[Mithadan]

This letter is interesting for a number of reasons. First, it demonstrates the breadth of the challenge confronted by CRRT when he rapidly assembled The Silmarillion for publication in 1977. The fall of Doriath has received some attention because it was the element least modified from its early conception of all of the Great Tales. When HoME was published over time, some were critical of CRRT for "rushing" the publication of The Silmarillion opining that it may have resulted in JRRT's "final" or "latest" conceptions being omitted. Clearly, CRRT did not have access to this letter (or overlooked it) when preparing The Silmarillion for publication. But if the letter was available, I question whether it would have changed his approach to the fall of Doriath.

CRRT was often faced with differing versions of his father's work. The difficulties he encountered included determining which versions were the latest in time, which were experimental, and which (if any) were final. CRRT admitted this difficulty after the fact. However, it is also clear that JRRT "thought about" revisions to his work with pencil in hand. Witness NoME and the multiple iterations of his musings on time and the aging of the Eldar. Consider his experimentation with a "round world" conception of Arda. I would speculate that CRRT was at least aware of the latter even in 1977, but chose not to attempt to modify his father's stories. To do so would have required both speculation, as well as wholesale drafting, not mere revision, of portions of JRRT's mythos.

A further comment. JRRT was what we Americans would call a "pack rat." He apparently retained a significant portion of his writings, notes and doodles over his lifetime. However, his papers were not well organized. When he was actively drafting, it seems that he sometimes had earlier drafts on hand. But when he was writing down his musings, thoughts and ideas, or writing a letter, he often did not have his drafts available and worked from memory. As a result, details changed. Here, perhaps the discussions of the timing of Thingol's death, when the Dwarves were passing through Doriath's borders, Hurin's attitude towards Thingol and what happened to his band of bandits (for lack of a better term) were not necessarily a "final conception" but rather his best recollection of what he had written before (maybe combined with some real time revision).