J.R.R. Tolkien
It was very heartwarming to see how much Tolkien cared about his children, After searching for Michael's toy for two days and deciding to write a story to cheer him up, Tolkien, in December that year, mentioned Rover and the Man in the Moon in one of his Father Christmas letters as well, ensuring that the tale would become a favorite with the boys.
Roverandom includes a number of childish colloquialism, such as whizz, splosh and tummy, which are of particular interest for their like is rarely met with in Tolkien's published writings, having been omitted ab initio in his manuscripts or deleted in revision as tummy was altered in The Hobbit to stomach.
Here they are surely survivals from the story as it was originally told to the Tolkien children,
It's interesting to compare Tolkien's earlier fiction with his magnum opus, The Lord of the Rings, The wizard Artaxerxes, who 'walked into the story, came wandering up the gardenpath in a ragged old coat, with an old pipe in his mouth', really reminded me of Gandalf.
Additionally, it's interesting to note one of Artaxerxes' special features, he wore a 'blue feather stuck in the back of his green hat', He shares this piece of clothing with Tom Bombadil see: The Fellowship of the Ring, supporting the theories that there's more to Tom than Tolkien would led on.
Even Rover, who 'was beginning to get used to extraordinary things happening to him', was reminiscent of some of Tolkien's later and more beloved character, His vexation about adventures and his struggles with dragons really reminded me of good o'le Bilbo at times,
Roverandom is also essential in understanding the root of Tolkien's fascination with dragons and the Faery both of which are discussed in the tale:
Of the moon garden, Tolkien wrote: 'Pale blue leaves that never fell Later in the year the trees all bursts together into pale golden blossoms', These descriptions are foreshadowing, perhaps, the mallorn trees of Lothlórien: 'Far in the autumn their leaves fall not, but turn to gold, ' see: The Fellowship of the Ring, bk,, ch.
Naturally, it's just as interesting to analyze how his writing style changed over the years, Whether we're looking at Farmer Giles of Hamor Roverandomit becomes clear that his earlier fiction was much more whimsical, lighthearted and funny:
:
Despite being a short children's tale, Roverandom has many interesting things to offer, The mythology that runs through the novel is rich and refreshing and the themes discussed are actually worth while, I was especially fond of Rover's adventures on the moon and his discovery about how good dreams and nightmares are made and how children are dealing with it.
Furthermore, I liked the exploration of friendship between Rover and the moondog and how their dynamic changed after Rover tasted freedom and the scent of his home on earth, where he truly belonged.
Sometimes, the best thing you can do is let go of a person and allow them to move on as well,
Roverandom is a truly heartwarming tale that comes full circle by the end and really didn't feel halfassed, I genuinely think that Tolkien put much thought and effort into it and I would recommend it to anyone interested in his work or just looking for a good children's story.
This book is such a charming glimpse into Tolkien's sillier side, It is a little upsetting that so many Tolkien fans out there have no idea this book exists, I had a total and complete blast with it, It was cute and surprisingly emotional at moments, It would make a great Disney film, in all honesty, But, considering Tolkien was no fan of Walt Disney, I don't think we'll be seeing that in this timeline, Even if it wasn't Disney, a short animated movie would be really cool,
I loved the tale of the toy dog and his adventures to the moon, Which, admittedly, I really did not see coming, The moon, Tolkien What's in that pipe
I actually picked Roverandom up in a bundle from a bookstore in London, right by Oxford, I can't remember the bloody name of it, I was perusing all the Tolkien merchandise when the lady working there told me Tolkien himself used to shop in the store with his friends, Once I heard that I had to buy everything in sight, I bought bundle after bundle and edition after edition, just for the memory of getting them from London, I don't regret all the money I spent, as I am Tolkien's biggest fan, I just hope that lady was telling me the damn truth,
If I ever become a father someday, this is one of the books I will read to my son/daughter, I look forward to that, Short, sweet, and silly. It's got a lot of the rambly sort of Tolkien descriptions I love, and you can pick up hints of his other writings and influences in it, It's harmless fun, I enjoyed it well enough, even if the meandering nature of it was a bit tiresome at times it's so short that it's not that bothersome.
I think it's one you could read to a child and they'd love it, which makes sense, since he wrote it for his own children, My father remarried a few months ago, and my stepmother still owns her own house, She's been cleaning it out for a while, and getting rid of odds and ends mostly belonging to her exhusband, She came across this and my father grabbed it to give to me since he knows I like Tolkien, I'm very glad he did, I had never heard of this book before, and was interested in checking it out,
Evidently Tolkien wrote it for, or maybe just told it to, his second son after said son had lost a toy dog on a beach outing.
He liked it so much that he tried to have it published after sitelinkThe Hobbit, but the publishers wanted a sequel instead of this kid's tripe, so he put this away and wrote sitelinkThe Lord of the Rings instead.
Now, I'm glad he wrote LOTR, but surely the publishers could have just nipped this in their printing press, but oh well,
The story involves a dog who steps afoul of a wizard, The wizard turns him into a toy dog, who gets purchased by a mother for her boy, and the boy loses the dog on the beach, Another wizard turns him into a real dog again, but he's still toy size, There's a trip to the moon, more wizards, a dragon, spiders, sea serpents, dreams, merpeople, a whale, sea goblins, and all kinds of Tolkienish things, These are the bedtime stories the Tolkien children heard, and it makes me wonder if a Tolkien child ever got a wink of sleep,
At any rate, while some of these creatures are inherently creepy, Tolkien spins his yarn in the same light vein as The Hobbit, and it all winds up being very amusing.
I'm sure if it was written in the same heavy language of LOTR with its multiple lexicons, then this would be nowhere near as enjoyable,
Best of all, there is not a single song in it, Well, songs are sung, but we don't have to read the lyrics to any of them, and everything is in English, In short: Roverandom is the antisitelinkThe Silmarillion as far as writing style is concerned, Actually, that's just a guess, I've never made it through The Silmarillion, and know far more people who have attempted it and failed than I do people who succeeded to make it to the end.
The wit and humor in this story is superb, and I enjoyed every page of it, All the wizards, and some of the other characters, have the Gandalf/Thorin grumps going on, which has always been highly entertaining to me, Roverandom almost inadvertently destroys the world when he bites a shark's tailfin for a bit of fun because it causes a chain reaction that upsets the seaserpent, a beast so powerful that not even the most powerful wizard, the man in the moon, can do much with him.
The last time he tried, they accidentally sank Atlantis before the sea serpent just went back to sleep, Just think of the sitelinkscene in Police Academy when Fackler tosses an apple out the window of his cruiser which starts a riot, and you'll understand,
It's onlypages, and I finished it in a single evening, This version of the book has a lengthy introduction which I skipped, so I can tell you nothing about it, but that doesn't mean there isn't interesting stuff in it.
I almost never read introductions that aren't written by the author himself, and I might even stop doing that, I'm still smarting from that sitelinkintroduction to The Scarlet Letter, It also has about a million end notes which talk about various changes from the original text, sources of some odd phrases, and what not, I also skipped these, and it was easy to do it, The end notes are just at the end of the book and give the corresponding page number, but there are no end note numbers included in the text of the story, so you have no idea when there's an end note included unless you mark them yourself or constantly flip back to the end notes to see.
I recommend this to just about anyone who enjoys a light, kid's fantasy story packed with humorous and witty elements, and especially to dog lovers, .
is a novella by J, R. R. Tolkien, originally told in, about the adventures of a young dog, Rover, In the story, an irritable wizard turns Rover into a toy, and Rover goes to the moon and under the sea in order to find the wizard again to turn him back into a normalsized dog.
The blind was down but outside the moon rose up out of the sea, and laid the silver path across the waters that is the way to places at the edge of the world and beyond, for those that can walk on it.Tolkien wrote this children's tale for his son Michael to amuse him upon the loss of his favorite toy, a little leaden dog which he lost on a beach of grey shingle stones in Filey, a town on the Yorkshire coast where the Tolkiens spent their holiday.
It was very heartwarming to see how much Tolkien cared about his children, After searching for Michael's toy for two days and deciding to write a story to cheer him up, Tolkien, in December that year, mentioned Rover and the Man in the Moon in one of his Father Christmas letters as well, ensuring that the tale would become a favorite with the boys.
Roverandom includes a number of childish colloquialism, such as whizz, splosh and tummy, which are of particular interest for their like is rarely met with in Tolkien's published writings, having been omitted ab initio in his manuscripts or deleted in revision as tummy was altered in The Hobbit to stomach.
Here they are surely survivals from the story as it was originally told to the Tolkien children,
It's interesting to compare Tolkien's earlier fiction with his magnum opus, The Lord of the Rings, The wizard Artaxerxes, who 'walked into the story, came wandering up the gardenpath in a ragged old coat, with an old pipe in his mouth', really reminded me of Gandalf.
Additionally, it's interesting to note one of Artaxerxes' special features, he wore a 'blue feather stuck in the back of his green hat', He shares this piece of clothing with Tom Bombadil see: The Fellowship of the Ring, supporting the theories that there's more to Tom than Tolkien would led on.
Even Rover, who 'was beginning to get used to extraordinary things happening to him', was reminiscent of some of Tolkien's later and more beloved character, His vexation about adventures and his struggles with dragons really reminded me of good o'le Bilbo at times,
Roverandom is also essential in understanding the root of Tolkien's fascination with dragons and the Faery both of which are discussed in the tale:
It would take the whole of another story, at least, to tell you of all their adventures in Uncharted Waters and of their glimpses of lands unknown to geography, before they passed the Shadowy Seas and reached the great Bay of Fairyland as we call it beyond the Magic Isles and saw far off in the last West the Mountains of Elvenhome and the light of Faery upon the waves.In Tolkien's mythology the Shadowy Seas and the Magic Isles hide and guard Aman Elvenhome, and the home of the Valar from the rest of the world.
Roverandom thought he caught a glimpse of the city of the Elves on the green hill beneath the Mountains, a glint of white far away, . .
Of the moon garden, Tolkien wrote: 'Pale blue leaves that never fell Later in the year the trees all bursts together into pale golden blossoms', These descriptions are foreshadowing, perhaps, the mallorn trees of Lothlórien: 'Far in the autumn their leaves fall not, but turn to gold, ' see: The Fellowship of the Ring, bk,, ch.
Naturally, it's just as interesting to analyze how his writing style changed over the years, Whether we're looking at Farmer Giles of Hamor Roverandomit becomes clear that his earlier fiction was much more whimsical, lighthearted and funny:
Only the shrimps heard him, and they asked him what was the matter.I'm aware that this is a reach but I really feel like WWII sucked the joy out of Tolkien.
He told them all bout it, and expected them to be very sorry for him but they only said:
'How would you like to be boiled Have you ever been boiled
:
Despite being a short children's tale, Roverandom has many interesting things to offer, The mythology that runs through the novel is rich and refreshing and the themes discussed are actually worth while, I was especially fond of Rover's adventures on the moon and his discovery about how good dreams and nightmares are made and how children are dealing with it.
Furthermore, I liked the exploration of friendship between Rover and the moondog and how their dynamic changed after Rover tasted freedom and the scent of his home on earth, where he truly belonged.
Sometimes, the best thing you can do is let go of a person and allow them to move on as well,
Roverandom is a truly heartwarming tale that comes full circle by the end and really didn't feel halfassed, I genuinely think that Tolkien put much thought and effort into it and I would recommend it to anyone interested in his work or just looking for a good children's story.
This book is such a charming glimpse into Tolkien's sillier side, It is a little upsetting that so many Tolkien fans out there have no idea this book exists, I had a total and complete blast with it, It was cute and surprisingly emotional at moments, It would make a great Disney film, in all honesty, But, considering Tolkien was no fan of Walt Disney, I don't think we'll be seeing that in this timeline, Even if it wasn't Disney, a short animated movie would be really cool,
I loved the tale of the toy dog and his adventures to the moon, Which, admittedly, I really did not see coming, The moon, Tolkien What's in that pipe
I actually picked Roverandom up in a bundle from a bookstore in London, right by Oxford, I can't remember the bloody name of it, I was perusing all the Tolkien merchandise when the lady working there told me Tolkien himself used to shop in the store with his friends, Once I heard that I had to buy everything in sight, I bought bundle after bundle and edition after edition, just for the memory of getting them from London, I don't regret all the money I spent, as I am Tolkien's biggest fan, I just hope that lady was telling me the damn truth,
If I ever become a father someday, this is one of the books I will read to my son/daughter, I look forward to that, Short, sweet, and silly. It's got a lot of the rambly sort of Tolkien descriptions I love, and you can pick up hints of his other writings and influences in it, It's harmless fun, I enjoyed it well enough, even if the meandering nature of it was a bit tiresome at times it's so short that it's not that bothersome.
I think it's one you could read to a child and they'd love it, which makes sense, since he wrote it for his own children, My father remarried a few months ago, and my stepmother still owns her own house, She's been cleaning it out for a while, and getting rid of odds and ends mostly belonging to her exhusband, She came across this and my father grabbed it to give to me since he knows I like Tolkien, I'm very glad he did, I had never heard of this book before, and was interested in checking it out,
Evidently Tolkien wrote it for, or maybe just told it to, his second son after said son had lost a toy dog on a beach outing.
He liked it so much that he tried to have it published after sitelinkThe Hobbit, but the publishers wanted a sequel instead of this kid's tripe, so he put this away and wrote sitelinkThe Lord of the Rings instead.
Now, I'm glad he wrote LOTR, but surely the publishers could have just nipped this in their printing press, but oh well,
The story involves a dog who steps afoul of a wizard, The wizard turns him into a toy dog, who gets purchased by a mother for her boy, and the boy loses the dog on the beach, Another wizard turns him into a real dog again, but he's still toy size, There's a trip to the moon, more wizards, a dragon, spiders, sea serpents, dreams, merpeople, a whale, sea goblins, and all kinds of Tolkienish things, These are the bedtime stories the Tolkien children heard, and it makes me wonder if a Tolkien child ever got a wink of sleep,
At any rate, while some of these creatures are inherently creepy, Tolkien spins his yarn in the same light vein as The Hobbit, and it all winds up being very amusing.
I'm sure if it was written in the same heavy language of LOTR with its multiple lexicons, then this would be nowhere near as enjoyable,
Best of all, there is not a single song in it, Well, songs are sung, but we don't have to read the lyrics to any of them, and everything is in English, In short: Roverandom is the antisitelinkThe Silmarillion as far as writing style is concerned, Actually, that's just a guess, I've never made it through The Silmarillion, and know far more people who have attempted it and failed than I do people who succeeded to make it to the end.
The wit and humor in this story is superb, and I enjoyed every page of it, All the wizards, and some of the other characters, have the Gandalf/Thorin grumps going on, which has always been highly entertaining to me, Roverandom almost inadvertently destroys the world when he bites a shark's tailfin for a bit of fun because it causes a chain reaction that upsets the seaserpent, a beast so powerful that not even the most powerful wizard, the man in the moon, can do much with him.
The last time he tried, they accidentally sank Atlantis before the sea serpent just went back to sleep, Just think of the sitelinkscene in Police Academy when Fackler tosses an apple out the window of his cruiser which starts a riot, and you'll understand,
It's onlypages, and I finished it in a single evening, This version of the book has a lengthy introduction which I skipped, so I can tell you nothing about it, but that doesn't mean there isn't interesting stuff in it.
I almost never read introductions that aren't written by the author himself, and I might even stop doing that, I'm still smarting from that sitelinkintroduction to The Scarlet Letter, It also has about a million end notes which talk about various changes from the original text, sources of some odd phrases, and what not, I also skipped these, and it was easy to do it, The end notes are just at the end of the book and give the corresponding page number, but there are no end note numbers included in the text of the story, so you have no idea when there's an end note included unless you mark them yourself or constantly flip back to the end notes to see.
I recommend this to just about anyone who enjoys a light, kid's fantasy story packed with humorous and witty elements, and especially to dog lovers, .