In a second-hand bookshop in Salisbury, in the year 1965 in the Fourth Age of Middle Earth, there was once a Book.* There were of course many other books there, but only this one merited the capital letter: The Fifth Book of Thucydides, edited with a short introduction and notes by C.E. Graves, MA, Fellow and late Classics Lecturer of St John’s College, Cambridge, and published by Macmillan & Co. of London in 1891 (reprinted 1899, 1908).** History does not record why Zillah Shelling chose to leaf through this particular book, but she did so, and was struck by a series of curious annotations in an unknown script that a former owner had added to the pages, including one long one at the very back, as well as by one of the names written on the flyleaf: J.R.R. Tolkien. (more…)
Posts Tagged ‘J.R.R. Tolkien’
One Text to Rule Them All
Posted in Musings, Research in Progress, tagged classical reception, J.R.R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings, Melian Dialogue, Thucydides on April 11, 2019| 3 Comments »
