it was easier to believe in the Dragon and less easy to believe in Thorin in these wild parts

For if joyful is the fountain that rises in the sun, its springs are in the wells of sorrow unfathomable at the foundations of the Earth.

Saruman," I said, standing away from him, "only one hand at a time can weild the One, and you know that well, so do not trouble to say we!

Curse us and crush us, my precious is lost!

Outside the ring of dancing warriors with spears and axes stood wolves at a respectful distance, watching and waiting.

The Resurrection was the greatest ‘eucatastrophe’ possible in the greatest Fairy Story — and produces that essential emotion: Christian joy which produces tears because it is qualitatively so like sorrow, because it comes from those places where Joy and Sorrow are at one, reconciled, as selfishness and altruism are lost in Love.

My 'Sam Gamgee' is indeed a reflexion of the English soldier, of the privates and batmen I knew in the 1914 war, and recognised as so far superior to myself.