on Peter Jackson's film trilogy. It is being published on Thursday by HarperCollins on the 10th anniversary of the last Middle Earth book, The Children of Hurin.
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Sucker that I am... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll probably buy it.
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Fascinating! I can only speak for myself, but I certainly wondered if you would buy it! Thank you for putting my mind at ease.
(you're a fucking idiot. go eat some more Cheetos, neckbeard)
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Re:Fuck sakes (Score:5, Insightful)
Did you not read his books?
Death is to be feared by the young but welcomed by the wise and old. We are to fill our lives, and the lives of those around us, with adventures, song, stories, food, and love. After we've filled ourselves up and spread ourselves thin we should embrace the next life that awaits us all.
Trying to extend our lives beyond it's natural course is a path leading to pain, suffering, and evil. Those that are successful lose their humanity.
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What next life? This is the one we got and we got to make the most of it, and not welcome death.
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"How to post as an Anonymous Coward, influencing people and winning friends"? "Posting cheap trash for fun and profit"?
Re:Fuck sakes (Score:4, Insightful)
Trying to extend our lives beyond it's natural course is a path leading to pain, suffering, and evil.
What natural course? The one where your mother died giving you birth and you die at forty because of a massive dental infection? Or the one where you're born in a sterile hospital and get to live to eighty five thanks to antibiotics, heart drugs, and/or chemotherapy?
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What natural course?
Bilbo described it as being stretched too thin. Despite not feeling the least bit frail in mind or body. He felt off without knowing why and didn't trust the way things were headed.
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Trying to extend our lives beyond it's natural course is a path leading to pain, suffering, and evil.
So then we should ban antibiotics and measles vaccinations?
Should we reintroduce smallpox into the population?
Hollywood (Score:5, Insightful)
Meanwhile, movie industry starts planning to make 2 trilogies of 150min films out of this book.
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Re:Hollywood (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Hollywood (Score:5, Informative)
Tolkien died after the first Mickey Mouse film, so presumably his stuff will never enter the public domain.
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Third strike (Score:2)
That's not what the copyright industry claims. What happened was that the international standard for the copyright term had been the life of the author's grandchildren, with the exception of the United States. In the 1970s, the United States aligned itself with the international standard. But over the course of the twentieth century, health care improvements caused people to live longer and have babies later. This led first the European Union and then the United States to update the details of what "life of
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Thus the three short films establishing the character Mickey Mouse will enter the public domain in the United States on January 1, 2024, after the end of the 95th Gregorian calendar year after the films' first publication. They will enter the public domain in the European Union on January 1, 2037, after the end of the 70th Gregorian calendar year after the death of Walter Elias Disney.
So it isn't until the actual grandchildren are all dead, it is until some imaginary, super-healthy grandchild sired minutes
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This isn't about IP
Correct: it isn't about Internet Protocol, and patents and copyrights differ too much to be usefully lumped into a discussion of "intellectual property" in the abstract [gnu.org].
patents expire infinitely sooner
Patents are also stronger than copyrights in two ways that some believe compensates for their shorter term.
First, a patent encumbers everybody, not just persons who have had access to the subject of the exclusive right. A successful claim of copyright infringement requires the alleged infringer to have had access to the plaintiff's work. A s
Re:Tolkien was a devout Christian (Score:5, Interesting)
You're already pegged at -1, so this won't help:
Tolkien was a devout Roman Catholic; there is a difference, and this caused problems even in his early life. Read Carpenter's Biography for the _official_ version. Unofficially, Tolkien struggled with the Church his entire life, and pretty much broke away from it after Vatican II, including walking out of Services when English was spoken instead of Latin.
That is not to say that he became a Protestant Christian; he believed in the old Fairy Tales and the way that they were told. In other words, Tolkien was a nutter. There were those close to him that had serious doubts about his sanity at times, especially when he retreated into his own World, and neglected to do such things as paying Taxes. (Which is the very reason why Jackson was able to make his Films; Tolkien sold the Rights off for a pittance when it finally came to pay Inland Revenue.)
As a devout Atheist, I quite like the old fossil. I really appreciate the way that he viewed His Church. But it was still based on Fairy Tales, and believing in them does not make them true.
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That is not to say that he became a Protestant Christian; he believed in the old Fairy Tales and the way that they were told. In other words, Tolkien was a nutter. (...) As a devout Atheist, I quite like the old fossil.
If it's a compliment or an insult is in the eye of the beholder: Non-mainstream or deeply religious people that don't simply follow doctrine are excellent fantasy writers, not just Tolkien but for example look at Lewis Carroll and the Chronicles of Narnia, J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter, all these fantastical, magical stories about a world that's more than flesh and blood come from some form of imagination very few are able to genuinely tap into. At least past the age they figure out Santa Clause is not real
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Tolkien came at his mythology through a very unusual path. While, no doubt, he's deeply held Catholicism informed his writing (it's much more clear in his writings on the First Age than in LOTR), he really began developing the mythology as a means to produce a world in which the languages he was inventing could exist. He began developing the earliest Elvish dialects before 1917, which is about when he began writing The Fall of Gondolin, the first story in Middle Earth (though the conception as very differen
Re:Tolkien was a devout Christian (Score:4)
Non-mainstream or deeply religious people that don't simply follow doctrine are excellent fantasy writers, not just Tolkien but for example look at Lewis Carroll and the Chronicles of Narnia,...
Read about The Inklings:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Tolkein and C. S. Lewis where both members. G. K. Chesterton was an occasional guest. Charles Williams is probably less well-known at this point (possibly because his prose was more unabashedly Christian -- e.g. "War in Heaven": https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00R... [amazon.com] etc).
I've always found it interesting that both Lewis -- arguably one of the most famous of the Christian Apologists of his time, although Chesterton was no slouch -- and Williams wrote books that were either thinly disguised Christian fantasy or openly fantasies about biblical/apocryphal fantasy, while in the Hobbit and LOTR, the characters (with the exception of the Elves, maybe) HAVE no overt religion. Yes, there is a fantasy connection with the supernatural and magic, but there are no descriptions of worship or prayer -- it is more a matter of "invoking" the protection (or sometime receiving it gratis) of e.g. Elbereth. Elves are immortal (but not unkillable), they don't die they "return" to "the west" (a.k.a. "heaven") through some sort of dimensional barrier. And although there is magic in LOTR, for the most part in the BOOKS (as opposed to the overheated movie) it isn't "telekinetic" magic like battling with wand-based thunderbolts or using a ring to stop the heart of an enemy, it is more "perceptual" magic -- making somebody invisible, generating light, extending life, healing, harming. The closest you come to religion is probably the "resurrection" of Gandalf, "sent back" from death because his work "isn't finished".
This has the effect of making it remarkably uncomplicated and ecumenical. We don't really understand why Sauron is so horribly evil, or how he manages to get killed but come back from the dead to try to take over the world -- again -- or just what he wants to do with the world when he wins that he can't do already. We don't really understand why or how "rings" can be given power (or what power they actually grant, since nobody actually USES a ring to do ANYTHING overt anywhere in the story). We don't understand where Ents come from, we don't understand Bombadil, we don't see why or how barrow-wights could come to be. We don't even understand Saruman -- supposedly good guy turned bad.
We don't need to. It's just a damn good story about a war between cartoon good (so very very good, so very very uncomplicated) and cartoon evil (so horribly unredeemably bad, so very very uncomplicated). Not at all like real life, where evil doesn't come with such a clear label -- and neither does good.
rgb
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Is that you, AC? Always good to know what "you" have said.
Atheism isn't a religion, and saying it infinity times won't make it be one. It is the absence of belief in a religion. A (without) -- theism (religion). It's what the word means.
It's also what atheists are. Most atheists require a mix of evidence and consistency with evidence supported belief in order to raise any old notion that somebody throws out there -- such as some incredibly detailed description of how the Universe was created by a myste
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Tolkien was also a devout racist.
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"Tolkien was also a devout racist."
No, he certainly was not. He despised the Nazis and spoke out publicly and specifically against their Racial "Theories", and he was also very public in speaking out against Apartheid in South Africa.
What I have a problem with is the fact that Tolkien in his Middle Earth was an Elitist. Aragorn was of High Birth but had to reclaim his Family's Throne. Elves are proudly Snobs. Even Frodo, Pippin and Merry come from "Respectable" Families. In fact the only character in "Lord
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The closest we get to overt racism in LOTR is that Orcs are described as "swarthy". To my mind, outside of Tolkien's clear hatred of Nazis and how they had co-opted his beloved Nordic culture, is that scene in LOTR when Frodo and Sam are in Ithilien and see Dunedain battling men of Harad (who were pretty obviously black people) and how Sam sees one of the Haradrim fall dead, and he wonders what lies or threats had taken the man so far from his home and family. Tolkien was making it clear that the common sol
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Elitist? Nah, these guys [wikipedia.org]sound just like the good ol folk you would see in a Wal-Mart.
We Boggies are a hairy folk,
Who like to eat until they choke.
Loving all like friend and brother,
We hardly ever eat each other.
Ever hungry, ever thirsting
Never stop till belly's bursting.
Porking out from morn till moon,
And don't forget your plate and spoon.
Oh, wait.
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Unfortunately, idiots like Skinheads have taken to Tolkien recently...
You're kidding, right?
"OI! Elberef' Gil'foniel!"
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Citation needed.
And... (Score:3)
I thought I procrastinated putting things off, good to know someone else has me beat by 99 years.
The Silmarillion (Score:5, Interesting)
The Silmarillion is worth a read if you have enough imagination to fill in some of the visual details yourself; it is in a sort of abstract epic writing style one level more removed from the writing in LOTR, so many people have trouble with it, but there are beautiful moments in it if you can read it. For example, it opens with a description of music sung by beings of great power at the beginning of time, and also of the discord that the great enemy tries to sing into the music.
And there are high hosts of elves, and fights of elven-kings, and brave acts of love.
Beren and Luthien is one of the classic grand love stories of high fantasy. I hope this version is a good one, but whether it is or isn't you should still check out the other one.
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You mean the expanded Dune universe stuff by Anderson. Herbert Jr. couldn't write his way out of a paper bag which is why he needed a ghost writer.
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If Brian Herbert had done what Christopher Tolkien had done, we would have had those various plot lines and notes that were Frank Herbert's plan for the Dune universe, instead of a series of pretty fucking awful novels. Anderson really is a hack, and what they've done to Herbert's pretty majestic writing is a travesty. I'd sooner just read point form chronologies of what happened after Chapterhouse Dune or chronologies of the Butlerian Jihad than have to wade through acres of bad prose.
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"Dune" is schlock. Good schlock, but still schlock.
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Anderson really is a hack, and what they've done to Herbert's pretty majestic writing is a travesty.
THEY HAVEN'T DONE ANYTHING to Frank Herbert's majestic writing. The original works stand, and Brian and what's-his-name are as entitled to write lame Dune fanfic packed with giant robot battles as anyone.
I'd sooner just read point form chronologies of what happened after Chapterhouse Dune or chronologies of the Butlerian Jihad than have to wade through acres of bad prose.
And that's why we have the Dune Encyclopedia, even if Frank Herbert said it wasn't canon.
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Partaking in cannabis while reading the Silmarrilion is a good idea. I recommend a good couch lock Kush.
We are talking complete immersion into a fantasy world like no other.
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The important thing with the Silmarillion is to be willing to "skip the begats" (much as with reading the old testament). There's a lot of stuff up front with no plot, just laying out the creation myth and history of the early days. That puts a lot of people off, who never really give the book a chance. And that's a shame, because it's filled with wonderful short stories.
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"just laying out the creation myth and history of the early days. That puts a lot of people off..." -- you just described my experience perfectly. Thanks for the update, maybe I'll give the book another chance.
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I recommend it. It's still the same long-winded style as LOTR, don't get me wrong, but there are some great fantasy stories in there.
I found It fascinating, though it was never stated explicitly, that no one ever fought a Balrog and lived. Some heroes killed a Balrog or three, but none survived. Puts Gandalf's last stand in perspective.
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That's largely because the published Silmarillion is by and large based on chronologies like the Grey Annals which Tolkien used to keep track of events while he attempted to write a proper large-form narrative. The Silmarillion as Tolkien envisioned it was never completed, though you can see what it would have looked like in stories like the woefully unfinished version of the Tuor story in Unfinished Tales, or in the much expanded Turin saga to be found in Unfinished Tales and in the later The Children of H
How about copyright? (Score:2)
I mean he's dead, the story was written 100 years ago but I guess they will change the law again, so that his grand-grand-grand-grand-children won't have to lift a finger and actually _work_.
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I mean he's dead, the story was written 100 years ago but I guess they will change the law again, so that his grand-grand-grand-grand-children won't have to lift a finger and actually _work_.
From the summary even, it was edited by this son. How does that constitute not working? Furthermore, if the story was never published, why should it be placed in the public domain. Seems to me it would be property of his estate.
Re:How about copyright? (Score:5, Informative)
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Indeed. The History of Middle Earth bored me to tears, but it's certainly a work in itself, even if it's just the research and collation of someone else's work too.
He could have just sold off his father's works before he hit 90 himself, and lived off the proceeds but that's not what happened. He worked at them, and it's hard enough to keep track of reading his collations, let alone the effort to collate it all. And, it was all his father's legacy and he gets a bad rap for that because he doesn't write "o
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You don't understand much about copyright, do you?
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They die.
Beren, more than once.
Dear lazy internet (Score:2)
Is it a new story? I've read somewhere that it's just a re-edition. How much different is it from the Silmarillion's chapter?
I obviously didn't bother to RTFA.
Screw the Tolkien Estate (Score:1)
...and their abuse of copyright.
If you want to read an important SciFi/Fantasy book, try Never Let Me Go [amzn.to].
There's big money in movies! (Score:1)