Beren and Lúthien (book)

Beren and Lúthien is the most recently published story to take place in Middle-earth. Published in 2017, it is painstakingly restored from Tolkien’s manuscripts and presented for the first time as a continuous and standalone story.

Synopsis
Painstakingly restored from Tolkien's manuscripts and presented for the first time as a fully continuous and standalone story, the epic tale of Beren and Luthien will reunite fans of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings with Elves and Men, Dwarves and Orcs and the rich landscape and creatures unique to Tolkien's Middle-earth.

The tale of Beren and Lúthien was, or became, an essential element in the evolution of The Silmarillion, the myths and legends of the First Age of the World conceived by J.R.R. Tolkien. Returning from France and the battle of the Somme at the end of 1916, he wrote the tale in the following year.

Essential to the story, and never changed, is the fate that shadowed the love of Beren and Lúthien: for Beren was a mortal man, but Lúthien was an immortal elf. Her father, a great elvish lord, in deep opposition to Beren, imposed on him an impossible task that he must perform before he might wed Lúthien. This is the kernel of the legend; and it leads to the supremely heroic attempt of Beren and Lúthien together to rob the greatest of all evil beings, Melkor, called Morgoth, the Black Enemy, of a Silmaril.

In this book Christopher Tolkien has attempted to extract the story of Beren and Lúthien from the comprehensive work in which it was embedded; but that story was itself changing as it developed new associations within the larger history. To show something of the process whereby this legend of Middle-earth evolved over the years, he has told the story in his father's own words by giving, first, its original form, and then passages in prose and verse from later texts that illustrate the narrative as it changed. Presented together for the first time, they reveal aspects of the story, both in event and in narrative immediacy, that were afterwards lost.

Published on the tenth anniversary of the last Middle-earth book, the international bestseller The Children of Húrin, this new volume will similarly include drawings and color plates by Alan Lee, who also illustrated The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit and went on to win Academy Awards for his work on The Lord of the Rings film trilogy.

Details
The intent of the book is to extract a 'single narrative' out of the ever evolving materials that make up The Tale of Beren and Luthien. It does not contain every version or edit to the story, but those chosen by Christopher Tolkien which he believed would offer the most 'clarity' without need to over explain the complexities of the changes.


 * The purpose of this book, then, is altogether different from that of the volumes of The History of Middle-earth from which it is derived. It is emphatically not intended as an adjunct to those books. It is an attempt to extract one narrative element from a vast work of extraordinary richness and complexity; but that narrative, the story of Beren and Lúthien, was itself continually evolving, and developing new associations as it became more embedded in the wider history. The decision of what to include and what to exclude of that ancient world ‘at large’ could only be a matter of personal and often questionable judgement: in such an attempt there can be no attainable ‘correct way’. In general, however, I have erred on the side of clarity, and resisted the urge to explain, for fear of undermining the primary purpose and method of the book.

The book starts with the most complete version of the beginning of the tale as told in the Book of Lost Tales (with only some slight character/place name editing to add referencess from later versions of the story to avoid confusion). However, the general aspects of the story have not been modified, for example Beren is a 'Gnome (Nolder)' the son of Egnor bo-Rimion, rather than the human son of Barahir (Beren's heritage switches between 'elf' and 'man' throughout the story depending on which portion of the story is being told). No major modifications are made to make the older material inline with the newer material.

As Christpher explains:


 * A further problem which I should mention arose from the very frequent changes of names. To follow with exactness and consistency the succession of names in texts of different dates would not serve the purpose of this book. I have therefore observed no rule in this respect, but distinguished old and new in some cases but not in others, for various reasons. In a great many cases my father would alter a name in a manuscript at some later, or even much later, time, but not consistently: for example, Elfin to Elven. In such cases I have made Elven the sole form, or Beleriand for earlier Broseliand; but in others I have retained both, as in Tinwelint/ Thingol, Artanor/ Doriath.

Then the book continues the story in later sections/chapters through later poems, summaries and prose showing how the story evolved over time and 'myth'. These follow in order of the chronology of the story itself (but not the release order of the texts being used). These are made up of portions of different versions of The Lay of Lethian, and various versions of the Silmarillion, and later chapters of the Lost Tales in the order of where they take place 'in the full story'.

Due to the nature of the story undergoing the most changes and edits and style over time by J.R.R Tolkien the presentation of this story is somewhat 'fractured', and there is some overlap of details (and discrepancies in continuity), but mostly the sections are put in order that creates a 'complete and continuous' story. Christopher Tolkien included further editorial explanations between sections.

It also mean some details 'lost' in later accounts get reintroduced back into the 'complete narrative' such as the Tevildo (who due to the nature of his introduction is treated as his own character, rather than an preconception of Sauron for the sake of the narrative), Thu the Necromancer (treated as the first appearance of Sauron), and even some of the stories including the Wicked dwarves/treacherous Dwarves (one of the Hobbit's references back to the Lost Tales), and other terminology such as Gnome, Fays, Fairy, leprawn, pixies, etc (some of the terminology were used in some editions of the Hobbit, but lost in later stories of the legendarium.

The book offers a somewhat 'in-universe' perspective for some of the inconsistencies being rather evolution of stories being told by different perspectives/voices over time, with both 'historical/mythic' styles (but also mirroring his own father's 'styles' and interpretive changes over time).

Index
It is made up of chapters including;


 * The Tale of Tinúviel
 * A Passage from the 'Sketch of the Mythology'
 * A Passage Extracted from The Lay of Leithian
 * The Quenta Noldorinwa
 * A Passage Extracted from the Quenta
 * A Second Extract from The Lay of Leithian
 * A Further Extract from the Quenta
 * The Narrative in The Lay of Leithian to its Termination
 * The Quenta Silmarillion
 * The Return of Beren and Luthien According to the Quenta Noldorinwa
 * Extract from the Lost Tale of the Nauglafring
 * The Morning and the Evening Star

Appendix

 * Revisions to The Lay of Leithien
 * Footnotes
 * List of names in the Original Texts
 * Glossary

Behind the scenes
Of particular note is Christopher Tolkien now in his nineties at the time of editing this book, admits this will probably be his last book. This seems to indicate that he has no plans finish the trilogy of "Great Tales" with an edition that covers material concerning the The Fall of Gondolin.