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Christopher Tolkien has died

by deadmetheny on 1/16/20, 7:28 PM with 227 comments

• by scop on 1/16/20, 8:20 PM

  RIP Christopher Tolkien. His labors have given the world a great gift.

  And, given the subject, I just have to drop what I believe to be one of the greatest lines of literature:

  Elrond: “The road must be trod, but it will be very hard. And neither strength nor wisdom will carry us far upon it. This quest may be attempted by the weak with as much hope as the strong. Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere.”

• by martinpw on 1/17/20, 6:27 AM

  A long time ago I was working at an observatory searching for new asteroids. For cloudy nights, they had a large library of paperbacks and I read LOTR twice through. Because of this, when I got to name a newly discovered asteroid, I wanted to call it Tolkien. I wrote to the publisher and got a wonderful short letter back from Rayner Unwin, who talked to Christopher Tolkien about it - here is the letter:

  https://imgur.com/a/XDGwOl6?

• by _bxg1 on 1/16/20, 8:33 PM

  For those who don't know, Christopher Tolkien played a key role of editing and compiling his father's drafts and notes into several complete books published after his death, including The Silmarillion, The Children of Hurin, and Unfinished Tales. Basically everything that came after The Lord of the Rings.

• by AdmiralAsshat on 1/16/20, 8:27 PM

  While primarily an editor for his father's work, he was a scholar in his own right. He released his own translation of a Norse epic, "The Saga Of King Heidrek The Wise":

  http://vsnrweb-publications.org.uk/The%20Saga%20Of%20King%20...

• by saalweachter on 1/16/20, 8:36 PM

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tolkien_family

  That's a nice hearty family tree.

  It always makes me a little sad when there's a historical figure I liked and their family tree just kind of peters out after a bit. May be a bit silly, since I liked them for their intellectual output or creativity or political impact.

• by quentinms on 1/16/20, 10:04 PM

  If you find yourself in Paris, the National Library has a great exhibit on JRR Tolkien [0] until February 16. Christopher Tolkien's work is heavily featured. It's fully translated in English (for once).

  [0] https://www.bnf.fr/en/agenda/tolkien-journey-middle-earth

• by hyperion2010 on 1/17/20, 6:57 AM

  I have so many things to say here, but I think that the kernel of it is as follows.

  The Children of Húrin, Beren and Lúthien, and The Fall of Gondolin are a gift, unlooked for and unexpected. They are the best founding mythology one could ask for, three Silmarils in the crown of a lifetime sorting through the mind of his father. We can wish that JRR had lived another lifetime, we are blessed to have gotten Christopher in his stead. If you have not read the forward to The Fall of Gondolin it is a timely and poignant reflection. All I can say is thank you.

• by vbtemp on 1/16/20, 9:08 PM

  What sad terrible news. I finished reading the Silmarillion just last week, and was impressed by how he turned loosely associated stories and myths into a single, cohesive narrative that even had full continuity with LoTR. Just this week again I was marveling that he was still around.

• by bovermyer on 1/16/20, 8:11 PM

  Well .

  I'm going to start reading the Silmarillion again tonight. Maybe this time I can finish it.

• by twodave on 1/16/20, 9:27 PM

  Last year, I finished reading The Lord of the Rings to my girls. Before that I read them The Hobbit. It took about three years to finish it all, but it was a great for them as an opportunity to learn about a variety of topics (language arts in general primarily, but especially vocabulary). The experience was also good to me because, while I'm typically prone to skim through less interesting passages, it forced me to read every word.

  I adopted voices for the different characters to keep them interested, and to give them something to look forward to, I would not let them watch the movies until we finished reading the corresponding volume of the series. We had so much fun with this!

  I'm extremely thankful for Christopher's work because the movies (which were released when I was a teenager) were my first introduction to his father's work.

• by z3t4 on 1/16/20, 11:51 PM

  The commercialization screwed it for me too. I remember that at the time the first movie was released, the web was scorched of fan material. Fans where threatened and insane amount of fan arts where removed and replaced by commercialized material, especially cartography.

• by agumonkey on 1/16/20, 11:50 PM

  I just read that he was quite critical of Jackson's adaptation. I'm not a huge fan of the franchise (not too critical either since it's not the easiest adaptation to make) and I'd love to read if Christopher made detailed comments on what he felt was wrong. Le Monde (french newspaper) interviewed him but he only said one line "they turned it into an action movie for teenagers".. I'd hope he had more to say elsewhere :)

  Or maybe I should just read the silmarillion

• by TheDesolate0 on 1/17/20, 10:57 AM

  At only 95! So young for an Elf.

• by kaesar14 on 1/16/20, 8:10 PM

  Interesting to see the low opinion in which he held the movies, considering the revered place in American cinema the trilogy holds. Considering the astounding length and detail with which they were adapted, what more could he have possibly hoped for? What other adaptions have done more to hold true to such a complicated and intricate fantasy universe, especially in the early 2000's and earlier? Many adaptions since, inspired by LOTR, have failed to hold to their source material with such honor and gravity (GoT, etc.).

• by StarlaAtNight on 1/16/20, 9:17 PM

  I read that as Christopher Walken has died

• by fsckboy on 1/16/20, 10:28 PM

  on hacker news, we STEM lords (of ring 0?) like to examine both sides of every issue, right guys? Guys?

  I'm sure he was a nice man, and I'm sure you've all derived a lot of pleasure from time spent with his work, much like so many engineers over the years have spent so much time and earned so much of their livings from FORTRAN and COBOL. Because, it must be said, FORTRAN and COBOL are to Computer Science as Lord of the Rings is to English Literature.

  So I hope this man rests in blissful peace as earnestly as I could wish it of any good man. But let me go even further and say, if it turns out that if after we pass instead of sleep we are instead subjected to involuntary cage-fighting in our area of expertise, I earnestly hope that this nice man is not put in the cage with the recently departed literary critic and scholar Harold Bloom, may he also rest in peace having left us a cultural hole that's more than 6 feet in every dimension, but not as big as the "new ones" he and his friends tore in Lord of the Rings.

  [and lest you think I'm just being snarky, there's plenty of trash genre porn that I enjoy, I just don't exalt it. Quick quiz: who was the only credible protagonist in Lord of the Rings? answer after the jump]