The Westron Page

Athelas 16

The snow is falling white outside as your truly editor is wondering what to write and hoping for a white Christmas.

Much has happened since last issue, almost too much! For one thing, I have retired as a member of the Council of Imladris and as editor of Athelas. This is my final issue and, as you can see, a very special one too. The reason why we decided to make this a double issue with the supplement 'Kongekløver' (the Danish name for 'Kingsfoil') is that nobody has volunteered for the task of editing a magazine for the members of Imladris. It is therefore unclear as for how long Athelas will hibernate this winter.

The reason why I have decided to step down is my constant lack of spare time. I simply haven't got the time for all of this combined with the hectic life of a journalist. It seems ages ago since I last had a chance to read a good book out of pure curiousity. That and a visit to Marquette University, where Tolkien's original manuscripts are kept, will be among some of my highest wishes for what to do next year when I cross the Atlantic to work at ComputerUser in Minneapolis, USA. By 1 August I'll be back in Copenhagen to work at Politiken, one of the largest morning news papers in Denmark And luckily, it happens to be just in time for the Northern Tolkien Festival in Oslo Hopefully, if not before, we'll meet then!

My time as 'leafbearer' has been a great pleasure Athelas has been a terrific playground for my imagination and I would like to thank all contributors for their support and help. Thank you, all of you, without your contributions, Athelas would not have grown just half as green and powerful as it has.

So much for my farewell speech. As I said, much has happened. Besides the abscense of an editor and the election of new members for the Council (see the back of Athelas 16), there's been a number of Tolkien events during the past few months, all covered in this issue of Athelas. The greatest of these was the Tolkien event that took place in Hørsholm north of Copenhagen on the night of 27 September when 2,000 people took part in an evening with light shows, concert, live roleplaying, dances and a magnificent firework. Quite indescribable. A great event though also a very wet one, since those arranging it hadn't calculated with the risk of rain in September... Of course Imladris was present and so was the Danish media. We got a lot of press attention in national news papers, in national radio and in national TV news, though apparently it had no significant effect on the number of members.

Some other events during the last few months was the celebration of Bilbo and Frodo's birthdays, the role playing con 'Pentacon' in Børkop where Imladris had an exhibition of illustrations and videos, and the founding of a new independent local society for the Copenhagen area called 'Bri' (Bree). The latter was founded by four members of Imladris who want more local activities in style of the Swedish society Angmar in Malmö.

So, after this long tale, what is there to find in this issue? Well, how about the news of a Disney comic caricature of The Lord of the Rings!? As is well-known, Tolkien had a profound dislike of the Disney studios, so what could we expect other than a very silly story where Donald Duck is a caricature of Frodo trying to bring not a Ring but a pan into the Dark Lord's realm. I cannot possibly think that HarperCollins or the Tolkien Estate would grant permission to something like this, but perhaps the Disney Company, i.e. Gutenberghus in Copenhagen, feel themselves raised above copyright matters?

Besides the review by Rasmus Bolding, you'll also find our usual news and letter columns, reports from the past Tolkien events and comments on the Danish media. And Erik Ravn Christensen writes about the German Tolkien-inspired metal band 'Blind Guardian'. In the supplement you will find five portrait interviews with the newly elected members of the Council (what they have in common seems to be the desire to seek adventures on long journeys (so members ought to make sure what their membership fee is used for!) and a special program on the radio). You'll also find a lot of Quenya stuff and an article by Peter N. Edelberg on the similarity between Frodo and Abraham from the Bible.

'But perhaps Tolkien's power as a story-teller hasn't displayed fully until here in the late 1990s where his books and universe(s) at the edge of the cyberspace age has made a basis for a movement, possibly even a movement with a potential for some day to expand in an ecological-humanistic manifest. Maybe once in the next milennium people will seriously talk of Gandalfism or hobbituality. All the pieces for a complete ideological system is present in Tolkien's works. Naturally, it's only play and fairy-stories but when you look in the magazine of the Danish Tolkien Society called Athelas and see the enthusiasm with which modern-day Tolkien fans familiarize themselves with Middle-earth and interpret the dramatic incidents and even practise the artificial language of Quenya, it is difficult not to seriously question the myth of the fall of the great tales and consequently the fall of the ideologies.

-LT