The age of anxiety:

[Mithalwen]

Originally Posted by Eönwë

I know this isn't strictly lotr (and maybe not entirely relevant), but what about the Sil? Is Feanor on the good or bad side? He's sort of more on his own side. And what does that count as?

Feanor is a bit more Miltonic / Byronic but I think he is an earlier creation?

LOTR is that much later and WW2 was a lot more clear cut and though it was started during the War it was published as the cold war developed. Again the younger downers may not realise that nuclear war seemed a real possibility at a time when I was young. It did seem much more "us against them" . Glaost and the fall of the Berlin Wall seemed quite miraculous.

Terrorism is not a recent phenomenon - think of the clicheed drawings of the anachist with a bomb - and the threat is something Brits raised under the shadow of the IRA usually take in their stride - but it has never had such prominence, we have never perhaps been so encouraged to suspect the people around us.