The War of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien Christopher Tolkien

Author:J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2016-04-08T22:00:00+00:00

NOTES

Note on the Chronology

1. This text went back in turn to an earlier outline, 'The Story Foreseen from Moria', VII.209.

2. At that time Kirith Ungol was the name of the main pass into Mordor.

3. The first mention of the Tower of Kirith Ungol.

4. As I have noted in VII.260, Sam's visions in the Mirror of Galadriel were already in the fair copy manuscript of 'Galadriel' almost exactly as in FR (p. 377); the actual words used in the manuscript of this vision were: 'and now he thought he saw Frodo lying fast asleep under a great dark cliff: his face was pale.' When my father wrote this the words of the outline 'The Story Foreseen from Moria' (VII.209) had already been written: 'Gollum gets spiders to put spell of sleep on Frodo. Sam drives them off. But cannot wake him.'

5. The illegible word might possibly be 'grin'.

6. The fair copy manuscript, with some correction and addition from the time of composition, reaches the text of TT, pp. 312-17, in all respects save one: the passage describing Frodo's dash towards the bridge is still absent. The manuscript reads here:

... Frodo felt his senses reeling and his limbs weakening.

Sam took his master's arm. 'Hold up, Mr Frodo!' he whispered, but his breath seemed to tear the air like a whistle.

'Not that way! Gollum says not that way - thank goodness! I agree with him for once.'

Frodo took a grip on himself and wrenched his eyes away.

The reading of TT, introduced later, thus in part returns to the outline given on p. 186.

7. In general I do not go into the detail of textual problems, but this is a very unusual case, and the reconstruction of the evolution of the story to some degree depends on the view taken of it; I therefore give here some account of it.

Page 4 of the manuscript, on which the pencilled draft though overwritten can mostly be read, ends with the words: 'Then he saw that a faint light was welling through his fingers and he thrust it in his bosom.' Page 5 was likewise originally a page of rough, continuous, pencil drafting. The top of this page, some 14 lines or so, was erased, and the later narrative was written in this space (ending at 'and there it suddenly entered a narrow opening in the rock. They had come to the first stair that Gollum had spoken of', TT p. 317). Towards the end of this short section, however, the erasure was not complete, and the following can be read: 'not the odour of decay in the valley below ..... that the hobbits could recognize, a'. Thus the original narrative was here entirely different, for within a short space they are already at the mouth of the tunnel.

The strange thing is that from this point the original pencilled draft (continuing with 'repellent evil taint on the air'), not erased any further but overwritten, was overwritten with the earlier narrative ('Version 1'). Thus as the text in ink stands on this page it reads:

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