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 … - J. R. R. Tolkien

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 light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.

Gueroult: I thought that conceivably Midgard might be Middle-earth or have some connection? </br> Tolkien: Oh, it is; they're the same word. Most people have made this mistake of thinking Middle-earth is a particular kind of Earth or is another planet of the science-fiction sort, but it's simply an old-fashioned word for this world we live in, as imagined surrounded by the ocean. </br> Gueroult: It seemed to me that Middle-earth was, in a sense, as you say, "this world we live in", but this world we live in at a different era. </br> Tolkien: No, at a different stage of imagination, yes.

Where now are the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the harp on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow.
Who shall gather the smoke of the deadwood burning,
Or behold the flowing years from the Sea returning?

Nothing has astonished me more (and I think my publishers) than the welcome given to The Lord of the Rings. But it is, of course, a constant source of consolation and pleasure to me. And, I may say, a piece of singular good fortune, much envied by some of my contemporaries. Wonderful people still buy the book, and to a man 'retired' that is both grateful and comforting.