The Ninety-second Roving Ranger

For three months I have not been able to send you the next edition of the Roving Ranger, for a number of reasons. I will try and get back into the bi-weekly swing of things and do a special edition on the months I have missed.

Events & Shows

A play on Lewis & Tolkien (Si apre in una nuova finestra) is on in Hollywood, CA.

The Exeter Tolkien Society is organising a fantasy Christmas ball (Si apre in una nuova finestra) on Nov 24th.

The Tolkien Society is having an online seminar on Tolkien and Religion in the Twenty-first Century (Si apre in una nuova finestra) on Nov 26 - an excellent outlook on it can be found with Anna Smol (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

The Tolkien Collector’s Guide (Si apre in una nuova finestra) did a live stream (Si apre in una nuova finestra) on the revised Letters; a review of the release event (Si apre in una nuova finestra) in Oxford; and do join their subreddit (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

In Exeter College’s on-going seminar series Laura Varnam will talk about Tolkien & Beowulf (Si apre in una nuova finestra) at the college’s ‘new’ Cohen Quad on Nov 15 and Simon Horobin on ‘J.R.R. Tolkien: The Making of a Philologist’ on Nov 22.

Weta Workshop will be doing a special screening of LotR: Return of the King (Si apre in una nuova finestra) in Auckland on Dec 5, including Richard Tayleor and Tania Rodger. The NZ Post (Si apre in una nuova finestra) is issuing another set of celebratory stamps as well.

Wadham College (Si apre in una nuova finestra)’s members of the MCR and SCR will be getting a Tolkien, Lewis and the Inklings tour.

The British Library has opened its massive Fantasy: Realms of Imagination (Si apre in una nuova finestra) exhibition - two early (Si apre in una nuova finestra) reviews (Si apre in una nuova finestra).
[Please note: the BL’s website has come under attack (Si apre in una nuova finestra) so you might not see the exhibition page; all exhibitions are running and you can book tickets here (Si apre in una nuova finestra).]

Pembroke College has an event on the OED (Si apre in una nuova finestra) at Nov 17.

The C.S. Lewis podcast Pints with Jack is trying to establish a CSL Reading Day (Si apre in una nuova finestra) - on Nov 29 (CSL’s birthday).

Don’t forget - John Howe’s exhibition (Si apre in una nuova finestra) in Brittany is still on until January.

Scholarship and Fandom

Reviews of Letters: Tolkien Guide (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | Telegraph (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [paywall]; The Times (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [paywall].

A great write-up on recent Tolkien events & publications by Robin Reid (Si apre in una nuova finestra). Anna Smol ist offering some of the books coming up (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

For those of you who have not heard of Tom Hillman’s book Pity, Power, and Tolkien’s Ring you can listen to some of the chapters read by the author (Si apre in una nuova finestra) on Youtube.

Verlyn Flieger has left Tolkien Studies (Si apre in una nuova finestra) - thanks and kudos to Verlyn! - and Yvette Kisor (Si apre in una nuova finestra) will pick up her baton. Read more about Its Origins and Evolutions (Si apre in una nuova finestra) with Douglas A. Anderson.

List, list, O, list! is a column with the Times Literary Supplement, including the subtitle 100 Novels, Tove Jansson’s Hobbit, Reviews misrepresented (Si apre in una nuova finestra) and being a little acidic about top 100 reading lists and the British Library exhibition.

For the sake of Jansson’s other work, we are glad that she never had to endure a return to Middleearth (sic!). But because she portrayed Gollum as a paunchy giant, we are told, Tolkien later clarified that this particular creature of the imagination was “small” and “slimy”. We know whose fantasy we prefer. [List, list, o, list!]

Peter Grybauskas - the editor of Tolkien’s Battle of Maldon (Si apre in una nuova finestra) - will be offering a course called Advanced Composition: Tolkien in Oxford (Si apre in una nuova finestra) at the University of Maryland.

A professional writing course exploring the life and works of J.R.R. Tolkien, professor and author of The Lord of the Rings. 

To some people it may come as a surprise, it is nothing new to Tolkien scholars - the Italian right have been abusing his writings since the 1970s and today’s prime minister is only another name in a very long list: How did The Lord of the Rings become a secret weapon in Italy’s culture wars? (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Guardian]; Inside Giorgia Meloni’s Hobbit fantasy world (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Politico]; Why a Lord of the Rings exhibition matters to Italy's far-right PM Giorgia Meloni (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [euronews.culture]; Is a Tolkein Exhibition in Rome Part of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s Far-Right Agenda? (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [artnet]; Meloni e Tolkien, la stampa inglese all’attacco (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Repubblica]; Rome to host Italy's first major Tolkien exhibition (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Wanted in Rome; only general tourist info]

It is unfortunate that the politics involved in this question offer a skewed picture of an exhibition that will be outstanding: TOLKIEN. UOMO, PROFESSORE, AUTORE (Si apre in una nuova finestra) has been curated by none other but Tolkien scholar Oronzo Cilli (Tolkien’s Library (Si apre in una nuova finestra)). There also was a special event during Italy’s reading week for schools, Libriamoci (Si apre in una nuova finestra), at Milan, on Tolkien’s Hobbit. See this video for the opening (Si apre in una nuova finestra), supported by the Italian Ministry of Culture and with the cultural minister Sangiuliano (Si apre in una nuova finestra) present, as well as Tolkien scholar Giuseppe Pezzini (Corpus Christi College (Si apre in una nuova finestra)) who recently organised the exceptional conference Tolkien's Words and Worlds (Si apre in una nuova finestra) in Oxford.

The Apocalypse According to J.R.R. Tolkien (Si apre in una nuova finestra) by Robert Lazu Kmita [European Conservative]

Diana Glyer’s C.S. Lewis Bibliography (Si apre in una nuova finestra) contains a number of titles relevant to Tolkien scholarship. Do look out for her latest publication, The Major & The Missionary (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

John Garth started a series of posts with Steady on Wetwang (Si apre in una nuova finestra). [I am still incredibly pleased to say I convinced John of joining me at Steady.]

Franchise and Merchandise

Lord of the Rings: Online is back with another expansion: Corsairs of Umbar (Si apre in una nuova finestra). [YT, launch trailer]

A list of reviews on LotR: Return to Moria: Metacritic (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | IGN (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | Checkpoint Gaming (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | Polygon (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | Game Tyrant (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | TechRaptor (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | Empire (Si apre in una nuova finestra). Here is an outlook on (Si apre in una nuova finestra) future patches and DLCs by the developers. Luckily enough, the game is not as overwhelmingly bad as LotR: Gollum (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

In the age of celebrities Chanel’s In the Library series is a prime specimen: Margot Robbie likes - among many others - The Hobbit (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

It really does not come as a surprise that Jeff Bezos (Si apre in una nuova finestra) is a Tolkien fan, too, like Peter Thiel (Si apre in una nuova finestra) and Elon Musk (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

An Australian ‘traveller’ seems to have missed out on franchise tourism the world over: Oh Lord: I visited a bizarre, fake Hobbit-theme park in a cloud forest (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

Inter alia & Back in the day

I am not sure whether Esquire should be asking the question but here we are: What’s the future of books? (Si apre in una nuova finestra)

Greta Gerwig is doing Narnia (Si apre in una nuova finestra) for Netflix.

Sir Anthony Hopkins stays true to form and returns to C.S. Lewis - but this time as Sigmund Freud, talking to Lewis, in the film Freud’s Last Session (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

The Eagle & Child (Si apre in una nuova finestra) has been sold to a tech institute expanding into Oxford University - we’ll see what will come of it (see also with the BBC (Si apre in una nuova finestra)) [I have written extensively on Tolkien’s pubs with Steady (Si apre in una nuova finestra) and am in the process of writing more about this development.]

Star Wars author Timothy Zahn weighs in on ‘his’ character, Thrawn, his books and what might be in store (Si apre in una nuova finestra) for one of the best characters in that universe.

Strange but true: The original model of Star Trek’s spaceship Enterprise was considered lost but might have resurfaced now (Si apre in una nuova finestra), many decades later.

One of the most hilarious pieces I saw this week: the Economist titled The business of mining literary estates is booming (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [paywall] and the website Fior Reports simply copied it fully (as far as I can see), retitling it The business of exploiting literary estates is booming (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

If you need fresh reading material the Hugo award winners (Si apre in una nuova finestra) - and all the nominees - make for a great TRL. Or the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize (Si apre in una nuova finestra). Or the World Fantasy Awards (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

Ansible 436 (Si apre in una nuova finestra) has been published.

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, the bookshop of my personal trust.

If you are interested in my other Tolkien-related work please have a look:
The Tolkienist Blog (Si apre in una nuova finestra) : Facebook (Si apre in una nuova finestra) : Twitter (Si apre in una nuova finestra) : Instagram (Si apre in una nuova finestra) : Tolkien-Discord (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [de/en]