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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Hriston" data-source="post: 9801097" data-attributes="member: 6787503">I finished reading The Roots of the Mountains, by William Morris, last night. It felt like a bit of a slog, probably because I was reading it every night before falling asleep, and I've had a tendency lately to doze off pretty quickly, so it took me a long time to get through it.Its influence on JRR Tolkien is apparent from the beginning. It concerns the people of "the Dale", an idyllic mountain valley also called Burgdale, and their dealings and relationships with the people of other nearby mountain valleys, Rose-dale and Silver-dale, which, in context, are both simply referred to as "the Dale". I think this probably influenced the naming of Dale in The Hobbit. It also seems to be the inspiration for the Aragorn-Arwen-Eowyn-Faramir love quadrangle in the LotR. A similar set of relationships figures somewhat more prominently and is more tightly knit, with the protagonist, Face-of-god's, father's relationship with the Bride, his betrothed, adding a further complication. Another point of comparison is the young war leader's love interest, the Sun-beam, being from a people who live in a remote place in the mountain-wastes called Shadowy Vale whom we are at first led to believe to be supernatural "wood-woses" (the Sun-beam is said to have the beauty of one of the gods) but are later revealed to be normal men distantly related to the Dalesmen.Another strong point of resemblance is the way Morris describes the "Dusky Men" who are the story's primary antagonists and are described as a sadistic, all-male society, wielding crooked swords, and being "long-armed like apes." I think the resemblance to Tolkien's orcs is obvious.Of course, there's also the propensity of the author to punctuate the action with verse by having his characters burst into song, a feature this novel shares with The House of the Wolfings, Morris's first foray into modern fantasy which also features the "Mirkwood" as a location which figures prominently. All in all, The Roots of the Mountains seems to have had even more of an influence on Tolkien's work.Eta: Another point of interest for fans of Tolkien is the colophon at the end of the Project Gutenberg EBook version I was reading (emphasis added):CHISWICK PRESS:---C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.</blockquote>

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