Galadriel's Lament; from the Fellowship of the Ring

Ai! laurië lantar lassi súrinen,

yéni únótimë ve rámar aldaron!

Yéni ve lintë yuldar avánier

mi oromardi lissë-miruvóreva

Andúnë pella, Vardo tellumar

nu luini yassen tintilar i eleni

ómaryo airetári-lírinen.

Sí man i yulma nin enquantuva?

An sí Tintallë Varda Oiolossëo

ve fanyar máryat Elentári ortanë

ar ilyë tier undulávë lumbulë

ar sindanóriello caita mornië

i falmalinnar imbë met,

ar hísië untúpa Calaciryo míri oialë.

Sí vanwa ná, Rómello vanwa, Valimar!

Namárië! Nai hiruvalyë Valimar!

Nai elyë hiruva! Namárië!

Ah! like gold fall the leaves in the wind,

long years numberless as the wings of trees!

The long years have passed like swift draughts

of the sweet mead in lofty halls

beyond the West, beneath the blue vaults of Varda

wherein the stars tremble

in the voice of her song, holy and queenly.

Who now shall refill the cup for me?

For now the Kindler, Varda, the Queen of the stars,

from Mount Everwhite has uplifted her hands like clouds

and all paths are drowned deep in shadow;

and out of a grey country darkness lies

on the foaming waves between us,

and mist covers the jewels of Calacirya for ever.

Now lost, lost to those of the East is Valimar!

Farewell! Maybe thou shalt find Valimar!

Maybe even thou shalt find it! Farewell!

the Scroll of Isildur; from the Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien

The Great Ring shall go now to be an heirloom of the North Kingdom; but records of it shall be left in Gondor, where also dwell the heirs of Elendil, lest a time come when the memory of these great matters shall grow dim.

It was hot when I first took it, hot as a glede, and my hand was scorched, so that I doubt if ever again I shall be free of the pain of it. Yet even as I write it is cooled, and it seemeth to shrink, though it loseth neither its beauty nor its shape. Already the writing upon it, which at first was as clear as red flame, fadeth and is now only barely to be read. It is fashioned in an elven-script of Eregion, for they have no letters in Mordor for such subtle work; but the language is unknown to me. I deem it to be a tongue of the Black Land, since it is foul and uncouth. What evil it saith I do not know; but I trace here a copy of it, lest it fade beyond recall. The ring misseth, maybe, the heat of Sauron's hand, which was black and yet burned like fire, and so Gil-Galad was destroyed; and maybe were the gold made hot again, the writing would be refreshed. But for my part I will risk no hurt to this thing: of all the works of Sauron the only fair. It is precious to me, though I buy it with great pain.

Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul, ash nazg thrakatulûk, agh burzum-ishi krimpatul.

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

Soul and Understatement; from How To Be an Alien by George Mikes

Foreigners have souls; the English haven't.

On the Continent you find any amount of people who sigh deeply for no conspicuous reason, yearn, suffer and look in the air extremely sadly. This is soul.

The worst kind of soul is the great Slav soul. People who suffer from it are usually very deep thinkers. They may say things like this: 'Sometimes I am so merry and sometimes I am so sad. Can you explain why?' (You cannot, do not try.) Or they may say: 'I am so mysterious.... I sometimes wish I were somewhere else than where I am.' (Do not say: 'I wish you were.') Or 'When I am alone in a forest at night-time and jump from one tree to another, I often think that life is so strange.'

All this is very deep: and just soul, nothing else.

The English have no soul; they have the understatement instead.

If a continental youth wants to declare his love to a girl, he kneels down, tells her that she is the sweetest, most charming and ravishing person in the world, that she has something in her, something peculiar and individual which only a few hundred thousand other women have and that he would be unable to live one more minute without her. Often, to give a little more emphasis to the statement, he shoots himself on the spot. This is a normal, week-day declaration of love in the more temperamental continental countries. In England the boy pats his adored one on the back and says softly: 'I don't object to you, you know.' If he is quite mad with passion, he may add: 'I rather fancy you, in fact.'

If he wants to marry a girl, he says:

'I say... would you?...'

If he wants to make an indecent proposal:

'I say... what about?...'

Overstatement, too, plays a considerable part in English social life. This takes mostly the form of someone remarking: 'I say...' and then keeping silent for three days on end.

The creation of water, from Ainulindalë (Music of the Ainur) in the Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien, p. 7-9

Now the Children of Ilúvatar are Elves and Men, the Firstborn and the Followers. And amid all the splendours of the World, its vast halls and spaces, and its wheeling fires, Ilúvatar chose a place for their habitation in the Deeps of Time and in the midst of the innumerable stars. And this habitation might seem a little thing to those who consider only the majesty of the Ainur, and not their terrible sharpness; as who should take the whole field of Arda for the foundation of a pillar and so raise it until the cone of its summit were more bitter than a needle; or who consider only the immeasurable vastness of the World, which still the Ainur are shaping, and not the minute precision to which they shape all things therein. But when the Ainur had beheld this habitation in a vision and had seen the Children of Ilúvatar arise therein, then many of the most mighty among them bent all their thought and their desire towards that place. And of these Melkor was the chief, even as he was in the beginning the greatest of the Ainur who took part in the Music. And he feigned, even to himself at first, that he desired to go thither and order all things for the good of the Children of Ilúvatar, controlling the turmoils of the heat and the cold that had come to pass through him. But he desired rather to subdue to his will both Elves and Men, envying the gifts with which Ilúvatar promised to endow them; and he wished himself to have subjects and servants, and to be called Lord, and to be a master over other wills.

But the other Ainur looked upon this habitation set within the vast spaces of the World, which the Elves call Arda, the Earth; and their hearts rejoiced in light, and their eyes beholding many colours were filled with gladness; but because of the roaring of the sea they felt a great unquiet. And they observed the winds and the air, and the matters of which Arda was made, of iron and stone and silver and gold and many substances: but of all these water they most greatly praised. And it is said by the Eldar that in water there lives yet the echo of the Music of the Ainur more than in any substance else that is in this Earth; and many of the Children of Ilúvatar hearken still unsated to the voices of the Sea, and yet know not for what they listen.

Now to water had that Ainu whom the Elves call Ulmo turned his thought, and of all most deeply was he instructed by Ilúvatar in music. But of the airs and winds Manwë most had pondered, who is the noblest of the Ainur. Of the fabric of Earth had Aulë thought, to whom Ilúvatar had given skill and knowledge scare less than to Melkor; but the delight and pride of Aulë is in the deed of making, and in the thing made, and neither in possession nor in his own mastery; wherefore he gives and hoards not, and is free from care, passing ever on to some new work.

And Ilúvatar spoke to Ulmo, and said: ‘Seest thou not how here in this little realm in the Deeps of Time Melkor hath made war upon thy province? He hath bethought him of bitter cold immoderate, and yet hath not destroyed the beauty of thy fountains, nor of thy clear pools. Behold the snow, and the cunning work of frost! Melkor hath devised heats and fire without restraint, and hath not dried up thy desire nor utterly quelled the music of the sea. Behold rather the height and glory of the clouds, and the everchanging mists; and listen to the fall of rain upon the Earth! And in these clouds thou art drawn nearer to Manwë, thy friend, whom thou lovest.’

Then Ulmo answered: ‘Truly, Water is become now fairer than my heart imagined, neither had my secret thought conceived the snowflake, nor in all my music was contained the falling of the rain. I will seek Manwë, that he and I may make melodies for ever to thy delight!’ And Manwë and Ulmo have from the beginning been allied, and in all things have served most faithfully the purpose of Ilúvatar.

a Psalm of Montreal by Samuel Butler

[The City of Montreal is one of the most rising and, in many respects, most agreeable on the American continent, but its inhabitants are as yet too busy with commerce to care greatly about the masterpieces of old Greek Art. A cast of one of these masterpieces—the finest of the several statues of Discoboli, or Quoit-throwers—was found by the present writer in the Montreal Museum of Natural History; it was, however, banished from public view, to a room where were all manner of skins, plants, snakes, insects, &c., and in the middle of these, an old man, stuffing an owl. The dialogue—perhaps true, perhaps imaginary, perhaps a little of one and a little of the other—between the writer and this old man gave rise to the lines that follow.]

Stowed away in a Montreal lumber-room,

The Discobolus standeth, and turneth his face to the wall;

Dusty, cobweb-covered, maimed, and set at naught,

Beauty crieth in an attic, and no man regardeth.

O God! O Montreal!

Beautiful by night and day, beautiful in summer and winter,

Whole or maimed, always and alike beautiful,—

He preacheth gospel of grace to the skins of owls,

And to one who seasoneth the skins of Canadian owls.

O God ! O Montreal!

When I saw him, I was wroth, and I said, "O Discobolus!

Beautiful Discobolus, a Prince both among gods and men,

What doest thou here, how earnest thou here, Discobolus,

Preaching gospel in vain to the skins of owls ?"

O God! O Montreal!

And I turned to the man of skins, and said unto him, " Oh! thou man of skins,

Wherefore hast thou done thus, to shame the beauty of the Discobolus?"

But the Lord had hardened the heart of the man of skins,

And he answered, "My brother-in-law is haberdasher to Mr. Spurgeon."

O God ! O Montreal!

"The Discobolus is put here because he is vulgar,—

He hath neither vest nor pants with which to cover his limbs;

I, sir, am a person of most respectable connections,—

My brother-in-law is haberdasher to Mr. Spurgeon."

O God ! O Montreal!

Then I said, "O brother-in law to Mr. Spurgeon's haberdasher!

Who seasonest also the skins of Canadian owls,

Thou callest 'trousers' 'pants,' whereas I call them 'trousers,'

Therefore thou art in hell-fire, and may the Lord pity thee!

O God ! O Montreal!

"Preferrest thou the gospel of Montreal to the gospel of Hellas,

The gospel of thy connection with Mr. Spurgeon's haberdashery to the gospel of the Discobolus?"

Yet none the less blasphemed he beauty, saying, "The Discobolus hath no gospel,—

But my brother-in-law is haberdasher to Mr. Spurgeon."

O God ! O Montreal!