157 – Don’t Stop Believin’

Following an insensitive remark about the “darksome” halls of Khazad-dûm by Samwise at bedtime, Gimli delivers an impassioned defense of his people’s lifestyle choices — in verse — and Gandalf gives a history lesson about Moria and mithril. Safe in his (really valuable) mail-shirt, Frodo takes the first watch… and starts to believe he may not be the only one doing the watching. We revisit the ill will of Caradhras, spoil Gimli’s family reunion plans, and terrify our vegetarian listeners (and Alan) with way too much talk of meat extract.

To watch grown men put something in their stomachs that doesn’t belong there, check out the Top Gear “V8 Beef, Bovril and Brick Smoothie” segment on YouTube here: youtube.com/watch?v=vDlMLqdvHzI

Recommended Reading:

Tolkien, J. R. R. The Fellowship of the Ring: Being the First Part of The Lord of the Rings (Mariner Books, paperback) pp. 307-12, “A Journey in the Dark”

Tolkien, J. R. R. The Hobbit (Mariner Books, paperback)

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)

Tolkien, J. R. R. (Christopher Tolkien, ed.) The Treason of Isengard (The History of Middle-earth, Vol. 7) (Houghton Mifflin, paperback)

Tolkien, J. R. R. (Christopher Tolkien, ed.) Morgoth’s Ring (The History of Middle-earth, Vol. 10) (HarperCollins, paperback)

Gilliver, Peter, Jeremy Marshall, Edmund Weiner. The Ring of Words: Tolkien and the Oxford English Dictionary (Oxford University Press, hardcover)

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

Flieger, Verlyn. Splintered Light: Logos and Language in Tolkien’s World (Kent State University Press, paperback)