Tolkienists.org

There are few greater delights in the quiet of an evening, than turning to books read when young. There, amongst my mass of well-worn books, is The Hobbit of course, but not far away are my copies of Arthur Ransome. The books by Tolkien and Ransome have been life-long companions, but as with all familiar things, it sometimes takes many years to realise and appreciate all their qualities and occasional common themes. Just such an epiphany of contact and similitude occurred to me this past summer — a silver lining to Covid-19 lockdown reading. The contacts are but brief, and largely contrived. Indeed, they are nothing more than happenstance encounters — orbits that chance to pass close to each other — thoughts built upon temporary moments of parallelism.…