Quotes by J.R.R. Tolkien

Far over misty mountains coldTo dungeons deep and caverns oldWe must away, ere break of day,To find our long-forgotten gold.

Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens.

In this hour, I do not believe that any darkness will endure.

I have claimed that Escape is one of the main functions of fairy-stories, and since I do not disapprove of them, it is plain that I do not accept the tone of scorn or pity with which Escape is now so often used. Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls?

Have you thought of an ending?Yes, several, and all are dark and unpleasant.Oh, that wont do! Books ought to have good endings. How would this do: and they all settled down and lived together happily ever after?It will do well, if it ever came to that.Ah! And where will they live? Thats what I often wonder.

I met a lot of things on the way that astonished me. Tom Bombadil I knew already; but I had never been to Bree. Strider sitting in the corner at the inn was a shock, and I had no more idea who he was than had Frodo. The Mines of Moria had been a mere name; and of Lothloriene no word had reached my mortal ears till I came there. Far away I knew there were the Horselords on the confines of an ancient Kingdom of Men, but Fanghorn Forest was an unforeseen adventure. I had never heard of the House of Eorl nor of the Stewards of Gondor. Most disquieting of all, Saruman had never been revealed to me, and I was as mystefied as Frodo at Gandalfs failure to appear on September 22.J.R.R. Tolkien, in a letter to W.H. Auden, June 7, 1955

I wisely started with a map.

grows like a seed in the dark out of the leaf-mould of the mind: out of all that has been seen or thought or read, that has long ago been forgotten, descending into the deeps.

So comes snow after fire, and even dragons have their endings.

Pippin glanced in some wonder at the face now close beside his own, for the sound of that laugh had been gay and merry. Yet in the wizards face he saw at first only lines of care and sorrow; though as he looked more intently he perceived that under all there was a great joy: a fountain of mirth enough to set a kingdom laughing, were it to gush forth.

Mercy! cried Gandalf. If the giving of knowledge is to be the cure of your inquisitiveness, I shall spend all the rest of my days in answering you. What more should you like to know?The names of all the stars, and of all living things, and the whole history of Middle-Earth and Over-heave and of the Sundering Seas, laughed Pippin. Of course! What less?

We set out to save the Shire, Sam and it has been saved - but not for me.

A great dread fell on him, as if he was awaiting the pronouncement of some doom that he had long foreseen and vainly hoped might after all never be spoken. An overwhelming longing to rest and remain at peace by Bilbos side in Rivendell filled all his heart. At last with an effort he spoke, and wondered to hear his own words, as if some other will was using his small voice. I will take the Ring, he said, though I do not know the way.

Then holding the star aloft and the bright sword advanced, Frodo, hobbit of the Shire, walked steadily down to meet the eyes.

This thing all things devours:Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;Gnaws iron, bites steel;Grinds hard stones to meal;Slays king, ruins town,And beats high mountain down.

If you have ever seen a dragon in a pinch, you will realize that this was only poetical exaggeration applied to any hobbit, even to Old Tooks great-granduncle Bullroarer, who was so huge (for a hobbit) that he could ride a horse. He charged the ranks of the goblins of Mount Gram in the Battle of the Green Fields, and knocked their king Golfibuls head clean off with a wooden club. It sailed a hundred yards through the air and went down a rabbit-hole, and in this way the battle was won and the game of Golf was invented at the same moment.

I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence. I much prefer history – true or feigned– with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of readers. I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but the one resides in the freedom of the reader, and the other in the purposed domination of the author.

What do you fear, lady? [Aragorn] asked. A cage, [Éowyn] said. To stay behind bars, until use and old age accept them, and all chance of doing great deeds is gone beyond recall or desire.

A man that flies from his fear may find that he has only taken a short cut to meet it.

This is the ending. Now not day only shall be beloved, but night too shall be beautiful and blessed and all its fear pass away.