Jr R Tolkien Quotes

Don't you let go. Don't let go. Reach! ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

We who have lived long under the Shadow may surely listen to echoes from a land untroubled by it? ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Farewell sweet earth and northern sky,
for ever blest, since here did lie
and here with lissom limbs did run
beneath the Moon, beneath the Sun,
Lúthien Tinúviel
more fair than Mortal tongue can tell.
Though all to ruin fell the world
and were dissolved and backward hurled;
unmade into the old abyss,
yet were its making good, for this―
the dusk, the dawn, the earth, the sea―
that Lúthien for a time should be. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Alas, not me, lord!" she said. "Shadow lies on me still. Look not to me for healing! I am a shieldmaiden and my hand is ungentle. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

O Sam! cried Frodo. 'What have I said? What have I done? Forgive me! After all you have done. It is the horrible power of the Ring. I wish it had never, never, been found. But don't mind me, Sam. I must carry the burden to the end. It can't be altered. You can't come between me and this doom. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

And no one was ill, and everyone was pleased, except those who had to mow the grass. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Ilúvatar; and he made first the Ainur, the Holy Ones, that were the offspring of his thought, and they were with him before aught else was made. And he spoke to them, propounding to them themes of music; and they sang before him, and he was glad. But for a long while they sang only each alone, or but few together, while the rest hearkened; for each comprehended only that part of the mind of Ilúvatar from which he came, and in the understanding of their brethren they grew but slowly. Yet ever as they listened they came to deeper understanding, and increased in unison and harmony. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Eastward the dawn rose, ridge behind ridge into the morning, and vanished out of eyesight into guess; it was no more than a glimmer blending with the hem of the sky, but it spoke to them, out of the memory and old tales, of the high and distant mountains. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

But fairest of all was the great white gem, which the dwarves had found beneath the roots of the Mountain, the Heart of the Mountain, the Arkenstone of Thrain. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. It is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love. Why Bilbo Baggins? Perhaps because I am afraid, and he gives me courage. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

The fate of Men after death, maybe, is not in the hands of the Valar, nor was all foretold in the Music of the Ainur. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

An author cannot of course remain wholly unaffected by his experience, but the ways in which a story-germ uses the soil of experience are extremely complex, and attempts to define the process are at best guesses from evidence that is inadequate and ambiguous. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Books ought to have good endings.How would this do: and they all settled down and lived together happily ever after? ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

I do not crave this
But he needed it before he became a danger to himself and others. ~ J.R. Ward

Elves and Dragons! I says to him. Cabbages and potatoes are better for me and you. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Bilbo Baggins was standing at his door after breakfast smoking an enormous long wooden pipe that reached nearly down to his woolly toes (neatly brushed) - Gandalf came by. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Moonlight drowns out all but the brightest stars. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

My Precioussss!
-Gollum ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

They say it is the first step that costs the effort. I do not find it so. I am sure I could write unlimited 'first chapters'. I have indeed written many. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

For to him that is pitiless the deeds of pity are ever strange and beyond reckoning. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

The forest is queer. Everything in it is very much more alive, more aware of what is going on. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

For LOBELIA SACKVILLE-BAGGINS, as a PRESENT;' on a case of silver spoons… Bilbo believed that she had acquired a good many of his spoons, while he was away on his former journey. Lobelia knew that quite well. When she arrived later in the day, she took the point at once, but she also took the spoons. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Art is the human process that produces by the way (it is not its only or ultimate object) Secondary Belief. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Where are Haldad my father, and Haldad my brother? If the king of Doriath fears a friendship between Haleth and those who have devoured her kin, then the ways of the Eldar are strange to Men. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

the pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Though slow to quarrel, and for sport killing nothing that lived, they were doughty at bay, and at need could still handle arms. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

These hobbits will sit on the edge of ruin and discuss the pleasures of the table. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Strange are the turns of fortune! Often does hatred hurt itself! ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

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. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

I pity snails, and all that carry their homes on their backs. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

The world changes, and all that once was strong now proves unsure. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Deep they delved us, fair they wrought us, high they builded us; but they are gone. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Let go! Gollum,' he said. 'This is Sting. You have seen it before once upon a time. Let go, or you'll feel it this time! I'll cut your throat ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

I am Bard, and by my hand was the dragon slain and your treasure delivered. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Now come, you filth! You've hurt my master, you brute, and you'll pay for it. We're going on; but we'll settle with you first. Come on, and taste it again! ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

But who knows what she spoke to the darkness, alone, in the bitter watches of the night, when all her life seemed shrinking, and the walls of her bower closing in about her, a hutch to trammel some wild thing in? ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

After some time he felt for his pipe. It was not broken, and that was something. Then he felt for his pouch, and there was some tobacco in it, and that was something more. Then he felt for matches and he could not find any at all, and that shattered his hopes completely. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

if he had used all his power to guard Mordor, so that none could enter, and bent all his guile to the hunting of the Ring, then indeed hope would have faded: neither Ring nor bearer could long have eluded him. But ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

What a tale we have been in, Mr. Frodo, haven't we?' he said. 'I wish I could hear it told. Do you think they'll say: Now comes the story of Nine-fingered Frodo and the ring of Doom? And then everyone will hush, like we did, when in Rivendell they told us the tale of Beren One-hand and the Great Jewel. I wish I could hear it! And I wonder how it will go on after our part. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Don't be a fool Mr. Baggins if you can help it. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart you begin to understand ... there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep.. that have taken hold. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Always after a defeat and a respite, the Shadow takes another shape and grows again. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

The only just literary critic," he concluded, "is Christ, who admires more than does any man the gifts He Himself has bestowed. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

I first read The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit when I was eighteen. It felt as though the author had taken every element I'd ever want in a story and woven them into one huge, seamless narrative; but more important, for me, Tolkien had created a place, a vast, beautiful, awesome landscape, which remained a resource long after the protagonists had finished their battles and gone their separate ways. In illustrating The Lord of the Rings I allowed the landscapes to predominate. In some of the scenes the characters are so small they are barely discernible. This suited my own inclinations and my wish to avoid, as much as possible, interfering with the pictures being built up in the reader's mind, which tends to be more closely focussed on characters and their inter-relationships. I felt my task lay in shadowing the heroes on their epic quest, often at a distance, closing in on them at times of heightened emotion but avoiding trying to re-create the dramatic highpoints of the text. With The Hobbit, however, it didn't seem appropriate to keep such a distance, particularly from the hero himself. I don't think I've ever seen a drawing of a Hobbit which quite convinced me, and I don't know whether I've gotten any closer myself with my depictions of Bilbo. I'm fairly happy with the picture of him standing outside Bag End, before Gandalf arrives and turns his world upside-down, but I've come to the conclusion that one of the reasons Hobbits are so quiet and elusive is to avoid the pr ~ Alan Lee (artist)