Serious scholar?
Anyway, welcome
Melkondil!
I doubt the following will be exactly what you're looking for, but as there are a lot of words below, this post might
seem helpful, if nothing else.
At the moment I'm only aware of a fan-version which includes certain invented
internal names for Christopher
Tolkien's external notations (like Christopher's "manuscript C", or the "D-typescript" for examples), as well as invented commentary from a certain "B.B." himself.
I didn't link it for possible legal reasons, but this version is discussed a bit in the linked thread. . .
I recently downloaded this version of the Lay of Lathien from the internet, as I hope to memorise it eventually. However, I am unsure if this is a correct version of the Lay, as some parts seem substituted from Tolkien's other works. One passage in particular sparks doubt, page 3: King Thingol...
thetolkien.forum
Anyway,
if I read the "signs" (Christopher Tolkien's commentary) correctly . . .
. . . initially he seems to have
essentially given the reader a chunk of the D-typescript, in the sense that:
"I give below the text of the manuscript C in its final form (that is, after certain changes have been made to it), so far as it goes (line 624), incorporating one or two very minor alterations made later to the D typescript(s), followed by a further short section (lines 625 - 660) found only in draft before being added to D."
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd be surprised if CJRT left out substantial revisions of D here (there were two copies of D, but I'm just going to use D).
If I'm correct however, that's a pretty good chunk to start out with at least (pp. 331 - 348 in the HMC first edition).
As noted, the line ending this section is
660.
Then one would have to go through the commentary that follows and note anything we can with respect to the D-text > for example the first note for line 52 explains that in one of the D-texts
Dungorthin was changed to
Dungortheb, but Christopher Tolkien didn't change it in the preceding text (which indeed reads
Dungorthin).
From here Christopher Tolkien writes that from the end of the rewritten opening (again, line 660), the
D typescript continues as a copy of B to the end of the poem, but though it was certainly made under Tolkien's supervision
"it is of very minor textual value in itself"
For the next section (Canto III) we find a substitution of 142 new lines, of which Tolkien
typed the first 103, and which we know were inserted into the D-text. What about the rest in manuscript? Christopher Tolkien had also commented that:
"There is a quantity of rough draft material in manuscript, but also a typescript made by my father of the first 103 lines, inserted into the D-text."
Anyway, all this to say, if one were to follow the rest of the new writing and commentary (which isn't relatively that much with respect to the older Lay) one could try to figure out what made it into the D-text.
Anyway again, to almost but not really answer your question
(!): My hope would be "yes" it all fits well enough (if not down to every single line), assuming that JRRT would be aware that any new writing should fit nicely within what was already written. . .
. . . ahem.
But
I'm too
pedantic to just say yes it all fits perfectly without actually doing more study on
the matter. It wouldn't be a ton of work with respect to just the text:
"Of the original Lay scarcely more than a sixth is represented in the rewriting, and the proportion of new verse to old is less than a quarter."
But all the possible thinking/comparing! That could notably interfere with naps beyond my current schedule, and my awake time
possibly includes more babble about
Galadriel's wonderful feet!
Using less words: I guess I don't know where to get such a version 🐾
Well, I
tried to appear serious (and scholarish)
Anyone else?
