Microphones in Middle-earth...the BBC Lord of the Rings

[Mithalwen]

He really conveys a sense of immediacy - narrators can sound far too "knowing" - which would of course have been a problem if one of the fellowship had been a narrator.

I was thinking about this partly in relation to a discussion elsewhere about the films, and unless you take a radically different approach to the material and lose the perspective of going through the story basically at hobbit level of knowledge (cf the difference between "TheQuest of Erebor" in UT and the Hobbit), you need a narrator who doesn't sound too omniscient.

I am sorry I have been so lacking in my contributions sinceI have so been enjoying my more focused re listenings. I am continually amazed at how much has been kept especially given the shortness of the original episodes and the consequent need to make allowances for new listeners.

I am also impressed that although I know the story so well I am still on tenterhooks at the dramatic moments and still moved.

This episode contains perhaps my favourite piece of dialogue which is given proper treatment - the "memory is not what the heart desires" . A good example of what for me makes this adaptation superior to the films. Yes this little sequence may not move the plot on but it tells so much about these characters - as characters, as representatives of their races and also gets to the heart of so much of the essence of the story. Courage is not enough nor is sacrifice. Gimli and Boromir are so confident of their strength that this moment of weakness make Gimli seem very human - for want of a more appropriate word.