Tea with Tolkien

Find the show notes at www.teawithtolkien.com/podcast/16

All of the show notes for this episode are available at www.teawithtolkien.com/podcast/15

Pull up a cozy chair and join us as we chat about the works and Catholic faith of J.R.R. Tolkien! I hope this podcast encourages you to carry a little piece of Middle-Earth into your own life as we grow together in hobbitness and holiness. Thanks so much for listening!

‘How do I feel?’ he cried. ‘Well, I don’t know how to say it. I feel, I feel’ — he waved his arms in the air — ‘I feel like spring after winter, and sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!’

If you listened to our Tolkien Reading Day episode yesterday, this is one of my favorite Tolkien quotes that I had mentioned. And today I wanted to talk a bit more about it and Spring in general, particularly because last week marked the beginning of Spring for us and because March 25th is of course the day on which the Ring was destroyed as well as the Feast of the Annunciation.

Spring represents or calls to mind images of hope, new life, a fresh start, the light after dark, warmth after the cold, cleansing rains, a gentleness after the harshness of winter. It is soft, and joyful, a season to be celebrated. Tolkien was a lover of myth and symbol and the natural rhythms of the seasons, and the way The Lord of the Rings flows is a testament to that.

Tolkien writes in Letter 210, “Seasons are carefully regarded… They are pictoral, and should be, and easily could be, made the main means by which the artists indicate time-passage. The main action begins in autumn and passes through winter to a brilliant spring: this is basic to the purport and tone of the tale.”

Tolkien, being a devoted Catholic, lived in line with the Church’s liturgical calendar. To Catholics, Spring is closely associated with Easter: the Resurrection, which Tolkien called the Greatest Eucatastrophe.

In Letter 89 he wrote, “The Resurrection was the greatest ‘eucatastrophe’ possible in the greatest Fairy Story — and produces that essential emotion: Christian joy which produces tears because it is qualitatively so like sorrow, because it comes from those places where Joy and Sorrow are at one, reconciled, as selfishness and altruism are lost in Love. Of course I do not mean that the Gospels tell what is only a fairy-story; but I do mean very strongly that they do tell a fairy-story: the greatest. Man the storyteller would have to be redeemed in a manner consonant with his nature: by a moving story. But since the author of it is the supreme Artist and the Author of Reality, this one was also made to Be, to be true on the Primary Plane….”

After death, comes life; after winter, comes spring. And we see this all over the place in his writings as they are so rooted in both physical actual time, as he had mentioned before, and in the symbolism of the seasons. Both Bilbo and Frodo leave Bag end right at the beginning of Autumn, and the Ring is destroyed right at the beginning of Spring…

Pull up a cozy chair and join us as we chat about the works and Catholic faith of J.R.R. Tolkien, and strive to carry a little piece of Middle-Earth into our own daily lives.

Tolkien Reading Day is celebrated on the 25th of March every year, in honor of the day on which the One Ring was destroyed. Since 2003, the Tolkien Society has celebrated this day by encouraging fans to read and share their favorite Tolkien passages, so I wanted to share five of mine. Share yours on social media using the #TolkienReadingDay hashtag, and tag me so I can see, too!

I chose all of these from The Lord of the Rings, perhaps because it's most familiar to me of all Tolkien’s works, but also because it has had the biggest influence on my life and has meant the most to me. The more I read the Silmarillion, the more I fall in love with its depth, but I’m still not as familiar with it to be able to choose my favorite specific passages or chapters. So all of these are from The Lord of the Rings, and I didn’t realize this until now, but all of them are from The Return of the King at that.

This first one is from Book Six, Chapter One. After he believed Frodo to be dead, Sam took the Ring and determined to finish Frodo’s quest for him. However, he learned that Frodo was not actually dead, and he had been taken by orcs and carried away. So Sam is following them now in an attempt to rescue him, but already he is being tempted by the Ring.

“In that hour of trial it was the love of his master that helped most to hold him firm; but also deep down in him lived still unconquered his plain hobbit-sense: he knew in the core of his heart that he was not large enough to bear such a burden, even if such visions were not a mere cheat to betray him. The one small garden of a free gardener was all his need and due, not a garden swollen to a realm; his own hands to use, not the hands of others to command.” - The Return of the King, The Tower of Cirith Ungol

Sam is strengthened by his realized, and continues on. After climbing to the top of the stairs in the Tower of Cirith Ungol and being unable to find Frodo, Sam sinks down and bows his head. However, he then begins to sing:

In western lands beneath the Sun
the flowers may rise in Spring,
the trees may bud, the waters run,
the merry finches sing.
Or there maybe 'tis cloudless night
and swaying beeches bear
the Elven-stars as jewels white
amid their branching hair.

Though here at journey's end I lie
in darkness buried deep,
beyond all towers strong and high,
beyond all mountains steep,
above all shadows rides the Sun
and Stars for ever dwell:
I will not say the Day is done,
nor bid the Stars farewell.

Sam’s song draws the attention of an orc, thinking he’s hearing Frodo. The orc uses a ladder to access the final chamber above, and with that Sam is able to follow the orc up and rescue Frodo.

In the next chapter, The Land of Shadow, Frodo and Sam scramble through Mordor, trying desperately to finish their quest. At one point, they find a place to hide and Sam tells Frodo to sleep while he keeps watch.

“Then at last, to keep himself awake, he crawled from the hiding-place and looked out. The land seemed full of creaking and cracking and sly noises, but there was no sound of voice or foot. Far above the Ephel Duath in the West the night-sky was still dim and pale. There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.”

After the Ring is ultimately destroyed, Frodo and Sam awake to find themselves in the Field of Cormallen. Aragorn is king; Gandalf is returned.; the Ring is gone. All is right with the world once again.

“‘Well, Master Samwise, how do you feel?’ he said.

But Sam lay back, and stared with open mouth, and for a moment, between bewilderment and great joy, he could not answer. At last he gasped: ‘Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself. Is everything sad going to come untrue? What’s happening to the world?"

‘A great Shadow has departed,’ said Gandalf, and then he laughed, and the sound was like music, or like water in a parched land; and as he listened the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, the pure sound of merriment, for days upon days without count. It fell upon his ears like the echo of all the joys he had ever known. But he himself burst into tears. Then, as a sweet rain will pass down a wind of spring and the sun will shine out the clearer, his tears ceased, and his laughter welled up, and laughing he sprang from his bed.

‘How do I feel?’ he cried. ‘Well, I don’t know how to say it. I feel, I feel’ — he waved his arms in the air — ‘I feel like spring after winter, and sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!’

Later on, as the hobbits are brought out before the host of men and met with great praise, Tolkien writes:

“And all the host laughed and wept, and in the midst of their merriment and tears the clear voice of the minstrel rose like silver and gold, and all the men were hushed. And he sang to them, now in the elven-tongue, now in the speech of the West, until their hearts, wounded with sweet words, overflowed, and their joy was like swords, and they passed in thought out to regions where pain and delight flow together and tears are the very wine of blessedness.”

So these are five of my favorite passages from The Lord of the Rings, quotes that have pierced my own heart and hopefully they will resonate with you a little bit, or at least inspire you to read a little or a lot of Tolkien. I’d love to hear about your favorites in the comments below, or you can send me a note on twitter or facebook or instagram!

Also, on a quick final note, today is the opening of our spring pop-up shop! I have a limited selection of some of our most popular items from when our Etsy shop was open and I’m very excited to be able to offer some of them again. It was such a challenge to run our busy Etsy shop while also staying at home with my little hobbits, and so I made the difficult decision to close last December. However, this pop-up shop will be open from today until April 5th! We have a beautiful new design made for Tea with Tolkien by Ash of Daffodils and Ink, as well as our Rose Bookstack tee, our enamel Hobbit at Heart campfire mug, and our Little Hobbit baby onesie.

I also wanted to mention, if you’re on instagram, I’m hosting a giveaway in celebration of Tolkien Reading day this week. The giveaway will close on March 30th and 10pm EST, and I hope it’s you that wins! You can visit my instagram feed, @teawithtolkien, for all of the details and how to enter.

I will be back tomorrow to talk about one of my favorite quotes that I had mentioned in this episode, Sam’s “I feel like spring after winter and sun on the leaves”, as well as a little discussion of the significance of Spring in Tolkien’s writings, so make sure you’re subscribed to the podcast so you won’t miss an episode.

I hope you have a beautiful day, and make sure to read more Tolkien! And drink more tea, too!

Also, here’s the link to my piece about March 25.

Pull up a cozy chair and join us as we chat about the works and Catholic faith of J.R.R. Tolkien as well as how we can carry Middle-Earth into our own daily lives.

I’ve wanted to begin discussing some of Tolkien’s letters every so often and so today I thought we’d talk about Letter 213.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about or why these letters have numbers, it’s because they’ve been compiled and published in this really lovely and insightful book called The Letters of JRR Tolkien, edited by Humphrey Carpenter. I’ll link to it in the show description, I highly highly recommend it…

This week, I was joined by my best friend Theresa Williams! We chatted about a piece she wrote for the Tea with Tolkien blog on the life, writings, and faith of Flannery O’Connor, friendship, and more! I hope you’ll enjoy!

Read Theresa’s piece on Flannery O’Connor here.

You can learn more about Theresa here.

(Also just a quick note, I’m sorry for the kinda wonky audio! I’m still learning how to be a good podcaster so I hope it wasn’t too bad & I’m sure it will be better next time! Ha!)

Thank you all so much for listening to our little podcast! I think you’re all the best and I love being able to have tea with you every week. If you’re enjoying these episodes, I’d love to hear from you! You can send me a note on twitter @teawithtolkien or simply capture a moth and whisper a message to me and I’m sure it will deliver that right along, agh okay not really.

Today we’re going to having a bit of a topical discussion on the subject of Lembas! As well as looking at the Catholic influences behind this, the lovely waybread of the Elves.

We’re first introduced to Lembas in The Fellowship of the Ring when the Fellowship is leaving Lothlorien. As they prepare to set off, Galadriel presents them with several gifts-- both for each individual and the company as a whole. One of these gifts is a bunch of Lembas.

A tiny bit of backstory here because I just learned this as I was preparing for this episode and I t5hought it was cool: Lembas was actually first made by Yavanna, one of the Queens of the Valar, the same that made the Ents, and the recipe was eventually passed down to Galadriel. It’s actually made out of a special corn grown that had grown in Aman. It was also an Elven custom, apparently, that only women should bake it so sorry boys! I should also note that it is extremely rare that Lembas is given to any non-Elves so this occasion of the Fellowship receiving large quantities of it is quite important.

Gimli mistakes it for ‘cram’ but is pleasantly surprised that it’s actually very lovely!

The elves explain basically what it is, how to care for it, and so on…

“Eat a little at a time, and only at need. For these things are given to serve you when all else fails. The cakes will keep sweet for many many days, if they are unbroken and left in their leaf-wrappings, as we have brought them. One will keep a traveler on his feet for a day of long labour, even if he be one of the tall Men of Minas Tirith.”

After this chapter, we see Lembas carries throughout the rest of the story, even as the fellowship has broken, all the way to Mordor -- just makes me wanna cry thinking about it.

One of my favorite things that you can sort of pull out of The Lord of the Rings and bring to life in our own world is Lembas. Tolkien goes to a lot of detail to describe it, so it’s really the sort of thing that we can actually bake ourselves and feel like we’re eating alongside the Fellowship. Even if we might have realized just two seconds ago that Lembas is actually a corn-based cake and I’ve been using wheat flour and almonds this whole time! But that’s okay!

Two years ago, I came up with a recipe based on my own interpretation of Lembas and I’m quite fond of it and I’ll add a link to it in the show notes if anyone else is interested.

It’s basically like a cookie but it’s not very sweet, maybe we would call it a biscuit, and in it we’ve got honey, almonds, orange, and lavender among other things. And of course, it’s very good with tea!

So how does the Eucharist fit into this?

One of the first hints of Catholicism in The Lord of the Rings that I picked up on after my conversion was Lembas.

Of all the Catholic parallels in Tolkien’s writings, Lembas bread is perhaps the strongest as it bears a striking resemblance to the Eucharist (also known as communion).

Tolkien acknowledges this similarity in Letter 213 when he writes about different instances of readers pointing out his Catholic influence, “Another saw in waybread (lembas)=viaticum and the reference to its feeding the will and being more potent when fasting, a derivation from the Eucharist…”

While not allegorical, of course, several characteristics of the Elvish way bread are reminiscent of the Eucharist, so it is worth spending a little time reflecting on its role in the story of Middle-Earth.

So when given to a person near to or in danger of death, the Eucharist is called Viaticum (meaning in Latin: ‘provision for a journey’). Similarly, Lembas is called way bread by the Elves, and is given to the members of the Fellowship as they embark on their perilous quest.

In Book III, Chapter II, Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli are following after the group of Orcs that had captured Merry and Pippin. Tolkien writes, “Often in their hearts they thanked the Lady of Lorien for the gift of lembas, for they could eat of it and find new strength even as they ran.”

A person cannot receive the Eucharist while in a state of mortal sin without placing themselves in grave danger. Similarly, Gollum cannot eat Lembas and is actually harmed by it. Lembas is also considered more ‘potent’ when it is a person’s sole sustenance, which can be seen as a nod to the Catholic fast before receiving Communion.

And like Lembas must be eaten daily, it is recommended to that Catholics receive the Eucharist often.

In Lembas, the hobbits find renewed strength of spirit and body, often being reminded of home or safer times. Tolkien wrote, in Letter 55, of receiving Communion as “a fleeting glimpse of an unfallen world…’

Similarly, Merry remarks to Pippin that Lembas “does put heart into you! A more wholesome sort of feeling, too...” And the Elves themselves say that it is “more strengthening than any food made by Man.”

In The Return of the King, as Frodo and Sam are almost to the end of their journey, Tolkien writes, “The lembas had a virtue without which they would long ago have lain down to die… it fed the will, and it gave strength to endure, and to master sinew and limb beyond the measure of mortal kind.”

Catholics believe the Eucharist is the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ — in which He is truly present. While there is no such parallel within Lembas, its power of nourishment for both body and soul speaks to the influence of the Eucharist on Tolkien’s life.

Tolkien wrote of the Eucharist often in his letters, which were compiled and published 1981 - a book, as always, I highly recommend adding to your bookshelf.

He referred to it as ‘the one great thing to love on earth’, recommending it as ‘the only cure for sagging or fainting faith’.

If you’d like to read more of his thoughts on his faith and the Eucharist, I’d recommend letters 43, 55, 89, 213, and especially 250 — available in “The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien” edited by Humphrey Carpenter.

I wanted to share two quotes from these letters:

In this one, Letter 43, Tolkien is writing to his son Michael,

“Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament. . . . There you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves on earth, and more than that: Death: by the divine paradox, that which ends life, and demands the surrender of all, and yet by the taste—or foretaste—of which alone can what you seek in your earthly relationships (love, faithfulness, joy) be maintained, or take on that complexion of reality, of eternal endurance, which every man’s heart desires.

Later, in Letter 250, also to Michael, he writes:

"The only cure for sagging or fainting faith is Communion. Though always itself, perfect and complete and inviolate, the Blessed Sacrament does not operate completely and once for all in any of us. Like the act of Faith it must be continuous and grow by exercise. Seven times a week is more nourishing than seven times at intervals.”

One of the coolest parts of Catholicism in my opinion is that not only can we receive the Eucharist during Mass, but we can also participate in something called Eucharistic Adoration.

This is when the consecrated host is placed in a neat sort of holder called a monstrance and it’s displayed, often in an adoration chapel or maybe even in the regular church building for special occasions, and anyone can just come and sit in the presence of our Lord.

Someone asked on Twitter the other day if you need to be catholic to visit an adoration chapel and I was so excited to hear this question honestly because you totally don’t have to be catholic at all! I know a lot of people have found a lot of peace within adoration, even if they don’t really believe in the Catholic teaching that the sacrament is truly Christ present. So if you’ve ever want to attend adoration but weren’t sure about it, you should totally find one nearby and go!

Whenever I feel like everything around me is chaos or I’m struggling with feeling low, I try to run to the Blessed Sacrament as often as I can. A few weeks ago I was in kind of a bad place mentally and so I was able to drive down to adoration every night after my husband came home for a week. That kind of peace and quiet and dedicated alone time in prayer helped pull me out of a pretty dark place and so if you are at all able to, I really really highly 10/10 recommend it.

Catholics refer to the Eucharist as the source and summit of the Christian life, and so I’ve been trying to really anchor myself around this and cling to this truth when I’m kinda feeling like Frodo and Sam on the slopes of Mount Doom.

So to bring it all back together, I just wanted to share how once again learning something more about Tolkien had led me on another winding path into the depths of Catholicism!

I love so much how devoted Tolkien was to the Eucharist and it’s such a balm for my soul to see it, even just in a small way, reflected in Lembas.

I’ll talk to you all next week, but until then I’ll be on twitter and instagram (but mostly twitter) @teawithtolkien…

You might have heard me mention that after hosting my own hobbit parties for the past 7 or 8 years, I’m working on putting together all of my ideas and tips into one resource for all of you! It will be available probably within the next month but instead of selling it on my website, I’m going to first make it available for free to all of my patrons so if you’d like to sign up to become a patron of Tea with Tolkien you can head to patreon.com/teawithtolkien.

The guide won’t be available for purchase on its own until probably August or September otherwise.

Thank you so much for hanging out and having tea with me today!

Just another reminder that I’ll include the Lembas recipe in the show notes if you’d like to make a batch of your own. The recipe makes a ton because it was meant for Hobbit Party prep, but I cut it all in half yesterday when I wanted to make a smaller batch and it turned out perfectly so you can feel free to to do that as well.

I hope you all have a lovely week and we’ll be back next Tuesday for an exciting interview that I can’t wait to share with you!

Resources & Links:

Lembas Recipe by Tea with Tolkien

“The Letters of JRR Tolkien”

Tea with Tolkien on Patreon

Find all of the shownotes at: www.teawithtolkien.com/podcast

Follow us on twitter @teawithtolkien

:)

To Middle-Earth and Back Again by Kaitlyn Facista (me!)

Sweet Sequels (the etsy shop where I got my Baby’s Guide to LOTR cloth book)

http://www.mi.imati.cnr.it/marco/Who_is_Tom_Bombadil.htm

https://www.tolkiensociety.org/author/faq/#tellme

https://terpconnect.umd.edu/~jkeener/tolkien/getserious.html