With @shaungunner.bsky.social, Brian Sibley, Jay Johnstone, and @aranelparmadil.bsky.social, making fools of ourselves in “Just a minute in Middle-earth” at #Oxonmoot! @tolkiensociety.org

Today is the day! Folks attending #Oxonmoot in person or online, come join us at 11:00 am BST for “Athrabeth Podcast Live: Tolkien's Try-hard Troublemakers” with the extremely cool @aranelparmadil.bsky.social and @jrrtastrochick.bsky.social! See you soon @tolkiensociety.org!

Another edition of the Roving Ranger has just been sent to its subscribers. Including: Parma Eldalamberon 12; Tolkien Fest; Sarehole Mill; New York Tolkien Conference; Tolkien Thing; Finnish Summer Moot; Lasse Lanta; Verlyn Flieger's Latest; Horn & the Sword; Old Noakes and more...

For #TolkienTrewsday #TolkienTuesday on 𝐆𝐎𝐋𝐃: everyone should read the amazing text by @aranelparmadil.bsky.social “𝘈𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘨𝘭𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘨𝘰𝘭𝘥”: 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘙𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘰𝘧 𝘗𝘰𝘸𝘦𝘳 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘋𝘦𝘤𝘦𝘱𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘰𝘧 𝘚𝘪𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘦! Note: It won the TS award for the best article in 2023. journals.tolkiensociety.org/mallorn/arti...

i know he's just finding excuses to be racist but it's still funny to be like this when we live in the country of the chili cheese fry, the walking taco, the fried oreo, the loaded potato skin, etc. there's nothing more american than lighting up a big messy pile of starchy goop with your hands

If you haven’t registered yet for Moothub to attend Mythmoot online, there’s still time. To register you just sign up via Blackberry at this link: blackberry.signumuniversity.org/moots/mythmo...

I’m really looking forward to Signum University Mythmoot next weekend! I will be giving my keynote on Friday, as well as doing a special lunchtime session from the event just for the online folks, which will be a Q&A, AMA, and general chat with whoever attends the zoom session.

Up now on JTR: 'Tolkien & Psychology'. Papers by @nicholasbirns.bsky.social, @cameronbourquein.bsky.social, @drfairylelie.bsky.social, Mareike Huber, Kris Larsen, Martin Hauberg-Lund Laugesen & Bo Kampmann Walther, Ali Mirzabayati, Dawn Walls-Thumma, & me! scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftol...

Pope Chocolate IV. I’m ok with that!

Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus! Happy St David's Day! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

I've been inactive on here for a few weeks and missed sharing this when it first went live. Go give the most recent Athrabeth episode a listen. @aranelparmadil.bsky.social does a fantastic job breaking down feminist scholarship on Tolkien, past, present, and (hopefully) future!

This is going to be a fantastic seminar! @aranelparmadil.bsky.social mentioned this in our most recent episode and we’ll be attending for sure!

Still going strong!! Currently listening to the one and only @quickbeam2000.bsky.social read, with more brilliant folks to go, like @aranelparmadil.bsky.social, @silmarilleanne.bsky.social and @kaiakayy.bsky.social !!! #Tolkien #Luinellë #LOTR

Mother has spoken! Go listen to @aranelparmadil.bsky.social talk about feminist criticism in Tolkien with @podcast.athrabeth.com open.spotify.com/episode/5Bel...

So, this was a really fun podcast to do! These two wonderful people asked me to come on and talk about the past, present, and (possible) future of feminist criticism and Tolkien's work. They had far more trouble getting me to stop talking than they had to get me to agree to come on 😂

It’s always really humbling when we have scholars like @aranelparmadil.bsky.social on our podcast but this was a real treat. Really excited for everyone to listen and enjoy this terrific episode.

This is an important post about a highly toxic individual who haunts Tolkien fandom spaces to gain access to women and female-presenting fans.

LONG POST - For those with larger audiences, a repost will be much appreciated to share with as many people as possible In June 2023 it was brought to my attention (and @drnosy.bsky.social ) that there was an individual stalking and harassing women across Tolkien Fandoms /1 #TROPSky #RingsofPower

Cymru am byth! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

Some absolutely wonderful papers in these open-access conference proceedings, including my own paper on 'Our Flag Means Death'. Congratulations in particular to @queerlodgings.bsky.social for organising this great event. dc.swosu.edu/mythpro/

Included are the keynote remarks from @taylorwdriggers.bsky.social, and wonderful papers from @aranelparmadil.bsky.social, @chrisvaccaro.bsky.social, @roryq.bsky.social, @mercuryreads.bsky.social, @lukebshelton.bsky.social, @cameronbourquein.bsky.social & @njspolk.bsky.social, and more!

Full respect to this man, who has learned to sing the Welsh National Anthem and did so on camera. Chwarae teg! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

The greates irony in the history of irony to ever irony. Irony McIronyface.

Word of the Day is ‘uhtcearu’ [ucht-kay-aru, with the 'ch' as in the Scottish ‘loch']: Old English for ‘the sorrow before dawn', when you lie awake in the darkness and worries crowd your mind.

Just like much of the furore this week, here is an example of a law passed 4 years ago and the Tories did nothing with it. Within months of us being in power we delivered the scheme because we are about actual actions and real outcomes. They talked we walked. www.burytimes.co.uk/news/2484314...

Pretty sure it's not up to women to "think carefully" about taking a higher-paid job than their partner. It's up to their partner to get the fuck over himself and be pleased for her.

Cheers!

Doing a lot of work on Tolkien’s poetry lately. Here’s a sweet one.

Epic levels of stupidity.

Boromir in the White Mountains 24" x 18" oil on panel collect. of the artist I've always loved what Boromir represents, a loyal, dedicated servant wishing the best for his city and land,but tragically stumbling as that passion is distorted by the power of the ring into selfish demands from a friend.

For anyone interested in these, we have added summaries for each of the FC Letters to our Guide to Tolkien Letters and information about which books each letter appears in. www.tolkienguide.com/pages/Father... 🎅

We're resharing this but this time we're spelling #Tolkien correctly in our hashtag...doh.

I'm enjoying this! Like fishing with dynamite! bsky.app/profile/did:...

Sara's paper raises some important questions about one of the most-debated texts in the legendarium: "Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth," a debate between the Elf Finrod and the human woman Andreth about the nature of death. No absolute answers are possible, but here are some thoughts! 1/7

An event I have been helping to organize for the @tolkiensociety.org is finally open for registration! Come to Kansas City in early May with me and a lot of other #Tolkien fans and scholars! www.tolkiensociety.org/events/westm...

An excellent review of the @tolkiensociety.org conference this past weekend celebrating the 100th birthday of Christopher #Tolkien, by David Bratman

My paper from last weekend's wonderful Christopher Tolkien Centenary Conference as been published on the open-access Journal of Tolkien Research. If you are interested in readig it, you can find it here: scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftol...

My new poems about women scientists in The London Review of Books www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

A toast to Christopher Tolkien on what would have been his 100th birthday, for his lifelong dedication to his father‘s literary legacy and for bringing so much more Middle-earth to light for fans around the world. His importance to us fans cannot be overstated. Eglerio! Praise him with great praise!

Word of the day is ‘librocubicularist’: one who loves nothing better than reading in bed. (Not easy to say, but I’m glad to know it exists).

Someone called this mass exodus from Twitter ‘the fall of the Broman Empire’ and I died laughing. 💀

The "bluesky is an echo chamber" think pieces that keep popping up really tickle me because they show how certain people genuinely believe social media should be for debating and arguing and not talking about the things that make you happy and sharing art with the world.

This Thursday online 7-8 pm GMT

I think today is a good day to post this, to paraphrase Monty Python, "What has Christopher #Tolkien ever done for us?"

Father and son, 1928. Christopher Tolkien is around three years old here.