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Adam Roberts
Adam Roberts

267 Followers

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Published in Adam’s Notebook

·1 day ago

Tolkien Reread 3: ‘The Treason of Isengard’

So my reread moves from The Fellowship of the Ring (Book 1 here, Book 2 here) onto The Two Towers. Which two towers? Tolkien, it seems, changed his mind on this question: ‘In letters to Rayner Unwin [in 1954], Tolkien considered naming the two as Orthanc and Barad-dûr, Minas Tirith…

Lord Of The Rings

13 min read

Tolkien Reread 3: ‘The Treason of Isengard’
Tolkien Reread 3: ‘The Treason of Isengard’
Lord Of The Rings

13 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·2 days ago

Pindar, ‘Olympian 1’

[The Greek from which this has been translated is here] . [Strophe A] The best thing is water: then airy gold burning through the gleaming night, magnificent with lordly wealth. And to sing of the prizes — your wish, dear my heart — look no further than the sun’s warming daylight, and the shining…

Pindar

24 min read

Pindar, ‘Olympian 1’
Pindar, ‘Olympian 1’
Pindar

24 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 24

Tolkien Reread 2: ‘The Ring Goes South’

[Part 1 of this reread is here] . :1: Rereading Book 2, and with it completing The Fellowship of the Ring, it occurs to me that ‘the Fellowship of the Ring’ actually only describes part of this second book (so less than one sixth of the whole Lord of the…

Tolkien

19 min read

Tolkien Reread 2: ‘The Ring Goes South’
Tolkien Reread 2: ‘The Ring Goes South’
Tolkien

19 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 22

Is the title ‘Lord of the Rings’ indicative or subjunctive?

Rereading Lord of the Rings, as I am at the moment doing, I’m struck by one particular detail — oddly, I’ve read this novel a dozen times and more, and it’s never struck me before. It’s to do with the plural in the novel’s title. There’s no doubt as to…

Tolkien

5 min read

Is the title ‘Lord of the Rings’ indicative or subjunctive?
Is the title ‘Lord of the Rings’ indicative or subjunctive?
Tolkien

5 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 21

Tolkien Reread 1: ‘The Ring Sets Out’

:1: Thing is, I’m writing a short-ish History of Fantasy — I signed the contract earlier this week, and am looking to deliver the book to the publishers by the end of the year. …

Tolkien

23 min read

Tolkien Reread 1: ‘The Ring Sets Out’
Tolkien Reread 1: ‘The Ring Sets Out’
Tolkien

23 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 18

Publishing ‘The Lord of the Rings’

What I knew about the original publication of The Lord of the Rings I gleaned from Humphrey Carpenter’s Tolkien biography: namely that Allen & Unwin were keen for a sequel to 1937's The Hobbit, which had been pretty successful; that Tolkien offered them The Silmarillion in draft form, and when…

Tolkien

6 min read

Publishing ‘The Lord of the Rings’
Publishing ‘The Lord of the Rings’
Tolkien

6 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 16

Pindar, ‘Pythian 2’

[The Greek from which this has been translated is here] μεγαλοπόλιες ὦ Συράκοσαι …” [Strophe A] Syracuse, megalopolis! Deep-plunged in war, temple of Ares, home to men and horses, steel-delighting nourisher: I come to you from gleaming Thebes with this song with news of a four-horse chariot to make the earth shake! — the…

Pindar

14 min read

Pindar, ‘Pythian 2’
Pindar, ‘Pythian 2’
Pindar

14 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 13

If Lear Wrote Carroll

I The Lad and the Jabberwock went to sea In a beautiful pea-green boat, They took two toves, and some borogroves, To gimble their gyre afloat. The Lad looked up at the beast in shock, And flourished his scimitar, “O frightful Jabber! O Jabber, my wock, What a horrible Jabber you are, You…

Edward Lear

1 min read

If Lear Wrote Carroll
If Lear Wrote Carroll
Edward Lear

1 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 12

What do we call a ‘violence-prude’?

Sex, as the phrase goes, and violence. And here’s the thing: I have no problem with reading about explicit sex, but the older I get the harder I find it reading about explicit violence. There’s an awful lot of violence in contemporary writing, and film, and video games — in…

4 min read

What do we call a ‘violence-prude’?
What do we call a ‘violence-prude’?

4 min read


Published in Adam’s Notebook

·Jan 9

‘Sophocles, long ago …’: Dover Beach

Here’s Matthew Arnold’s ‘Dover Beach’ (probably written 1851; first published 1867). It’s one of the most famous short poems of the nineteenth-century. The sea is calm tonight. The tide is full, the moon lies fair Upon the straits; on the French coast the light Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand, Glimmering…

Matthew Arnold

7 min read

‘Sophocles, long ago …’: Dover Beach
‘Sophocles, long ago …’: Dover Beach
Matthew Arnold

7 min read

Adam Roberts

Adam Roberts

267 Followers

Writer and academic. London-adjacent.

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