“Lord of the Rings” Expert Shares 50+ Interesting Middle-Earth Facts and Helps Better Understand Peter Jackson’s Films

I recently reviewed The Lord of the Rings with a fan of books and realized how much deeper and more interesting the characters and the magical world have become, thanks to the comments of a person immersed in lore.

I was so impressed that I decided that such a viewing will not harm anyone who has not read Tolkien but enjoys the film trilogy, and possibly all six Middle-earth films from Peter Jackson.

For help in explaining the fantasy world order, I turned to an expert named George Owl. Previously, he was the administrator of one of the largest thematic communities of Tolkienists. He told why the Ring of Omnipotence is made of gold, Aragorn from the film adaptations is non-canon, and Gandalf became White thanks to his devout faith in God.

Why do some book fans dislike or even hate the Lord of the Rings film trilogy? Can you name the most revealing moments of the plot in which Jackson not only removed something, but frankly distorted the source?

It’s mostly about changing characters. For Tolkien, for example, it is simply inconceivable that Aragorn would kill a truce, whereas in the film he cuts off the head of the Mouth of Sauron simply for impoliteness.

Aragorn slays the truce of Mordor, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Aragorn slays the truce of Mordor, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

This is due to certain laws of cinema: this is how we close the arc of the existence of a bad character, but from the point of view of the author’s morality, this is simply terrible.

And there are many such moments. In the book, Denethor is more adequate, and the Ents go to war with Saruman out of a sense of duty and not because of momentary revenge, and Legolas would not shoot at the already safe Grima, and so on.

How do you personally feel about the film adaptations of “The Lord of the Rings” from Jackson?

Well, I went through that stage of rejection, but now, for me, adaptations from Jackson are, well, just another adaptation among many that are at least interesting to watch.

And Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy also includes great films. They are not as deep as books, but they are quite good in their own right.

What do you think of his Hobbit trilogy?

The Hobbit is such an entertaining action movie. These aren’t straight-up horror movies, and they have a lot of good moments, but for me personally, they’re almost uninteresting and too superficial.

Although, as they say, “on duty,” I watched a lot of them and knew them well.

And the last introductory question: Why did you fall in love with Tolkien’s books directly?

A very difficult question, in fact. because there are no specific parameters. At first, perhaps, I was attracted by the well-developed world; then I became interested in the linguistics of the Elvish languages; then I delved into literary merits.

Tolkien is one of the rather few authors in whom, over time, you find all sorts of interesting details that keep your attention.

Then let’s move on to these details. Let’s start from the very, very beginning: how was Middle-earth and all things born? Where did all these elves, dwarves, and people come from? As far as I know, Tolkien has it in great detail.

Well, this is the beginning of The Silmarillion. Tolkienists have a running joke: when asked a difficult question, respond with the first line of the book: “In the beginning there was Eru, the One, who is known as Iluvatar in Arda… “in the sense that the answer to the question is so extensive that it requires a story right from the creation of the world.

In short, Eru, the local god, gave his angels, the Valar, music. One of them, Morgoth, in his pride, tried to bring his own motives into it—strong but not at all musical—but Eru stopped him with his melody. And this music was, as it were, the creation of the world. In the original version, uncorrupted, there was the world itself with the elves that inhabited it. The dissonance of Morgoth added all sorts of bad things to it, but the final melody of Eru heralded the creation of people and the correction of this evil in the future.

Hobbits are also people, and they have a common history, but Morgoth somehow managed to bring out the orcs.

A little later, the gnomes were created by one of the angels, Aule.

Can you elaborate on the fact that hobbits are also people and about their common history? I always thought it was a completely separate race.

This is a literal quote from Tolkien’s letters. He came up with the idea of hobbits quite late, when work on The Silmarillion had been going on for about twenty years. Apparently, therefore, he did not somehow try to fit them into all these ancient events. He only indicated that the hobbits are a branch of the human race, but they just lived somewhere; they didn’t show themselves to anyone in particular. Until they crossed the continent from the east to the west.

If The Hobbit had been written ten years earlier, then Tolkien might have had the same system as in modern fantasy, where the hobbits, who are halflings, are definitely a separate race. But it didn’t work out.

You’ve mentioned The Silmarillion twice already, so it’s time for me to ask: what is this work, what does it mean for fans, and how does it relate to the trilogy? And, of course, why is it called that, and what kind of silmaril?

 The Silmarillion is Tolkien’s main work.He spent almost his entire life working on his own mythology, rewriting, supplementing, expanding, and inventing events and characters..

And this fictional world captured him so much that, willy-nilly, it penetrated almost all of his works, up to the fairy tales that he invented for his children. He also penetrated The Hobbit, and so much so that when Tolkien began to write its sequel, The Lord of the Rings, it turned out that the book turned into a continuation of existing legends, that is, a continuation of The Silmarillion.

The Silmarillion was published in book form after Tolkien’s death. His son Christopher put the drafts in order, removed the rejected versions, and compiled all these legends into one single book. It tells the events from the creation of the world until the end of the War of the Ring.

Accordingly, for fans of The Silmarillion, it is a must-read. Otherwise, one cannot understand who Sauron is, what kind of Turin is mentioned at the Council of Elrond, why the elves are not very friendly with the dwarves, and much more that is mentioned somewhere in the background in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. True, it is written in the style of ancient legends, so it can be hard to read if you are not used to it.

But this is only the first ten times.

Well, the Silmarils are magical gems that were created by the greatest of the elves, Feanor. In the trailer for the upcoming series, many have probably already seen the Two Trees: they illuminated the world before the creation of the Sun and Moon, but Morgoth destroyed them. And their light, untainted by darkness, was preserved only in the Silmarils.

Two Trees, The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power
Two Trees, The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power

Accordingly, the Silmarils are the greatest treasure in the world. With their help, at the end of history, the world will be healed of evil. And, of course, everyone wanted to own such jewels. The plot of the Silmarillion mostly revolves around the wars for the Silmarils; the name itself is translated from Elvish as “The History of the Silmarils.”

By the time of the events of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, all three silmarils were lost: one was thrown into the sea, another into the bowels of the earth, and the third was sent to fly in the heavens as a star that reminds the peoples of Middle-earth of hope.

Tolkien wrote The Silmarillion first; that was his main work, and The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings were just lucky to show up over time?

And there is. All this super-realistic world that we see in these books comes from The Silmarillion.

That is, The Lord of the Rings, one of the main and maybe the most important fantasy books, is just a sequel to The Hobbit, which a serious professor wrote for children in his spare time from his titanic work on man-made mythology?

 Well, yes.

In The Hobbit, the influence of The Silmarillion was limited to some common names and borrowing images and plots. For example, the Arkenstone is a simplified and altered story about the Silmaril (there is still an erroneous theory among fans that the Arkenstone is one of the Silmarils).

The Arkenstone, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
The Arkenstone, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

But The Lord of the Rings, already in the course of writing, grew from a fairy tale into a real epic and turned not so much into a sequel to The Hobbit as into a sequel to The Silmarillion.

Actually, this is why The Lord of the Rings is not “pure fantasy” in the modern sense of the word: there is too much mythology and fairy tales in it.

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Sauron is the antagonist of The Lord of the Rings—in fact, this same Lord of the Rings In the films and in the books, he is the great embodiment of darkness, but in fact he is not “the most important of the villains” after all. There is someone more important. You already mentioned it when you talked about the creation of the world. Tell us more about the Lord of the Rings, why he is the main attack on Middle-earth, and how Sauron is connected with him.

Yes, Morgoth. He, as you might guess, is the local analogue of the Devil, a fallen angel.

He was the most powerful among all the Valar and was able to distort the music so much that literally the entire physical world began to carry a particle of his influence. If Sauron put his powers into the Ring, then the whole world would become the Ring of Morgoth.

Morgoth could not create something (the fact that “evil is not able to create” is one of Tolkien’s main motives), but he distorted what already existed. It was because of him that orcs, trolls, dragons, and balrogs appeared.

Morgoth’s ultimate goal was to destroy the world along with all living things. True, over time, his strength became less and less, and in the end, they were able to defeat him. Since Morgoth is an angel, it is completely impossible to destroy him, so his spirit was thrown out of the world.

When he finds a way to return, the world of Middle-Earth will come to an end.

Sauron also belonged to the angelic forces, but weaker – they are called Maiar. He was the right hand of Morgoth. Sauron pursued his goals; his dream was not the destruction of the world but the establishment of an ideal order in it and its management (for those who are familiar with socionics, Sauron is Maxim). In Morgoth, he saw enough power to use it.

Speaking of the ring itself I read a small, very small fact about him, and I was impressed by how Tolkien had everything thought out. The Ring of Omnipotence: is it no coincidence that it is made of gold?

The fact is that the two main precious metals, gold and silver, have their own associations. Gold in our time is associated with greed, wars, and other bad things, while silver has remained a “pure” metal (it is no coincidence that it is used in the fight against all evil spirits) since the time of ancient medicine.

In Tolkien’s later stories (written at the time of The Hobbit and later), these associations are reflected. In one of the texts, he directly describes that silver remained the most pure metal, while gold became completely distorted, polluted by the evil will of Morgoth.

The use of gold was not some kind of sin or something bad, but it was over gold that it was easiest to perform any evil witchcraft, and it was gold that attracted evil creatures like dragons.

Dragon Smaug, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Dragon Smaug, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug\

Therefore, it is not surprising that the Ring of Sauron was made from this metal. And it is also not surprising that Tolkien’s elves use silver and silvery colors much more often.

It’s not clear from the movie, but Gandalf is not a man who was taught spells, and in general, wizards in the world of Middle-earth are not the same as in some Harry Potter books. Can you elaborate on this?

Gandalf and Saruman are Maiar, lesser angels, like Sauron. The difference is that the magicians were not supposed to influence the freedom of the peoples of Middle-earth, so they arrived infused with mortal bodies. They had to eat and sleep, and in general their strength was rather severely limited.

Wizards Gandalf and Radagast, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

whereas Sauron did what he wanted and was limited only by his own abilities. Gradually, he became weaker and weaker, but even in this state at the time of the War of the Ring, he remained much stronger than the magicians.

In general, “magic” in Tolkien is a very abstract concept, and elves can create a magic sword not because they cast any spells on it, but because they understand the spirit world well enough to apply its properties when forging a sword.

Therefore, the magic of Middle-earth practically does not have any combat applications, and Gandalf in this regard is more like some Scandinavian gods (specifically, the wanderer Odin) than a wizard in the usual sense.

Is it true that Gandalf was powerful enough to defeat the dragon Smaug on his own, but he was constrained by some kind of “non-intervention policy” of wizards throughout history?And what kind of “politics” is this and where did it come from?

As for Smaug, it’s a bit of a myth.

It stems from the fact that, having defeated the Balrog, another of the Maiar, albeit weak and imprisoned in the form of a fiery demon, Gandalf will deal with the dragon.

But in fact, Tolkien’s dragons are a completely separate category of creatures. This is literally the personification of danger and destruction, and during the wars with Morgoth, it was the dragons who participated in the most terrible and destructive events.

Therefore, they should not be directly compared in strength to Gandalf.

Well, besides, Tolkien did not think in terms of computer games, where whoever has more “HP” and a higher level will win. In his books, as in reality, victory over a powerful opponent is made up of many different factors, and an ordinary person can kill a dragon if there is a suitable environment for this.

Could Gandalf defeat Smaug alone? Big question.

Trying to fight a dragon one-on-one is clearly not the smartest idea, even if you are a lesser angel.

As for “non-intervention,”  it comes from the problem of theodicy. Translating into ordinary language, I’m talking about the question “Why does God allow the existence of evil?” One answer is that if you created some creatures and gave them free will, then forcing them to do something contrary to this freedom is immoral, and God does not commit immoral acts by definition.

It is clear that this answer does not suit everyone, but it is important for our conversation that it suited Tolkien. In his world, people are the product of the music of Eru himself, not even of his angels, but of God personally, so direct intervention in their fate is actually a dispute with the divine plan.

Moreover, the Valar were taught by bitter experience: once they came to the elves in all their splendor and convinced them to leave Middle-earth and move to Valinor, and it did not end well. Therefore, in the fight against Sauron, the Valar were as careful as possible and sent the magicians not as representatives of higher powers in shining armor with fiery swords, but as ordinary sages who could advise but could not force someone to do something with their powers.

Oh, you touched on a topic that I was just about to ask. At the end of The Return of the King, some of the heroes, along with the elves, go to the West. And this is not just a relocation to another longitude. There is something special in the West, the same Valinor. What is it, and why do only elves, apart from a few special guests, go there?

Yes, the West is Valinor. Blessed are the immortal lands where the angels who came to our world and the elves they once took with them live.

The fact is that the elves are a product of the music of the Valar, as well as Valinor being its creation. Therefore, the elves in Valinor feel normal: they are immortal, and the world around them is too; they are not tainted with evil, and the world around them is too. Elves in the ordinary world feel its distortion and eventually begin to “fade,” while the West, let’s say, is a normal habitat for them.

The Ship to the West, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
The Ship to the West, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

The fate of people cannot be changed, and a person can live in the West for, say, two hundred years, but during this time even the season will not change. But a person will grow old and die, while everything around remains alive and young. This causes envy.

In addition, there are no people in the West because of the same “non-intervention policy”: the Valar fenced themselves off from the world because its true masters, according to God’s plan, are people. People must develop themselves, learn something themselves, develop science, culture, and everything else, and not receive all this on a silver platter.

The Valar can watch this; they can sometimes help in small ways, but to allow excursions from everyone who wants them is already too much.

Later, when only people remained in Middle-earth, Valinor was completely removed from the circles of the world. just so that people would not be tempted to go there.

 And more about elves. In The Lord of the Rings, I’m talkingabout thet movies, we mostly see elves from Rivendell and Lorie. Inn TheHobbit,t we’re shown elves from Mirkwood, and they’re kindof…… different. By nature, by behavior. Can you tell us how elves from different forests are generally different and why some elf kingdoms are not like the rest?

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 The fact is that the elves of Rivendell are the elves of the Noldor. This is part of the very elves who visited Valino  and then returned to Middle-earth to regain those same Silmarils.

 They have the highest knowledg and, great skil  because their teachers were the angels who created this world. The Noldor “absorbed” the light of the Blessed Lands in the Wes. Theyy had the tenacity and courage to first go to the West, and then return.

 There are not many of them left in Middle-earth, and almost all of themlived in Rivendell. Plus Galadriel, she settled in Lorien.

Lady Galadriel, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
Lady Galadriel, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

whereas in Mirkwood (or Darkwood) lived elves who did not reach the West: Sindar and Nandor. In Lorien, the main population is also Sindar. They are not as exalted, irreconcilable, or wise, but they are still elves, wondrous people.

 Therefore, yes, these are peoples with different cultures and different histories. To be honest, I did not analyze how, on average, the elves from the films correspond to the books: apart from important characters, they are almost never shown to us. But the fact that they are different from each other is the way it should be.

You have already mentioned the battle between Gandalf and the Balrog, but I would like to hear more about it. I learned that in the books this confrontation is not only bigger in itself than just falling into the abyss but also ends much more dramatically—Gandalf the Grey dies. Finally. Can you tell us more about this battle, about how Gandalf died, was resurrected, and became white, and what is the difference between the white version of the character and the grey?

 Well, not much bigger, actually. The film simply missed the moment that the battle went on for several days (if I remember the film correctly, of course). Therefore, there is not much to tell about the course of this confrontatio;- Gandalf himself also briefly talks about it in the books, and that’s it.

Gandalf Blocks the Balrog's Way, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
Gandalf Blocks the Balrog’s Way, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

But as for death… This is an example of how the author’s Christian morality breaks through in The Lord of the Rings. The Valar sent Gandalf to Middle-Earth with a specific mission: to oppose Sauron.

But at the moment when Gandalf fights the Balrog, he sacrifices himself and his mission to save the lives of his friends. He is mentally unable to say something like: “Hey, Legolas, hold him up, and we’ll run away for now.  At this moment, he, the younger angel, entrusts the fate of his mission to God, believing that he will not allow it to fail.

And the god Eru responds to such faith, bringing Gandalf back to life.

Gandalf the White, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Gandalf the White, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

Gandalf the White is freed from the restrictions that were previously placed on him as a Maiar wizard. He still does not use his powers to the fullest, but not because he cannot, but because he understands that it is impossible to influence free will with their help.

For example, the bookish Gandalf cannot kill Denethor; this is the wrong thing to do for an angel. But it is not forbidden to save someone, and he heals Theoden, drives the Nazgûl away from Faramir, and neutralizes Saruman. In general, it affects the overall picture without rewriting it entirely.

Maybe in the films it was mentioned that Aragorn was “Dunedain” or “Nmenórean,”  but I don’t remember, but did Jackson decipher these concepts? Therefore, I ask you to decipher. Tell us what is so special about Aragorn and how he differs from the common people of Middle-Earth. Ordinary people do not live to 210…

Here it is worth starting with the fact that, throughout history, there have been several marriages between humans and elves. Children from such marriages were mortal by default, but there was an exception: the descendants of Eärendil.

Earendil was a sailor. He was able to sail to Valinor and call the Valar to battle with Morgoth. After the victory, his ship was sent to heaven, and it is he who carries one of the silmarils through the sky.

As a result of Earendil’s defeat of the greatest of enemies, his descendants were granted the right to choose between human and elven fate.

The children of those who chose “humanity” remained people; the children of “elves” always had the right to choose.

Earendil himself had two children. One of them, Elrond, chose the elven fate. And the second, Elros, is human. Elros became the first king of Numenor, an island state midway between Middle-earth and Valinor, and his far-flung descendant is Aragorn.

Therefore, the longevity of Aragorn, his majesty, and his lack of a beard in the canon are a consequence of the fact that the legacy of elven blood has been preserved in him.

How many names! For me, The Lord of the Rings is not only a fantasy world, but also about heroes that you become attached to. It’s one of the few movies that actually has so many important characters, and you can list them all by name. The Fellowship of the Ring, for sure. But not everyone was lucky enough to move into the film adaptation. Some were left behind. What characters from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings do you most regret missing from Jackson’s films?

 Beregond. In the book, this is a Gondorian guard who broke the “charter” and protected Faramir from burning.

Later, Aragorn expelled him from the city for this offense, but at the same time appointed him to the service of Faramir. After the war, he began to rule one of the regions of Gondor.

The character himself is quite episodic and simple and cannot compete in charisma with either Glorfindel or Tom Bombadil, the “cut” characters who are usually remembered after such a question. But the fate of Beregond is a perfect example of what kind of value system Tolkien preaches.

In a short episode with the trial of the character, the primacy of human life and the importance of law, mercy, and justice fit in. Just such a small quintessence of almost all the key messages of The Lord of the Rings

But Bombadil, who is often mentioned, is someone you just remembered a little about. How was he involved in the story? And who is he, in your opinion? Versions are full.

 In The Lord of the Rings, he saved Frodo and a company of hobbits first from a tree that tried to eat them, and then pulled them out of a not-so-pleasant mound. He also gave them special “anti-Nazgulblades,s, also found in the barrow.

Tom Bombadil is a great example of what The Lord of the Rings was like when Tolkien first started describing it: an ordinary fairy tale with an ordinary fairy tale character. There is really nothing deeper than this.

 But, of course, there is a temptation to discuss the character in terms of “inner” histor.,Whoo could he be according to the logic of Middle-earth?

And, in fact, there is exactly one option: Bombadil is one of the Maiar, the lesser angels.

All other versions simply do not fit: the Valar are definitely sitting in Valinor; Eru is outside the world; Morgoth (yes, there was such a version) is also somewhere in those parts; the elves look different.

So only a few spirits remain who chose such a form and such a habitat.In early texts, Tolkien had all sorts of small spirits, but in later texts he abandoned this idea. All of them came together to form a strong Maiar.So Bombadil just can’t be anyone else.

 Giant eagles. First, who are they? It’s not just big birds. Secondly, I can’t help but ask, why didn’t Gandalf call them at once? so that not only back but also to Orodruin, into which the ring had to be dropped, could be flown quickly and without undue difficulty

Eagles are like dragons, only they’re eagles. Many small maia were enclosed in physical shells in ancient times. Maiar, enclosed in the bodies of lizards, became dragons, but there were also birds: great eagles.

True, it is not known exactly what Tolkien was thinking about the heredity of this “angelic” mind and whether he thought at all, but in general, it can be stated that the giant eagles in The Lord of the Rings are the descendants of the very eagles that were embodied by Maiar.

Eagles Save Sam and Frodo, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Eagles Save Sam and Frodo, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

As for the eternal question, then, in fact, the reasons were “external.” Tolkien used eagles as an element of a “eucatastrophe”—a catastrophe on the contrary, when everything is bad but then suddenly the hero comes to an unexpected (albeit justified and well-deserved) salvation. It is the validity and meritoriousness that distinguish Tolkien’s eucatastrophe from the classical concept of Deus ex machina, “God from the machine.” So they are similar but not the same.

If we look at the “internal” history of the world, then in general we will come to two things: distance and invisibility. It is enough to look at the map and estimate by name where the eagles flew to understand that these are relatively short distances. And the success of the mission rested on the stealth and protection of the Guardian. If Frodo had accidentally fallen from the eagle’s back during the dogfight, the Ring would have been lost.

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There are a huge number of arguments in favor of one or the other, but in the end, it all comes down to these two.

However, it must be admitted that Tolkien himself did not voice these arguments, we can assume about them only on the basis of some general logic.

So the situation with eagles in general can be called one of the examples of the conflict between the element of mythology and the element of fantasy. This occurs in Tolkien, and more than once.

The last character I want to know more about is Frodo. For starters, who were they and where did his real parents go?

A very interesting story will not come out, because Frodo’s parents, Drogo Baggins and Primula Brandybuck, simply drowned while riding a boat. Frodo was taken in by his Uncle Bilbo.

The story of Frodo in this, as in some other moments, echoes the story of Tolkien himself, who lost both parents at a very young age.

But this question will be more interesting to answer.

There is an opinion among viewers of the film trilogy that Frodo, to put it mildly, is not a hero. In fact, Sam brought the Ring to the volcano; he was brave, loyal, and unshakable. But Frodo let go of nurses, behaved like a bestial (you can remember the moment where he believed Gollum and accused Sam of stealing food), and in general, he couldn’t throw the Ring away; he was just lucky that Gollum attacked. And I have two questions about this. First: Is this opinion of the audience about Frodo fair?

Second, please tell us more about the power of the ring over the bearer and why neither Gandalf nor Galadriel, nor anyone else wise and powerful enough, dared to bear it himself.

Unfair, of course.

In order to understand the main motive for the relationship between Frodo and Sam, you need to know that Tolkien was at the front of the First World War as a communications officer. A rather typical officer: a young intellectual, educated, intelligent, and talented, but completely unsuitable for field life, especially for life in the trenches. And their batmen—ordinary village men, the same soldiers who can cook porridge with an ax—were the real salvation for such young officers.For many officers, batmen replaced their fathers.

 And the relationship between Frodo and Sam is just the relationship between an officer and his batman. One of them has knowledge, skills, and education, and the other knows how to work with his hands, adapt to different living conditions, get and cook food, and so on.

Frodo and Sam, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Frodo and Sam, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

Why? And this is just the answer to the second question. The ring felt the desires of the owner and twisted them to the maximum. If the owner was “small,” then his desires were small. Gollum, for example, limited himself to petty dirty tricks, and the Ring could not promise him mountains of gold even at the moment of maximum impact.

But Sam, who had a certain amount of pride, self-confidence, and vanity (this is a characteristic of Tolkien, if anything), because of the Ring, saw how he conquers Mordor and sets up a flower garden on its lands (the gardener). Well, even more wise and powerful characters, such as Galadriel, clearly understood what great accomplishments they were capable of with the Ring.

Here we run into late Christian virtues. In one sentence, the more humility you have and the less ambition you have, the less you need the ring and the higher the chance that you can throw it away.

In the book, Frodo is also much more… adequate, if that makes sense. He doesn’t cry, doesn’t fall down in every scene, always treats Sam well, and generally acts as brave and dignified as a hobbit can get.

A typical example: At the very beginning, on the way to Rivendell, the wounded and exhausted Frodo in the book takes out a sword and says to the Nazgul: “You will not receive the ring.” In the movie, he just passes out and is saved by Arwen.

The portrayal of Frodo in the movie is good for the movie, and Elijah Wood is perhaps an example of an almost perfect cast, but his character is much weaker than the Frodo from the books.

The last question about the “Lord of the Rings” is: what happened next? First, what kind of future Middle-earth was told about in the books but not mentioned in the films, at least not in the theatrical version? Secondly, do we know what happened to this world after the Trilogy of Books? Did Tolkien have plans for his sequels? For example, I heard that, according to his idea, The Lord of the Rings is a kind of prequel to the real earthly Middle Ages.

 Well, ye … “The Lord of the Rings” (“TheSilmarillion,n, to be more precise) is a fictional mythology of our world. In different periods of time, Tolkien tried to integrate it in different ways. In early versions, it got to the point that a certain city in Europe was a certain city in Middle-earth, but later it all moved to such a more abstract plane, and Tolkien, although he described the fictional mythical past of our planet, ceased to tie it so seriously to real history.

After the events of The Lord of the Rings in Middle-earth, for some time everything was very good; everyone lived gloriously and prospered.

But Tolkien, as is often the case, is good—and a little sad.

Aragorn restored the once-destroyed northern kingdom of Arnor and became King of Arnor and Gondor. Hobbits received protection and independence; people were forbidden to enter their lands, and Aragorn himself observed this ban. Over time, the hobbits returned to where they started: they became semi-mythical creatures invisible to large people, but there seems to be no specific information about their fate.

The elves gradually left Middle-Earth. With the victory over Sauron, something ceased to hold them, and over time they became less and less. Those who did not sail away, after some time, “melted away”—lost their physical appearance. Surely this happened after millennia, but it happened.

The Dwarves have returned to Moria. Gimli led part of the people to the Glittering Caves near Rohan and became the ruler there. All the realms of the Dwarves (the Lonely Mountain, Moria, and the Glittering Caverns) prospered, but over time, the Dwarves became less and less, and at some point in the distant future, they completely disappeared.

Gimli, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Gimli, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

The orcs lost that evil will that forced them to adhere to certain rules and fled. Finally, they perished either in wars with people or in civil strife.

In general, over time, the world of Middle-earth became the world of people, the world that we now know.

Tolkien began to write a sequel about the events in Gondor after the death of Aragorn. He wrote quite a bit about the fact that some kind of cult of Sauron had appeared and something bad was in the air. But then I realized that the new book is not about elves, dragons, and the struggle between good and evil, but about conspiracies, politics, and other similar things in Martin’s style. And I decided not to continue.

 Does Tolkien really have such a well-thought-ou,d well-thought-out elvish language that you could give answers in an interview in it?

If we were talking about medieval things, then ten years ago I could have tried.

In the Elvish languages, there are quite a few such late words like “allegory” or “cinema,”  and they have to be reconstructed somehow. This is still possible, but it takes time to invent a word. And the usual conversation at the level of “hello, how are you, let’s go to the beach for a swim”—yes, it is quite possible.

 Is there a foul language in Elvish?

 You can say no  There, of coursee are words for body parts, processes,animals,s and everything else that we use asmatst, but they are not recorded anywhere in an abusive sense, and it is unlikely that elves called someone names.

How do you say “Thank you for the interview” or “Thank you for an interesting conversation” in Elvish?

 I could be wrong, but I think something like this Hantanye an cesyalima lanquetta.

 Hantanye an cesyalima lanquetta!

 I don’t remember how to say “mutually” in Elvish, so I’ll just say mutually.

How do you say “Thank you for the interview” or “Thank you for an interesting conversation” in Elvish?

I could be wrong, but I think something like this

Hantanye an cesyalima lanquetta.

Hantanye an cesyalima lanquetta!

I don’t remember how to say “see you again” in Elvish, so I’ll just say “See you again!”

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