Yup!

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'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'

Are they? I'm not sure the latitude of Númenor is ever specified (though I also wouldn't be surprised to learn otherwise), but on the real Earth at least, Native Americans, Mongolians, the Inuit, the Maori, and Tasmanian aboriginals are all more heavily pigmented than Europeans, in some cases much more so, despite originating from comparable or even higher latitudes. There is certainly a tendency toward lighter skin as you move away from the equator, but it's by no means absolute.

Right, Dave. Didn't Tolkien (?) say Minas-Tirith was about where Florence is?

Also, Gondor was basically an empire, with a minority of Numenorian refugees from the ships and the rest of the population the indigenous people they colonized. Assuming that only white people were in position of authority throughout history implies very unflattering things about the supposed good guys.

P. S. I read recently that the Inuit are unique for retaining high melanin content through the year while living in the extreme North, and that is enabled by their diet, which is high in vitamin D.

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“It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.”

- Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman, Good Omens

"Mixed race", "non-white" or "white" are rather anachronistic and utterly reductionist terms for Middle-earth (and the real world).

The magnitude of phenotypic differences in humans simply cannot be grasped through the limited, nationalistic prism of the contemporary U.S. Census. In a world before globalization (and in most parts of even a globalized planet), groups of people look different not just from continent to continent, but from region to region, peninsula to peninsula, valley to valley. "Ethnic Europeans" alone are an extremely diverse group of people. North Italians look markedly different from Sicilians; South Germans look different from North Germans, etc. Even more phenotypic differences can be seen among "Sub-Saharan Africans": Hausa, Xhosa, or Oromo are an extremely diverse groups of people, yet they are still simply conceptualized (and marginalized) as "black" from an American (and European) perspective.

Which brings us to the human/hobbit phenotypes of Middle-earth. Historically, terms such as "swarthy" or "browner of skin" (which is the term used for the Harfoots in LOTR) were not limited to "non-European peoples". A medieval or early-modern Englishman could describe a Frenchman or even a Swede (!) as rather swarthy. Consider this excerpt from Benjamin Franklin's Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind, Peopling of Countries, etc. for example:

"All Africa is black or tawny. Asia chiefly tawny. America (exclusive of the new comers) wholly so. And in Europe, the Spaniards, Italians, French, Russians and Swedes are generally of what we call a swarthy complexion ; as are the Germans also, the Saxons only excepted, who with the English make the principal body of white people on the face of the earth."

In other words: If one takes Middle-earth serious as a pre-modern, mythic world, it is much more plausible to view the Harfoots as phenotypically resembling for example Welsh people or Northern Frenchmen; and Forlong and his men maybe (but not necessarily) resembling Basques.

All good points... but I was reacting to the article which suggested Morgan Freeman as Gandalf, Idris Elba as Aragorn and the Korean guy from the Fast and Furious movies as Legolas. That's just going too far since it would require remodeling Middle-earth too much, at which point it ceases to be Middle-earth. If you're going to get such actors, put them in appropriate roles like the Blue Wizards and their followers.

Wizards and Elves have to be White, too? I can see Gondor being run by racists (all too easily, right now), but I don't think it's fair to cast Eru as one.

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“It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.”

- Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman, Good Omens

So, this morning I saw on FB that Ian McKellen wants to play Gandalf in the new TV series! Thoughts on this?

I guess the major concern is his age, and that he might not be physically capable of doing a lengthy series that obviously is going to take more than one season to complete.

And now that he's expressed his interest, I wonder if other cast members may want to return.

http://www.indiewire.com/2017/12/ian-mc ... 201908369/

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When the night has been too lonely, and the road has been too long,
And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snows,
Lies the seed, that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes The Rose.

I'll just be an optimist about this with fingers crossed.
Tolkien's legacy has hung over worse odds before.

Your optimism can balance out my cynicism.

And one more post will be a thousand!

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'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'

Soooo... any more news?

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The Vinyamars on Stage! This time at Bag End

Nope!

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'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'

And here it is.

Well, my first post in this site was also in one of these 'Hobbit' threads. So it's a circle I guess.

Not much to say, except that I loved all the conversations and exchanges I've had here over the years. Six more months, and I'll be having much more time on my hands to get back here. And even though I might not be posting very often, I do keep an eye on all the topics from time to time. So cheers to more of that.

And many thanks to V, who invited me over on this side a while back to join this site.

(Pssst.... where's PtB? No whispers in a while)

Haven't seen PtB in a couple of years, at least. Maybe he will show up again (in some form or another) when this show gets started up so he can explain to us why Game of Thrones was so much better.

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'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'

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I wanna love somebody but I don't know how
I wanna throw my body in the river and drown
-The Decemberists

In recent news, Amazon is also planning to make a Conan the Barbarian series based on the original 1930s pulp stories, unconnected to the Schwarzenegger movies.

They also released a series about the Roman conquest of Britain a while back, called Britannia. So I checked it out... and gave up after one episode. I really hope that doesn't bode anything ill for these projects.

I haven't seen Britannia but the trailer looked like a trip--in the more literal sense of being deliberately trippy and postmodern. I wouldn't necessarily expect the same approach to be taken with LOTR.

I hope that Amazon gets a good showrunner and gives them a decent level of autonomy. The guy in charge of The Man in the High Castle left in the middle of season two due to conflicts with the studio (apparently in part over the budget) and I think that had an impact on the finished product.

Eldo, that's pretty much what I heard about Britannia. The person described it as trippy but brilliant.

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“It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.”

- Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman, Good Omens

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The Vinyamars on Stage! This time at Bag End

Some reasonable speculation there, but honestly I'm ready to move from speculation to solid news, even though I know its probably still going to be a while before we get any.

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'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'

What's with the "web series" comment?

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The Vinyamars on Stage! This time at Bag End