There are also conflicts about important things or ideas. In such cases I am more impressed by the extreme importance of being on the right side, than I am disturbed by the revelation of the jungle of confused motives, private purposes, and individual actions (noble or base) in which the right and the wrong in actual human conflicts are commonly involved.

J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
Notes on W. H. Auden’s review of Return of the King (1956)
    (Source)

Auden's review: "At the End of the Quest, Victory," New York Times Book Review (1956-01-22).

Tolkien never sent or shared these notes. Reprinted in Humphrey Carpenter, ed., The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, #183 (1981).

 
Added on 1-Feb-04 | Last updated 21-Apr-23
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