"The Treason of Isengard", was an interesting take on Sauraman's betrayal and eventual defeat by the Ents as well as the Battle of Helm's Deep. The editor's notes of Christopher Tolkien that explained how J.R.R Tolkien came up with the final form of these stories from "The Two Towers" were very informative. I'd recommend it to any fan of Middle Earth stories.

4.5*

Still tremendously cool to track the journey of lotr to the page. Less enlightening than the previous volume because Tolkien clearly had more purpose than before, but still exhaustive and extremely interesting to fans. A singular work of scholarship, as part of the wider HOME.

Linguistic note: includes a quick treatise on runes.

This one was a tough one to finish tbh. Looking forward to the ones about the Silmarillion

Compared to The Return of the Shadow, this book just doesn't measure up. Much less fun trivia, more first draft paragraphs. Also, it frequently refers directly to the text of The Two Towers, as if it expects the reader to have he Two Towers available for reference at all times. This book was still interesting in showing how close Tolkien's prose is in his rough drafts to the final form, and in how uniquely he develops plot. Also, as someone who enjoyed reading LOTR more than the Silmarillion, it's bizarre that I now found myself wishing for the planned out complexity of the First Age storylines. You can tell Tolkien's passion was really in those stories.

You know you're a nerd when the mention of Dairon and Rumil in the Rune appendices sends you into a little spiral of glee because "remember when Cirdan mentioned them in The Rings of Power I know those guys!!"
In all seriousness though, this was once again a very fun read and I have lots of facts now stored in my brain about the writing of LOTR that I will whip out at any given random moment. Seeing how Tolkien would plan out the story from different parts is so rough when you know what happens. What do you MEAN Boromir would have lived but turned traitor. I love seeing the progression from Ond to Ondor to Gondor and the mess that is What is Aragorn's Actual Name. Even Galadriel wasn't really developed until he realized how powerful she actually was. As I probably said before, it's really inspiring to see Tolkien's process and how he also did not know everything he was doing. Now it is time for me to get back to the massive restructuring of my story.

Sedma knjiga Istorije Srednje Zemlje i druga knjiga koja prati nastajanje Gospodara Prstenova.
Ova knjiga se nastavlja na predhodnu, i veoma je zanimljivo pratiti Tolknov tok misli o idejama vezanim za radnju i svaki karakter ponaosob. Sve je manje vise na vec dobro znanom putu, medjutim alternativne ideje cesto nam daju neke od najzanimljivijih informacija koje ne mozete da nadjete u zavrsnom tekstu Druzine Prstena ili Dve kule, ali veoma realno leliujaju u pozadini. Svakome ko je procitao Gospodara Prstenova bice veoma zanimljivo da se upusti u ovaj, slobodno mogu reci, visi nivo analize najpoznatijeg dela fantastike.

As always, it is delightful to realize Tolkien was a fairly normal author. I love the moments of Christopher's confusion and annoyance. They're so funny. I love that Tolkien wrote on every scrap of paper he could get his hands on. I love that when he had to change the timeline, Tolkien missed a couple of moments. I love that Tolkien also had imperfections and went back and forth over whether it was Gandalf or Saurman that the Three saw outside of Fangorn. I laughed at the point where Tolkien apparently forgot that Gimli was present. Most of all, I was delighted to discover that Aragorn didn't say "other" but "others" in reference to Pippin's small size. The singular and utterly out of character "other" was a typo. Excuse me while I go correct all my copies of LOTR.

Seriously, what's with renaming everyone every other draft? Hamilcar Bolger, Faramond Took, Peregrin Boffin, Folco Boffin, Odo, Drogo, Frodo, Bingo. The Land of Ond, Ondor, Gondor. Trotter. In the Fourth iteration of the narrative Gandalf is held captive by a Giant Treebeard. And a lot of messing around with all the place names. No idea why not just stick with first one?

HOME7 still deals in large parts with rewritings of the Fellowship and maybe dips into Two Towers a bit as well, but it clearly was a massive long process. One can just admire the grit, or despair on the perfectionism.

This history of LOTR is still a set of paradoxes - mind-numbingly boring and fascinating at the same time.

The evolution of names, events, etc. is fascinating.

An amazing work in which you really see LoTR 'post Moria' take shape.

Take for instance the instance of Galadriel, in the space of a few pages she went from non-existence to one of the most powerful beings in Middle-earth with a completely flashed out background and Elven Ring, which also solidified the way they had been created.

On the other hand you have the subtle and complicated history of other subject, and the significants of certain lines from LoTR which take on soo much more of a background. Simply amazing!

I read the Lord of the Rings beforehand, but really I should read it when I finish this series.

Me gusto mucho también este libro por que la considero que cuenta desde otra perspectiva los sucesos que ocurrieron en "El Señor De Los Anillos: Y Las Dos Torres" a un narrada de manera diferente a la original realmente.