Happy Eleventy-tenth or Twelvetieth Birthday?

On the 3rd January 1892 John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa where his father was managing a branch of the Bank of Africa (a British owned colonial banking concern).

When he was three his mother Mabel decided that the climate in England would be better for John and his younger brother Hilary Arthur Reuel so they returned while his father carried on in South Africa, but he died the following year of a severe haemorrhage as a result of rheumatic fever. His mother was to die in 1904 as a result of complications from diabetes. Therefore before he was 13 J.R.R. Tolkien found himself orphaned. This may well be why Frodo Baggins lost both his parents in a boating accident when he was twelve and like his creator was orphaned at the same young age.

The boys guardian upon their mother's death was Fr. Francis Xavier Morgan of the Birmingham Oratory. She had converted to Roman Catholicism in 1900 to the disgust of many of her Baptist family. Possibly a basis for the separation of Bilbo Baggins from the Sacksville-Bagginses. However, one of the places he visited on holiday growing up as an oprhan was his Aunt Jane at her farm Bag End.

Of course he may well have just be another Oxford Don who was only known to academics of Anglo-Saxon, had he not in the early 1930s started to write a story about imaginary lands and races. Starting with the line "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." The book that was published on 21st September 1937, with the birthday of its hero being the 22nd it was always getting mentioned near my own birthday. This year of course Peter Jackson, who has already brought the sequel The Lord of the Rings to the screen, will be finalising The  Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey to present to expectant audiences in December. The second part The Hobbit: There and Back Again is due the following year.

I shall probably not be alone this year is revisiting my first Tolkien book, and the others probably, in preparation for the film that I have been waiting for since the campaign to ensure that Jackson was selected to direct it.

But of course the best reason for celebrating J.R.R. Tolkien's Eleventy-tenth of Twelvetieth birthday is that I can of course show Gandalf's fireworks.



Of course as well as looking back we should also look forward, so here is that trailer which some of us can never tire of.

The best supporting actor and a Vulcan Hobbit

Earlier today oneexwidow got an excellent song stuck in my head when he posted his Sound for Sunday. Go take a listen and enjoy.

However later on his undid his hard work when as Martin Freeman lifted the BAFTA for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, he tweeted "Ah, good for Bilbo". Of course Martin will be filming with Peter Jackson in New Zealand for The Hobbit, which I believe to be excellent casting.

However, what then got embedded in my head was this:



Now oneexwidow is of course denying all responsibility.

Now he may be right.

It may be my fault for having a brain that links phrases to song lyrics no matter how inappropriate.

It may be the fault of Peter Jackson, or his casting supervisor for casting a BAFTA nominated actor for such a role.

However, I know that Harry Cole is currently working on the theory that is down to Chris Huhne and the failed super injunction on Leonard Nimoy's singing career, especially where it led to the need to get There and Back Again* in as hurry to avoid the dread of Mordor (aka Vicky Pryce) since it is obviously all Nick Clegg's fault.

* This was the name of Bilbo Baggins's memoir of his earlier trip that he is writing at Rivendell when Frodo and the Fellowship of the Ring are formed, on which J.R.R. Tolkein based his book The Hobbit.