[HN Gopher] Rarely Seen Paintings by Tolkien Portray a Lush 'Lor...
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Rarely Seen Paintings by Tolkien Portray a Lush 'Lord of the Rings'
Landscape
Author : bryanrasmussen
Score : 121 points
Date : 2022-06-15 18:45 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.smithsonianmag.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.smithsonianmag.com)
| swayvil wrote:
| Tolkien would have been a good friend. Maybe he was Tom Bombadil.
| I mean, because that happens so often, the author is mirrored in
| a character. Tom is kind and generous, but with a serious hidden
| side. Deep and a bit scary.
|
| Maybe Tolkien had a hidden side. I'd like to have known him. His
| craft, 1000x polished, we see that. But the man. To talk with
| him. That must be honey and cream.
|
| Tolkien, Lewis and Lovecraft all were big fans of Dunsany. He was
| all about the deep, strange, and a bit scary. He talked about the
| elves, these true aliens, and their world. He dipped into the
| mythology of the isles. So rich.
|
| You see that in British scifi too.
| ismail wrote:
| There is a hike here In South Africa called the Amathole trail
| [0]. It is a Gruelling 106km hike.
|
| Fans of Tolkien say the hike and Forrest in the Amathole
| mountains [1] could be straight out of middle earth.
|
| [0] https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-
| times/lifestyle/travel/20...
|
| [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amathole_Mountains
| selimthegrim wrote:
| These were in the 50th anniversary hardcover edition of _The
| Hobbit_.
| [deleted]
| bitwize wrote:
| I love Tolkien's depiction of Smaug. He looks... cartoony, like
| Singe from _Dragon 's Lair_. Everything is evocative of pure
| imagination. I guess when you fought in WWI and have seen how
| bleak the real world is, an imaginary world of whimsy and bright
| colors is a more cheerful place for your mind to inhabit from
| time to time.
| falcrist wrote:
| Despite the Peter Jackson movies, The Hobbit was actually
| written as a childrens' story rather than a grand epic.
|
| I'd wager a lot that the cartoonish nature of his pictures was
| an accurate reflection of how he saw that story.
|
| If you haven't seen the 1977 animated Hobbit film (often called
| Rankin-Bass after it's creators), you're doing yourself a
| disservice.
| bombcar wrote:
| Online you can find a PDF detailing the differences between
| the pre-LotR Hobbit and the second edition (Tolkien rewrote
| comparatively _small_ parts of the Hobbit to make it fit and
| actually didn 't expect the publisher to release a second
| edition with the changes, hence the preface to the Lord of
| the Rings and Bilbo himself apologizing for "a different
| version of the story").
|
| You can even see the "Hobbit-esque" writing at the beginning
| of LotR, remember the fox that sees them walking and talks to
| himself about it. The last we see of humanish animals.
| jonnycomputer wrote:
| I'm a fan of Jackson's LOTR, but his Hobbit was almost a
| complete failure (in my opinion). Radical departures from
| feel, and yes, plot, of the book.
| petepete wrote:
| You can read the book in half the running time of the
| movies. There's a lot of padding and pointless meandering
| in them. It should never have been a trilogy.
| saalweachter wrote:
| You can _listen_ to the audiobook in just under six
| hours, compared to the theatrical release of the trilogy
| which is nearly eight, or the extended release which is
| over eight and a half hours.
| bombcar wrote:
| Is there some thing new somewhere? Each of the paintings in the
| article I've seen before in various copies of the books
| themselves.
|
| Ah it's on the Painting section of the Tolkien Estate:
| https://www.tolkienestate.com/painting/
| falcrist wrote:
| Yea the ones in the articles have been used as cover art for
| certain editions of his books.
|
| The images on the website are rarely published.
| capableweb wrote:
| > The images on the website are rarely published.
|
| According to the article, some of them _never_ been published
| before.
|
| > According to an emailed statement, the site features 12
| previously unpublished items
| AndrewDucker wrote:
| Follow the link to the website and you'll see several that, at
| least, I hadn't seen before.
| [deleted]
| LAC-Tech wrote:
| What a weird coincidence, I was just searching this last night.
| There's a particular tolkien painting I'd love to buy a print of
| [0], but it doesn't seem to be sold anywhere.
|
| The official tolkien shop only has 3 or so of his hobbit
| illustrations and a bunch done by other artists.
|
| Feel like they're missing out on a lot of money.
|
| [0] https://1konag4dcg12gdvjc12ot2wu-wpengine.netdna-
| ssl.com/wp-...
| macmac wrote:
| Maybe interesting anecdote: the only other illustrations that
| supposedly met with Tolkien's approval were done by the now
| Danish queen Margrethe.
| cinntaile wrote:
| I don't think it is known what he thought of Tove Janssons
| illustrations for Bilbo for example, so I think that is just a
| myth.
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