RE: completely off-topic question...

I read the Silmarillion - It's a hard go the first time, but it grows on you. I especially liked the stories in Beleriand, the creation of the rings, the capture of the twin silmarils on their pillars of light and the fall of that island - can't remember its name now. Most of its kings had names that started with Ar- .

The travels of the elves, the creation of the dwarves, the Ainur and the Valar, the Illuvatar, Morgoth and Melkor.

I soaked up that book, it is so broad in scope that it creates a world in itself. I must have read it four or five times at least. Much of it hints at ancient legendary events in our own history, as if it contained echoes of our own distant past. Tolkien did a lot of work with anglo-saxon and the Gaelic languages and he used that to help him weave a whole world. The elves from the East, that echoes the Gaelic stories of the Tuatha de Danaan. The Valar remind me of them a bit.

There were some useful resource items published on Middle-Earth by a company called I.C.E. - but they were forced into bankruptcy as soon as work on the upcoming movie started... a very sad state of affairs. Granted they were pushing a role-playing game, but they had published good detailed descriptions of all the characters in the Middle-Earth related stories, and had resource materials, scenarios and detailed maps as well. Bree and The Barrow Downs, Isengard, Mirkwood, Angmar, all the modules struck me as being of very high quality. Overall I think I.C.E. did an outstanding job and they encourage people my age to explore Middle-Earth in detail and develop a strong liking for Tolkien's works. They did more in that regard for me than Christopher Tolkien (J.R.R.'s son) ever did with all those drafts he published. I.C.E. just couldn't compete with the allure of big movie revenues, the upcoming movie appears to have a stranglehold on Tolkien-related mechandising now, they are forcing web sites to close, and some companies were forced to shut down. Ref. Re. I.C.E. materials http://www.chapter-one.com/merp/products.html#ref
<http://www.chapter-one.com/merp/products.html#ref> ; re. the upcoming movie
trilogy that is trying to control the appearance of all Tolkien products, à la Star Wars for merchandising:
http://www.lordoftherings.net/index_flat.html
<http://www.lordoftherings.net/index_flat.html>

This is the same nonsense that took place when Paramount decided to revamp Star Trek to make it more "popular".

OK, no more OT topics from me for this week, the list is getting overwhelmed with them.

Regards,
Patrice Boivin
Systems Analyst (Oracle Certified DBA)

        -----Original Message-----
        From:   Yosi Greenfield [SMTP:yosi_at_comhill.com]
        Sent:   Tuesday, August 07, 2001 1:55 AM
        To:     Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L
        Subject:        Re: completely off-topic question...

        Oy - I could NOT get through The Silmarillion, even though I loved
        the Hobbit (I was but a kid), and I really liked the Trilogy
(although
        I admit to skipping lots of the songs and such...)

        Some people really read The Silmarillion, huh?

        

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Author: Boivin, Patrice J
  INET: BoivinP_at_mar.dfo-mpo.gc.ca

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