The One hundred and thirty-eighth Roving Ranger

Life and Works

May 24, 1973. Tolkien writes Letter 350 (Opens in a new window), relaying C.V.L. Lycett's comments about the T.C.B.S. (Opens in a new window) & Tolkien's current status.
May 25. 1972. Tolkien writes Letter 337 (Opens in a new window), on inspirations.
May 27, 1958. Tolkien writes a letter to Nancy Smith (Opens in a new window) on the index to The Lord of the Rings.
May 28, 1964. Tree and Leaf (Opens in a new window) is first published in the UK.
May 30, 1945. Tolkien writes Letter 100 (Opens in a new window), expressing his loathing for warplanes.
May 24, 2014. Special mention: The Beowulf Launch Party (Opens in a new window), supported by the Tolkienist (Opens in a new window). [See also Tolkien Society (Opens in a new window).]

• T.A. (Opens in a new window) 3019 (Opens in a new window). Arwen (Opens in a new window) and Elrond (Opens in a new window) leave Lothlórien (Opens in a new window) on their way to Minas Tirith (Opens in a new window). [May 27]

Events & Shows

Marie Bretagnolle will be giving a talk (Opens in a new window) with the Mythopoeic Society Online MidSummer Seminar (Opens in a new window) [Aug 2-3]

InBound Brew in Minneapolis have a LotR-themed day (Opens in a new window). [May 24]

The New York Tolkien Conference has announced its Artist Guest of Honor: Donato Giancola (Opens in a new window).

The Italian Tolkien event, La Contea Gentile, has shared photos of its recent get together (Opens in a new window).

As part of this year’s Odyssey of the Mind global competition, a Michigan school team (Opens in a new window) went for Classics… Cooking with Books (Opens in a new window) [PDF] and chose the Hobbit.

For all events check out the International Tolkien Fellowship (Opens in a new window) [FB] and the Tolkien Guide Calendar (Opens in a new window).

Scholarship & Fandom

Miriam Ellis has Henneth Annûn: A Window on Eru? (Opens in a new window)

Stephen C. Winter has “Maybe It Was the Ring That Called to The Wraith-lord, and For a Moment He Was Troubled.” A Contest of Powers Within the Morgul Vale (Opens in a new window).

James Tauber’s 2023 Oxonmoot talk has been found: Linguistic Variation in Tolkien's Writing Styles (Opens in a new window). [Youtube]

Dimitra Fimi has Reflections on Tolkien's Unfinished Tales (Opens in a new window). [Substack]

Miriam Ellis has Bilbo and the Butterflies: A Magnificent Escape as well as Unexpected Enchantment (Opens in a new window).

Robin Reid has some reading recommendations (Opens in a new window) as well as The Webs of Women update (Opens in a new window). [Substack]

Science’s ‘Gollum effect’: PhDs bear brunt of territorial behaviour (Opens in a new window) [Nature; see original publication with One Earth: Systemic territoriality in academia: The Gollum effect’s impact on scientific research and careers (Opens in a new window).]

The Spanish Tolkien Society has shared a Guide to Oxford (Opens in a new window), prepared for the first ‘organised’ visit by STE members in 2024. [PDF]

The Diary of a City Guard (Opens in a new window) as another installment.

Tolkien Trewsday has shared its June topic roster (Opens in a new window) on ‘celebrating fandom.’ [Bluesky]

Thoughts on Tolkien has Tolkien’s Liturgical Imagination (Opens in a new window).

Laura Stanifer has a very good description of how she became the Wade Center archivist (Opens in a new window) - if this is a career you are considering this still relevant post might be for you.

Tom Emmanuel has Fantastic Architecture: Studying Tolkien at the University of Glasgow (Opens in a new window).

doubtfulsea has By Ear (3) (Opens in a new window).

Christopher Lockett has Tolkien’s Uncanny Magic. (Opens in a new window) [Substack]

The Criterion has Home, Exile, and Displacement in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit (Opens in a new window)¹. [College of the Holy Cross]

Michael Drout’s The Tower and the Ruin has a cover. [Dec 2025; pre-order with Blackwell’s (Opens in a new window) UK | Bookshop.org (Opens in a new window) US | Genialokal (Opens in a new window)]

Merchandise & Franchise

Artist David Wenzel has published the title page to the ‘new’ Hobbit comic (Opens in a new window). [Instagram]

This hardcover edition has 40 new paintings for the story and a back section with additional artwork and notes on my creation process.

Personally happy to see that LotRO now has an official account with Bluesky (Opens in a new window).

LotR make-up² is now available with Glamlite (Opens in a new window).

'Making of The Lords of the Rings: The Rings of Power' roundtable panel (Opens in a new window). [Youtube]

Games Workshop has some free scenarios to download (Opens in a new window) for MESBG.³

Inter alia

Are Pop Lyrics Getting More Repetitive? (Opens in a new window)⁴ [The Pudding; on language compression]

Amazing posts on maps of Oxford (Opens in a new window)⁵.

Baggins of Downing Street (Opens in a new window). [Tribune Magazine, UK]

How Silicon Valley’s influence in Washington benefits the tech elite (Opens in a new window) [TechCrunch; many of those companies are named after objects found with Tolkien’s stories.]

LibraryThing has just sent out its May State of the Thing (Opens in a new window), including an interview with Laura Spinney (Opens in a new window), author of Proto: How one ancient language went global. [Also includes all literature awards winner of last month, globally.]

Jurassic Park: Rebirth has a trailer (Opens in a new window).

Thinking about starting a newsletter, podcast, Patreon, Substack etc.?

Then do consider using Steady (Opens in a new window) - it is an exceptionally easy to use option for all needs. Built originally for an independent journalists’ collective, Krautreporter (Opens in a new window), it is run by creative minds for creative minds. Think Patreon, just better. It is based in Germany, free of enshittification (Opens in a new window) and nazis.

Do use my invite link (Opens in a new window) and start with three months fee-free.
[Transparency note: I get a small referral bonus with no extra costs to you.]

According to German law I have to inform you all links to enterprises, artists, products etc. are [unpaid advertisements.] Some purchase links may earn me a small commission from Blackwell's (Opens in a new window), Bookshop.org (Opens in a new window), or Genialokal (Opens in a new window), the (independent) bookshops of my personal trust (one with a Tolkien connection!)

If you are interested in my other Tolkien-related work please have a look:
The Tolkienist Blog (Opens in a new window) : Facebook (Opens in a new window) : Bluesky (Opens in a new window) : Instagram (Opens in a new window) : Threads (Opens in a new window) : Mastodon (Opens in a new window).

Have a look at all Roving Rangers published so far. (Opens in a new window)

As this is 2025 I would like to note that this newsletter is 100% human-made, curated by me, Marcel R. Bülles. This also holds true for everything I write with my blog and here at Steady. Also, the average time of curating this newsletter ranges from 12-16 hours for the bi-weekly edition and 6-8 hours for the weekly one.

1. h/t to Tolkien Gleanings #304 (Opens in a new window). ↩

2. h/t MGCoCo (Opens in a new window). [Bluesky] ↩

3. h/t to TableTopSentinel (Opens in a new window). ↩

4. h/t Adam Roberts (Opens in a new window). [Bluesky] ↩

5. h/t Bodleian Libraries (Opens in a new window). [Bluesky] ↩