Heren Istarion

January 23rd 2003

Heren Istarion and the Gathering of the Fellowship is proud to announce a very special guest to its December 2003 event, leading Tolkien Scholar and editor of Beowulf and the Critics: Professor Michael Drout.

Professor Drout will be lecturing on Beowulf and the Critics and taking part in a panel discussion TBA.

We all are very grateful and thank the Professor for agreeing to join us

---Anthony and Jessica

We have been keeping up with all the news concerning Arwen at Helm's Deep and felt that we needed to add our two cents in the matter. We have come across these two pics, and not for nothing the one on the left is pretty cool.

There have been some new developments, a lot actually, to the Programming that Heren Istarion is providing for The Gathering of the Fellowship in December 2003. Outside of having two great bands, Glass Hammer and Urban Tapestry, as well as Joe Piela of Lonely Mountain Forge, Heren Istarion recently signed a very special guest to appear at The Gathering, stay tuned for details, SO go on over and visit the latest in the largest Celebration of Tolkien and his works.

For all students of Anglo Saxon check out Dr Sam Newton's Wuffings' Website where "...it brings you in-depth courses at Sutton Hoo with specialists in Anglo-Saxon studies". The works of JRR Tolkien and Tom Shippey are mentioned on the reading list. Sutton Hoo and East Anglia is especially significant to the study of Beowulf. In 1939, three years after Tolkien gave his famous lecture Beowulf:The Monsters and the Critics many burial mounds were found in Suffolk with artefacts similar in style and era of those in Beowulf. Tom Shippey here gives a review of Dr. Newtons book The Origins of Beowulf and the pre-Viking Kingdom of East Anglia.

The National Geographic Explorer:The Lord of the Rings special had a segment featuring the Kalevala the first inspiration for Tolkien's language of the Quendi and tales which followed. Here follow how the Kalevala was first compiled by Elias Lonnrot and visit the land of the Finnish Epic, as well as listen to Jussi Huovinen (the Rune Singer featured in the National Geographic special) and others sing the the poems of the Kalevala.

We have word from "Whil Whitfoot" over at the ShirePost concerning some new coins that are currently being considered for production in his mint. Provided that these ideas come to fruitiion, these are what we all can be using in the Shire in the future.

To commemorate Professor Tolkien's "111st" birthday, though he could not complete it before the actual birthday earlier this month he told us:

"...doing a comemmorative token for JRRT's 111st birthday. It would not be denominated, and would simply be a token of remembrance. Inscriptions would be in English, transcribed into Tengwar lettering. The obverse would be:
THE ROAD GOES EVER ON AND ON in an arc over a landscape image with a road winding into the distance, with mountains and sunset ...with a small figure upon it. At the bottom in small characters would be "Jan. 3, 2003"
While the reverse would be:
DOWN FROM THE DOOR WHERE IT BEGAN over an image of the door to a Hobbit hole, with a flowerpot and bench on the stoop. And "Jan. 3. 1892" at bottom. People would just have to be able to transcribe Tengwar to read it, and would have to know the significance of the dates to "get it". It would be a large piece, perhaps silver-dollar size to contain all that text. I hope to have it completed before the end of the year."

"Other plans include a couple of Dale pieces, one pre-Dragon with a raven, and one comemmorating the 50th anniversary of the death of Smaug. Also an Isengard piece with the White Hand on it, and of course I hope to do some Gondoran pieces this year also. I also have a small and precious supply of pure niobium and I'm thinking something elvish, perhaps Hollin... not round but in the shape of a holly leaf and anodized bright green, perhaps even made by Celebrimbor himself!"

In December we reported having gotten some coins for the holidays like the Axe of Durin, The Eye of Sauron, and a Dram of Rohan, these can be found here. Other coins can be viewed here including coins of solid gold.

On September 13-14th 2002: "The Sigurour Nordal Institute devoted to promote Icelandic culture and research into it, both past and present, in all parts of the world, and to build up links between scholars in this field in Iceland and abroad." held "A conference on Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, its links with the Norse cultural heritage, a comparison of Tolkien's approach to this heritage to that of Halldór Laxness and Sigrid Undset, contemporary references in the works, and their ethical stance. Professor Tom Shippey was one of the six lecturing on Tolkien, two of which are in Icelandic.
See the "Lectures" button to Read More...

While on the topic of Tolkien's foreign influences see what a young finnish student has to say on Tolkien's languages.
Read More...

As previously reported Professor Michael Drout of Wheaton College is publishing a two volume set entitled Beowulf and the Critics. We have seen a news story posted on many sites concerning the publication of these texts. This report states that the translations will be published Summer 2003. Professor Drout informed us that a miracle or divine intervention would NOT have them ready before 2004.

In regard to this we have been asked by Professor Drout to help set the record straight:

Professor Drout:"Here's what I have been trying to get out to explain some of the confusions:

I would like to clear up two confusions in the article (probably my fault for not expressing myself clearly enough to the reporter). First, the "discovery" of the manuscript was a personal discovery for me; it's not really possible to "discover" something that's in a library catalogue and was known to scholars in the field (though never published). Second, there's no possible way that the Beowulf translation will be published in 2003. I'll be finished with much of the editing of the translation by the end of the summer, but there will be a lot of post-production work (copy-editing, fact checking, writing notes, etc.) I don't expect the translation to be ready for publication until the middle to the end of 2004."

If you are interested in purchasing the 1st volume of this set then you can do so here.

Slowly we are all absorbing the 2nd film installment to The Lord of the rings trilogy The Two Towers by Peter Jackson, you may have read the review by Jessica and myself, and also the lovely Hobbit Diary by Hannah, now read Catherine's review and see what she has to say of the film after viewing it for her 3rd time on the Professors birthday.

Last evening turned out to be a very meaningful one for us all. The local members of Heren Istarion all turned out for our viewing of The Two Towers, then we all journeyed over next door to Chevy's joined by Catherine our Staff Artist, and Anne, the organizer of The Two Towers Line Party this past December, thanks to her and her friend for attending, also thanks to Michelle for joining us and recording all of our thoughts on Tolkien for her station.

We all dined and toasted the professor as well as held a raffle for some great books graciously provided by Houghton Mifflin. In Vestal, NY our friend and fellow staffer Jan held his toast before the 8:30pm show, please refer to the news of December 31st for the great toast he gave the Professor.

To end this toast I had the pleasure of reading a wonderful piece of poetry written by our WebMaster Dennis the Ol' Took who could not join us last evening due to the fact that he was snowed in on top of Caradhras (aka Bearfort Mountain, the 2nd tallest peak in New Jersey). Dennis wrote the following and read it with his family at the 9pm toasting time.

A Toast to J.R.R. Tolkien
by Dennis J. Reulbach
On the Occasion of His Eleventy-First Birthday
January 3rd, 2003

All hail the great Professor,
and the stories he has told.
We raise our glass to this fine man,
whose works we have extolled.

All hail the great Professor,
and the lands which he created.
Rolling hills and deep cool vales,
and places ne'er outdated.

All hail the great Professor,
and the races he envisioned.
The orcs and elves, hobbits and dwarves,
and proud men though divisioned.

All hail the great Professor,
creator of such depth.
Of languages and history,
all detailed in great breadth.

All hail the great Professor,
so loved by many strong.
His tales live on inside our hearts,
in art and film and song.

From all of us here at Heren Istarion we would like to take the time to say Happy Eleventy First Birthday to our beloved Professor Tolkien, and thank you for all you have provided to the world. It is your work that has left a mark on all of our lives. Thank you for everything.

Our fellow staff and friend Jan has come across something quite interesting while listening to the

"end-to-end playing of the sound track from "The Two Towers" via winamp.com", While listening to this, I discovered that about twice a day they play a rap on the stream which is LOTR-based. I finally tracked it down. The group is offering the lead track for free, so I put it on my website.
To hear it, go to: Lord of the Rings RAP and follow the instructions. (Essentially, you right-click on the link there, and elect "Save Target As" to get it.)

CAUTION: There are Explicit lyrics (1) This is an almost 6 MB MP3 file, so it is not something to approach using download-challenged tools. (2) It is a RAP file, so the socially controversial aspects of that genre, which I don't mind at all, are prevalent throughout it. Listen to it with appropriate safeguards!"

Also tomorrow at Loews Cineplex in Vestal, NY. before their 8:30 pm showing of The Two Towers Jan will be toasting the Professor.

From all of us here at Heren istarion, HAPPY NEW YEAR!! May everyones new year be happy, healthy and safe, may all your resolutions come to fruition