[Folwren]

I saw this thread title and I just had to read it. It turned out to be quite entertaining. I'm glad I bothered to look.

But what do you think - some of the topics I've seen brought up at times (this one, for instance) just seem really...superficial. Do you think Tolkien really thought about this at all when he wrote it? He was drawing a picture, and a very vivid one...did he think about the fact that the fire was made out of the same stuff the tree was made of? I highly doubt it. My guess was that he wrote it and didn't think about it again, as is likely the case with many things in the book. As Lord of Agmar said above, it was likely "a bit of exposition to give life and humanity to the elderly Wood."