The One hundred and thirty-third Roving Ranger

Life and Works

April 18, 1917. Tolkien and Christopher Wiseman (Opens in a new window), the Great Twin Brethren, meet in Harrogate, and discuss the fate of the Barrovians (Opens in a new window) and the future of the Society.
April 20, 1973. Tolkien writes a letter to John Higgins (Opens in a new window), declining the request to be part of a literary jury.
April 23, 1925. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Opens in a new window) is first published.
April 25, 1954. J.R.R. Tolkien (Opens in a new window) writes Letter 144 (Opens in a new window) to Naomi Mitchison on The Lord of the Rings (Opens in a new window) and languages (Opens in a new window),

• Third Age, 2841. Thráin (Opens in a new window) sets out for the Lonely Mountain (Opens in a new window), Balin and Dwalin with him. [April 21]

Events & Shows

I have published my report of the first ever Omentië Nolwë conference in Zurich, Switzerland.

Tolkien's Medieval Worldbuilding (Opens in a new window) is a talk given as part of the Medieval Fair Free Lectures Series in Oklahoma (Opens in a new window) [April 18]

Meet the amazing Shawn Marchese at the Greater Austin Book Festival (Opens in a new window) and get a signed copy of Why We Love Middle-earth [April 26]

The Arden Theatre Company has a trailer for their Hobbit (Opens in a new window) [Youtube]

If you feel like combining the City Nature Challenge with a visit to Sarehole Mill, April 25th is a good day to visit (Opens in a new window) [Birmingham Museums]

The New York Tolkien Conference has added Tom Hillman as guest speaker (Opens in a new window).

A new LotR LCG event is coming to France: La Communauté des Cartes (Opens in a new window) [Instagram; May 31; h/t Lure of Middle-earth (Opens in a new window)]

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

Mythlore’s Volume 43, Number 2 (Opens in a new window)(Spring/Summer 2025, #146) has much to offer; Tom Emanuel’s An Aspirational Cultus? Tolkien Fandom at the Borders of Belief (Opens in a new window) is just one of the many interesting pieces.

The Journal of Tolkien Research has added Sounds of Battle and Battle of Sounds: Belliphonic in Tolkien (Opens in a new window).

Ardacraft has How we're building trees for Middle-earth (Opens in a new window) [Youtube]

Stephen C. Winter has “I Looked For no Such Friendship as You Have Shown. To Have Found it Turns Evil to Great Good.” The Redeeming Friendship of Frodo and Faramir. (Opens in a new window)

Henry Gee has proven his comedic qualities once again (Opens in a new window), making light fun of a certain recent “de-extinction” with paragraphs like this:

Ents
In ‘Project Treebeard’, scientists at Humungous Biosciences have been trying to create ents by splicing actin and myosin genes into banyan trees. The results have been encouraging, if disconcerting. The trees really do seem to move around, but only when nobody is looking.

The Exeter College magazine EXON has a piece on Tolkien’s poetry (Opens in a new window) [PDF¹]

The Oxford Tolkien Network on Youtube has added five videos to its channel (Opens in a new window).

The British Fantasy Society Journal has a call for submissions for their winter special issue: War in Fantasy (Opens in a new window), with Tolkien being named as potential topic.

doutbfulsea has Lingua Orca (Opens in a new window).

Adam Roberts has On Tolkien's ‘Lay of Leithian’ (1925-31) (Opens in a new window) [Substack]

The Tolkien Scciety has announced the shortlist for The Tolkien Society Awards (Opens in a new window) 2025; members can now vote until April 25 (Opens in a new window).

Merchandise & Franchise

An adorable new Hobbit board game is coming from tabletop legend Reiner Knizia (Opens in a new window) [Wargamer]

Weta Workshop is already stirring the proverbial Hobbit cooking pot with Oven Mitten Sets, Tea Towels, and Ingredients of the Shire (Opens in a new window) [Tales of the Shire merchandise]

Lord of the Rings Online has announced compensation for all the server transfer woes (Opens in a new window)[Massively OP]

At the time of writing the Lord of the Rings Fountain Pen & Ink Collection (Opens in a new window) Kickstarter was financed at 9287% of the originally asked for sum.

The Burgschneider Middle-earth Adventures - The Brandywine Festival (Opens in a new window) Kickstarter was financed at 398% of the originally asked for sum (the starting sum was much higher to begin with than the Ferris Wheel Press one.)

Not a huge fan of the Shmun but they have Lord of the Rings to get HUGE attraction in new UK theme park – 30 years after first film hit screens (Opens in a new window) [Sun]

The script for LotR: Hunt for Gollum, written by Philippa Boyens (?), might be turned in this May (Opens in a new window) [Deadline]

Inter alia

File770 has: Op-Ed: “No More Worldcons in the United States?” (Opens in a new window); another view is: Worldcon In An Age Of American Truculence (Opens in a new window). In answer Mike Glyer wrote: Op-Ed: Solidarity Not Divisiveness. (Opens in a new window)

Jean Marsh (Upstairs, Downstairs; Willow; Dr. Who) has passed away. [Wertzone (Opens in a new window) | Guardian (Opens in a new window) | Big Finish (Opens in a new window) ]

Quite a few Pratchett fans² will rejoice: Announcing the Discworld Graphic Novel Universe (Opens in a new window) [TP Estate]

An important question that should be compared with other countries: Do Charity Bookshops Drive Out Other Second-Hand Bookshops? (Opens in a new window) [Wormwoodiana; this is on the UK³; do also read the follow-up (Opens in a new window)]

The big idea: will sci-fi end up destroying the world? (Opens in a new window) [Guardian]

Jeff LaSala has Faith & Heresy. (Opens in a new window)

Finally, an Affordable Reprint of Medusa by E.H. Visiak (Opens in a new window) [Wormwoodiana]

We need more heroes like this, that is, we need more Jason Statham!

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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 Tolkien Gleanings #297 (Opens in a new window) ↩

2. I am definitely looking forward to this as I am Moist von Lipwig ↩

3. h/t Tolkien Gleanings #297 (Opens in a new window) ↩