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Raymond's avatar

I adore that poem of Tolkien's.

You know, it's been quite a few years since I re-read LotR - maybe it's time.

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Lucy Holland's avatar

I always say I'll do a reread every year and never get round to it 🙈

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Raymond's avatar

I once read it three times in one year. And I read it 30 times over 30 years from the age of 15 (the first time I read it).

But it's been quite a few years - 11, I think!

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Lucy Holland's avatar

Impressive! Don't get me wrong, I look up my favourite passages when the mood takes me, but yes need a full reread to feel the true impact. I still remember the utter devastation I felt as a 14 year old watching Frodo's ship sail into the west.

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Raymond's avatar

Oh yes!

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Emily Cremins's avatar

this is wonderful, i love ubi sunt!!! i’m currently writing my master’s thesis on its use in old norse-icelandic literature:-)

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Lucy Holland's avatar

That sounds fascinating! It really is such a universal theme in art, and often very beautiful. A confrontation of mortality, a mourning for times which seem better than now...but perhaps were not. I am reminded that it's not a dissimilar rhetoric to that used by the Leave campaign to persuade the electorate to vote for Brexit. Sovereignty and sunlit uplands etc.

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