And then at last over the miles between there came a rumble, rising to a deafening crash and roar; the earth shook, the plain heaved and cracked, and Orodruin reeled. Fire belched from its riven summit. The skies burst into thunder seared with lightning. Down like lashing whips fell a torrent of black rain. And into the heart of the storm, with a cry that pierced all other sounds, tearing the clouds asunder, the Nazgûl came, shooting like flaming bolts, as caught in the fiery ruin of hill and sky they crackled, withered, and went out.

‘Well, this is the end, Sam Gamgee,’ said a voice by his side. And there was Frodo, pale and worn, and yet himself again; and in his eyes there was peace now, neither strain of will, nor madness, nor any fear. His burden was taken away.

The Return of the King is third and final part of J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel The Lord of the Rings. It describes the final battles against Sauron, as well as Sam and Frodo’s journey through Mordor to throw the One Ring into Mount Doom. But then it spends a good amount of time untangling all its plot threads and wrapping up its many character’s stories.

Chris and Suzanne explore these various endings as they look at a kind of ending of their own, as The Spouter-Inn prepares to change its format in the new year to something related, but a little different, from what they’ve been doing for the past six years. They hope you’ll still come around to join them as they talk about what they’ve been reading.

J.R.R. Tolkien: The Return of the King.

Our episodes on the first two parts of The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers.

Our episodes on Troilus and Criseyde, Harriet the Spy, Monkey Beach, the Aeneid, Memory Serves, and our conversation with Lee Maracle about Great Expectations and more.

Roberta Mazza: Stolen Fragments: Black Markets, Bad Faith, and the Illicit Trade in Ancient Artefacts.

George Eliot: Daniel Deronda. (See also our episode on Middlemarch.)

By-The-Bywater is another podcast on our network, about all things Tolkien.

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