{"id":56496,"date":"2012-06-01T08:00:20","date_gmt":"2012-06-01T13:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/?p=56496"},"modified":"2012-05-31T18:02:36","modified_gmt":"2012-05-31T23:02:36","slug":"j-w-brauns-bookshelf-june","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2012\/06\/01\/56496-j-w-brauns-bookshelf-june\/","title":{"rendered":"J.W. Braun&#8217;s Bookshelf &#8211; June"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"intro\">This month, \u00a0J.W. Braun reports from the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando Florida to tell you how you can win a free Harry Potter board game.\u00a0 He also reviews <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/0307885135\/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=jwbraswri06-20&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=0307885135\">The Sorcerer&#8217;s Companion: A Guide to the Magical World of Harry Potter<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;\" src=\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=jwbraswri06-20&amp;l=as2&amp;o=1&amp;a=0307885135\" alt=\"\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" border=\"0\" class=\"no-lazyload\" \/> and, in the mailbag section below the video, answers your questions.<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe data-src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/NYCE0qI5OKM\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/center>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>J.W. Braun&#8217;s Mailbag<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>It seems strange that Sauron could show Denethor Frodo trapped at the Tower of Cirith Ungol but he could not get the Ring. When Frodo was captured at Cirith Ungol, why didn\u2019t Sauron just send a Nazgul to the tower right away? It seems like he didn\u2019t care about Frodo\/Sam until too late. \u2013 Kathryn<\/em><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>One of the plot points somewhat buried in <em>The Lord of the Rings<\/em> that\u2019s quite important is that Sauron doesn\u2019t actually know what\u2019s going on with the Ring throughout most of the story, outside of some vague details. When he learns of Frodo\u2019s capture, it doesn\u2019t occur to him that the hobbit is trying to destroy the Ring. It\u2019s especially ironic that when Sauron alerts Denethor (and others) to Frodo\u2019s capture, he\u2019s simply doing so to display that a spy\u2019s mission has failed. He has no idea that the others will assume that he is trying to tell them that he now has the Ring! &#8211; JW<\/p>\n<p><em>Is Bilbo \u201cthe narrator\u201d of <\/em>The Hobbit<em>? It seems like he\u2019s writing in third person about his adventures. But the book also says, \u201cI suppose hobbits need some description nowadays, since they have become rare and shy of the Big People, as they call us.\u201d So how could Bilbo have written the story? &#8211; Todd<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The idea is that <em>The Hobbit<\/em> is based on a lost manuscript (partially written by Bilbo) that Professor Tolkien has discovered. So Bilbo\u2019s thoughts drive some of the narrative, but Tolkien lends an editorial hand as well. (Incidentally, when I reread the book I like to think of the narrator as a kindly old man sitting by a fire in front of a semi circle of children.)<\/p>\n<p><em>I bought the cartoon version of<\/em> The Hobbit<em> on DVD but I swear it\u2019s missing some of the sound effects that were on my old VHS tape. Am I crazy or is this true? \u00a0\u2013 Garrett<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Indeed, the DVD version of the Rankin\/Bass adaptation of <em>The Hobbit<\/em> (released on September 11, 2001 of all days) has a different sound mix than the prior releases, taken from a 1978 record collection. Because this sound mix was originally intended to be separate from the cartoon, it excludes many of the cartoon\u2019s sound effects. (Meanwhile, there are a few sound effects &#8211; and even a line of dialogue \u2013 added to the mix.) For those of us who watched the movie on video tape a hundred times, it\u2019s really an awkward thing. &#8211; JW<\/p>\n<p><em>I was poking around the amazon reviews for Ralph Bakshi\u2019s <\/em>Lord of the Rings<em> and people are saying that Warner Brothers took the original pan &amp; scan version of the film (as it was on the original VHS tape) and rematted it to give it the appearance of a letterbox film. In other words this is not the widescreen version that was shown at the cinemas in 1978. Is this true?! Will we never see the original version? \u2013 Pando<\/em><\/p>\n<p>While it\u2019s generally assumed that \u201cfullscreen\u201d versions of films (formatted to fit the old square-ish tvs) are always showing us less of the picture than the \u201cwidescreen\u201d versions, this isn\u2019t always so. Sometimes films (with the <em>Back to the Future<\/em> films being a good example) are made in the 4:3 fullscreen aspect ratio, and then the top and bottom of the frame are matted out for the theater.\u00a0 This is how the animated <em>Lord of the Rings<\/em> was designed, which means the fullscreen version actually has more of the picture than the widescreen. (That said, since the widescreen aspect ratio is how the film is meant to be seen, the framing for the fullscreen version looks worse.) So in a way, people are right in that the widescreen version presently available on DVD and Blu ray is a matted version of the prior fullscreen release, but in this case it\u2019s a good thing!<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s also interesting to note that even the fullscreen versions of Peter Jackson\u2019s <em>Lord of the Rings<\/em> films include some of the picture that was matted out for the theaters and the widescreen DVDs.\u00a0 (But unlike the animated <em>Lord of the Rings<\/em>, the fullscreen versions of Jackson\u2019s <em>LOTR<\/em> films do crop off the some of the sides of the frame.)\u00a0 &#8211; JW<\/p>\n<p><em>What do you do to warm up your voice for your book reviews? &#8211; Mitchell<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><\/em>Funny you should ask. Here&#8217;s a look:<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe data-src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZiPB4ueBe30\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"480\" height=\"360\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/center>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>J.W. Braun is a Tolkien scholar and author of <a href=\"http:\/\/jwbraun.com\">The Lord of the Films<\/a>, published by ECW Press in 2009. If you have a question for him, simply drop him a line at <a href=\"mailto:lordofthefilms@gmail.com\">lordofthefilms@gmail.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>You can find out more about J.W. at <a title=\"J.W. Braun's Website\" href=\"http:\/\/jwbraun.com\">jwbraun.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This month, \u00a0J.W. Braun reports from the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando Florida to tell you&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":87,"featured_media":46771,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[163],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-merchandise-books"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/theonering.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1tLoH-eHe","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/87"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56496"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56496\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56510,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56496\/revisions\/56510"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}