000) Lord of the Rings, Chapter by Chapter

Currently started on The Return of the King.

New to the book, and finding it hard to read?  Click on this link.

But for those who have read it, or are reading it, I am making a careful study of each chapter.   Be warned that some chapter-studies refer to future events.  But nothing that would be a ‘spoiler’ for anyone who had seen the films.

When Did Each Chapter Happen?
A chronology for each chapter, including things that happened at the same time but are told of elsewhere.  It includes details not in Tolkien’s Appendix B.

Book One

  1. A Long-expected Party
  2. The Shadow of the Past
  3. Three Is Company
  4. A Short Cut to Mushrooms
  5. A Conspiracy Unmasked
  6. The Old Forest
  7. In the House of Tom Bombadil
  8. Fog on the Barrow-downs
  9. At the Sign of The Prancing Pony
  10.  Strider
  11. A Knife in the Dark
  12. Flight to the Ford

Wider views:

Why Gandalf took so long to identify the One Ring
When Would Normal Gold Melt?
Who Is Tom Bombadil?.
Gandalf: From Bladorthin to Olorin.

Book Two

  1. Many Meetings
  2. The Council of Elrond
  3. The Ring Goes South
  4. A Journey in the Dark
  5. The Bridge of Khazad-dûm
  6. Lothlórien
  7. The Mirror of Galadriel
  8. Farewell to Lórien
  9. The Great River
  10. The Breaking of the Fellowship

Book Three

  1. The Departure of Boromir
  2. The Riders of Rohan
  3. The Uruk-Hai
  4. Treebeard
  5. The White Rider
  6. The King of the Golden Hall
  7. Helm’s Deep
  8. The Road to Isengard
  9. Flotsam and Jetsam
  10. The Voice of Saruman
  11. The Palantir

Book Four

1. The Taming of Smeagol
2. The Passage of the Marshes
3. The Black Gate is Closed
4. Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit
5. The Window on the West
6. The Forbidden Pool
7. Journey to the Cross-roads
8. The Stairs of Cirith Ungol
9. Shelob’s Lair
10. The Choices of Master Samwise

Book Five

  1. Minas Tirith
  2. The Passing of the Grey Company
  3. The Muster of Rohan
  4. The Siege of Gondor
  5. The Ride of the Rohirrim
  6. The Battle of the Pelennor Fields
  7. The Pyre of Denethor
  8. The Houses of Healing
  9. The Last Debate
  10. The Black Gate Opens

Extra – The Rohirrim Song and Sibley’s Additions.

Book Six – Begun May 2020

1. The Tower of Cirith Ungol
2. The Land of Shadow
3. Mount Doom
4. The Field of Cormallen
5. The Steward and the King
6. Many Partings
7. Homeward Bound
8. The Scouring of the Shire
9. The Grey Havens

Appendices – To Do

Why am I doing this?

Back in August 2017, Dominic Russell took the initiative in forming a Coventry local branch (Smial) of the Tolkien Society.  I attended the first meeting of what became Rangers Of Mordor Minor (Coventry Smial).  We met on 7th September at a café and second-hand bookshop called The Big Comfy Bookshop, whose owners are Tolkien fans.

On that occasion, we discussed the poem Mewlips.  We also agreed to meet monthly, and in October we would begin a read-through of both The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.  This soon switched to two chapters per month of Lord of the Rings.

The intention is to study the whole book.  We have reached the early chapters of The Return of the King.  Should finish in 2020.

We are of course aware that the ‘trilogy’ format was the publisher’s idea, in part to limit expense on a book that was quite different from most.  The basic format is six ‘books’ in a complete work.

I myself prepared written notes.  I decided that these were worth putting on my website, though tidied and including some interesting comments made by other members.  And with various extra thoughts I have had since.  Some of them have expanded considerably.

We carry on under Lockdown, using Skype for on-line meetings.