Mechtild's

Aw, you. I had you and your work in mind, you know. Your writing has Tolkien's respect for things, his wonder at the things of creation, running all through it. :)

Edited at 2013-01-03 11:51 pm (UTC)

if i am given some time this weekend, perhaps we can make a whole series of them....

Really???? WOW.

He was such a talented man. I would recommend you buy a copy of 'J.R.R.Tolkien: Artist and Illustrator', but it must have gone out of print. Amazon has copies for sale but for ridiculous amounts. I bought mine new off Amazon a couple of years ago (2000 paperback edition), for the less than the retail price on the back of the book, which says 25.00.

It's a terrifying, fascinating section of the novel, I agree. I don't think JRRT's drawing does it justice, considering the tree's malice, but it's a lovely drawing of an old willow.

This reminds me of Frodo, as he laid his hand upon a tree in Lothlorien: "....never before had he been so suddenly and so keenly aware of the feel and the texture of the tree's skin and the life within it".

That is just what I think. Although I think what he portrays Frodo feeling in Lorien is akin to what Elves feel about trees. So maybe it's properest to say that Tolkien's keen, reverent, love of trees comes through in the perspective of the Elves towards trees. I don't know that the attitude of the Elves comes through clearly in LOTR, but it's very clear in other writings. Humans (and hobbits would be grouped with humans more than with Elves) are portrayed in Tolkien as seeing trees as raw material - for what they can yield in the way of lumber or fuel, but Elves see the trees as trees, with their own dignity, wonderful in their own right, without reference to their practical possibilities or usefulness.

Edited at 2013-01-03 11:49 pm (UTC)

That's what I have come to think as the "Elvishness" about Frodo that other characters comment on: his Elvish eye, or way of looking at the world around him. I don't think he had it to start with, but learned it. He had the potential for it, but I think readers can see it growing right before their eyes within the written story.

Oh, Shirebound, what a perfect icon for your comment!

*clinks you back* Here! here!

Did you? I'll have to get off my duff and take a look! :)

Hi, Diem Kieu. I am out of town and have been for a few weeks. With my mobile broadband set-up for traveling I can't load this video. I'll have to wait till I get back to see "the beautiful Frodo" of Cal High. :)

You were a Haremite, on the Khazad-dum fan website? What was your name there?

Ha ha ha! Not to worry. You would have loved it there, had you been older. The name of the thread on the message board (which was devoted to LOTR and Tolkien) was "Frodo's Harem". It was the fan thread for everyone besotted with Frodo. They called themselves "Haremites" and wrote loads of fanfic on the side using the AU of Frodo in the Undying Lands loved and cared for (in every way) by hobbit lasses who came over the Sea precisely to give Frodo everything he'd missed while in Middle-earth. It was such fun. I think I never laughed so hard or had such interesting, sometimes pithy conversations about the character of Frodo as I did on that website thread.