How do YOU pronounce 'Tolkien'?

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Narnangol

Haha, no, yours is fine. The pronunciation I called dubious had the emphasis on the last syllable. Is that not a bit strange? TolkiEN instead of TOLkien.

I tried to say that and couldn't. It just didn't work. I asked someone else to read it the way you wrote it. They also failed ("how the hell do you say that?" reaction). I know theoretically how TolkiEN would sound like, but I just can't say it. How does your friend do it? He must be a linguistic miracle!

Pronouncing it as TolkiYEN makes it sound Chinese (probably because all my failed attempts at pronouncing it turn it into Toukyan ). And Tolkeen/Tolkin - Slavic. And the Tolkayn that I mentioned - German (maybe because of the -ein endings?).

I also happened to be part of a little boring story regarding the name. In Russia, the Professor is known as TOLki-en. However, a copy of an obscure translation of one of his books put down his name on the front cover as TOLkeen/TOLkin (this is a poor effort to recount the pronounciation...). One of the Russian people I know asked me upon seeing the book who on earth wrote it, since the name sounded like a Russian last name, but the photo on the front was Tolkien's.