What are you writing about now?

Nah. I need to cover off the debate and demonstrate Middle Earth: Its Religious and Moral Elements first. Then bring alongside the companion volume: Middle Earth: Its Characters and Events In Context as a companion volume. (Titles to change of course.)

OK enough of the ponderings...on with the work(s).

The chronological idea appeals to me very much, as it would be a unique approach to a unique work.

Ent said:

Nah. I need to cover off the debate and demonstrate Middle Earth: Its Religious and Moral Elements first. Then bring alongside the companion volume: Middle Earth: Its Characters and Events In Context as a companion volume. (Titles to change of course.)

OK enough of the ponderings...on with the work(s).

Click to expand...

If you wouldn't mind, when you have time would you clarify this portion? I'm not sure I understand what you're saying here. It sounds like you decided to make the books separately instead of one work, but now I'm wondering if I understood you in the first place.

WatcherWraith said:

but now I'm wondering if I understood you in the first place.

Click to expand...

Right on point.
Muttered Musings often lead to confusions.

To clarify:

Originally, I was considering two 'books'.

One book was relating to the ongoing debate of if and whether Tolkien included 'Christianity/Catholicism' in his work. This is due to his various statements with regard to it, which SEEM to conflict...and most authors' attempts to deal with Tolkien and his background/worldview deductively, with their focus on Tolkien, rather than demonstrating what he actually did inductively, by reviewing the works themselves to explain.

The second book was Tolkien's Characters... opening them out regarding who they are, what they represent in the works, and broadening our thinking about them.

These two books are very closely related in many respects.

So more recently, (expressed within the last couple days or so), I saw a potential fusion - an integration of the two works into one. And, it could be done, in several ways, a couple of which I have noted above. There are more, all equally exciting.

However... the work would be massive.

Now currently - in the car this morning, pondering deeply, I determined I really do need to separate the concepts - and the two works - going back to the initial "two books" plan, One on the moral and religious elements issue, the other on the characters.

Dealing with Middle-earth: Its Religious and Moral Elements goes back to sharing my view of the clarification of Tolkien's statements, and eliminating the misunderstanding driving the conflict, it being a needless point of disagreement - this done using his texxt itself to inductively (rather than deductively) demonstrate how he dealt with things, showing what he meant "in action" as it were.

Middle-earth Characters: Their What, Why, When, Where, and How (or whatever i'll title it), - is a 'companion volume' dealing iwth the characters themselves, and Tolkien's purpose for them in his works - again, like Religious and Moral Elements, being demonstrated inductively, from the works themselves to their natural conclusions about the characters.

Again,the two are intrinsically connected. In the end, we will see more clearly what Tolkien has done, and why his works feel so 'real.'

Sorry.. the concepts take a lot of words.

I hope this helps rather than hinders the current confusions I've brought to the table due to the dangerous state of my overly stimulated heartwood cells at present.

WatcherWraith said:

The chronological idea appeals to me very much, as it would be a unique approach to a unique work.

Click to expand...

p.s. - this concept, though it does not apply to the Religious and Moral Aspects so much as a single volume, does still apply as one of the ways to deal with the Characters, and may still end up being the method of choice. (And the 'characters' book will still end up being a bit - well - big.)

The explanation helped a lot. Thank you! :]

Sadly (or not) what this also means, is Mankind, Life and the Religion of Opinion becomes the 3rd book in line...and if ever completed, would be my last.
Perhaps it's entirely fitting though - my final, fond farewell to this world, should it manage to remain as it is in the time remaining to me here.

I confess, I feel better. Thank you all for e-listening.

My mind is aligned and now I be no longer in a dither.
It's to the planning and writing I go. Yes I will go a thither,
words to hunt and ways to speak: the final works deliver.
Excitement explodes within me now, and I be all a-quiver,

@Ent, Thank you so much for sharing all this! I've been praying for you to be granted as much time and longevity as you need to accomplish what you are called to do. Many blessings as you work to the glory of the Lord! 🙏😊 I can't wait to read your works some day.

Glorfindel Goldtress said:

@Ent, Thank you so much for sharing all this! I've been praying for you to be granted as much time and longevity as you need to accomplish what you are called to do. Many blessings as you work to the glory of the Lord! 🙏😊 I can't wait to read your works some day.

Click to expand...

How very kind of you.
My work, much like Tolkien's, will 'predominantly' be devoid of any "overt Christian references," though there will of necessity be some inclusion of references to the same.
That said, many of the 'elements' included in his works are also found in Islam, the B'Hai faith, hedonism, secularism, satanism, athiesm, and dozens of other religions.

(Yes, contrary to what many want to say, these are all indeed religions, requiring specific sets of beliefs, actions and reactions to things in certain ways, and with their ritual needing to "religiously" be adhered to, else they do not hold togehter. I may or may not bother to expand on this in my work. But then again, I may. Most likely will. Need a little controversy to keep things spiced up...and in fact, it's all there, included in his work..!)

But again, the issue is simply to let Tolkien's text demonstrate. Not his background. Nor his worldview. Nor his 'unavoidable' reliance on it, or his incapability to step aside from it.

No, no... he 'considered every word.' He was nowhere near as unequal to the task before him, as such a posture would require him to be.

Naturally, 'negative morality' will be covered as well as 'positive morality' (and depending on 'which side of the coin' one stands on, 'negative' and 'positive' morality may not look the same either) - but again, it will all come from an inductive look at the Text.

As noted somewhere, I've already jotted out 24 elements of religion covered without even dusting off the brain cells, with more to come.
List of morals is beginning shortly.

Just one more book needed to be added to the collecction at this time, to have all the resources available and insure I"m not treading on toes, or overlooking possibilities. It will arrive tomorrow. (Not available digitally..! Insert frown here.)

At the end of the day, what we will come to see, is the full scope of Tolkien's extension of our current world, just as it is, backward into the past... with all its goods and evils, perfections and warts, not a single thing missing.

My hope is we will come to pay more attention to the text on every level and in every arena of life. (Thus, the extension of it into the 'characters' book.)

Truly, Tolkien drew a leaf.

WatcherWraith said:

Sometimes it gets discouraging to realize the progress you made doesn't actually work...and now I have to redo my theme and plot-theme for my story. Well...all my work wasn't for nothing, so I've been told.

Click to expand...

Just for the record, Tolkien wrote The Fellowship of the Ring all the way to the attempt on the pass over Caradhras before he realized that the character named "Trotter", a hobbit who wore wooden shoes, just wasn't going to work out.

Trotter turned into Strider, the heir to the lost Kingship of Arnor and Gondor, and he rewrote it.

That story was very encouraging to me years ago when I was really struggling with my story.

Well, good news and bad news.

Good news first:

• Finished the Grammarly and Autocrit edits of Volume II.
• 130 pages into the continuity edit. Cleaned up a lot of minor layout inconsistencies and such.
• Decided to move two stories from the past out of the appendices and place them where they would be more useful to the reader. There are many events that refer back to these two stories so it's really best to have them embedded within the main storyline. The main storyline is a prose translation of an epic poem written by an elf in Lorien (not members of the House of Finrod). They are labelled Canto One, Two, etc. I now have 3 non-Canto chapters embedded in the main storyline. The first one now starts off the novel. It's a light-hearted, fun story about how 3 of the characters met and became the best of friends and is set 1009 years before the main storyline starts. It's from Book One. It was named "Honey for Money" before the re-org. I renamed it to "Sweet Memories From the Past". I'm putting an editorial note in it from "the editor" so folks who read Volume One will know they've already read this chapter. The other story from the past, also from Volume One, was called "A Meeting of Souls", which had lots of stuff in it that was not essential to the present story, so I had already cut those parts out, including the actual "meeting of souls". So, I renamed it "Cavernous Echoes from the Past" as the relevant parts dealt with a journey into the realm of the dwarves that did not go as desired. (Ditto on the advisory from "the editor.") Now that info is when and where the reader needs it to get full enjoyment of the main storyline. The third non-Canto chapter was already there. It was a document found in a hastily abandoned lair of the bad guys up in Eriador. It's a report of what an agent of the bad guy who participated in two of the assaults on Lorien witnessed. I think this is an improvement, particularly since Volume Two now starts off with a chapter about the main character instead of her daughter. (When I wrote the first chapter, it was supposed to be about the main character, but her daughter took one look at another character in the scene, and I suddenly found myself a typing spectator of an unplanned, whirlwind romance. Sometimes characters have their own tales to tell and won't let go of your fingers until you write them!

Bad news next:

• Somehow I got the dates that record when each Canto starts all goofed up. So I have to go back through the timeline and correct them. Hopefully, it's just an easy clerical error fix and not a major plot error. This is a major problem because I've interleaved the story into the known events per LOTR, and if I got the dates wrong, then not everything may fit as written.
• Noticed that the events in Chapter Three, which overlap the events in Chapter Two but from a different character's perspective, can't overlap as written. The character in Chapter Three would be doing what I describe a day later than they need to be. I have a few scenes (that I want to keep) that interfere with the solution I came up with late last night. Have to think on this one.

david_wendelken said:

Noticed that the events in Chapter Three, which overlap the events in Chapter Two but from a different character's perspective, can't overlap as written.

Click to expand...

Brilliant. Better thee and now, than thy reader and then.

Yet remember WHEN you publish and readers question... Tolkien always used the questions as opportunities. "What does this mean?" he would ask? And off to research and revision he would go, for adjustments in a future ediition.

Thank you all for continuing to partiipate in this thread. It remains an incredible source of encouragement for me.

Today and this weekend, I expand my list of inclusions, lay out the overall Plan for book one, and set e-ink to e-paper on the introduction.

Life is always full of surprises. A formal book review of Middle-earth Lore was presented us. The reviewer missed a key element, which unfortunately invalidates part of his review, and makes him look not so good as a reviewer.

I couldn't let it go, so have connected with him with comments so he can realign. (Always I seem to be 'editing' one way or another.)

I don't prefer for anyone who depends on their work for their living to look bad, putting a mark into their 'negative column' so to speak, if it can be avoided. This particular gaffe could do so in his case.

How can we withhold action, if doing so is detrimental to another? (A very deep subject tossed out for a bit of pondering in 'spare' time. )

Have made some progress working on my theme ideas. It has been suggested to me it would be best if the question my book surrounds is one which is currently relevant to me, as this will help me write about it more thoroughly and with a better look at the various answers to it.

The task definitely feels more doable now I've made some progress. My sprits have risen somewhat, and I'm going to spend some time later today seeing what I can do to advance further.

Ent said:

I don't prefer for anyone who depends on their work for their living to look bad, putting a mark into their 'negative column' so to speak, if it can be avoided. This particular gaffe could do so in his case.

How can we withhold action, if doing so is detrimental to another? (A very deep subject tossed out for a bit of pondering in 'spare' time. )

Click to expand...

Agreed.

david_wendelken said:

• Somehow I got the dates that record when each Canto starts all goofed up. So I have to go back through the timeline and correct them. Hopefully, it's just an easy clerical error fix and not a major plot error. This is a major problem because I've interleaved the story into the known events per LOTR, and if I got the dates wrong, then not everything may fit as written.
• Noticed that the events in Chapter Three, which overlap the events in Chapter Two but from a different character's perspective, can't overlap as written. The character in Chapter Three would be doing what I describe a day later than they need to be. I have a few scenes (that I want to keep) that interfere with the solution I came up with late last night. Have to think on this one.

Click to expand...

Luckily, both these issues appear to be clearly defined. At least now you'll know where to look to find your answer. :] Wishing you all the best on it!

Mostly good news!

I went through all the starting dates for each chapter, and they were mostly correct or just off by a day. They are all already fixed. When I did the conversion from modern months/dates to the steward's reckoning, I used the wrong year. I should have started with fall of 1941 and sometimes I started with fall of 1942. (Needed to use the correct phases of the moon in my story, but I misremembered the almanac year that Tolkien used for that purpose halfway through the book. )

Now for the bad news. It's not disastrous, just a dratted nuisance and will take a day or two to sort out. (Or, if I had my brain in full working order, a couple of hours.)

I had been using the Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE) map of Lorien and its environs as it's considerably more detailed than the map that Tolkien provided. This may have been a mistake because the ICE map is seriously wrong. In it, Caras Galadhon is almost due east of the Mirrormere outside of Moria. In Tolkien's map, it is due south-east. I caught it whilst double-checking some references in the LOTR when Haldir made a comment about having returned from "the Northern fences" of Lorien. I had missed that before. I have multiple references to the western borders or eaves of Lorien in several chapters, not the northern ones. I also have a major skirmish and a set-piece battle, plus some travel back and forth between the border and Caras Galadhon that may have to be adjusted.

I need to review the Tolkien map more closely and compare it to the text describing the path of the Fellowship into Lorien. It may not require the rewriting I'm concerned about. It could be that Haldir was speaking in a different context than my characters have been.

david_wendelken said:

Mostly good news!

I went through all the starting dates for each chapter, and they were mostly correct or just off by a day. They are all already fixed. When I did the conversion from modern months/dates to the steward's reckoning, I used the wrong year. I should have started with fall of 1941 and sometimes I started with fall of 1942. (Needed to use the correct phases of the moon in my story, but I misremembered the almanac year that Tolkien used for that purpose halfway through the book. )

Now for the bad news. It's not disastrous, just a dratted nuisance and will take a day or two to sort out. (Or, if I had my brain in full working order, a couple of hours.)

I had been using the Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE) map of Lorien and its environs as it's considerably more detailed than the map that Tolkien provided. This may have been a mistake because the ICE map is seriously wrong. In it, Caras Galadhon is almost due east of the Mirrormere outside of Moria. In Tolkien's map, it is due south-east. I caught it whilst double-checking some references in the LOTR when Haldir made a comment about having returned from "the Northern fences" of Lorien. I had missed that before. I have multiple references to the western borders or eaves of Lorien in several chapters, not the northern ones. I also have a major skirmish and a set-piece battle, plus some travel back and forth between the border and Caras Galadhon that may have to be adjusted.

I need to review the Tolkien map more closely and compare it to the text describing the path of the Fellowship into Lorien. It may not require the rewriting I'm concerned about. It could be that Haldir was speaking in a different context than my characters have been.

Click to expand...

Good news on the map issue! The route the yrch took from Moria was down the Celebrant, then across the Nimrodel and the Celebrant again. When they entered Lorien they were coming from the west, even if they came from the north to get to that point.

Now I just have to get the date-timing between the second and third cantos sorted out. My brain was just too tired and muddled to pull that off today. My intended solution will work if it turns out it's needed, I just need to make sure I have them properly synched.

In case you don't know about this site, https://psarando.github.io/shire-reckoning/#tolkiens-calendars has several interactive Tolkien LOTR calendars. The year 1942 was the one Tolkien used for 3A 3019, the year the war of the ring took place. I've found it quite useful.

I've started learning Adobe InDesign for laying out my book.

I would just like to take this moment to mention that, in my experienced software user opinion, Adobe User Interface Designers are incompetent.

Aside from that, it will give me greater control over the placement of text and graphic elements than MS Word will. (Or so experienced folks have told me.)

I designed a prototype asterism using mallorn leaves. It's not quite right, but it's getting close. An asterism is used to denote a change of scene or time lapse.

It's pretty tiny when inserted into the book text.

Good grief, here I am bounding around working to discern the proper differences/distinctions between use of the em dash and the elipsis, and you're bounding around among the asterisms.

Don't I feel uneducated..!! 😄

Ent said:

Good grief, here I am bounding around working to discern the proper differences/distinctions between use of the em dash and the elipsis, and you're bounding around among the asterisms.

Don't I feel uneducated..!! 😄

Click to expand...

Ah, wait until I show you my dinkus!

Some days you get lucky! I posted my frustration with the User Interface in Adobe InDesign on FB, and an acquaintance contacted me. She wants to learn more enamelling and she's a book designer who teaches InDesign. So she's coming down to spend a day with me to get me up and running in InDesign, then next month, I'll spend a day or two working with her to learn enamelling. That's a double-win in my book.