The One hundred and eighty-eighth Roving Ranger

Life & Works

J. R. R. Tolkien’s Soul’s Ward: A critical edition of his unpublished translation of the early Middle English homily Sawles Warde (Abre numa nova janela) [OUP]

Dimitra Fimi notes on Bluesky (Abre numa nova janela) [plus manuscript pages]

NEW TOLKIEN JUST OUT: delighted to see “JRR #Tolkien’s (Abre numa nova janela) Soul’s Ward: A critical edition of his unpublished translation of the early Middle English homily Sawles Warde” edited by Andoni Cossio and Nelson Goering (…) Chuffed to have played a minor role in this…

Telegraph (Abre numa nova janela) (paywall)

The way the internet is going reliable information will be more difficult to find every day - so a curated newsletter like the Roving Ranger is more needed than ever.
Share it, let people know! Thank you 😊

Events & Shows

Visit this year’s EuroCon and meet me (Abre numa nova janela) 😇

The Tolkien Society has announced its seminar date and topic: Tolkien’s Invented Languages (Abre numa nova janela) [Nov 21; CfP deadline is 31st July]

History came alive for third-graders at Heritage Elementary (Abre numa nova janela), Byron Center, Michigan, USA [School News Network; including Tolkien]

If you are in the Rochester (New York, USA) area check out this request on Craigslist to start a Tolkien reading group (Abre numa nova janela).

Reviews on the Stratford Festival’s Hobbit: The Road Goes On, But the Adventure Never Quite Arrives for Stratford’s “The Hobbit (Abre numa nova janela)” [Front Mezz Junkies] | Stratford Festival’s unimaginative ‘Hobbit’ strips the colour and heart from the beloved novel (Abre numa nova janela) [Toronto Star] | The Stratford Festival's The Hobbit is an Exciting Adventure (Abre numa nova janela) [Broadway World]

Composer & Sound Designer Debashis Sinha Talks About The Hobbit At The Stratford Festival (Abre numa nova janela) [Ludwig Van]

The Family Pinecone Book Club in the Art Center East has a number of reading performances of The Hobbit (Abre numa nova janela) in June [La Grande, Oregon, USA]

The Hobbit will be staged at the Alberta Theatre Projects (Abre numa nova janela) [Dec 1 - Jan 3, 2027; Calgary, Canada]

The Zephyr Theatre will do an outdoor edition of The Hobbit (Abre numa nova janela) [July 23 - Aug; Stillwater, Minnesota, USA]

Bedrock Gardens are having their Annual Fairy and Hobbit Festival again (Abre numa nova janela) [Jul 17-19; Lee, New Hampshire, USA]

Registration is now open (Abre numa nova janela) for June 19-21, 2026.

For all events check out the Tolkien Guide (Abre numa nova janela).

Scholarship & Fandom

A documentary about the Tolkien Society Forodrim (Abre numa nova janela) is now live with Kickstarter.

Dimitra Fimi has The Slow LotR Re-read (7): "hobbit talk" and non-standard English (Abre numa nova janela) as well as The Slow LotR Re-read (8): Sam Gamgee, folklore, and the numinous (Abre numa nova janela) [Substack]

Robin Reid has Pope Leo, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Peter Thiel (Abre numa nova janela)¹,

Shawn E Marchese has Dispatch from Westmoot 2026 (Abre numa nova janela) [Substack]

French Tolkien scholar Vincent Ferré has participated² in Les mondes et les peuples de la fantasy (Abre numa nova janela), a Radio France four part documentary podcast on fantastic worlds.

The 2026 Mythopoeic Awards Finalists (Abre numa nova janela) have been announced.³

Tolkien Guide has an interview with Giuseppe Pezzini, editor of J.R.R. Tolkien and G.B. Smith (Abre numa nova janela) [Youtube]

A new book has been announced: Tolkien's Material Culture by Marie Loughlin (Abre numa nova janela) [Bloomsbury; it seems to be an expansion of this Tolkien Studies article (Abre numa nova janela)]

John Garth has Tolkien, the critics, and why I’m starting an Oxford DPhil on Lord of the Rings and war (Abre numa nova janela) [Steady]

A new special issue with the Journal of Tolkien Research has the topic Asexuality in Tolkien's Legendarium (Abre numa nova janela).

Tom Hillman has "Galadriel," he murmured (Abre numa nova janela) [Blogspot]

The Silmarillion — Clowes Intermediate Second State (Abre numa nova janela) (1977) [Blogspot]

Delving too deep: Morphological and molecular description of the cave-dwelling Dolichopoda balrogi (Abre numa nova janela) sp. nov. [Journal of Othoptera; new type of cave cricket]

Matej Cadil has Mushrooms in Middle-earth (Abre numa nova janela) [Substack]

Miriam Ellis has Galadriel's Weavers and Glorious Glimpses in The Lord of the Rings (Abre numa nova janela) and Edith's Dance for J.R.R. Tolkien at Roos and the problem of war (Abre numa nova janela).

Anke Eissmann has…

Abigail Nussbaum has The Great Tolkien Reread: The Council of Elrond, Part 2 (Abre numa nova janela) [Blogspot]

doubtfulsea has Tennis, Anyone? (Abre numa nova janela)

Stephen C. Winter has “The Red Arrow Has Not Been Seen in The Mark in All My Years.” Rohan Receives The Call for Aid From Gondor. The Importance of Strong Ritual (Abre numa nova janela) and “So We Come To It in The End… The Great Battle of Our Time, in Which Many Things Shall Pass Away.” A Great Cloud Comes From Mordor That Simplifies The Mind of Théoden (Abre numa nova janela).

Distant reading of The Lord of the Rings: visualization and statistical analyses of its character network (Abre numa nova janela) [Springer Nature]

Audiobook Review: The World of Tolkien (Abre numa nova janela) [by Dimitra Fimi]

If you are more comfortable following me and my ventures via WhatsApp - here’s the Travelling Tolkienist Channel (Abre numa nova janela). 📝

Merchandise & Franchise

As one of the early Tolkienian-named companies (and now licensee of MEE) Rivendell Mountain Works (Abre numa nova janela) have recently shared their new Lupine day packs [read up on their early days as Middle-earth fans (Abre numa nova janela); and if any of you feel like Xmassing me - it’s either wine & coyote or brown & navy!]

Free League Publishing has shared: Available Now: New Middle-earth RPG Releases Explore Saruman, Isengard, and the Shire (Abre numa nova janela) [Mailchimp]

Stone Blade Entertainment have shared a first update on The Lord of the Rings: Ascension (Abre numa nova janela) [GameFound; some of the artwork from the game]

Brick Fanatics has LEGO Minas Tirith Siege Tower instructions revealed (Abre numa nova janela).

Brick Tap has leaked the next major LotR LEGO project: the Oliphaunt (Abre numa nova janela) [Instagram]

Amazon Still Wants to Make a Lord of the Rings Game (Abre numa nova janela) Despite Canceling the MMO It Was Working On [IGN]

German heo group has announced additional Hobbit Squaroes items - like Radagast (Abre numa nova janela) [a brand of the Ultimate Group]

Dark Horse the latest publisher to unionize (Abre numa nova janela) [icV2; part of Embracer and offering Middle-earth related merch like Gollum (Abre numa nova janela)]

Exciting news of film exploring the magic of fandom and friendship (Abre numa nova janela) [TORn; on Wise Sam Gamgees]

The Board Games Insider has episode #421 The One About Small Publishers Getting Tolkien Licenses. (Abre numa nova janela)

German podcasters Annika Röttinger & Tobias M. Eckrich (chairman of the German TS) have started a project for #PrideMonth titled “Das Auenland ist bunt” (Abre numa nova janela) with a message of diversity and inclusion.

Inter alia

John Boorman’s son mentioned that for the Lord of the Rings film project sheep were supposed to replace… extras (Abre numa nova janela) [Instagram]

Numbers from the UK: Publishing reaches highest ever revenue in 2025 (Abre numa nova janela) [Publishers Association]

My favourite webradio is celebrating its 25th Anniversary with a new look for its website and quite a few other perks if you support it: Radio Rivendell (Abre numa nova janela).

You may consider them a traditional feature of Oxford colleges but they really aren’t as you migth believe: Should colleges scrap the quad? (Abre numa nova janela) [Oxford Blue]

One way of following Oxford’s cultural history was Nightshift - and the last issue has hit the stands and the web (Abre numa nova janela).⁴

SFWA Announces 61st Annual Nebula Awards Winners (Abre numa nova janela).⁵

YouTube Is Taking Over Hollywood: How Three Films From Online Creators Are Dominating the Box Office Right Now (Abre numa nova janela) [Comic Basis]

‘The Mandalorian And Grogu’ (Abre numa nova janela) Will Set An Unfortunate ‘Star Wars’ Record [Forbes]

RIP John Blanche (Abre numa nova janela) [Wertzone; he also did Tolkien illustrations (Abre numa nova janela), found with the Bestiary]

Benny Johnson (Abre numa nova janela)'s advice for Trump on Iran: Be like Smaug from The Hobbit. “You got to go full dragon in Lord of the Rings, and scorched-earth the entire town” (Abre numa nova janela) [Media Matters]

Ansible 467 (Abre numa nova janela) has arrived. My favourite quote?

Terry Pratchett (Abre numa nova janela)’s works are apparently teetering on the brink of oblivion, according to someone called Helen Lewis: ‘One of England’s funniest writers is in danger of being lost to history.’ (The Atlantic, May) The point of the clickbait headline is that Lewis feels there’s never been a successful screen adaptation and Terry’s reputation can’t possibly survive on the strength of mere old-fashioned books.

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

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Do use my invite link (Abre numa nova janela) and start with three months fee-free.
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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 (Abre numa nova janela), Bookshop.org (Abre numa nova janela), or Genialokal (Abre numa nova janela), 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 (Abre numa nova janela) : Facebook (Abre numa nova janela) : Bluesky (Abre numa nova janela) : Instagram (Abre numa nova janela) : Threads (Abre numa nova janela) : Mastodon (Abre numa nova janela) - and have a look at all Roving Rangers published so far. (Abre numa nova janela)

As this is 2026 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 minimum time of curating this newsletter ranges from 8-12 hours every week. Please consider supporting me so I can continue offering the Roving Ranger - thank you.

1. Robin is so kind as to mention my talk at the 2019 Birmingham Tolkien Conference. ↩

2. h/t LinkedIn (Abre numa nova janela). ↩

3. h/t File770. ↩

4. h/t Oxford Clarion (Abre numa nova janela), Jun 2, 2026 edition. ↩

5. h/t File 770. ↩