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I have never had much confidence in my own work, and even now when I am assured (still much to my grateful surprise) that it has value for other people, I feel diffident, reluctant as it were to expose my world of imagination to possibly contemptuous eyes and ears.

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
Work
Eyes
Assured
Much
Values
Possibly
Never
Eye
Surprise
World
Stills
Ears
People
Still
Grateful
Diffident
Feel
Confidence
Contemptuous
Feels
Value
Expose
Even
Imagination
Reluctant

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I am wholly in favour of 'dull stodges'. A surprising large proportion prove 'educable': for which a primary qualification is the willingness to do work.
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I don't see why the likes o' thee Without axin' leave should go makin' free With the shank or the shin o' my father's kin So hand the old bone over! Rover! Trover! Though dead he be, it belongs to he So hand the old bnone over!
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There was a willow hanging over the mill-pool and I learned to climb it. It belonged to a butcher on the Stratford Road, I think. One day they cut it down. They didn't do anything with it: the log just lay there. I never forgot that.
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What do you fear, lady? [Aragorn] asked. A cage, [Éowyn] said. To stay behind bars, until use and old age accept them, and all chance of doing great deeds is gone beyond recall or desire.
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But I have been too deeply hurt, Sam. I tried to save the Shire, and it has been saved, but not for me. It must often be so, Sam, when things are in danger: some one has to give them up, lose them, so that others may keep them.
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Don't dip your beard in the foam, Father! They cried to Thorin. It is long enough without watering it!
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Very potent influence on myself has been Finnish.
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Then Elrond and Galadriel rode on for the Third Age was over and the Days of the Rings were passed and an end was come of the story and song of those times.
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Trolls simply detest the very sight of dwarves (uncooked).
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Praise from the praise-worthy is beyond all rewards.
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I have spoken words of hope. But only of hope. Hope is not victory.
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Instead of a Dark Lord, you would have a queen, not dark but beautiful and terrible as the dawn! Tempestuous as the sea, and stronger than the foundations of the earth! All shall love me and despair!
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He may become like a glass filled with a clear light for eyes to see that can.
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I don't deny it, said Frodo, looking at Sam, who was now grinning. I don't deny it, but I'll never believe you are sleeping again, whether you snore or not. I shall kick you hard to make sure.
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And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And for two and a half thousand years, the ring passed out of all knowledge.
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The realm of Suaron is ended!' said Gandalf. 'The Ring-bearer has fulfilled his Quest
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Fire, fear, foes! Awake!
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The only just literary critic, he concluded, is Christ, who admires more than does any man the gifts He Himself has bestowed.
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Let the unseen days be. Today is more than enough.
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But do not despise the lore that has come down from distant years for oft it may chance that old wives keep in memory word of things that once were needful for the wise to know.
J. R. R. Tolkien