Beren and Lúthien
| Beren and Lúthien | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Author | J.R.R. Tolkien |
| Editor | Christopher Tolkien |
| Illustrator | Alan Lee |
| Publisher | HarperCollins (UK) Houghton Mifflin (US) |
| Released | 1 June 2017 |
| Format | Hardcover; paperback; deluxe edition |
| Pages | 288 |
| ISBN | 0008214190 |
| Preceded by | The Children of Húrin (2007) |
| Followed by | The Fall of Gondolin (2018) |
Beren and Lúthien is a collection of writtings by J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien as a single book, published in 2017. It contains the various versions of the story of Lúthien and Beren previously published throughout the volumes of The History of Middle-earth.
The common plot is the story of the love and adventures of the mortal Man Beren and the immortal Elf-maiden Lúthien, and how they stole a Silmaril from the Dark Lord Morgoth's crown.
Tolkien wrote several versions of their story, the latest published in The Silmarillion, although the tale is also mentioned in The Lord of the Rings.
The story is one of three "great tales" set in the First Age of Tolkien's Middle-earth, the other two being The Children of Húrin and The Fall of Gondolin.
Synopsis[edit]
The tale of Beren and Lúthien was, or became, an essential element in the evolution of the mythology of ancient Arda (the Creation through the First Age) conceived by J.R.R. Tolkien, which were published as The Silmarillion. Returning from France and the battle of the Somme at the end of 1916, he wrote the tale in the following year.
Essential to the story, and never changed, is the fate that shadowed the love of Beren and Lúthien: for Beren was a mortal man, but Lúthien was an immortal elf. Her father, a great elvish lord, in deep opposition to Beren, imposed on him an impossible task that he must perform before he might wed Lúthien. This is the kernel of the legend; and it leads to the supremely heroic attempt of Beren and Lúthien together to rob the greatest of all evil beings, Melkor, called Morgoth, the Black Enemy, of a Silmaril.
In this book Christopher Tolkien has attempted to extract the story of Beren and Lúthien from the comprehensive work in which it was embedded; but that story was itself changing as it developed new associations within the larger history. To show something of the process whereby this legend of Middle-earth evolved over the years, he has told the story in his father's own words by giving, first, its original form, and then passages in prose and verse from later texts that illustrate the narrative as it changed. Presented together for the first time, they reveal aspects of the story, both in event and in narrative immediacy, that were afterwards lost.
Contents[edit]
- Preface
- Notes on the Elder Days
- Beren and Lúthien
- The Tale of Tinúviel
- A Passage from the 'Sketch of the Mythology'
- A Passage Extracted from The Lay of Leithian
- The Quenta Noldorinwa
- A Further Extract from the Quenta
- The Narrative of The Lay of Leithian to its Termination
- The Quenta Silmarillion
- The Return of Beren and Lúthien According to the Quenta Noldorinwa
- Extract from the Lost Tale of the Nauglafring
- The Morning and Evening Star
- Appendix: Revisions to The Lay of Leithian
- Footnotes
- List of Names
- Glossary
Conception and development[edit]
The first iteration of the tale of Beren and Lúthien was written in late 1917[1] and was one of the first tales written by J.R.R. Tolkien which would form part of his legendarium. Tolkien later erased this original draft and wrote over it; the resultant text constitutes the earliest surviving copy of the tale, and was named "The Tale of Tinúviel".[1][2] There are a number of differences present in this early text when compared to the tale in the published version of The Silmarillion. Notably, Beren is an Elf, the character of Felagund is not present, and there is no mention of Nargothrond. This version includes a narrative predecessor to Sauron: Tevildo, Prince of Cats.
In 1926, the tale was incorporated into the earliest known version of what would become The Silmarillion, namely, the Sketch of the Mythology, by Tolkien. This was written as a brief synopsis of events, and would be the first in a line of directly evolving texts that would culminate in the final, published version of The Silmarillion. A notable alteration from the Tale of Tinúviel is that Tolkien had changed Beren to be a man.[3]
During this time, Tolkien composed The Lay of Leithian (from 1925[4] to 1931[5]), a poem telling the tale of Beren and Lúthien, which was refined to include the characters Felagund, Celegorm and Curufin, and the Necromancer Thû, the direct predecessor to the character Sauron. Tolkien abandoned the Lay before its completion.[5] Nonetheless, it is still an extensive piece of work, standing at over 4,000 lines long.[6]
Subsequent to the Sketch of the Mythology, the Quenta Noldorinwa was written in 1930. This was "the only complete and finished version of The Silmarillion" Tolkien wrote.[7] As in the Lay of Leithian, the character of Felagund is present in the story of Beren and Lúthien. The next main iteration in development of the tale was also the final version, as found in the Quenta Silmarillion.
Publication history and gallery[edit]
|
- HarperCollins hardcover (2017), pp. 288. ISBN 0008214190
- HarperCollins large print paperback (2017), ISBN 0008248079
- HarperCollins hardcover with slipcase (2017), ISBN 0008214204
- HarperCollins paperback (2018), ISBN 0008214220
- HarperCollins paperback (2022), ISBN 0008503966
See also[edit]
- "Of Beren and Lúthien" (chapter of The Silmarillion)
- The Children of Húrin
- The Fall of Gondolin
- Images from Beren and Lúthien illustrated by Alan Lee
External links[edit]
- Sherwood Smith, Review of the book, Tolkien Studies. 15
- Beren and Lúthien, by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull
- New Tolkien book: Beren and Lúthien, announcement by The Tolkien Society
- Beren and Lúthien, a centenary publication, by John Garth
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), Beren and Lúthien, "Beren and Lúthien: [Unnamed introduction]"
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Book of Lost Tales Part Two, "I. The Tale of Tinúviel": "Notes and Commentary"
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), Beren and Lúthien, "A Passage from the ‘Sketch of the Mythology’"
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), Beren and Lúthien, "A Passage from the Lay Of Leithian"
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Lays of Beleriand, "III. The Lay of Leithian", pp. 150-151
- ↑ Power, Rebecca. "Tolkien's Penchant for Alliteration: Using XML to Analyze The Lay of Leithian." Journal of Tolkien Research 11.1 (2020): 7.
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), Beren and Lúthien, "A Passage Extracted from the Quenta"
