Readers who venture beyond the material published while Tolkien was alive,
are quickly faced with ambiguity: what is the right version of a story? What is the ‘correct’ history of Galadriel? What is the ‘correct’ background of the orcs?

A ‘canonical’ text is one which is believed to provide authoritative information about Middle-earth. All agree that The Lord of the Rings is a canonical text, and most assign near equal weight to The Hobbit. However, due to heavy posthumous editing, The Silmarillion is considered by many not to be canonical, and people put various amounts of trust in the many drafts and essays in Unfinished Tales and the “History of Middle-earth” series. Additionally there’s the ‘letters of JRRT’ to consider.

We will discuss why the ‘inner consistency’ was so important to Tolkien and the experience of the reader, how the mythology changed over the course of his life, and what texts should comprise the canon.

Join us this weekend in #thehallofire as we explore Tolien and the ‘canon’.
Upcoming Topics:

August 16-17: Colours in Tolkien’s World
August 23-24: RoTK, Book 6, Chapter 2: The Land of Shadow

Times:

Saturday Chat:
5:30pm ET (17:30)
[also 11:30pm (23:30) CET and 7:30am Sunday (07:30) AET]

Sunday Chat:
7:00 pm (19:00) CET
[also 1:00pm (13:00) ET and 3:00am (03:00) Monday morning AET]

ET = Eastern Time, USA’s East Coast
CET = Central European Time, Central Europe
AET = Australian East Coast

Do you have a possible topic for Hall of Fire? Drop us a line at halloffire@theonering.net.

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