Quote:
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May I ask what line of Tom's you're referring to here?
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[Tom] had now wandered into strange regions beyond their memory and beyond their waking thought, into times when the world was wider, and
the seas flowed straight to the western Shore; and still back and on Tom went singing into
ancient starlight, when only the Elf-sires were awake.
[...]
"When the Elves passed westward, Tom was here already, before the seas were bent. He knew
the dark under the stars when it was fearless -- before the Dark Lord came from Outside."
__________
While it's certainly true that Tolkien in his last years was looking at "garbled Mannish legends" as his out, that would have been a very difficult solution for several reasons, including the physical presence of Aman during the Journey and the Elves' passing westward at that time (even if the mobile island were written off as myth), and the return of the Exiles after the Silmarils. Somehow the significance of the Trees would have to be maintained in a world where the Sun is already in the sky. The second starkindling would be a serious problem, and the significance of Ursa Major and Orion presented in LR given a completely different historio-mythological background. So, again, it would have taken heavy construction equipment and the digging up of foundations.
But the biggest problem would be this- however misguided the early Numenoreans may have been, and we'll pretend that their visitors from Eressea and their own visits to Lindon didn't set them straight, by the time we're into the Third Age the scholars of Arnor would have been in regular contact with Lindon and especially Rivendell, where the Elves knew better. Heck, Glorfindel personally remembered the Trees and had crossed the Grinding Ice! And then we have the problem of Bilbo, whose Translations from the Elvish was, in the Second Edition, at just the time of this interview (1965-66), being at least heavily hinted as being the Silmarillion. And if Bilbo was translating "from the Elvish" at Rivendell, then surely he would have got the straight scoop, not old Numenorean legends! (On that note, remember that almost no Numenorean writings survived the Downfall)