The One-hundred and eighth Roving Ranger

Have a look at all Roving Rangers published so far. (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)

Life and Works

The Guardian has Beyond Bilbo: JRR Tolkien’s long-lost poetry to be published (Öffnet in neuem Fenster); see Wayne & Christina’s post on this (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

For your information

This is the last newsletter before the start of season 2 of Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (Öffnet in neuem Fenster). I have published two additional newsletters you can have a look at if you take an interest:

Roving Ranger. A Special edition: The Best of June-December 2022 (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [going through 25,000+ news items I have listed what I consider the essential pieces of information of that time span.]

Curumo’s Current Affairs (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [a list of links I summarised as J.R.R. Tolkien’s writings have become a global phenomenon and people from all over the world appreciate them, are inspired by them - or abuse them.]

Events & Shows

The Tolkien Society has announced the Christopher Tolkien Centenary Conference (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [online only; Nov 23-24.]

Composer Johan de Meji is often touring as a conductor, including parts of his Tolkien repertoire (such as the Lord of the Rings symphony); this time on Sept 7/8 in Germany (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [Facebook] and other concerts around the world (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) in Kansas City, Vilnius, Amsterdam & Chicago [official website]

The English Faculty at Oxford is running the Tolkien Seminars: 70th Anniversary of The Lord of the Rings series of talks. A full list is available with Eventbrite (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) - including Holly Ordway, John Garth, Stuart Lee et al.

The J.R. Tolkien seems to have survived its sale and is up for many tours (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) (in German but you can surely ask in English as well).

For all events (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) check out the International Tolkien Fellowship (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [FB] and the Tolkien Guide Calendar (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

Scholarship & Fandom

A new Tolkien documentary by German public broadcasting stations ARTE, Phoenix and ZDF will be published in December. Among the speakers are John Garth, Dimitra Fimi - and myself. (Pre-premiere at Wiesbaden (Öffnet in neuem Fenster), Sept 13). [My members with Steady know more (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).]

The people over at the Tolkien Collectors’ Guide have the info on the Beyond Bree Calendar (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) for 2025.

New Age - and Tolkien (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) - Artist Peter Pracownik has passed away (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

Gaming archivist Jason B. Dyer - via his blog Renga in Blue (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)- is hunting down the earliest ever Tolkien-inspired games (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

Lord Of The Rings in Unreal Engine 5 (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) - FotR River Scene [Youtube; this short (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) for development process]

The Bodleian has a librarian trainees blog which recently offered Leah Brown: A Sérprent Saga: Professor Turville-Petre and his Literary Network (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) (one of Tolkien’s students).

Incredibly proud and happy to see as a longtime member of the German Inklings Society (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) that our Yearbook is now open access with Stacks (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) (upload in progress) [press note (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)].

Nick Polk has Heroic Poetry in Shōgun and The Lord of the Rings (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

Robin Reid has More on Far-Right Extremists & Tolkien (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) and a Call for Papers (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) on ‘Great Heart and Strength:’ New Essays on Women and Gender in the Works of J.R.R. Tolkien.

Cities and Strongholds of Middle-earth (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) has been published.

Which hand did Frodo put the Ring on? (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) is asked by Tom Hillman.

Jeff LaSala has The Words of Glorfindel and the Witch-King of Angmar (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

A fun find: THE HOBBIT, first edition, lives on! (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)

Merchandise & Franchise

Behind the scenes on Amazon's quest to make The Rings of Power season 2 a hit (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [GQ]

Amazon’s press release material (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) for the trailer.

Games Workshop have announced a new board game (Öffnet in neuem Fenster): The Hobbit: Hunt for the Arkenstone.

Specialist drum makers HHG Drums (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) in Pennsylvania have brought the ring inscription (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) to the world of percussion. [Instagram]

The official trailer for LotR: War of the Rohirrim has been published (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

On LotR:RoP - ‘The Rings of Power’ Showrunners Tease Season 3 Plans: “Let Us Cook!” [Hollywood Reporter (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)]

Everything You Need to Remember Before Season 2 of The Rings of Power (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)[Time]

Online train ticket company Trainline is offering Tolkien’s England: explore the real-world inspirations behind Middle-earth (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

PSA Another blog post that is full of assumptions and half-truths you need to be an expert to tell reality from nonsense. Having said this - lovely list of places to visit with some of them actually Tolkienian. Your go to book: Garth, Worlds of Tolkien (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

Inter alia & Back in the Day

2024 World Fantasy Awards Finalists announced (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [Locus]

Paul Kidby interview - Terry Pratchett’s Discworld illustrator talks about his work and inspirations (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [Blackmore Vale]

‘The Acolyte’ Canceled: No Season 2 For Disney+’s ‘Star Wars’ Series (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) [Deadline]

Next time you are in Seattle - why not go for the Hobbit Trail (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)?

You can now enter your work with the New Zealand Youth Film Festival (Öffnet in neuem Fenster), supported - amongst others - by Weta Workshop and Weta FX.

Talpa Search (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) promises to find you the books you do not know the title or author of (run by LibraryThing (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)).

The 2024 Hugo Award Winners (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) have been announced (additional literary awards via LibraryThing (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

John Scalzi has a few choice words to say some people neet to read: Please Don’t Idolize Me (or Anyone, Really) (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

xkcd always makes me smile.

According to German law I have to infom you all links to enterprises, artists, products etc. are [unpaid advertisements.] Some purchase links may earn me a small commission from Blackwell's (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) or Bookshop.org (Öffnet in neuem Fenster), the bookshops of my personal trust.

If you are interested in my other Tolkien-related work please have a look:
The Tolkienist Blog (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) : Facebook (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) : Bluesky (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) : Instagram (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) : : Threads : Mastodon (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) : Xitter (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
You can support me by becoming a member with my Steady page (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).

If you happen to use Feedly (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) - why not subscribe to one of their most popular Tolkien blogs: thetolkienist.com ☺️

As this is 2024 I would like to note that this newsletter is 100% human-made, curated by me, Marcel R. Bülles. This also holds true for everything I write with my blog and here at Steady. Also, the average time of curating this newsletter ranges from 12-16 hours.