Quote

Go not to the Elves for counsel, for they will say both no and yes.

J. R. R. Tolkien

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

J. R. R. Tolkien
Age: 81 †
Born: 1892
Born: January 3
Died: 1973
Died: September 2
Author
Essayist
Historian
Illustrator
Linguist
Literary Critic
Military Officer
Poet
Teacher
Translator
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
John R. R. Tolkien
J-R-R Tolkien
Tolkien
J.R.R. Tolkien
J. R. R. Tolkien
Elves
Counsel
Advice

More quotes by J. R. R. Tolkien

Image
he was for long my only audience... Only from him did I ever get the idea that my ‘stuff’ could be more than a private hobby. But for his interest and unceasing eagerness for more I should never have brought The L. of the R. to a conclusion.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
The only just literary critic, he concluded, is Christ, who admires more than does any man the gifts He Himself has bestowed.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
If you're going to have a complicated story you must work to a map otherwise you'll never make a map of it afterwards.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
But to Sam the evening deepened to darkness as he stood at the Haven and as he looked at the grey sea he saw only a shadow in the waters that was soon lost in the West. There he stood far into the night, hearing only the sigh and murmur of the waves on the shores of Middle-Earth, and the sound of them sank deep into his heart.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
In doubt a man of worth will trust to his own wisdom.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
Far more often [than asking the question 'Is it true?'] they [children] have asked me: 'Was he good? Was he wicked?' That is, they were far more concerned to get the Right side and the Wrong side clear. For that is a question equally important in History and in Faerie.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
Better mistrust undeserved than rash words.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
My dear Frodo!’ exclaimed Gandalf. ‘Hobbits really are amazing creatures, as I have said before. You can learn all that there is to know about their ways in a month, and yet after a hundred years they can still surprise you at a pinch.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
And thus it came to pass that the Silmarils found their long homes: one in the airs of heaven, and one in the fires of the heart of the world, and one in the deep waters.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
Then Aragorn was abashed, for he saw the elven-light in her eyes and the wisdom of many days yet from that hour he loved Arwen Undómiel daughter of Elrond.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
One has personally to come under the shadow of war to feel fully its oppression but as the years go by it seems now often forgotten that to be caught in youth by 1914 was no less hideous an experience than to be involved in 1939 and the following years. By 1918 all but one of my close friends were dead.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
And thou, Melkor, shalt see that no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
Faërie contains many things besides elves and fays, and besides dwarfs, witches, trolls, giants, or dragons it holds the seas, the sun, the moon, the sky and the earth, and all things that are in it: tree and bird, water and stone, wine and bread, and ourselves, mortal men, when we are enchanted.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
Go back! Fall into the nothingness that awaits you and your Master.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
For if joyful is the fountain that rises in the sun, its springs are in the wells of sorrow unfathomable at the foundations of the Earth.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
It [discovering Finnish] was like discovering a wine-cellar filled with bottles of amazing wine of a kind and flavour never tasted before. It quite intoxicated me.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
Fantasy (in this sense) is, I think, not a lower but a higher form of Art, indeed the most nearly pure form, and so (when achieved) the most potent.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
Then something Tookish woke up inside him, and he wished to go and see the great mountains, and hear the pine-trees and the waterfalls, and explore the caves, and wear a sword instead of a walking-stick.
J. R. R. Tolkien
Image
And the Ring is so heavy, Sam. I begin to see it in my mind all the time, like a great wheel of fire.
J. R. R. Tolkien