Some who have read the book, or at any rate have reviewed it, have found it boring, absurd, or contemptible; and I have no cause to complain, since I have similar opinions of their works, or of the kinds of writing that they evidently prefer.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Authors & Writing
All your words are but to say: you are a woman, and your part is in the house. But when the men have died in battle and honour, you have leave to be burned in the house, for the men will need it no more. But I am of the House of Eorl and not a serving-woman. I can ride and wield blade, and I do not fear either pain or death.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Men & Women
Farewell we call to hearth and hall! Though wind may blow and rain may fall. We must away ere the break of day. Far over wood and mountain tall.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls?
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Not all who wander are lost.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Goals
Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Last Words, Faith
Well, here at last, dear friends, on the shores of the Sea comes the end of our fellowship in Middle-earth. Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Elves seldom give unguarded advice, for advice is a dangerous gift, even from the wise to the wise, and all courses may run ill. But what would you? You have not told me all concerning yourself; and how then shall I choose better than you?
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Advice
Still round the corner there may wait,
A new road or a secret gate.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Growth
The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Beauty
It’s the job that’s never started takes longest to finish.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Jobs, Procrastination
in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Then the enchantment became more dreamlike, until he felt that an endless river of swelling gold and silver was flowing over him, too multitudinous for its pattern to be comprehended; it became part of the throbbing air about him, and it drenched and drowned him. Swiftly he sank under its shining weight into a deep realm of sleep.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
I sit beside the fire and think
of all that I have seen,
of meadow-flowers and butterflies
in summers that have been;
Of yellow leaves and gossamer
in autumns that there were,
with morning mist and silver sun
and wind upon my hair.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Nature
The road must be trod, but it will be very hard. And neither strength nor wisdom will carry us far upon it. This quest may be attempted by the weak with as much hope as the strong. Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Trying
Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren land; long heath, broth furze, any thing.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Wilderness
Where did you go to, if I may ask? said Thorin to Gandalf as they rode along. “To look ahead,” said he. “And what brought you back in the nick of time?” “Looking behind,” said he.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Foresight
It is useless to meet revenge with revenge. It will heal nothing.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Forgiveness
He used often to say there was only one Road; that it was like a great river: its springs were at every doorstep, and every path was its tributary. “It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door,” he used to say. “You step into the Road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Travel
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 judgment. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Justice
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Journeys
You can only come to the morning through the shadows
—J. R. R. Tolkien
If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Food
I wish life was not so short, he thought. languages take such a time, and so do all the things one wants to know about.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Language
It’s wisdom to recognize necessity, when all other courses have been weighed, though as folly it may appear to those who cling to false hope.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
All tales may come true; and yet, at the last, redeemed, they may be as like and unlike the forms that we give them as Man, finally redeemed, will be like and unlike the fallen that we know.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
All that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Wilderness, Originality, Travel
Remember what Bilbo used to say: It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Journeys
Nearly all marriages, even happy ones, are mistakes: in the sense that almost certainly (in a more perfect world, or even with a little more care in this very imperfect one) both partners might be found more suitable mates. But the real soul-mate is the one you are actually married to.
—J. R. R. Tolkien
Topics: Marriage
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
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- Robert Ranke Graves British Writer
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- Ian McEwan (b.1948) British Novelist, Short-story Writer
- Hanif Kureishi British Novelist, Screenwriter
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- Terry Pratchett English Fantasy Writer
- L. P. Hartley British Writer, Critic
- Eden Phillpotts British Writer
- Arthur Ransome English Novelist, Journalist
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