How to successfully read Tolkien's THE SILMARILLION

J.R.R. Tolkien's THE SILMARILLION provides the cosmology behind his best know works THE LORD OF THE RINGS and THE HOBBIT. It presents all that came before, preparing Middle-earth for the War of the Ring. But lacking the same storytelling structure of those best known works, Tolkien's legendarium can present challenges to readers. Here we talk strategies, resources and tips for readers who may find the names, geography and massive volume of characters to be a challenge.

But if you are for the challenge, arm yourself with this advice and prepare to be richly rewarded by one of Tolkien's essential works. 

Transcript

Sauron, is the title character in J.R.R. Tolkien's most famous work; Many would say his greatest work, though not all. The Lord of the Rings is not the darkest dark Lord or the baddest bad guy in Tolkien's legendarium.

Without any doubt, that title belongs to Melkor whose who was so bad that they changed his name to Morgoth. At his best, he was able to help create and shape the world. And at his worst, he killed or destroyed or stole the most beautiful, valuable, wondrous creations in all of existence. And the greatest elves that ever walked in middle earth were bent solely on regaining their treasures and defeating Morgoth, who they hated nearly or as much as he hated them. 

This conflict between the elves and other races in middle earth and Morgoth is the meat of what makes up Tolkien's The Silmarillion. One of these elves, named a single orphan, saw the utter ruin of what he perceived as the other utter ruin of his people. I'm going to read a passage from The Silmarillion about single Finn and his challenge. His one-to-one personal elf to immortal being challenged at the gates of Angband mill course fortress.

And then this podcast, The Tolkien Podcast, is going to discuss ways that you, a reader, can mine the great treasures of Tolkien's challenging but rewarding work. THE SILMARILLION. 

We all know middle earth from maps in Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, but before that, the world was different. It was changed by great destructive forces. And in those days, in The Silmarillion days, it was called Valerian and the elves. The great elves who had lived in Paradise with the Valar were fighting Morgoth. And it points here and there. Often things did not go well. In chapter 18 of The Silmarillion.

It's titled Of The Ruins of Belleriand, and in the fall of Gondolin. It is into that chapter, as it seemed to him, the utter ruin of the Noldor, which is a word for elves, and the defeat beyond the redressal for their house.

"It seemed to him the wrath of the Lord bear, that he mounted upon Rakhal or his great horse, and rode forth alone, and none might restrain him. Thus he came alone to Angband. Gates. Angband is the fortress of Melkor, and he sounded his horn, and smote once more upon the Brazen doors, and challenged Morgoth to come forth to single combat, and Morgoth came."

Those are just a few of the words of one of my favorite passages in The Silmarillion. Although favorite seems to change by whatever was read last or most recent, or whatever sticks out most in your mind. It's a big, massive book. Lots of characters, lots of names, and lots of favorites from time to time. I was reading from my best copy of that book. I couldn't find my reader's copy. I try to generally have a copy I can beat up and a copy to keep preserved, and I only found the preserved copy which, as all Silmarillion editions are, is edited by Christopher Tolkien and written by J.R.R. Tolkien. 

This particular version was illustrated by the great, one of the greats, one of the all-time great Tolkien illustrators Ted Naismith and I discovered that mine is signed by Ted Naismith. And I know that we've met and talked, but I cannot remember the circumstances or how that happened. I don't remember if he visited Salt Lake City or if I was elsewhere, but he signed a nice note.

Bigger point in the back of that book, there's a foldout map, a glossy, beautiful map of malaria, and the which, will help a reader a lot, except that I would never want to read that copy of the book and get the map. Fold the map out a bunch of times it's attached, and I'd be afraid it's too fragile.

So, I need to get myself to a bookstore and find a beta copy of The Silmarillion. And when I say reader's copy, I mean the one that you can, fold down the corners of the pages. You can mark, you can take notes, you can underline, you can write, c page, blah, blah, blah, or whatever else. 

So some people might do that to their Ted Naismith illustrated hardback version. I'm not going to. I've said many times on this podcast, and we'll say many more times on this podcast, I am not a Tolkien scholar. I do not make that claim. I've known many, I've interviewed many. But, that is not my qualification. I am a journalist, which means I interview people and collect and report what I learn. 

One of the things I know about The Silmarillion is that we pronounce it funny in English. We do what's called a schwa. Which is sort of an extra vowel sound. This leaves us saying Silmarillion, but in Tolkien's languages, the vowels, they're not pronounced two different ways. They have a sound per vowel. So you don't ever say the vowels. Name is it sound? O is not pronounced o. E is not pronounced e. They. They each have unique sound. So when in Silmarillion, Silmarillion, the o sound should get it all sound, but not as. But we use a Swann English, so we say Silmarillion eon. I'm going to do my best to say Silmarillion, but it isn't what anyone hears. It isn't what most people say when you talk to Tolkien fans, so sometimes they won't get it right.

Listen, I'm not going to be perfect. As I said before, I'm not a talking scholar, and I'm certainly not a token linguist, although it would be great to have both of those on the show. There are people who would dispute that the Silmarillion is hard to read. I don't believe them. Perhaps it's not hard to read if you've done the legwork and put in the time and have a grasp, but for a first time reader sitting down and cracking that page open, it's not unlike reading the Bible or perhaps more Bullfinch's Mythology.

There are those who claim that The Silmarillion is their favorite of Tolkien's works. I think I just said Silmarillion. The Silmarillion is their favorite of Tolkien's work, and my first reaction to that is that I don't initially believe that. I wonder if, that's a way of Tolkien aficionados Tolkien eighths saying that. Look how well I know the Lord. I like The Silmarillion better than The Lord of the Rings, but I actually do believe them. They are. There are some deeply rich gems to be mined from The Silmarillion, and those who put in the time and effort have, probably earned the pleasure that they get from the work.

Now, what I hope today is to help you be one of those people and to not make it as hard or as daunting as it might be. Now, there are those among us who are predisposed to be brilliant, or I don't know, maybe to read on a whole different level than the rest of us. I remember as a kid, I probably read well above my grade average, and I felt that somewhat like, "how are these things hard for you?" I recall going to the library and reading that Bullfinch's Mythology, which, by the way, was made in the 1860s by a banker who also loved Latin.

The brilliance of the book was that he took Greek myths and made it accessible to the masses. And that's not very different from what The Silmarillion is. It is the mythology of middle earth, as told by elves, where we are essentially reading, of course, written by J.R.R. Tolkien. We were essentially reading Elven mythology, the tales and the legends and the stories that essentially define Elven culture for us short lived humans. So the reasons that it's challenging are the same reasons that it's great.

It has the mythology feeling does not have the narrative structure that The Lord of the Rings has. So this is not a story that with a beginning and a middle and an end, rather, it has many stories. It has many beginnings, middles and ends. And the way they're presented, ties them together, but not completely. And there's sidebars and side stories. What makes Tolkien great? What makes his world believable, what makes his language rich, What makes us feel as though we are witnessing culture and history is that he was a linguist, a philologist, that means the origin of words, a philologist who loved names.

So when he would have a name in his mythology, his cosmology, it would have a meaning. And these stories give those names, meanings. So that's the great part. But the challenging part is that people have wild and crazy names in essentially foreign languages. It's also challenging because these names with meanings such as Melkor becoming Morgoth. That isn't just random words. Tolkien use those in his language that his both of those names mean something to, you guess, elves.

So in the process of talking, imbuing his names with meaning, giving them history and culture, it means the names change, those very names change and they change in the same language. But because he also has a long, long history of elves who are conflicted with one another, it means that they change. Sometimes in multiple languages. And there's also Dwarves. We occasionally get names in those languages, so we're we're dealing with several cultures and names and languages, but even in one language, character can have several names. Not the most important character, but really useful.

For the illustrative point here, we can talk about Turin, the only son of Huron. He's the only son of Huron and his wife. More when Ellen went in Turin. Turinbar is in fact his name. The tale of the Children of Turin is is, both part of The Silmarillion and its own breakout book, later published by Christopher Tolkien. He had a sister named Erwin, who everyone called Lilith, I think is how you pronounce it. But she died in childhood. The first part of, the hard Life of Turin. And he was captured, and, and did all these many things. And so because he had a complex and, a highly eventful life, he has many names.

Tor Ambar, the master of fate to Remus, which is a Sindarin, or the another elf language, from Turinbar, nicknamed the wrong the gore or Thor the Dread home. On and on. More Miguel is one of my favorites, which means the Black Sword, which he had so I even tried to skip some of the more complex names, but he I mean, I think he has at least ten names, and he's one guy and he has a mother, father who have similar names. I guess his mother's name is and similar, but his father's name is, his sister's name is.

And so there's lots of names. That's one of the things that makes The Silmarillion difficult. Now, that is not limited to The Silmarillion. We know we all know Aragorn, I think from The Lord of the Rings. If, by the way, if you don't know where you're going and you've wandered here somehow into a Tolkien Podcast. Thanks. That's really brave of you. So Aragorn or Eleassar or Wingfoot or Thoringil —that’s wrong. And Strider.

Even so, that's there's probably others, Longshanks. And in fact, he was called the Dunedain, which is Sindarin for men of the West. But his people were the Dunedain. So the people of the West. So, yes, this all can be pretty confusing. We also know Gandalf had many manes. The point is, Tolkien loves words and loves names. So as you go, as any person goes through The Silmarillion, you're bombarded by locations, rivers, mountains, continents, and people who have lots of names.

And then is these significant events, these monumental events, actually, because they're mythological level as they happen, place names change and that's wonderful. And that it gives a sense of culture that in language that this is called this because of this, like it's meaningful. It's not just, you know, some kid making up stuff on a map, which is, by comparison, how a lot of fantasy might feel, but that comes with the burden of being a challenging read. And that is why when people say The Silmarillion is easy to them, I'm a little skeptical. So let's jump in at last to some real, concrete, specific things that you can do to make The Silmarillion easier.

One of the first things that you can do is look at the organization of the book. There's a part one, a part two, and a part three and skip part one called the I Knew Linda Lindley, which is, about the creation of existence. And then go ahead and skip part two as well, the val cuenta, which is the account of the Vela and the Maya, which are sort of the gods and demigods according to the law of the elves. You can go back and read these later, but it literally is a list of characters. And it's it's not going to help you with the narrative.

So, blessed to be that far along in the book, right? You'll be way ahead in the book. It feels good to start with part three, I guess, but that's the meat of the story anyway. Or at least the meat of the story and many side dishes as well. The other thing that you can do, knowing the organization of the book, will really help you. In the very back, there's notes on pronunciation, which will make it's great. You know, you want to be a nerd and sound cool when you talk to your friends, but more importantly, it'll just gel in your mind a little better. There's an index of names. Remember I said you need a beta copy so you can fold your mark a page, or put a bookmark in or do something so you can go back to that index of names and be that, you know, help yourself.

Who is that? Oh yeah. It's right there for you. There's elements in Quenya and Sindarin names as well in the back. That's helpful. Index notes and pronunciation. I got those. What else? Oh, there's genealogies. There's five tables of genealogies. And again, that's not to help you be a nerd. That's to help you understand who's being spoken of in the genealogy. It's actually pretty important. But the most important of those, I think, is the first one, the House of sin Way, which helps you understand who all the many elves are. Not only are there many, factions of elves, but their names change over time and loyalty can even change. And they make peace and then, do terrible things. So that's really helpful.

That House of Finwe is really important. In fact, I would I would almost photocopy it, which sounds like blasphemy, if you have to bend the spine of a book, Or, I don't know, write it down, but I would keep that handy.

All those things. And then maybe, maybe the very best thing in the organization of the book section is there is a section in the book, it's on page 293 for me called Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age. And almost anyone who comes to The Silmarillion will have read The Lord of the Rings, or at the very least, have seen the films The Lord of the Rings, Peter Jackson's films, but any other as well. And there you can sort of get a feeling for the text of The Silmarillion.

It's not exact, but it's a better feeling, for it talks about Sauron and you'll be kind of into the style of The Silmarillion in very familiar territory that can help you get acclimated as well. So all of those things in the organization of the book can really help you as a reader. There will be those who want to take notes and maybe not in their book. It isn't a bad idea to get a legal pad or some kind of note book that you keep with your, with your reader copy of The Silmarillion. Maybe if it's depending on how big or small, I like a reporter's notebook with those kind of long, skinny pages and those tucked right inside the book, and they act as a good little bookmark as well. So that's not a bad idea.

In 1977, when The Silmarillion was first published, and that's actually after J.R.R. Tolkien died, it was his great dream to see that published never met with fruition. But his son Christopher got it done. Christopher has now passed as well in the meantime. Well, since then, since '77, when I was a spry lad watching STAR WARS for the first time, Christopher was busy, and a lot of the stories that are found in The Silmarillion are now books of their own. In much expanded versions, those include the story of Beren and Luthien, I think it's called of Beren and Luthien and the Children of Huron, which we've talked about him with all his names. They're more like the style of The Lord of the Rings, but not exactly.

And they can really help, you know, some of the stories in there now, they're not exactly the story, the pure story line, the main story line of The Silmarillion, but it will give you some comfort. So I, you know, I discussed before in what order to read Tolkien's works: https://www.buzzsprout.com/admin/2436415/website/background/edit

Those are great choices, actually, to read before coming to The Silmarillion proper. Still merrily on, I'm really not using the schwa if the problems. If you really were trying to read The Silmarillion and it's giving you some trouble, another option is to take a break and go read Unfinished Tales.

And in there there's little segments. They're chopped up. Nobody expects you to read that book, like straight through a storyline, but there's a part called Overture and The Coming of Gondolin, which is, a story from The Silmarillion. But the style is easy, or it's more like Lord of the rings style, and that can really be helpful to it.

It's a transition, is what I'm telling you. All these are optional transitions. We are also lucky enough you and I, to live in the age of the Tolkien nerd, or the token geek, or the geek age in general, of which J.R.R. Tolkien is largely responsible, not solely responsible, but mightily responsible for bringing about.

Well, in this nerd age that we live in, I was lucky enough to be in Germany one time at a token event, and I met a fellow named Emil, and he had developed what is called the Token project. I think it's a meal. Joe Hansen, don't hurt me or sue me if that's not correct. But I think that's true. And he made, an online project that was dedicated to, I think it's called the http://lotrproject.com/. It still exists. You can still look it up, although it hasn't been, maintained or updated for a while.

But it started out with genealogy of Tolkien and of middle earth and of Blair and and it was really popular and successful. So, Emil kind of expanded the project and he wanted to keep it nonprofit, which is really admirable. But that also means that you're not going to have time to work on it as much.

Kind of like this podcast as matter of fact, it's free, and I wish I could devote all my time to it, but, it's free, so I can't. I have to eat and, I can't even pay the internet bill, you know? Anyway, Emil had the same problem, only much bigger scope. And so, that's worth going to, even though it's not maintained. http://lotrproject.com/ has maps, has some broken stuff.

I think the timelines feel like they're broken, but it has a really good genealogy there, so that's helpful. We also have fan websites where people, people there have been token fans publishing things and helpful newsletters and things since maybe always, at least since the paperback versions were, not illegally but unjustly published in the United States. And it created a whole uprising of token fans. Since those days, at least, there have been newsletters and fandom who have been super enthusiastic about tokens work.

But we live in the age when it can be online and easily accessible. So, I don't know. One really great one, though, is the token gateway dot net. And if you want to go, their token gateway dot net, it's basically kind of a wiki. And people fans have contributed a lot. And you can find a lot of information and click some of the illustrations and images of middle earth as well, which can often help cement something in your mind. That's one thing I love about the illustrated version. The illustrated version of The Silmarillion.

In Ted Naismith's version is something like 40, 40, or 50 paintings in them of moments from The Silmarillion and the one they're awesome. But to it, that visual, just that moment of visual really helps kind of cement it all in your head. And sometimes the visuals in that book are, characters, but oftentimes they're not scenes. It's mountains, it's, cities. It's cool things like that that just make it a tiny bit more real. So take advantage of the nerd age that we live in. The internet age, the information age token gateway dot net on the message boards at The One Ring dot net, which is last time I looked, a website that is teetering under old — It's old, that they will probably have updated it soon, but the message boards there have a thing called the reading room where they take talking reading pretty seriously, and they're really good discussions.

And best of all, the community there is really, helpful and welcoming and generally polite. The community is really, in my opinion, the the best part of the wondering dot net. It does news and it does promotions and it does other things. But the heart and soul of that community is the message boards, and the reading room is probably the most, significant of those non social. But like last thing value although there's lots of other things that are also important. So the wondering dot net there is a gentleman doctor Corey Olsen, who I have met and really liked. Actually, I met him when I was part of the wondering dot net, and he sort of suggested a team up, and at the time that was, not accepted by people that weren't me, that were in charge. And then I just read recently that they seem to have formed a partnership of some kind. So that's smart. That's really good.

But Dr. Olsen is called the talking professor, by the way. He's not the only one. There are other. There are other professors of I don't know, maybe he is the only one that's dedicated to that. But talking is taught in universities. All over the place, and, and should be, by the way, I hold the position that he is the most important. Underline the capital letters. Italicized, bold. The most important author of the 20th century. I genuinely believe that to be true. But there's lots of higher education help for Tolkien's work. But the Silmarillion specific Silmarillion specifically that we're talking about. But the Tolkien professor is a good podcaster for that, and he has led discussion groups through The Silmarillion on and, I didn't absorb those as well as some other methods, and I'm going to talk about it in a minute.

But they sure do present a lot of ideas sometimes, especially the early ones. The sound quality isn't acceptable in my opinion, but they were learning podcasting and maybe technology had something to do with it. But the discussions are really good and I had a really good impression of Corey Olsen. I thought he was a cool dude. Another cool dude is Michael Martinez, is he is a Michael mchale-martinez.com.

He helped with the Tolkien track before the, short sighted people at DragonCon and eliminated the track. I would have definitely recommended that as a place to go. I do not do that any longer, but he, he basically is a person who can you can ask him any Tolkien trivia and he can answer to your face. And I know, that one talk show host on TV, sort of puts himself forward as the preeminent Tolkien scholar, as a guy who knows everything, but he doesn't. And, Michael Martinez actually might.

I do these shows with from notes, for sure. I don't script them out. I've tried scripting and I anyway, I do it from notes. Well, I think I've saved the very two best I just to last one of those is to get Karen Wynn Fonstadt's Atlas of Middle Earth.

This was a book written in 1981, published in 1981 by a cartographer. I'm sure you can guess her name because I just said it, but. Karen Wynn Fonstadt. Love to do fantasy Map. As a cartographer, she had the skills to really do it, and her book is really valuable. Instead of just having the, well, not just having the map of middle earth, which it does, but it also has the map of Bel-Air and which is, before the world was changed for the Third Age in The Lord of the Rings. And so, so it shows also like the migrations of the elves shows you the oceans, the inland ocean. It shows the mountain ranges, it shows the names which can be daunting and troublesome. So let's say you read that somebody in The Silmarillion went in the hyphen. And, it's a little confusing. You can't remember where that is. Or maybe you never knew because you don't have a map. Well, Karen, when font sets book makes it really clear and really easy. You can see east blurry and, and, anyway, all the things that get described and, you know, the, the book, as we've mentioned, throws a bunch of names at you and some are geography and some are people. And the book really helps clarify what is what and where it all is. It's it's really invaluable. And you, you can, go through it kind of chronologically is right. You just have this resource handy. It's super helpful. The New York Times did a piece on her this year in January. She died in 2005. She would have been a dream guest for the for this, podcast actually. Like, she'd be high on my list of people I would love to talk to who are so passionate about talking and who contributed so much to it. But alas, she passed away in 2005. She was only 59 and I don't know any details. But I did see the New York Times did a story about her this year saying that she was forgotten no more, while she was never forgotten. For me and I don't know, the New York Times subscription online. So I didn't read the story, but somebody told me it was something of an obituary, but I definitely remember it. She also did, cartography for other fantasy worlds, which included Thomas The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. I haven't seen her do that, but, I would wish I did back when I read those. I think those are controversial now, right? Because there's, well, unsavory behaviors by the lead character, which actually, even as a kid I knew was the point, actually. But whatever. She that's a really, really valuable book if you're going to read The Silmarillion. And sure, you could read it without, but it would be easier and more enriching and better to read it with. I actually honestly believe every Tolkien bookshelf. Anybody who's serious about putting books on a shelf really should have that. And, you know, audio books are great, but that's one instance. The Alice of middle earth audiobook wouldn't do the job. But speaking of audiobooks, that's the, I think maybe one of the greatest tips I have for many years, Martin Shaw was the voice who read The Silmarillion in audiobook. I don't know anything. Nothing about Martin Shaw, but I know that his his version was considered the best version, and I'm sure it's still really great, actually. So I'm not not recommending it. I listen to it, but I don't remember it. It was a long time ago, so I, I can't say much. I think there was a couple of pronunciation issues. And look, I'm not great at pronunciation at all, actually. Tolkien does of course give us all a guide that we could follow. And it's not super complicated. I think maybe the hardest part is, is knowing which syllable or syllable to accent or accent, but, talking does have a guide for that as well, just a little more complex. But the vowels are fairly easy, and like c is always k, like there's some rules that are pretty easy to follow. But pronunciation remains complicated because Tolkien made complicated words. So when when I read The Silmarillion, those I often see a name and I don't. I don't need to sound it out the whole time because they're not Tim Clark and Dave. They are, in fact saying or which you could pronounce several different ways. If you don't know what's going on, I'm sure. In fact, I know for sure I've mispronounced names and things on this podcast. I'm not a, I the way that I read, I just recognize the shape of the word and skip it. I don't need to sound it out or know it every time. Listening to Martin Shaw's reading of The Silmarillion was great, but Andy Circus, who is widely known, as an actor for Gollum, like, almost universally, I mean, he's he's, he's not an A-list celebrity. I guess, but he's really well-regarded as an actor. And his Gollum is absolutely legendary and transcends, like, Tolkien fans. It's like film fans. It's common knowledge because of what he did and how groundbreaking his work with Weta was. Anyway, Andy Read did the audiobooks of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and they're great. And his Lord of the rings, for good or for ill. He sort of does, like his Gandalf voice reminds you of in Mckellen's voice, and his Sam voice reminds you of Sean Aston's voice. Well, for him to tackle the Silmarils early on is entirely different. There's not voices for those characters, and I, really love. And it's a long way for me to say I really, really loved his audiobook of The Silmarillion. But his dramatics, his acting, his breathing life into it reminds me very much of when you go to see a Shakespearean play. If you try to read that on the page, it's really some work, right? But you see King Lear, in front of you. Speaking of an McKellen, that's a great Shakespearean actor. And he brings that to life. So when he says the words that it really, carries the it carries the emotion, it carries the meaning. Like it's really clear. It's crystal clear now. Nobody criticizes anybody for watching Shakespeare. In fact, they probably celebrate it. You can read all the plays. I think, you know, people love to go and see them perform live. That's how I feel about Andy Circuses Silmarillion. It really brought it to life. It was really great. And I'm a guy who I do listen to audiobooks, and when I do them, I'm usually busy doing something else. So things go by pretty fast. And I did find myself listening to certain parts over and over. But when when he would get to character voices, which there are quotes in The Silmarillion, by the way, he did a tremendous job. But it was just it was just clear. It was just easy. So I actually really recommend it might even be the top suggestion. The unabridged Silmarillion from Andy Circus is it's a Harpercollins book. Harpercollins is the is for Ages and Ages, the UK company that has published Tolkien and then, Houghton Mifflin. Well, I think it's Houghton Mifflin Harcourt now is kind of the partner, but Harpercollins is, you know, the Tolkien estate partner. And so this is their audiobook and, it's astounding. It's really good. So if you are having trouble with The Silmarillion, I think that's one way to go. And and I'm going to hype it more. What I found is that when I would read, I would either skip, not skip, but I wouldn't try to sound out the names. I would just recognize them. Right. Well, circus pronounces them and and so it also helps you to know the right way to say certain things, like for example, a common person would say Gilgal ad but circus helps. You know that it's Gil galad. He really knows which syllable to emphasize, and that makes a big difference. If you if you want to talk to Tolkien experts or just for peace of mind, like you really can read it the way that Tolkien read it, it also has fun after you know some of these things better after they're real after repetition. Then you can go listen to, say, Tolkien reading some of his, own work. The other thing that audiobooks are great for, you can still follow many of the suggestions here, such as skipping the first couple of sections, which I actually didn't say. Skip it. I said maybe don't read it first, and then go back and read the creation story. After you've read the story of the Silmarils, which is the heart of the thing, or if you really want to, you almost can read it backwards. You can read about the Third Age and the War of the ring, and then read the story of the Silmarils, and then go back to the creation story at the beginning. But the audiobook, you can do all those same things with the touch of a button, typically on your phone. So, you know, he's pretty, Hollywood guy. You know, he's directed at some things, and he's been a lot of things, and he's been consulted for things. And he's definitely, you know, well, super well known in the talking world. But people are big fans of his performance. Even, Hollywood types are actually really impressed by that guy, and I certainly am. I will say that I've met him a couple of times, and he went out of his way to be a real gentleman, to really treat me and others well. But me specifically, that's how I know more about it. For example, I was on the set of The Hobbit, and the first day I was there, he, he approached there were some couple of guests of Peter Jackson's, and so they were going to get a little extra access and and I, I I'm not kidding. He he knew I was there. I don't know for sure. The people on set had been informed, maybe warned wouldn't be the word that a member of the media would be joining them and that he would be me. That I would be on set for a while. And so, I don't know, maybe watch your P's and Q's as they say, maybe don't speak about giant plot spoilers in front of everybody. Although, Warner Brothers allowed me to be there, so, like, it's fine. They knew I wasn't going to betray them anyway, blah blah blah. And he recognized, me and the the situation, right? That I wasn't going to be the special guest. So he because he's a good dude, came up and said, hey, you know, he was shooting some stuff in the night like he was with the B unit and they were shooting some action scene. Well, they were I think it's okay to talk about now. Right? We were shooting the crowd scene when Smaug, falls and lands in the middle of Laketown and he said, hey, we could really use your help tonight as if they needed my help. They had plenty of extras, but he said, hey, if you could be an extra tonight, I would really help us out. ]And he was just absolutely doing that to be nice. And I knew that at the time, too. So, you know, I ain't got nothing better to do, right? I'm just in New Zealand hanging out. So he got one of the PPAs and they took me to wardrobe and got me going so that when we filmed the Smaug scene at night, there I was. And the assistant director. So those are the kind of the people who deal with the extras and, maybe featured extras and not so much. The actors put me in a good spot and everything. They completely cut that shot out of the movie. You know, I was pretty stoked to be there with The Death of Smaug. Point being that Andy super, incredibly, nice. And then he just other times as well. You don't care about any of that. But I also just like to support him. The point is to I'd really, really like to talk to him. Not about Gollum. He's done 10,000 media interviews about that, not about so many other things. I loved his death and King Kong. I actually would want to talk to him about that. But that's ancient history. But I really would like to talk to him for this podcast. Regarding The Silmarillion. I think that's the way to go. I'd like to hear how we prepared. I'd like to hear how he worked on the language. I'd like to hear if he practiced voices ahead of time. Well, I'm sure he did. He had to. And how he remembers. You know, if Miss Randhir speaks, how he might remember him later. Or if Elrond speaks, he might speak here and there. I would really, really love to talk to Andy, so consider him high on the list. I should in this podcast and go make an official request. Thanks for listening. Thanks for your support. Thank you for your patience. I know this has been, this has been a particularly difficult one for me to get out. I've got to get faster and better at these still aching do interviews. But your support means everything in the podcast is growing. And, if only I could work on the talking podcast every day, that would be the dream. But I'll do it when I can. 
 It's always a labor of love. Hopefully for you. Definitely for me. Oh, lastly, do read The Silmarillion. It is worth it. It is worth all the the effort that it might require for some if you breeze through it, great for you. But the rewards are rich. It feels like a thing you can read over and over more than maybe The Hobbit or Lord of the rings even, and gain more as you read it more and of course, that includes the audiobook, and that definitely includes The Atlas of Middle Earth. 
 And it might include doing some preparation by reading other things. But you know, however you choose to do it, I do recommend that you do it, reading a book, a thing that seems to be lost this day, in this age, in this whatever age of Middle-Earth this is, it seems to be a thing we've lost. We've lost the law of reading. 
 We've lost the love of reading. And I definitely do think that I know audiobook counts, but I also have one other request, and that is that if you've enjoyed the token podcast, perhaps you would to one other person, recommend it. Doing this ensures the growth of the token podcasts, and probably increases our reach and our ability to land other interviews and talk more. 
 Talking with more people, which is always the hope you've been listening to The Tolkien Podcast.