249 – Down to the Crossroads

Frodo, Sam, and Gollum leave Henneth Annûn and continue on their quest with Faramir’s blessing and two (not three) shiny new hobbit-sized walking sticks. Gollum is totally over that betrayal business at the pool and surely isn’t planning any kind of revenge, which is nice; and there’s nothing at all creepy about the fact that they have to stay off the road because, y’know, invisible things may be watching. Also in this episode: blindfolds, wood-nerdery (not a typo), plus, what special object would we want for our Tolkien collections if money was no object?

Recommended Reading:

Tolkien, J. R. R. The Two Towers: Being the Second Part of The Lord of the Rings (Mariner Books, paperback) “Journey to the Cross-Roads”, pp. 679-82

Tolkien, J. R. R. The Return of the King: Being the Third Part of the Lord of the Rings (Mariner Books, paperback)

Tolkien, J. R. R. (Christopher Tolkien, ed.) The Silmarillion (Mariner Books, paperback)

Carpenter, Humphrey, ed. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien (Mariner Books, paperback)

Hammond, Wayne G. and Christina Scull. The Lord of the Rings: A Reader’s Companion (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, hardcover)

Judd, Walter S., and Graham A. Judd. Flora of Middle-Earth: Plants of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Legendarium (Oxford University Press, hardcover)

Fonstad, Karen Wynn. The Atlas of Middle-earth (Revised Edition) (Houghton Mifflin, Paperback)

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  • Re double meanings in chapter titles as is hypothesized for The Window on the West: Three’s Company is an obvious pun. It’s both a shortened inversion of the saying “Two’s company, three’s a crowd” and (by changing the contracted “is” to a possessive apostrophe “s”) a reference to the company that Black Riders keep with Frodo, Sam, and Pippen.

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