New interview with Christopher Tolkien - The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum

Mithalwen · 07-29-2012, 04:44 AM

Looking for something else, I found this on the Estate Website regarding the illustration of the Children of Hurin:

"We have always admired the work of Alan Lee, ever since he was commissioned to illustrate The Lord of the Rings at the time of J.R.R. Tolkien's centenary. While preparing the story for publication, Christopher decided that to have the book illustrated from first publication would also underline its essential quality as a story rather than a scholarly work."

For Christopher to have actively wanted Lee's illustration is quite a mark of approval. And the Estate website is surely a fairly reliable source....

Mumriken · 07-29-2012, 05:55 AM

Lee's work is in a class of it's own. I doubt I would be able to vizualise lord of the rings etc without his artwork. It's so rich and adds to the whole middle earth atmosphere. Here are some of his hobbit artwork, I wonder if the movies have taken inspiration from his work.

http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop..._porte_lee.jpg
http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop..._troll_lee.jpg
http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop..._smaug_lee.jpg
http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop...arrock_lee.jpg

Mithalwen · 07-29-2012, 07:27 AM

I like Lee's work - certainly better than just about anyone's save Tolkien's own and Pauline Bayne's which is a different style - but I don't need them. I find the word pictures quite vivid.

TheGreatElvenWarrior · 09-17-2012, 06:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

I like Lee's work - certainly better than just about anyone's save Tolkien's own and Pauline Bayne's which is a different style - but I don't need them. I find the word pictures quite vivid.

I, myself, watched the PJ version of Tolkien before reading the books. At the time I was perfectly satisfied with his interpretation -- I do not feel the same way anymore. I like Alan Lee's artwork. I also like John Howe's. I own four ME maps that were painted by John Howe and they are quite beautiful. Despite this, I find the longer it has been since I watched the films, the more I have a different visual of ME than was shown, and surprisingly, I like mine better. PJ was able to get people on his team that were talented in making the visual ME, but he botched it in the character and scripting department.

Christopher Tolkien has a right to be disappointed. He was there when his father was writing, after all. He probably knows better than anyone else alive what J.R.R.'s vision was for his works. Without Christopher Tolkien, we would know hardly anything about Middle-earth and its history.

davem · 09-18-2012, 05:13 AM

This is a brief excerpt from a recording made at Church House Bookshop back in 1981, launching the BBC Radio adaptation of Lord of the Rings. Its a short piece, where Brian Sibley goes into the contribution Christopher made to the series, & references the tape recording CT made as a pronunciation guide for the actors.

About 5 seconds of silence before the audio starts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5spIP...ature=youtu.be

jallanite · 09-19-2012, 12:25 PM

This tape is welcome here, at least to me.

Christopher Tolkien’s pronunciation of Thengel (using International Phonetic Alphabet symbols) as Then[dʒ]el where his father pronounced it as The[ŋɡ]el stands out as an odd differing pronunciation. It is probably not an error by either of the Tolkiens but would indicate different theories of how the Old English name may have been pronounced, and possibly theories of how the name was pronounced in different dialects of Old English.

Old English grammars, at least those that I have seen, get vague in their rules for words which contain ng. See http://www.lotrplaza.com/archive7/fo...asp?TID=234771 for a discussion which in its later sections, towards the top, gets into Christopher Tolkien’s pronunciation. Another possible pronunciation is The[nj]el. It is noted in the forum I have linked to that Tolkien preferred to pronounce the name Hengest as something like Hen[dʒ]est or Hen[j]est where other systems of Old English pronunciation prefer He[ŋɡ]est.

William Cloud Hicklin · 09-19-2012, 02:28 PM

The problem there is that in attempting to reconstruct ancient pronunciations, we rarely have much to go on besides what we can deduce from the sound-patterning of the language's surviving verse, whether rhyme, assonance, or alliteration; and that doesn't help much with medial consonants and consonant-pairs.

Occasionally orthography helps, as a sound-shift can be traced in a spelling change over time and/or colloquial spellings; but that's no help with -ng since there wouldn't have been an alternate orthography, "J" not existing in OE (except as an alternate written form of the vowel "I")

So -ng is really anybody's guess, depending on whether one wants to use "frog DNA" from mod. German, or from Dutch-Frisian which is a closer cousin. FWIW, I'm disposed to think that dzh- in English, spelled either J or G, is a French import. But I certainly have no evidence to back up my gut there.

Lalwendë · 07-29-2012, 04:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

Looking for something else, I found this on the Estate Website regarding the illustration of the Children of Hurin:

"We have always admired the work of Alan Lee, ever since he was commissioned to illustrate The Lord of the Rings at the time of J.R.R. Tolkien's centenary. While preparing the story for publication, Christopher decided that to have the book illustrated from first publication would also underline its essential quality as a story rather than a scholarly work."

For Christopher to have actively wanted Lee's illustration is quite a mark of approval. And the Estate website is surely a fairly reliable source....

That's good, because it confirms it's the journalist projecting some assumptions rather than CT's own feelings on the matter. One of the things that surely nobody could criticise about the films was the care put into the artwork by Alan Lee and John Howe - their Oscar was truly well deserved.

William Cloud Hicklin · 09-08-2012, 08:55 AM

It's also worth noting that the Estate *requested* that Alan Lee do Children of Hurin *after* the films- so the notion of petty resentment or blackballing is shown to be another myth.

Note on "upper-class" accents: JRRT himself would be the first to point out that the "Oxford accent" is of very middle-class origin. (To hear a bona fide upper-class accent, listen to some 50s-era recordings of the Queen speaking).

07-29-2012, 04:44 AM	#1
Mithalwen Pilgrim Soul Join Date: May 2004 Location: watching the wonga-wonga birds circle... Posts: 9,461	Looking for something else, I found this on the Estate Website regarding the illustration of the Children of Hurin: "We have always admired the work of Alan Lee, ever since he was commissioned to illustrate The Lord of the Rings at the time of J.R.R. Tolkien's centenary. While preparing the story for publication, Christopher decided that to have the book illustrated from first publication would also underline its essential quality as a story rather than a scholarly work." For Christopher to have actively wanted Lee's illustration is quite a mark of approval. And the Estate website is surely a fairly reliable source.... __________________ “But Finrod walks with Finarfin his father beneath the trees in Eldamar.” Christopher Tolkien, Requiescat in pace

07-29-2012, 05:55 AM	#2
Mumriken Banned Join Date: Jul 2012 Posts: 78	Lee's work is in a class of it's own. I doubt I would be able to vizualise lord of the rings etc without his artwork. It's so rich and adds to the whole middle earth atmosphere. Here are some of his hobbit artwork, I wonder if the movies have taken inspiration from his work. http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop..._porte_lee.jpg http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop..._troll_lee.jpg http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop..._smaug_lee.jpg http://tolkienilu.chez-alice.fr/epop...arrock_lee.jpg Last edited by Mumriken; 07-29-2012 at 06:00 AM.

07-29-2012, 07:27 AM	#3
Mithalwen Pilgrim Soul Join Date: May 2004 Location: watching the wonga-wonga birds circle... Posts: 9,461	I like Lee's work - certainly better than just about anyone's save Tolkien's own and Pauline Bayne's which is a different style - but I don't need them. I find the word pictures quite vivid. __________________ “But Finrod walks with Finarfin his father beneath the trees in Eldamar.” Christopher Tolkien, Requiescat in pace

09-18-2012, 05:13 AM	#5
davem Illustrious Ulair Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: In the home of lost causes, and forsaken beliefs, and unpopular names,and impossible loyalties Posts: 4,240	This is a brief excerpt from a recording made at Church House Bookshop back in 1981, launching the BBC Radio adaptation of Lord of the Rings. Its a short piece, where Brian Sibley goes into the contribution Christopher made to the series, & references the tape recording CT made as a pronunciation guide for the actors. About 5 seconds of silence before the audio starts. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5spIP...ature=youtu.be __________________ “Everything was an object. If you killed a dwarf you could use it as a weapon – it was no different to other large heavy objects."

09-19-2012, 02:28 PM	#7
William Cloud Hicklin Loremaster of Annúminas Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 2,330	The problem there is that in attempting to reconstruct ancient pronunciations, we rarely have much to go on besides what we can deduce from the sound-patterning of the language's surviving verse, whether rhyme, assonance, or alliteration; and that doesn't help much with medial consonants and consonant-pairs. Occasionally orthography helps, as a sound-shift can be traced in a spelling change over time and/or colloquial spellings; but that's no help with -ng since there wouldn't have been an alternate orthography, "J" not existing in OE (except as an alternate written form of the vowel "I") So -ng is really anybody's guess, depending on whether one wants to use "frog DNA" from mod. German, or from Dutch-Frisian which is a closer cousin. FWIW, I'm disposed to think that dzh- in English, spelled either J or G, is a French import. But I certainly have no evidence to back up my gut there. __________________ The entire plot of The Lord of the Rings could be said to turn on what Sauron didn’t know, and when he didn’t know it.

09-19-2012, 12:25 PM	#6
jallanite Shade of Carn Dûm Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: Toronto Posts: 479	This tape is welcome here, at least to me. Christopher Tolkien’s pronunciation of Thengel (using International Phonetic Alphabet symbols) as Then[dʒ]el where his father pronounced it as The[ŋɡ]el stands out as an odd differing pronunciation. It is probably not an error by either of the Tolkiens but would indicate different theories of how the Old English name may have been pronounced, and possibly theories of how the name was pronounced in different dialects of Old English. Old English grammars, at least those that I have seen, get vague in their rules for words which contain ng. See http://www.lotrplaza.com/archive7/fo...asp?TID=234771 for a discussion which in its later sections, towards the top, gets into Christopher Tolkien’s pronunciation. Another possible pronunciation is The[nj]el. It is noted in the forum I have linked to that Tolkien preferred to pronounce the name Hengest as something like Hen[dʒ]est or Hen[j]est where other systems of Old English pronunciation prefer He[ŋɡ]est.

09-08-2012, 08:55 AM	#9
William Cloud Hicklin Loremaster of Annúminas Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 2,330	It's also worth noting that the Estate requested that Alan Lee do Children of Hurin after the films- so the notion of petty resentment or blackballing is shown to be another myth. Note on "upper-class" accents: JRRT himself would be the first to point out that the "Oxford accent" is of very middle-class origin. (To hear a bona fide upper-class accent, listen to some 50s-era recordings of the Queen speaking). __________________ The entire plot of The Lord of the Rings could be said to turn on what Sauron didn’t know, and when he didn’t know it.