Tolkien Gleanings #454

* New from Marquette University, the Tolkien Fanzine Dataset, 1967-2017, with the bulk of material indexed being from 1969-79. Freely available, as a .CSV dataset and an accompanying .PDF fanzine titles list.

“This dataset reveals the heretofore hidden contents of fanzines […] it supplements the earlier Tolkien Fandom Review by S. Gary Hunnewell that discussed fanzines created through 1968. The dataset provides an item level index of the fanzines’ content and is intended to aid researchers in Fan Studies.”

* Now freely available, the schedule and PDFs/videos from Mythcon 54 (July 2026). Too many Tolkien and Inklings items to list, but don’t overlook “New Info on The Hunt for the Ring”…

“With Bill Fliss’s assistance, Chad plots the paths of all characters, including individual Nazgul, throughout Book 1 of The Lord of the Rings.”

The talk is also available as a YouTube recording. And, should you be considering Christmas presents already, Mythcon 54 also had a survey of “Middle-earth Inspired Chess Sets”.

* Westminster Abbey to honour J.R.R. Tolkien in Poet’s Corner…

“A major new memorial celebrating Tolkien’s creative vision and storytelling by artist Stephen Broadbent will be revealed at a dedication ceremony in Spring 2027”.

* The Beyond Bree Calendar 2027 is now pre-ordering. This year it… “celebrates the 50th anniversary of the publication of The Silmarillion”.

* Matej Cadil has posted his Oxonmoot 2026 impressions online.

* On the DiscipleDojo podcast, Holly Ordway sets about Debunking J.R.R. Tolkien Urban Legends (Part One). Part Two is due tomorrow.

* A YouTube recording of Bradley Birzer’s recent Tolkien Seminar: On Fairy Stories.

* Some details of an undergraduate final dissertation from eastern Europe, Female Figures and Their Impact in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and The Fall of Arthur (2026)

* A 20 minute YouTube documentary on The Sword of St. Michael, an Anduril-like flaming sword that Tolkien would have been aware of. This is St. Michael the Archangel, the leader of all angels, defender of the Catholic Church, patron saint of the sea.

* And finally, the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford will shortly open a major exhibition on the history of the various incarnations of Aphrodite / Venus in antiquity.

Tolkien Gleanings #453

* A new issue of the Journal of Tolkien Research is now underway. Freely available online. Includes, among others…

   – “Tolkien’s Philological Imagination – On Aelfwine’s Spelling, the AB Language and the Inner Consistency of Philological Reality”.
   – A book review of Tolkien’s Medievalism in Ruins: The Function of Relics and Ruins in Middle-earth (2025).

* The Worlds of Christopher Tolkien is a new scholarly/biographical book due in November 2026. Includes, among other chapters…

   – “Christopher Tolkien and the Maps of Middle-earth: Between Fidelity and Reinvention”
   – “Christopher Tolkien and the Elvish Languages: Five Decades of Work”

TolkienGuide has the full contents-list for the book.

* Sehnsucht: The C.S. Lewis Journal has issued Supplement 1, effectively a book. Age of Discovery: Essays from the Inaugural Undiscovered C.S. Lewis Conference (2026). The lead chapter is Holly Ordway asking “What Did Tolkien Really Think about Narnia?”. Freely available online.

* Tolkien Annotations, a new section at the Digital Tolkien Project.

* In Portuguese, the Masters dissertation O espaco urbano na obra de J.R.R. Tolkien. Analise da ideia de cidade em Minas Tirith (2025) (‘Urban space in the work of J.R.R. Tolkien: An analysis of the idea of ​​the city of Minas Tirith’). Freely available online, with an English abstract.

* An Oxonmoot 2026 report, “Elfenomeno in Oxford”. On walking… “I’m not used to walking so much, and I wasn’t wearing appropriate footwear”, which resulted in painful limping thereafter. I’d suggest: two pairs of hiking socks with anti-blister inners, proper moulded and pressure-point padded innersoles, good moleskin plasters on vulnerable toes and heels. With boots one side larger to accommodate all that, and boots well worn-in.

* A report with excellent photos, from the Brandywine Festival.

* Birmingham Oratory tickets are available, for the annual Birmingham heritage open days.

* Popping up on eBay, The Fox & Hounds pub at Great Haywood in Staffordshire. I can’t find any Tolkien connection, but it was a relatively small village and someone may know of one.

* Novelist Lazlo Ferran considers The Ridgeway (England’s oldest trackway) as a possible Tolkien inspiration. Part One and Part Two.

* In Italian, L’Indiscreeto magazine has the new long article “Tolkien contro Tolkien”, considering how “Tolkien has won” but also simultaneously lost to the marketing machines and pap-merchants. Freely available online, in Italian.

* Miriam Ellis is interviewed in the Stockholm Tolkien Society magazine, and she offers a free PDF for the article.

* Black Metal magazine has a new five-part article series on Tolkien and Black Metal.

* And finally, Appendix B of The Lord of the Rings, as an interactive map.