A cold darkness...

A cold darkness was about her and within her, and at the end of that darkness the high vision of instruction and fair companionship was fading also in the night. Despairingly she called to it; despairingly with all her soul she answered: "I will go on, I will, but tell me how." The phantom did not linger gently to mock or comfort her; it was gone, and around her was an absolute desolation which she supposed must be death. All the pain of heart-ache she had ever known, all negligences, desertions, and betrayals, were gathered here, and were shutting themselves up with her alone. Beyond any memory of a hurt and lonely youth, beyond any imagination of an unwanted and miserable age, this pain fed on itself and abolished time. She lay stupefied in anguish.

From somewhere a voice spoke to her, an outer voice, increasing in clearness; she heard it through the night. "Child," Lord Arglay was saying with a restrained anxiety, and then, still carefully, "Chloe! Chloe, child!" She made a small effort towards him, and suddenly the pain passed from her and the outer world began to appear. But in the less than second in which that change took place she saw, away beyond her, glowing  between the darkness and the returning day...

Charles Williams
Many Dimensions (1931)
(Ch.9 - The Action of Lord Arglay)

Death in Tolkien’s legerdemain

[ ‘Turin Turambar’ by Dovile Tarutyte ]

" 'Hail, Gurtholfin, wand of death, for thou art all men's bane and all men's lives fain wouldst thou drink, knowing no lord or faith save the hand that wields thee if it be strong.   Thee only have I now - slay me therefore and be swift, for life is a curse, and all my days are creeping foul, and all my deeds are vile and all I love is dead.'   And Gurtholfin said: 'That will I gladly do, for blood is blood, and perchance thine is not less sweet than many a one's that thou hast given me ere now'; and Turambar cast himself then upon the point of Gurtholfin, and the dark blade took his life." 

Turin Turumbar (Silmarillion) 

"Deserves it!  I daresay he does.   Many that live deserve death.   And some that die deserve life.  Can you give it to them?   Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement.   For even the very wise cannot see all ends.   I have not much hope that Gollum can be cured before he dies, but there is a chance of it.   And he is bound up with the fate of the Ring.  My heart tells me that he has some part to play yet, for good or ill, before the end; and when that comes, the pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many - yours not least." 

Gandalf (RK-LotR) 

Holy Trinity Church, Headington Quarry, Oxford

In the graveyard of Holy Trinity Church in Headington Quarry, Oxford, lies buried a professor of Medieval and Renaissance English. As befits a scholar of literature, the epitaph on his tombstone (chosen by his brother, who was later buried beside him) is taken from Shakespeare; "Men must endure their going hence." Spoken by Edgar in the final act of King Lear, these words strike a tone of stoic resignation in the face of death, and some might be surprised to find them engraved on the tombstone of this professor, C.S. Lewis, who is best known as a defender of full-blooded Christian orthodoxy. What, it may be asked, of his Christian hope? 

However, the Lewis’ epitaph had more significance than is at first evident. In the room where Lewis' mother died there was a Shakespearean calendar hanging on the wall. His father kept the leaf from that day, and "Men must endure their going hence" was the quotation. Warnie thus paid tribute both to Jack and to Albert and Florence (Flora) his parents in this ‘less-than-obvious’ quote. 

"Really, a young athiest..."

Really, a young Atheist cannot guard his faith too carefully. Dangers lie in wait for him on every side. You must not do, you must not even try to do, the will of the Father unless you are prepared to "know of the doctrine." All my acts, desires, and thoughts were to be brought into harmony with universal Spirit. For the first time I examined myself with a seriously practical purpose. And there I found what appalled me; a zoo of lusts, a bedlam of ambitions, a nursery of fears, a harem of fondled hatreds. My name was legion. Of course I could do nothing -- I could not last out one hour -- without continual conscious recourse to what I called Spirit. But the fine, philosophical distinction between this and what ordinary people call "prayer to God" breaks down as soon as you start doing it in earnest.

From Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life (1955)
Chapter XIV 

Christopher Tolkien gives his first ever press interview...

The first ever press interview of Christopher Tolkien, the official executor of J.R.R. Tolkien's estate, and the interpreter of his father's unpublished works. This original article and interview appeared in Le Monde :  http://www.worldcrunch.com/culture-society/my-father-039-s-quot-eviscerated-quot-work-son-of-hobbit-scribe-j.r.r.-tolkien-finally-speaks-out/hobbit-silmarillion-lord-of-rings/c3s10299/#.UWrdLKLCbTq

The Opening of Graves

She rapped at the door; there came no other sound.  She rapped again; as if the wood thinned before her, she heard a quick breathing from within.  She did not knock again; she laid a hand on the door and gently pressed.

It swung.  She peered in.  It was dark inside and very long and narrow and deep.  Its floor slid away, hundreds of yards downward.  There was no end to that floor.  A little distance within the shed  the woman was sitting on the earth, where the floor began to slope.  She was not alone; the occupiers of the broken- up graves were with her.  They were massed, mostly, about the doorway; in the narrow space there was room for infinities.  They were standing there, looking at their nurse, and they were hungry.  The faces -- those that were still faces -- were bleak with a dreadful starvation.  The hunger of years was in them, and also a bewildered surprise, as if they had not known they were starved till now.  The nourishment of the food of all their lives had disappeared at once, and a great void was in their minds and a great sickness.  They knew the void and the sickness. 

Charles Williams
Descent into Hell (Ch. 11)

The Ring?

VERY interesting piece from today's Guardian Newspaper :
The Hobbit Ring... <<<<<< Click Here