Tabby R.H. > Tabby's Quotes

“How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart you begin to understand... there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep, that have taken hold.”
― JRR Tolkein

“It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“PIPPIN: I didn't think it would end this way.

GANDALF: End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it.

PIPPIN: What? Gandalf? See what?

GANDALF: White shores, and beyond, a far green country under a swift sunrise.

PIPPIN: Well, that isn't so bad.

GANDALF: No. No, it isn't.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Home is behind, the world ahead,
and there are many paths to tread
through shadows to the edge of night,
until the stars are all alight.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Some who have read the book, or at any rate have reviewed it, have found it boring, absurd, or contemptible, and I have no cause to complain, since I have similar opinions of their works, or of the kinds of writing that they evidently prefer.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I want to be a healer, and love all things that grow and are not barren.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“But in the end it's only a passing thing, this shadow; even darkness must pass.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Pippin glanced in some wonder at the face now close beside his own, for the sound of that laugh had been gay and merry. Yet in the wizard's face he saw at first only lines of care and sorrow; though as he looked more intently he perceived that under all there was a great joy: a fountain of mirth enough to set a kingdom laughing, were it to gush forth.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisoned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Deeds will not be less valiant because they are unpraised.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“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 a light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach. His song in the Tower had been defiance rather than hope; for then he was thinking of himself. Now, for a moment, his own fate, and even his master’s, ceased to trouble him. He crawled back into the brambles and laid himself by Frodo’s side, and putting away all fear he cast himself into a deep untroubled sleep.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Yet dawn is ever the hope of men,’ said Aragorn.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“Memory is not what the heart desires. That is only a mirror,”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I feel I need a holiday, a very long holiday, as I have told you before. Probably a permanent holiday: I don't expect I shall return. in fact, I don't mean to, and I have made all arrangements....

I feel all thin, sort of stretched, if you know what I mean: like butter that has been scraped over too much bread. That can't be right. I need a change, or something.'

Bilbo”
― J. R. R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings Slipcase

“The great storm is coming, but the tide has turned.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“But do not despise the lore that has come down from distant years; for oft it may chance that old wives keep in memory word of things that once were needful for the wise to know.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

“Yet it is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I can ride and wield blade, and I do not fear either pain or death.’ ‘What do you fear, lady?’ he asked. ‘A cage,’ she said. ‘To stay behind bars, until use and old age accept them, and all chance of doing great deeds is gone beyond recall or desire.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“It depends on what you want," put in Merry. "You can trust us to stick to you through thick and thin- to the bitter end. And you can trust us to keep any secret of yours- closer than you keep it yourself. But you cannot trust us to let you face trouble alone and go off without a word. We are your friends, Frodo. Anyway: there it is. We know most of what Gandalf has told you. We know a good deal about the Ring. We are horribly afraid- but we are coming with you; or following you like hounds.”
― J. R. R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings Slipcase

“For still there are so many things that I have never seen: in every wood in every spring there is a different green. I sit beside the fire and think of people long ago, and people who will see a world that I shall never know.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I don’t feel like that now. I feel that as long as the Shire lies behind, safe and comfortable, I shall find wandering more bearable: I shall know that somewhere there is a firm foothold, even if my feet cannot stand there again.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend: the city of the Men of Númenor; and I would have her loved for her memory, her ancientry, her beauty, and her present wisdom. Not feared, save as men may fear the dignity of a man, old and wise.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I am very fond indeed of it, and of all the dear old Shire; but I think I need a holiday.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater. ‘Some”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I am wounded," he answered, "wounded; it will never really heal.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“The prime motive was the desire of a tale-teller to try his hand at a really long story that would hold the attention of readers, amuse them, delight them, and at times maybe excite them or deeply move them.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“they would sit together under the stars, recalling the ages that were gone and all their joys and labours in the world, or holding council, concerning the days to come.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

“I fear that in my eagerness to persuade you, I lost patience. And indeed I regret it.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings