Quotes from J. R. R. Tolkien

A pen is to me as a beak is to a hen.

It is ever so with the things that Men begin: there is a frost in Spring, or a blight in Summer, and they fail of their promise.

There is no curse in Elvish, Entish or the tongues of Men for this treachery!

Dead men are not friends to living men, and give them no gifts. (Ghan-buri-Ghan, of allies during war)

Yet seldom do they fail of their seed, And that will lie in the dust and rot to spring up again in times and places unlooked-for. The deeds of Men will outlast us.

Of all the things that men may heed 'Tis most of love they sing indeed.

For a while they stood there, like men on the edge of a sleep where nightmare lurks, holding it off, though they know that they can only come to morning through the shadows.

The only just literary critic," he concluded, "is Christ, who admires more than does any man the gifts He Himself has bestowed.

Indeed you did your best...I hope that it may be long before you find yourself in such a tight corner again between two such terrible old men. ~ Gandalf to Pippin

There are other men, and other lives, and time still to be.

And long there he lay, an image of the splendour of the Kings of Men in glory undimmed before the breaking of the world.

I wished to be loved by another. But I desire no man's pity.

You can only come to the morning through the shadows.

So fair, so cold; like a morning of pale spring still clinging to winter's chill.

It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish.

One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.

The road goes ever on and on

In this Music [the singing of the angels in harmony] the World was begun; for Iluvatar made visible the song of the Ainur,and they beheld it as a light in the darkness.

The wide world is all about you: you can fence yourselves in, but you cannot for ever fence it out.

Fear both the heat and the cold of your heart, and strive for patience, if you can.

See your road through.

Fear nothing! Have peace until the morning! Heed no nightly noises!

Well, here at last, dear friends, on the shores of the Sea comes the end of our fellowship in Middle-earth. Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil.

And there was Frodo, pale and worn, and yet himself again; and in his eyes there was peace now, neither strain of will, nor madness, nor any fear. His burden was taken away.