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For myself, I find I become less cynical rather than more--remembering my own sins and follies and realize that men's hearts are not often as bad as their acts, and very seldom as bad as their words.

J. R. R. Tolkien

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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
Remember
Sin
Follies
Find
Realize
Remembering
Heart
Realizing
Cynical
Men
Rather
Seldom
Less
Sins
Words
Folly
Often
Acts
Become
Hearts

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Art is the human process that produces by the way (it is not its only or ultimate object) Secondary Belief.
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And its object is Art not power, sub-creation not domination and tyrannous re-forming of Creation.
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Let this be the hour when we draw swords together. Fell deeds awake. Now for wrath, now for ruin, and the red dawn. Forth, Eorlingas!
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Middle-earth is our world. I have (of course) placed the action in a purely imaginary (though not wholly impossible) period of antiquity, in which the shape of the continental masses was different.
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Very potent influence on myself has been Finnish.
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Valour needs first strength, then a weapon.
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O! Where are you going With beards all a-wagging? No knowing, no knowing What brings Mister Baggins, And Balin and Dwalin down into the valley in June ha! ha!
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This of course is the way to talk to dragons, if you don't want to reveal your proper name which is wise, and don't want to infuriate them by a flat refusal which is also very wise. No dragon can resist the fascination of riddling talk and of wasting time to trying to understand it.
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I am looking for someone to share in an adventure that I am arranging, and it's very difficult to find anyone.' I should think so — in these parts! We are plain quiet folk and have no use for adventures. Nasty disturbing uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner!
J. R. R. Tolkien
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Gandalf: Three hundred lives of men I have walked this earth and now I have no time.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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His grief he will not forget but it will not darken his heart, it will teach him wisdom.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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If this is victory, then our hands are too small to hold it.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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The Bagginses had lived in the neighbourhood of The Hill for time out of mind, and people considered them very respectable, not only because most of them were rich, but also because they never had any adventures or did anything unexpected: you could tell what a Baggins would say on any question without the bother of asking him.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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He was as noble and fair in face as an elf-lord, as strong as a warrior, as wise as a wizard, as venerable as a king of dwarves, and as kind as summer.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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And it is not always good to be healed in body. Nor is it always evil to die in battle, even in bitter pain. Were I permitted, in this dark hour I would choose the latter.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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Farewell we call to hearth and hall! Though wind may blow and rain may fall. We must away ere the break of day. Far over wood and mountain tall.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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I invented that little rhyme about 'One Ring to rule them all', I remember, in the bath one day.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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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
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I am in fact a hobbit (in all but size). I like gardens, trees and unmechanized farmlands I smoke a pipe, and like good plain food (unrefrigerated).
J. R. R. Tolkien
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There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.
J. R. R. Tolkien