Reviews
The dedication of the book had me in a choke hold, let alone the rest of it. Such a cool look at Tolkien’s process as well.
This was great. Tolkien's writing (especially his 'epic poetry'), and Christopher Tolkien's commentary and additions to his father's work, reminded me of my medieval literature classes in University. It was excellent and fun. (Though, maybe a lot of people didn't have fun reading Beowulf and the Romance of Tristran, but I bloody well did).
This copy hold a lot of information and all possible versions and references of the story of Beren and Lúthien from the very first records till the last ever mentioning of them.
It is very touching to read how Christopher Tolkien dedicated his entire life to the stories his father had created. Also, it is unbelievable that J. R. R. Tolkien referred to Beren himself and Lúthien as his wife and that they did die in such a similar time period of one another.
The story itself, it feels like reading a fairytale. The first version is more cute since one of the evil forces they have to face is the Lord of the Cats Tevildo with his fellow Cats servants. In the later versions, he was exchanged to Sauron himself. I also loved to get so much more knowledge of the older days of middle earth and to read how Beren and Lúthien are through the grandchildren and great grand children till the time of Lord of the Rings still connected with this world.
The story is very sweet and touching, one of my favourite Characters was Huan the loyal friend of Beren and Lúthien.
This one opens with a preface by Christopher, at the age of 93, that I found truly astounding. It kind of continues throughout the book, as the tale is rather short, and has several versions. I think that Tolkien fans are really fortunate that he felt himself to be a protector/scholar of his father’s work, rather than living in its shadow, because he’s the only reason a lot of these things saw the light of day. In this preface he spoke to how his father would often change things, or names, or themes, and how an addition of a single character or thing could influence him rewriting something entirely. I loved how Christopher spoke to how he did not take these versions of the great tales to be canon, or to uncanonize other versions, he was just striving to give fans the most linear, narrative story possible. Beren and Lúthien, or The Tale of Tinúviel (as the story and chapter are entitled—from The Book of Lost Tales Two), is an extracted version of their love and stealing of a Silmaril from Melkor/Morgoth. I personally kind of found this edited version to erase Beren, in the sense that it did not really include any background on him and his heroics. Lúthien runs from her father and even frees Beren, which is in no way an issue for me, but I think it weighs even heavier when you include who he was. Aka he felt a little useless to me. Luckily however, this is a rather short extraction. (And that’s not at all to say that I actually found it to be bad! At all!!). The remainder of the book continues on with additional context from Christopher throughout, as well as additional excerpts from various versions and histories that he’s chosen to highlight for this combined edition of the great tale. These excerpts are from the actual lay, and therefore are genuine poetry in rhyme. That’s never been my cup of tea, but you can tell the lyrical prowess that Tolkien had, and the audio most definitely flowed effortlessly. I once again for my first read through miss out on all the illustrations, but we are hightailing it for The Rings of Power prep. I of course would be remiss if I did not include the fact that it’s said the story originated from Tolkien taking woodland walks with his wife-to-be Edith, and that he found himself to be the mortal in the presence of greatness, a beauty of the Eldar. That is why Beren and Lúthien are inscribed on their tombstones, and I can only imagine the story was continually rewrote as their love grew and changed, and Tolkien wove it into the fabric of middle-earth.
While the subpar "Children of Hurin" took an already great tale from the "Silmarillion" and lessened its quality with unnecessary length and depth, "Beren and Luthien" instead provides us with the story that shows how this central and beautiful tale was refined into its completed form. "Of Beren and Luthien" is easily my favorite part of the "The Silmarillion," so it was wonderful to see how it began as a story that Tolkein told to his children before adding layers of complexity and characterization that elevated from a fairy tale to a myth and finally to the central story in Middle-Earth's supernatural conflict between Good and Evil. The core tale of Lovers in a Dangerous Time keeps throughout all of its adaptations, but in each iteration their villains become more believable villainous, their allies become more ambiguous, and as a result the heroism of the central characters becomes more realistic and more powerful. This is not a book for just anyone interested in a Tolkein-esque tale, though. This is a book for the Tolkein nerds who want to witness each step of how the sausage was made, and get excited by the thought of reading page of elven verse. If that describes you, expect to love this book. If not, I would suggest purchasing a copy of "The Silmarillion" and either reading "Of Beren and Luthien" (I believe it's chapter 19), or reading the whole thing so that you may become the Tolkein nerd we all should be.
I love everything Tolkien, even the histories compiled by Christopher Tolkien. That being said, of all the books Christopher Tolkien has published in this vein, I liked this one the least, although I still loved it. The only part that lost me a little was the poetry section but that may be simply because I started to fall asleep during this section that required a lot of brain power. This book, admittedly, appeals to die hard Tolkien fans such as myself, the ones that immediately purchase anything associated with Tolkien. As much as some love to hate on Christopher Tolkien for his interpretation of his father's work, I appreciate the tireless effort he has put in, lasting well into his 90s. I have always loved the story of Beren and Luthien and this telling brings to light the development of the story in a brilliant way that I highly enjoyed. I recommend this book to all lovers of Tolkien.
Do you love romantic poetry? How about a story about the power of sacrificial love? And how do you feel about smart elven princesses saving their mysterious lovers from impending doom (or maybe just Morgoth)? Or maybe you loved the Beren and Lúthien story in The Silmarillion and desperately want some more so you can sing the tale around the campfire? If you answered yes to any of those questions, then this book may be for you. I do have to warn you, this book is a conglomeration of many different versions of this tale. + It has a version in poetry. + It has a version in prose (and is pretty much the version from the aforementioned confusing Tolkien work). + It also has yet another version in prose with Christopher Tolkien’s footnotes peppered throughout. + It has artwork that came up grainy and confusing in my ebook edition. So this book is basically an anthology of the classic Beren and Lúthien tale in all its forms. With Christopher Tolkien basically saying, “yeah, I know my dad kind of contradicted himself here, but he did say later that he actually wants it to be like this.” So that was fun. And it kind of led to some confusion. So, like in The Silmarillion, I knew what was going on roughly 75% of the time. I mean, I enjoyed it, but I kind of slogged through the poetry sections. (That’s kind of how I read poetry. Just pushing through and hoping I understand what’s happening. Somehow.) I loved the actual tale (when it was in prose) and was fascinated with some more history of Middle Earth. The Tale of Beren and Lúthien kind of gets buried in The Silmarillion and I enjoyed reading the tale in its full glory. Plus I loved seeing the similarities between Beren and Aragorn (the bomb.com) and Lúthien and Arwen (the elf of untouchable beauty who will always be Liv Tyler in my mind). I also loved some of the stories that took place around the central story. Like how Beren got to Lúthien’s neck of the woods. And Beren meeting with some of the infamous Fëanor’s kids (it was a rough time). So, in summary, I kind of got several versions of the Beren and Lúthien tale along with some surrounding action on the side. Oh, and Christopher popping in for some explanations. All in all, an enjoyable experience.
Finally done! I enjoyed the read, and it has a lot of interesting background material on Middle Earth. Sometimes it was quite long though. You really have to like Tolkien to appreciate this, especially as it's partly a documentation of the development of this story, rather than 'just' the adventure. Also, I'm tempted to put the illustrations on my wall (only tempted!), they are absolutely stunning!
