The One hundred and forty-eighth Roving Ranger

-:- Strange as news from Bree -:-

Life and Works

August 1, 2008. Pauline Baynes (Si apre in una nuova finestra), Tolkien's favourite artist, dies.
August 2, 1964. Tolkien writes Letter 258 (Si apre in una nuova finestra), on the real-life usage of Tolkien's words.
August 2, 1966. Tolkien is interviewed by William Cater (Si apre in una nuova finestra) (see quote below).
August 3, 1991. Priscilla Tolkien (Si apre in una nuova finestra) speaks on "J.R.R. Tolkien: Scholar and Storyteller" at the Martin Luther King Memorial Library in Washington, D.C.
August 4, 1953. Tolkien (Si apre in una nuova finestra) is angry over the fact that an editor at Allen and Unwin (Si apre in una nuova finestra) has corrected dwarves to dwarfs, elvish to elfish, further to farther, and worst of all, elven to elfin.
August 5, 2002. The History of Middle-earth Index (Si apre in una nuova finestra) is published.
August 7, 1954. Tolkien writes Letter 148 (Si apre in una nuova finestra), on nasturtians, a busy year.

The English-speaking world is divided into those who have read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings and those who are going to read them.¹

Events & Shows

Aug 4-8, 2005. The first ever Omentielva (Si apre in una nuova finestra) takes place in Stockholm, the International Conference on J.R.R. Tolkien’s Invented Languages.

When visiting Oxford it has been quite strange not to have an official tourist information centre. The Clarion (Si apre in una nuova finestra) reports that the city has now ‘opened’ eleven so-called ‘tourism hubs’ (Si apre in una nuova finestra) to alleviate some of the issues.

The Pembroke College-based Tolkien Lecture is now available as a podcast (Si apre in una nuova finestra). [Spotify]

If you are in the Santa Cruz (CA) area you might like to join the Hobbit Hikers (Si apre in una nuova finestra). [Meetup]

Auditions for the 2025-2026 ACT! for Youth season will be for The Hobbit at Wilson Art (Si apre in una nuova finestra); this weekend (NC).

Tolkien Society Seminar 2025 – Arda’s Entangled Bodies and Environments (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Oct 18-19]²

As this is the first home game of the season the only Tolkien-inspired football fan club worldwide, Jenas Tirith (Si apre in una nuova finestra), will be out in full force, with Tolkien scholar guest Hamish Williams (Si apre in una nuova finestra) joining us at stadium block G = Gandalf. [See Instagram for photos (Si apre in una nuova finestra)]

For all events check out the International Tolkien Fellowship (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [FB] and the Tolkien Guide Calendar (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

Scholarship & Fandom

Thoughts on Tolkien has Tolkien’s Greek Horsemen (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

Oronzo Cilli has The Wilton Diptych: a gift from Tolkien to the Convent of Santa Colette in Assisi (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

doubtfulsea has Pippin (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

Society calls for Tolkien to feature on a new bank note (Si apre in una nuova finestra)[Tolkien Society; see also BBC (Si apre in una nuova finestra)]

The archivist in charge of 11,000 pages of original Lord of the Rings drafts at Marquette University (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Milwaukee Tonight]

Merchandise & Franchise

Rebecca Romney has an uncorrected proof of Tree & Leaf, owned by W.H. Auden (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Youtube]

Office Dog Game has Announcing The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers™ Trick Taking Game (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

A Return to Moria expansion is coming at the end of this year (Si apre in una nuova finestra). [GameSpot]

The Rings Of Power Season 3 Enters Production As Amazon Teases Sauron’s Return (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Empire]

The Free League LotR RPG starter set has just been published (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

It's been a rough decade for Lord of The Rings games (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Polygon]

Inside the struggle to create a cozy Lord of the Rings game (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Verge]

The first reviews are coming in: Tales of the Shire. IGN (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | Polygon (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | PC Gamer (Si apre in una nuova finestra) (Youtube) | Guardian (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | Tea with Tolkien (Si apre in una nuova finestra) (Bluesky) | TolkienGuide, by Urulókë (Si apre in una nuova finestra)

• dreadfully boring and extremely buggy [IGN]

• It's a great premise, but these Hobbitses fail to stick the landing [Polygon]

• too cosy for comfort [Guardian]

• A game that could’ve been life-changing ended up pretty “meh”… 6/10 [Tea with Tolkien]

Inter alia

There’s A Huge Petition To Rename Birmingham Airport After Ozzy Osbourne – And BHX Has Responded With Its Plans To Honour The Black Sabbath Legend (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Secret Birmingham; JRRT named]

‘South Park’ Season 27 Premiere Draws Nearly 6M Viewers, Marks Franchise’s Biggest Cable Share Since 1999 (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Cartoon Brew]

Given the fact that I am on a ST: VOY rewatch right now this looks fun to me: Star Trek: Starfleet Academy (Si apre in una nuova finestra) | First Look Teaser [Youtube]

Brian Sibley has Tom Lehrer (Si apre in una nuova finestra).

Simon Tolkien Shares His Writing Secrets! (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Youtube]

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Have a look at all Roving Rangers published so far. (Si apre in una nuova finestra)

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. William Cater (Si apre in una nuova finestra), The Sunday Times (UK), 2 January 1972. ↩

2. h/t Ian M (Si apre in una nuova finestra) [Bluesky] ↩