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Places of inspiration

Further explorations in the vein of The Worlds of J.R.R. Tolkien

Where did Tolkien’s Silmarillion hero Beren get his name?

Beren is a name etched in the memories of Middle-earth fans. And it is literally carved beneath Tolkien’s own name on his Oxford gravestone. There was never a clearer…

March 22, 2024 2 reactions

Sound and vision

Amon Hen and Amon Lhaw are Middle-earth’s hills of seeing and hearing. Tolkien first contemplated a single hill combining both powers – but changed his mind. Why?

December 9, 2023 5 reactions

Wetwang revisited, part four

Part four: visions of the battlefield Everything that Tolkien said or knew about Wetwang, a place-name both in Yorkshire and in Middle-earth, fell into three different…

November 27, 2023

Wetwang revisited, part three

A story like The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien said, ‘grows like a seed in the dark out of the leaf-mould of the mind' …

November 5, 2023 2 reactions

Wetwang revisited, part two

En route to Wetwang in Middle-earth, Tolkien’s 1934 paper ‘Chaucer as a Philologist’ takes us into the lost English language of molars, sideburns and weeping.

October 28, 2023 1 reaction

Wetwang revisited, part one

I’ve been quiet for too long. I aim to give you a catch-up soon, but first I want to share something that’s hot off the press…

October 21, 2023 2 reactions

Old Joe Sauron?

Dear supporters, I’ve just returned from delivering the Annual Tolkien Lecture at the University of Birmingham. I chose to talk about ‘The Houses of Healing: Tolkien,…

May 14, 2023 2 reactions