J.R.R. Tolkien Quotes
Orcs, and talking trees, and leagues of grass, and galloping riders, and glittering caves, and white towers and golden halls, and battles, and tall ships sailing, all these passed before Sam's mind.
It is the way of my people to use light words at such times and say less than they mean. We fear to say too much. It robs us of the right words when a jest is out of place.
Here you find us sitting on a field of victory, amid the plunder of armies, and you wonder how we came by a few well-earned comforts!
I am wholly in favour of 'dull stodges'. A surprising large proportion prove 'educable': for which a primary qualification is the willingness to do work.
O Elbereth! Gilthoniel! We still remember, we who dwell In this far land beneath the trees. Thy starlight on the Western Seas.
And she looked at him and saw the grave tenderness in his eyes, and yet knew, for she was bred among men of war, that here was one whom no Rider of the Mark could outmatch in battle.
Stir not the bitterness in the cup that I mixed for myself,' said Denethor. 'Have I not tasted it now many nights upon my tongue, foreboding that worse lay in the dregs?
And what would you do, if an uninvited dwarf came and hung his things up in your hall without a word of explanation?
I am rather tired, and no longer young enough to pillage the night to make up for the deficit of hours in the day..." JRR Tolkien, Letter # 174
Evidently we look so much alike that your desire to make an incurable dent in my hat must be excused.
He was as noble and fair in face as an elf-lord, as strong as a warrior, as wise as a wizard, as venerable as a king of dwarves, and as kind as summer.
Chip the glasses and crack the plates! / Blunt the knives and bend the forks! / That's what Bilbo Baggins hates.
There are many powers in the world, for good or for evil. Some are greater than I am. Against some I have not yet been measured. But my time is coming.
But do not despise the lore that has come down from distant years; for oft it may chance that old wives keep in memory word of things that once were needful for the wise to know.
Go not to the Elves for counsel, for they will say both no and yes. Elves seldom give unguarded advice, for advice is a dangerous gift, even from the wise to the wise, and all courses may run ill.
Saruman," I said, standing away from him, "only one hand at a time can weild the One, and you know that well, so do not trouble to say we!
But the enemy has the move, and he is about to open his full game. And pawns are as likely to see as much of it as any. Sharpen your blade!
And it is not our part here to take thought only for a season, or for a few lives of Men, or for a passing age of the world.
Much evil must befall a country before it wholly forgets the Elves, if once they dwelt there.
Hammer and tongs! I am so torn between rage and joy, that if I do not burst, it will be a marvel!
Such bees! Bilbo had never seen anything like them. "If one were to sting me," He thought "I should swell up as big as I am!
Creative fantasy, because it is mainly trying to do something else ... may open your hoard and let all the locked things fly away like cage-birds.
There was a fire in the wide hearth before them, and it was burning with a sweet smell, as if it were built of apple-wood.
I should have said Welsh has always attracted me. By its style and sound more than any other, ever though I first only saw it on coal trucks, I always wanted to know what it was about.
People remember Longfellow wrote Hiawatha, quite forget he was a Professor of Modern Languages!
At my age I'm exactly the kind of person who has lived through one of the most quickly changing periods known to history. Surely there could never be in seventy years so much change.
A good vocabulary is not acquired by reading books written according to some notion of the vocabulary of one's age group. It comes from reading books above one.
I propose to speak about fairy-stories, though I am aware that this is a rash adventure. Faërie is a perilous land, and in it are pitfalls for the unwary and dungeons for the overbold.