He would have known of the Hobbits as they survived in tenth-century Britain, and, learning from them about the Red Book and its contents (the single volume of Bilbo's and Frodo's memoirs), have been inspired by its hints about the histories of the Elves to seek the Straight Road to the West, there to learn the lore of the Elves and recover it for the race of Men. NOTES | 1. | Cf. also II, 217: "the book of Rúmil." | | | | | 2. | See also Flieger, "Tolkien's Experiment with Time". | | | | | 3. | The only explicit statement that the Akallabêth is kept among the records of Gondor is to be found on RK, 313 of the first edition only. I expect that this is still true in the second edition, but is only implicit. | | | | WORKS CITED Flieger Verlyn. "Tolkien's Experiment with Time". In Proceedings of the J. R. R. Tolkien Centenary Conference, edited by Patricia Reynolds and Glen H. GoodKnight , 39-44. Altadena, Calif.: Mythopoeic Press, 1995. Fonstad Karen Wynn. The Atlas of Middle-earth. Revised edition. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1991. Hammond Wayne G., and Christina Scull. J. R. R. Tolkien: Artist and Illustrator. London: HarperCollins, 1995. Priestman Judith. J. R. R. Tolkien: Life and Legend. Oxford: Bodleian Library, 1992. Tolkien Christopher. The Silmarillion [by] J. R. R. Tolkien: A Brief Account of the Book and Its Making. [ Boston]: Houghton Mifflin, 1977. Tolkien J. R. R. "An Interview". In News from Bree 13 ( November 1974): 3-5. (Transcription of a 1964 BBC radio interview with Denis Gueroult, published on audiocassette as Tolkien and Basil Bunting, BBC Cassettes, London, 1980; distributed in the United States by Audio-Forum, Guilford, Connecticut.) -----. The Annotated Hobbit, annotated by Douglas A. Anderson. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1988. -68- |