The Fellowship of the Ring Read Free Page B

‘golden house’). There can be no doubt, however, that Tolkien attempted to
     correct inconsistency, no less than outright error, whenever it came to his attention, and it was our opinion, with the advice
     and agreement of Christopher Tolkien, that an attempt should be made to do so in the anniversary edition, in so far as we
     could carefully and conservatively distinguish what to emend.
    Many of the emendations in the present text are to marksof punctuation, either to correct recent typographical errors or to repair surviving alterations introduced in the second
     printing of
The Fellowship of the Ring
. In the latter respect and in every case, Tolkien’s original punctuation is always more felicitous – subtle points, when
     one is comparing commas and semi-colons, but no less a part of the author’s intended expression. Distinctive words such as
chill
rather than
cold
, and
glistered
rather than
glistened
, changed by typesetters long ago without authorization, likewise have been restored. A controlled amount of regularization
     also seemed called for, such as
naught
rather than
nought
, a change instituted by Tolkien but not carried through in all instances;
Dark Power
rather than
dark power
when the reference is obviously to Sauron (or Morgoth);
Barrow-downs
by Tolkien’s preference rather than
Barrowdowns
; likewise
Bree-hill
rather than
Bree Hill
; accented and more common
Drúadan
rather than
Druadan
; capitalized names of seasons when used as personification or metaphor, according to Tolkien’s predominant practice and the
     internal logic of the text; and
Elvish
rather than
elvish
when used as a separate adjective, following a preference Tolkien marked in his copy of the second edition of
The Lord of the Rings
. In addition, we have added a second accent to
Númenórean(s)
, as Tolkien often wrote the name in manuscript and as it appears in
The Silmarillion
and other posthumous publications.
    The result, nonetheless, still includes many variations in capitalization, punctuation, and other points of style. Not all
     of these are erroneous: they include words such as
Sun
,
Moon
,
Hobbit
, and
Man
(or
sun
,
moon
,
hobbit
,
man
), which may change form according to meaning or application, in relation to adjacent adjectives, or whether Tolkien intended
     personification, poetry, or emphasis. His intent cannot be divined with confidence in every case. But it is possible to discern
     Tolkien’s preferences in many instances, from statements he wrote in his check copies of
The Lord of the Rings
or from a close analysis of its text in manuscript, typescript, proof, and print. Whenever there has been any doubt whatsoever
     as tothe author’s intentions, the text has been allowed to stand.
    Most of the demonstrable errors noted by Christopher Tolkien in
The History of Middle-earth
also have been corrected, such as the distance from the Brandywine Bridge to the Ferry (
ten
miles rather than
twenty
) and the number of Merry’s ponies (
five
rather than
six
), shadows of earlier drafts. But those inconsistencies of content, such as Gimli’s famous (and erroneous) statement in Book
     III, Chapter 7, ‘Till now I have hewn naught but wood since I left Moria’, which would require rewriting to emend rather than
     simple correction, remain unchanged.
    So many new emendations to
The Lord of the Rings
, and such an extensive review of its text, deserve to be fully documented. Although most readers will be content with the
     text alone, many will want to know more about the problems encountered in preparing this new edition, and their solutions
     (where solutions have been possible), especially where the text has been emended, but also where it has not. To this end,
     and to illuminate the work in other respects, we are preparing a volume of annotations to
The Lord of the Rings
for publication in 2005. This will allow us to discuss, at a length impossible in a prefatory note, the various textual cruces
     of
The Lord of