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<img src="http://www.barrowdowns.com/images/posticons/redeye.jpg" align=absmiddle> Re: tolkien 's "myths transformed"
Slow typer that I am, I was afraid we would get to these type of details!
OK on page 370-375 the prof says" The making of the Sun and the Moon MUST [italicized in book ]occur long befire the coming of the elves: and CANNOT [again] be made to be after the death of the 2 trees - if that occurred in any connection w/ the sojourn of the noldor in valinor .
the time allowed is too short. Neither could there be woods and flowers &c. on earth , if there had been no light since the over throw of the lamps!"
and then I will summarize a replacement outline from p. 376
Melkor will "disarray" the sun so that there will be extreme hot and cold [instead of lamps -presumably] the valar then make the moon to counteract this which melkor promptly attacks - He contemplates having M attack or ravish[?!] Aren {maiden of the sun}
who then leaves arda altogether.
M sneaks back onto ME and builds Utumno and the Valar cannot easily ovecome it
2 Trees are then made and the var become selfishly {his words } valinorcentric and ignore Mid -Earth
in the are's where the elves are to awaken M darkens the sky so that ther is onla dim twilight- coming from the light of valinor in the west.
the valar manage to rend M's darkness and the stars come out "terribly " bright all this just as the elves are awakening - so that they see first darkness then extreme starlight - M covers uit back up and the elves are still thus associated w/ the stars and twilight in west.
then battle and captivity w/ morgoth
Men must awake while M is still in arda -because of their " fall"
this is gone into in detail in the Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth { also in same volume and this was intended by Tolkien to be an Appendix to Silm.- if I recall aright- anyway it is incredibly beautiful and profound theology}
there are more details and manuscript variants but that is the main outline as far as I have studied it. One other note is that JRRT toyed w/ the idea that the versions we know as
"The Silmarillion " could have been versions that changed in the telling as men got a hold of them.
I hope that gives every one who doesn't have the books a bit to chew on -not too mention a good reason to get them { vol. 10 -12 atleast}
an edited note: on page 383. CRRT says" It may be , though I have no other evidence on the question one way or the other that he came to perceive from such experimental writing as this text that the old structure was too comprehensive , too interlocked in all its parts, indeed had its roots too deep too withstand such a ... surgery."
however...
JRRT says on P.389 " the making of the SUn after the Death of the trees is not only impossible "mythology' now - especially since the Valar must be supposed to know the truth about the structure of Ea{ and not make mythical guesses like men}... it is also IMpossible chronologically in the narrative."
He also has the light of the "unfallen"sun
{ before melkor's ravishment of the sun maia} be reposited in the Trees and thence after there destruction only preserved in the silmarills.
I am afraid my summaries do not do justice to the texts -so may that inspire those who are interested to...
</p>Edited by <A HREF=http://www.barrowdowns.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_profile&u=00000076>lindil</A> at: 7/23/00 9:01:39 am
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The dwindling Men of the West would often sit up late into the night exchanging lore & wisdom such as they still possessed that they should not fall back into the mean estate of those who never knew or indeed rebelled against the Light.
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