HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: heinr@sci.kun.nl (Hein Ragas)
Subject: Re: ME maps
Organization: University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands
X-Newsreader: NN version 6.4.19
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 19:23:54 GMT

In <MVOORHIS.92Dec18111658@bigwpi.WPI.EDU> mvoorhis@bigwpi.WPI.EDU (Michael C Voorhis) writes:

>Considering the revelations we've had here about ICE's `fact-making'
>policies, I'm surprised anyone would assume anything that they made had a
>basi, but that's just my own personal opinion.

[stuff deleted]
>necissary, at Ms.  Fonstad's book.  When looking for good data, leave the
>game playing equipment to the gamers.

>	Mike.

(For those that do not know: ICE is Iron Crown Enterprises, a game-publishing
company that, among others, published MERP, Middle Earth Role Playing. They
also have published many adventure- and campaign-modules, each detailing
a different spot of ME.)

Please Mike, fill me in, what are ICE's 'fact-making' policies? As far as
I know, ICE takes great care that all their products are in line with LotR,
which they use as a main source, and not in conflict with later publishings
about ME.

Their modules are quite detailed, and they offer much information. Of course
they have to fill in the gaps, because JRRT didn't detail everything.
Overall, I like their stuff.

Hein
From: genetic+@pitt.edu (Dr. Dave)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Re: Movie Roles ....
Date: 11 Dec 92 19:30:55 GMT
Organization: Department of Industrial Engineering

I guess I have to add my bit...

Aragorn:	Gregory Peck would have been perfect 30 years ago.  Rutger
		Hauer will get a role, but he doesn't have the majestic
		persona Aragorn needs.  You D&D folks out there will know
		what I mean when I say that the character has to (at times)
		exude "Lawful Good".  If only Gerard Depardieu spoke better
		English...  What is Albert Finney doing these days?

Galadriel:	Catherine Deneuve, hands down, but you'd better hurry.

Saruman:	I like the Anthony Hopkins suggestion.  Or, alternatively,
		what is John Colicos doing these days?

Gandalf:	Too late for John Gielgud; Leonard Nimoy isn't a bad idea.

Butturbur:	John Rhys-Davies

Theoden:	I like Anthony Quinn for this one.  He can play both the
		hopeless old man and the vigorous old man, and play them
		well.  And you can pass his accent off as "Rohanish". :-)

Denethor:	Derek Jacobi, Peter O'Toole, or maybe Gregory Peck *now*.

Faramir:	Maybe here's where we put Rutger Hauer.

Legolas:	Alexander Godunov, clearly.

Eomer:		How about Bryan Brown?

And the kicker...

Frodo:		Linda Hunt.  No, really.  If she can do Billy Kwan in "The
		Year of Living Dangerously", she can do Frodo.  The problem
		is finding *another* dozen or so hobbits...

-- 
       David Tate        |"Out of the dugout endlessly swinging,
 dtate@unix.cis.pitt.edu | Out of the manager's throat, the sound fundamentals,
 Prof. of Story Problems | Out of the six-month season..."            
 Member ORSA, TIMS, SABR | 	Walt "Lefty" Whitman
From: sulkom@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu (Mark Sulkowski)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Re: Movie roles
Date: 17 Dec 92 00:35:00 GMT
Organization: University at Buffalo
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <1992Dec16.144917.4753@mr.med.ge.com>, bartlone@med.ge.com writes...
>In article H81@acsu.buffalo.edu, sulkom@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu (Mark Sulkowski) writes:
>>In article <1992Dec15.172546.22578@mr.med.ge.com>, bartlone@zeke.gemedical writes...
>>
>>>As to the Hobbits, what about some of the 'little people' from 'Willow'..
>>
>>	ARGGH!  Sorry, I really don't think that would work out well.
>>It may just be my personal taste.
>>
>>
>>Mark
> 
>I want more information on your objection..is it their acting, their look, or
>just the fact that they were in that damn sappy movie? I think the guy that
>played Willow looks like Frodo...most of the others wouldn't work, but He and
>one or two others could play the 'key hobbits'...

	Their acting was good.  But they just don't give me the impression
that they are hobbits.  I'm having difficulty expressing why in words.
I just know that if I were to see the movie it would loose something for
me.

Mark
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: cffitzge@IASTATE.EDU (Charles F Fitzgerald)
Subject: Re: Eowyn
Reply-To: cffitzge@IASTATE.EDU (Charles F Fitzgerald)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 05:38:14 GMT

Mark writes:
"Remember that Sam also settled down to comfortable home life.
I'll bet many characters settled down."
Steve Watson writes:
"Note that renouncing war in favour of gardening is also Faramir's
desire."

What I think is the primary difference between Sam, Faramir, Frodo,
Merry, Aragorn, etc. and Eowyn is that the males mentioned did not
really ever wish to be warriors.  Certainly the hobbits (especially
Sam and Frodo) never desired to go to war, and both Faramir and
Aragorn seem to be less then enthusiastic about war as a way of life.

Eowyn, on the other hand, actively sought to enter battle, though
it was clearly not socially acceptable.  She desired the glory of
battle.  Further, she willing surrenders this desire to be a wife
and servant to Faramir.  

Eomer, who also is a warrior born and  lives for the love of battle, 
is not said to be giving up his way of life for a more pastoral 
existence at the end of the story. There is nothing to indicate that 
the Rohirrim will not continue to glory in battle, even though the
threat of Sauron has passed.  It is to be assumed that there are
still enough perils left in the world to keep the warriors of
Rohan busy, that they may continue to live the existence that they
treasure so much.

Thus, Eowyn, by her choice to settle down to a pastoral livelihood,
is giving up her chosen career in favour of a more socially
acceptable one. 

This underlying sexism may not be palatable to our current
social dogma but to say that it does not exist or, worse yet,
to say that it does not matter because it is "only a work of
fiction" or because Tolkien lived in a different generation than
we do, is utterly reprehensible.

--
Charles F. Fitzgerald | '....Life's but a walking shadow,
Iowa State University | a poor player, that struts, and frets
cffitzge@iastate.edu  | his hour upon the stage,
                      | and then is heard from no more....'
                      | _MacBeth_, by W. Shakespeare.
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: jadair@cs.utexas.edu (John S. Adair)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Re: Balrogs, Nazgul, and Sauron
Date: 13 Dec 1992 00:59:12 -0600
Organization: CS Dept, University of Texas at Austin
NNTP-Posting-Host: cash.cs.utexas.edu

In article <rwang.724206600@husc8>, rwang@husc8.harvard.edu (Richard Wang)
writes:
>and were driven off Weathertop by a lone Ranger (albeit the chief) and a

Please forgive me:
wasn't it Tonto that scared them off? :)

                                            -John
From: det@bigbootay.sw.stratus.com (David Toland)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Re: Racism Survives!
Date: 15 Dec 1992 18:01:49 GMT
Organization: Stratus Computer, Software Engineering
NNTP-Posting-Host: bigbootay.sw.stratus.com

You could easily get bogged down in the racism issue - indeed the newsgroup
apparently already has.  Tolkein undoubtedly had his own biases, as does
any author, but overall I would say that the moral stance is pro-unity
vs. separatism; consider the friendship of Gimli and Legolas.  White
vs. black (or light vs. darkness, enlightenment vs. concealment) are
ancient themes that were already present in the mythologies from which
Tolkein's works were derived (he after all did not create them out of
whole cloth).

Other great authors (e.g. Mark Twain) were also accused of racism
because their writings used the language of the time, yet they are
no less worthy of exploration.  I'd just as soon drop the racism
discussion, as I think it trivializes a great work of literature.


-- 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
All opinions are MINE MINE MINE, and not necessarily anyone else's.
det@phlan.sw.stratus.com   |  "Laddie, you'll be needin' something to wash
                           |  that doon with."
From: laurence@cco.caltech.edu (Dustin Lee Laurence)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Re: Eowyn
Date: 18 Dec 1992 23:04:46 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: sandman.caltech.edu

lewchuk@cs.UAlberta.CA (Michael Lewchuk) writes:

>    ...There are many positive female
>    archetypes here, not only the domesticated Goldberry but the domestic
>    empowered Galadriel.

Our language has gotten pretty bloody marvelous when we refer to the oldest
and highest Elf still in ME, who helped lead the Noldor across the ice, and
if memory serves was the only elf still in ME who had seen the two Trees
directly, as "empowered".  I suppose one could refer to Athena as "empowered"
as well, but neither one seems exactly apropriate somehow...   :)

-- 
Dustin Laurence       "As sensitive and broad-minded humans, we must never
                       allow ourselves to be in any way judgmental of the
laurence@alice         religious practices of other people, even when these
caltech.edu           people clearly are raving space loons." -- Dave Barry
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: kelsey@jupiter.SLAC.Stanford.EDU (Mike Kelsey)
Subject: Re: The Hobbit
Organization: Stanford Linear Accelerator Center
Date: Fri, 11 Dec 1992 17:58:35 GMT

In article <1992Dec11.163120.9996@rchland.ibm.com>, seurer@rchland.vnet.ibm.com (Bill Seurer) writes:
[ ... ]
|> Are there any other interesting editions of _The Hobbit_ in print?
|> 
|> Maybe I will get lucky and find a copy of the old paperback edition at a
|> used bookstore if nothing else...

The current paperback release of _The_Hobbit_ and LOTR appears to be the black
cover with the "geeky guy in the winged helmet" (that's King Elessar after his
coronation, BTW :-).  However, many bookstores still have the previous
paperback, with _Hobbit_ in yellow, and LOTR in blue, red, and green (each
volume), and _The_Silmarillion_ in bronze.

Whatever you buy, *please* buy a Ballantine paperback edition, or a Houghton
Miflin hardcover.  As Tolkien points out in his preface to _The_Hobbit_, the
other American editions were pirate copies, and don't pay royalties.
HM/Ballantine is the authorized U.S. publisher.
						-- Mike Kelsey
-- 
[  My opinions are not endorsed by SLAC, Caltech, or the US government  ]
"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.  Attack ships on fire off
the shoulder  of Orion.   I've watched  C-beams glitter in  the darkness
near the Tannhauser Gate.  All these memories will be lost in time, like
tears in the rain."  -- Roy Batty
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: gds@york.cs.ucla.edu (Greg Skinner)
Subject: Re: Eowyn
Originator: gds@york.cs.ucla.edu
Reply-To: gds@cs.ucla.edu (Greg Skinner)
Organization: in your face!
Date: Sun, 20 Dec 92 00:01:04 GMT

In article <1gqt80INNn0e@gap.caltech.edu> laurence@cco.caltech.edu (Dustin Lee Laurence) writes:
>nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Nancy Lebovitz) writes:
>>Good point. However, it's also clear that the Rohirrim, as warriors,
>>are _inferior_ to Gondorians, precisely because liking war is a sign
>>of degeneration.

Waitaminnit ...

There are Gondorians, such as King Earnur and Boromir, who like war.

>I would say that Tolkien appears to have believed that women in general
>have better judgement and more wisdom than men in certain matters.
>Tolkien (understandably) seems to take the Beatitudes very seriously, and
>the attributes praised in the Beatitudes are rather feminine attributes
>in European civilization (and most others that come readily to mind).

I would say that Tolkien appears to have believed that peace loving
people in general have better judgment and more wisdom than war loving
people in certain matters.

>>Offhand, I think that the Eowyn/Faramir match may be the only example
>>of a woman marrying up in LOTR. It does back up the opinion that an
>>adventure is the only way of getting enough status/contact with one's
>>betters to marry one of them.

Depending on your point of view, Arwen "married up".  If she hadn't
married Aragorn (a King of two very large realms), she'd either have
wandered around Middle-Earth or left Middle-Earth.

--gregbo
From: leitm@solb1.essex.ac.uk (Leith M F)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Re: Tolkien a Racist?
Date: 17 Dec 92 15:57:50 GMT
Reply-To: leitm@essex.ac.uk (Leith M F)
Organization: University of Essex, Colchester, UK

Tolkien, as other posters have pointed out, makes much use of the "light and
darkness" contrasts.  What I have come to notice in some posts is that
some people are mixing up the two senses of "black" a great deal.  There has to
be a clear cut distinction between "black" in its negative, "evil" sense 
i.e bad prospects, bad events and "black" in its racial sense.  The two are
obviously *very* different things, and need to be realised as such.  I think
that Tolkien was aware of this clear cut distinction, and was not making
statements of racial superiority between white people and black people.
If Tolkien was clearly not anti-semitic (and Jews have been treated worse
than any race I can think of), I see no reason to suppose he had racist
opinions about black people. 
  
Mig.
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: kilhavn@idt.unit.no (Kjetil Kilhavn)
Subject: Re: Tolkien a Racist?
Reply-To: kilhavn@idt.unit.no (Kjetil Kilhavn)
Organization: Div. of CS & Telematics, Norwegian Institute of Technology
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 92 12:04:58 GMT

There has been many articles with a discussion on whether Tolkien was a racist or not, and among the arguments used most frequently are the references to colour, such as "a black evil".
I can't see why this should make him any more a racist than anybody else. After all our 
language is full of such sayings, i.e black magic, which is understood to be magic with an 
evil purpose, or at least not any good purpose. We had the plague here in the 15th (?) century
and it was called the black plague (at least in Norway where it was called "Svartedauen".)
There are probably many more examples.
Another argument is that the races that are considered to be lesser in his books have darker
complexion (nice word:-). This I can not debate, but it is something that belongs to our whole
culture (AND PARTICULARLY JJRTs HOMECOUNTRY) that white is good, black is bad. After all, why wasn't Jesus a negro? He ought to be, the way he was mistreated. (Not that I think we should mix this with religion.)
I'd think there were other (better) arguments to find, IF he really was a racist (which I have no opinion about.)
From: leitm@solb1.essex.ac.uk (Leith M F)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Morality of slaying Orcs (was Re: Thomas Covenant)
Date: 16 Dec 92 11:53:19 GMT
Reply-To: leitm@essex.ac.uk (Leith M F)
Organization: University of Essex, Colchester, UK

In article <1gl1s4INN25p@mirror.digex.com> dzik@access.digex.com (Joseph Dzikiewicz) writes:
>A couple points on this.  First, cavewights in Covenant (the equivalent
>of orcs) were equally as evil and deserving of death.  Covenant, and
>Foamfollower the giant, still felt guilt over killing them.  I found that
>refreshing.

Fair enough; but it seems rather pointless to suffer over slaying creatures 
who are 100% rotten to the core *and* are threatening ones life and lands.

> [paraphrase]
>I thought the game Legolas and Gimli played at the battle of Helms Deep
>was not from thirst for revenge.  It seemed to be more of a sporting
>contest.

The long standing feud between Orcs and Dwarves/Elves was clearly a motivation 
for Gimli and Legolas slaying them, at whatever battle they should be in.
The game, IMO, was simply a way of keeping their morale up in a desperate
situation.  If they knitted their brows in guilt every time they hacked an
Orc down, they wouldn't have survived five minutes!

>Third, the lack of guilt at killing in LOTR extends beyond killing orcs.
>No one seemed to mind killing Haradrim or Easterlings or any of the men in
>Sauron's army.  In fact, the only heroes of LOTR that seem to be in the
>habit of letting enemies live in potential combat situations are the 
>hobbits, starting with Bilbo holding back from killing Gollum.

Wrong.  All of the Dunlanders who surrendered at Helms Deep were released
(after an oath and a little burial work).  In the battle of the Pelannor
Fields, the Southrons and Easterlings were only wiped out because *they
refused to surrender*, being  "fierce in their despair" and hating Gondor
so much.  The fact we aren't subjected to endless guilt trips among the
good guys doesn't mean they don't feel any guilt at slaying fellow men.
But guilt would be needless in this situation anyway; they were simply 
defending their homelands from rampaging savage enemies who performed 
attrocities such as catapulting the mutilated heads of Gondor soldiers
over the walls of Minas Tirith.  

>Finally, if a preference against killing sentient beings is "political
>correctness," then let us hope that the world become politically correct
>in the near future...

Ouch! A rather misrepresentative parting dig there. :-) Perhaps I should have
chosen a different term to "political correctness". 
How about "pointless moralising" ?  Yes, that seems more apt.
I was trying to point out that morality has to have some element of pragmatism.
All of us (who are reasonable) hate the killing of sentient beings. But in the
situations in LoTR where the Good Guys kill, it is done because it was
necessary, i.e do or die.  The War of the Ring was broadly speaking about
*defending* what was good from the corrupt and evil. Again, I say that it
is pointless to split hairs about what is "ethically sound" in *these* cases.
The heroes did what they had to do.

Mig.
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: carney@rocky.rational.com (Mike Carney)
Subject: Re: Please, Sir, I want some more.
Organization: Rational, Santa Clara, CA
	<1992Dec10.165121.10988@stiatl.salestech.com>
Date: Fri, 11 Dec 1992 22:05:07 GMT


In article <1992Dec10.165121.10988@stiatl.salestech.com> rwt@stiatl.salestech.com (Roger Terrell) writes:
>Two series that I think are Tolkienesque are:
>
[ #1 deleted ]
>
>2) The Robert Jordan series.  I can't remember what the series is called.
>  I think the first book is "The eye of the world" or something like that.
>  Good Stuff!

Very good stuff! The name of the series is _The Wheel of Time_. So
far, 4 books in the series have been published:
        1. _The Eye of the World_
        2. _The Great Hunt_
        3. _The Dragon Reborn_
        4. _The Shadow Rising_

All of them are *very* good. Now for the bad news. I had a book signed
by Robert Jordan, and talked to him about the future of the series. He
said that he probably won't be able to tie up all the loose ends and
finish the series in less than about 8 books! That means 4 more
years!!!! I don't know if I'll make it :-)
--
  ___                                     ___ 
 (___)___________________________________(___)
  | |                       _   _+        | | 
  | |  Michael D. Carney   /_`-'_|  \+/   | | 
  | |  carney@rational.com \_`*'_| _<=>_  | |                    
  | |  Santa Clara, CA       `-' 0/ .[ /] | | 
  | |                            \/[.[//] | | 
  | |  "You can never really     | /_\/_/ | | 
  | |   know... anything."       | [] []  | | 
  | |   Heisenberg (paraphrased) | d! !b  | | 
  |_|_____________________________________|_|
 (___)                                   (___)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: carl@class.gsfc.nasa.gov (Carl F. Hostetter)
Subject: Re: The Disclaimer
Followup-To: alt.fan.tolkien
Organization: NASA/GSFC
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 16:25:24 GMT

In article <1gq62kINNs39@uwm.edu>, paulg@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Paul A
Gunderson) wrote:
> 
> In article <1992Dec12.011157.14583@leland.Stanford.EDU> jchokey@leland.Stanford.EDU (James Alexander Chokey) writes:
> >In article <1gb7eeINNijl@uwm.edu> paulg@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Paul A Gunderson) writes:
> >>
> >>It would be very hard to buy anything but the Ballantine edition at this
> >>point.
> >>
> >	No.  The Houghton-Mifflin editions are still widely available in
> >the U.S. They're a bit more expensive, to be sure--  but they are sturdier
> >and they're out there.
> >
> >	--  Jim Chokey <jchokey@leland.stanford.edu>
> 
> Right you are!  Of course, the Houghton-Mifflin editions are functionally
> the same as the Ballantine editions, i.e., both of these are the _revised_
> editions.
> 

Not exactly. The Houghton-Mifflin edition is the most authritative.
It incorporates many corrections that were left
out of the Ballantine paperbacks. Also, the Houghton-Mifflin 
pagination is the standard for scholarly citation.

|===================================================================|
|         Carl F. Hostetter      carl@class.gsfc.nasa.gov           |
|                                                                   |
|                    Ars longa, vita brevis.                        |
|          The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.            |
|  "I wish life was not so short," he thought.  "Languages take     |
|  such a time, and so do all the things one wants to know about."  |
|===================================================================|
From: rwang@husc8.harvard.edu (Richard Wang)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
Subject: Re: Aragorn: (was Re: Movie roles)
Date: 13 Dec 92 01:00:42 GMT
 <7742@news.duke.edu> <1992Dec8.184150.1958@ra.msstate.edu> <Bz4AED.K7q@cantua.canterbury.ac.nz>

>I seem to recall that, when he was trying to get the hobbits to accompany him,
>Aragorn said of himself, "I am older than I look. I might prove useful".

>Sounds to me like he had a somewhat youthful (though perhaps tatty) appearance.

Yes, but what he meant, I believe, was that he was simply longer-lived
than common Men.  To them, he looked weather-beaten and aged *for his
years*, but they thought he was about forty.  He was in fact over eighty
thanks to his lineage (I seem to remember Elros Tar-Minyatur living for
about 500 years!).  So he was indeed older than he looked, but he still
looked pretty ravaged by wind, weather, and time.  There's a part in
"Fellowship" where Sam jokes about all of them starting to look like
Strider and Aragorn replies that they would die first unless they were
made of sterner stuff than they looked.

Richard Wang
rwang@husc.harvard.edu
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
From: cary@carina.unm.edu (Ithlial the Archer)
Subject: Re: Balrogs vs. Ringwraiths ... and a questi
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 92 18:24:59 GMT
Organization: University of New Mexico, Albuquerque

In article <KETIL.92Dec14162659@spurv.ii.uib.no> ketil@ii.uib.no writes:
>Con: 
>
>Sauron wasn't a balrog, was he?  If not, what exactly was he?
>
If I remember correctly he was a Maia under Aule.

Ithlial

I bet the main reason the police keep people away from a plane crash 
is they don't want anybody walking in and lying down in the crash 
stuff, then, when some comes up, act like they just woke up and go, 
"What, was THAT?!"
  
  
 
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien