Tolkien Gleanings #428
* An elegant new interactive map, Middle-earth Storyteller. It shows the movements of each character across time, along a unified timeline and a dynamic map of Middle-earth. More characters, such as Radagast, are set to be added soon. Freely available.
* In the latest Edinburgh University Press journal Moreana, devoted to Thomas More studies, the article “From Utopia to Faerian eutopia: Thomas More, Ernst Bloch, and J.R.R. Tolkien”. ($ paywall).
“This article attempts to reconstruct Tolkien’s understanding of utopia, through his letters and his familiarity with utopian literature — particularly Thomas More’s Utopia. It positions Tolkien’s writings in relation to Ernst Bloch’s philosophy of hope and within the broader twentieth-century crisis of utopia, marked by the disillusionment caused by the rise of totalitarian ideologies.”
* The latest issue of The Independent Review: A Journal of Political Economy reviews Tolkien, Philosopher of War (2024). Freely available online.
* New Renaissance Mindset reviews Tolkien’s The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Freely available online.
“What gives the collection its lasting importance is that Tolkien’s critical positions are inseparable from his creative practice. He is not writing from the sidelines. The arguments in these essays illuminate The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and the whole architecture of Middle-earth, just as the fiction gives the criticism its authority.”
* In the latest issue of North Wind: A Journal of George MacDonald Studies, “Phantastic Art: George MacDonald’s View of the Imagination”. The issue is dated 2024 but seems to be late, being placed online only in the last few days. Judging by the date on the article itself, it is to be dated as 2026. Freely available online.
* New in the first issue of the journal Life Writing, “Editing Friendship: Arthur Greeves and Walter Hooper as Custodians, Curators, and Censors of the C.S. Lewis–Arthur Greeves Correspondence” ($ paywall)
* Newly uploaded to Archive.org, a run of the journal Filologia Polska (‘Polish Philology’), 2015-2025. Freely available.
* In the latest issue of the Virginia Tech undergraduate journal Philologia, “How the Symbolism of Color Illustrates Honor in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”. Freely available online.
* In Spanish, the latest issue (No. 11) of the free PDF magazine La Antorcha is a special issue on prayer. It includes the short article “Tolkien and the Hidden Prayer” which suggests that… “delving into how the author of The Lord of the Rings understood prayer allows us to discover new dimensions in his work.”
* Stafford Borough Council now has a listings page for the Tolkien Weekend at Great Haywood on 11th to 12th July 2026, along with contact details for the organisers.
Picture: Sherbrook Vale circa the 1930s, a short walk from Great Haywood. Colourised.
* And finally, “Tolkien’s Argument for Solitude” as a 30 minute YouTube talk. Notes the history of hermits and the Desert Fathers and monastic traditions in Christianity, and then relates hermits to the relative isolation of Beorn, Tom Bombadil, Treebeard and Gollum. Of course, Beorn does have his animals and very lively visiting bear-kin, and Bombadil has his lively young Goldberry. So they’re not really alone. Radagast might have made an interesting addition, though admittedly not so much is known about him.