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re: LMB Book Club, July 10: The Silmarillion: "Of the Begin

Today's chapter, "Of the Beginning of Days"...here are discussion topics, just barely in time for the meeting:

(1) The need of Middle-earth for LIGHT is a constantly recurring theme in the Silmarillion, here introduced in the form of the Lamps, Illuin and Ormal. Why do you think Tolkien begins the Quenta Silmarillion with (and will so often return to) such a theme?

(2) Melkor's return to Middle-earth in its first spring of the Lamps is gradual and subtle; what alerts the Valar to his presence, and what does this say about his nature?

(3) We know from "Leaf by Niggle" how significant to Tolkien was the imagery of trees, and in this chapter we have that imagery combined with the theme of Light, in the origins of the Two Trees of Valinor: Telperion and Laurelin (among all those other names). How do these light-sources differ from the Lamps the Valar first made? How do the Trees affect the stories of Valinor at this time?

(4) But in these Days of the Bliss of Valinor, what was going on in Middle-earth? To what extent are the Valar still involved there at this time, before the Children of Iluvatar awaken?

(5) We have not yet seen the Elves properly introduced, but this chapter starts using some of the names for branches of that race nonetheless. Though we will meet all these various Elf-kinds later, let's have a brief summary of them now to help clarify things in this chapter for those reading it for the first time: Who are the Vanyar, Noldor, Teleri, Sindar?

(6) What are, and what are the implications of, the "strange gifts" that Iluvatar gave to the race of Men? How do they differ from the firstborn Children of Iluvatar, the Elves?


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