Drop Everything Right Now!!!

[davem]

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

For your second question, the simple answer is that it is the most memorable and dramatic story - I didn't reread the Silmarillion for a long but the story of Turin stayed clearest in the memory.

It was also the story that was most directly inspired by the Kalevala, which seems to have been the great inspiration for Tolkien to begin the Legendarium. I wonder what that tells us. Did Tolkien feel more affinity for the themes in that story. I still find it odd that Beren & Luthien (with such a personal importance for Tolkien) wasn't the one he wanted to bring to a conclusion, or Tuor, which if Garth is correct was directly inspired by his wartime experiences. CoH seems to have been the one of the three Great Tales that had no 'autobiographical' aspect to it.

Seriously, having just read the Milton Waldman letter in its long form at the start of the Silmarillion second edition, I think it is just using a term which is perhas more understandable than "(angelic) powers", to those who don't perhaps know the Sil but have encountered Norse / Classical mythology..... however it surely should not have been capitalised ...how intriguing if CT did so himself!!!!

Its odd for CT to use the term 'God' or even 'god' at all - was Morgoth ever classed among the 'gods' even of the early Sil? I'm wondering if that little piece will appear on the flyleaf of CoH? Of course, Morgoth is the only 'divine' power to appear in the story as far as I recall (are any of the Valar even mentioned in the tale?).

[Mithalwen]

Yes I think so - the Valaquenta says he was counted "no longer "among the Valar and in the letter Tolkien says that the word Valar is "englished" as gods.