The Week Behind, and what lies ahead – Issue 05 | 14 March 2021

 

Issue 005 | 14 March 2021

Welcome to your newsletter looking at the Tolkien-related news from the previous week and what is coming up in the week(s) ahead.

Eight legs nightmare by Jian Guo. This week by the Shire-Reckoning, Sam uses Sting and the Phial of Galadriel to fend off Shelob’s attack.

LOTRO roundup

Quite a lot of Lord of the Rings Online news this week!

Executive Producer Rob Ciccolini (Severlin) released his annual Producer’s Letter this week with lots of upcoming goodness mentioned. Some highlights include:

• Update 29: The Wildwood of Bree-land
• Spring Festival with a guest appearance from Grimbeorn
• “Further adventures” quest arcs, starting with Bilbo Baggins
• Update 30: The Blood of Azog – Summer 2021
• Update 31: Gundabad – Fall 2021
• The Wastes comes to the Legendary Servers
• PvMP work
• LI work

On Friday (12 March 2021) +Cordof the Rings confirmed the Spring Festival would come next week and begin on Thursday 18 March 2021.

He also hoped that Update 29 would be released next week too. Get ready to discover the Wildwood!

SSG world builder Scenario (Matt Elliott) continued fantastic series of live streams discussing LOTRO regions with behind-the-scenes insights. This time he went to Angmar following a player vote on the LOTRO forums. You can watch the new chat here.

The latest LOTRO Beacon, #196, is out and available here.

LOTRO streamer Bludborn has created a video “What you need to know about Update 29 Wildwood” here – obviously spoilers for the region in the linked video!

LOTRO blogger Fibrojedi has got their fantastic guide for Spring Festival all ready for next week, just awaiting the new items we’ll see. You can find their blog here.

Back in 2018 I investigated the origins of one of the Spring Festival furniture items, the Garden-Dwarf, in a blog post titled “Ranatuor’s Lore: The Grasp of the Gnome.” You can read that article here.

Upcoming Laurelin player events

Lindamar presents Coirëar – “Days Of The Stirring”  

Sunday 21st March 2021 (3pm /servertime)

http://lotroartists.com/events/lindamar-presents-coirear-days-of-the-stirring-laurelin/

A musical performance on the eve of the Spring equinox to celebrate Nature’s awakening.

You can find more Laurelin RP events here.

The Tolkien Society

These items are from previous weeks but still relevant – the Proceedings of the Tolkien Society Seminar 2020 are available to pre-order in printed form and the Tolkien Society Seminar #1 2021 can be watched now on YouTube.

Adapting Tolkien: Proceedings of the Tolkien Society Seminar 2020
Release Date 12 April 2021
Peter Roe Series XX
https://www.lunapresspublishing.com/product-page/adapting-tolkien  

Tolkien Society February Seminar 2021: Twenty-first Century Receptions of Tolkien
The Tolkien Society
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5j5LMWt7DXI&list=PLoyx2jXs6Le9KChyyjvHiZE1wgUnACrFT  

The Tolkien Society is also running the Tolkien Reading Day, details in the Upcoming talks/events section below.

Upcoming talks/events

Tolkien Reading Day - “Hope and Courage”
Thursday 26th March 2021 – online - free
The Tolkien Society and the Centre for Fantasy and the Fantastic (University of Glasgow) 

Each year the Tolkien Society marks the day the Ring was destroyed whilst also celebrating the life of J.R.R. Tolkien with an international day of reading. People are encouraged to read their favourite passages from Tolkien’s books. The theme this year is “Hope and Courage.”

You can book on one of three sessions to suit you – morning, afternoon or early evening. Details can be found on the link below.
https://www.tolkiensociety.org/events/tolkien-reading-day-2021/ 

Mythmoot VIII: Annual Speculative Literature Conference – “The World Ahead”
24-27 June 2021
https://signumuniversity.org/mythmoot/

The call for papers ends 31 March 2021 at 11.59pm EST. 

Tolkien Society Seminar #2 “Tolkien and Diversity”
Saturday 3rd and Sunday 4th July 2021 – online - free 

The next Tolkien Society Seminar will be in July and is focusing on the theme of “Tolkien and Diversity.” There is currently a call for papers, deadline is Friday 23rd April 2021. Details here:
https://www.tolkiensociety.org/events/tolkien-society-summer-seminar/
https://www.tolkiensociety.org/2021/02/call-for-papers-released-tolkien-society-summer-seminar-tolkien-and-diversity/ 

International Medieval Congress
Monday 5th to Friday 9th July 2021 – online - £120 (full) / £75 (concessionary)
Leeds University
https://www.imc.leeds.ac.uk/imc-2021/ 

The Tolkien sessions for the International Medieval Congress have been finalised. Dr. Andrew Higgins is taking over organising these from Dr. Dimtra Fimi. There looks to be some wonderful talks lined up, Details can be found here:
http://wotanselvishmusings.blogspot.com/2021/02/eglerio-tolkien-sessions-at-leeds-imc.html 

17^th German Tolkien Society Seminar 2021 “Tolkien and Politics”
29th to 31st October 2021
Philipps-University of Marburg and Deutsche Tolkien Gesellschaft e.V. (DTG)
https://www.tolkiengesellschaft.de/43136/tolkien-seminar-2020-call-for-papers-en-stipendium-2/

The call for papers closes 30th April 2021. 

Shelob’s around the Web round-Up 

Having been poked in the eye and having suffered the human equivalent of standing on Lego, Shelob seems to have retreated this week and is refusing to find any news. Hopefully she’ll return soon with more juicy things!