Monday, August 10, 2020

Famous Saying

Years ago I encountered a young woman who had a bumpersticker "Not All Who Wander Are Lost."  I expressed my admiration for it. She cheerfully said that she'd heard it was from a book, but she just liked it because she wasn't very good at directions and her friends made fun of her, but she liked seeing different places. I am seeing the phrase on t-shirts more, and in striking up conversations, find that almost none of the wearers know the reference. Given the designs, including the one that I own*, I suspect that many of the shirtmakers have no idea where it comes from either.  It's just a fun saying. Cute, like the Father's Day card I got about a dad driving and being lost.

This is hard for me, because the meaning is quite serious in the book.

On the plus side, I have the opportunity to read LOTR out loud again after a hiatus of almost three decades.  As it used to take nine months, even at 30 minutes/night most evenings of the week, I have no hope of finishing this for my oldest granddaughter.  Yet it is a great thing to have even started, so that she can share in what was an important part of family culture for the first two sons, including her father.  I have changed a few of the voices.  It doesn't really matter where it breaks down, as this is a new experience in the world, not a mere echo of an older one.

*I dislike shirts with sayings, or even writing at this point, but certain relatives like them a lot and try very hard to find ones I might like.  I wear them around the house, sometimes even when there are visitors.

4 comments:

james said...

When I did the Hobbit, I was feckless enough to use chapter boundaries to end a night's reading. I felt very hoarse after Mirkwood.

Grim said...

I admit that I invested in the audiobooks. We wore them out.

I also bought audiobooks of the Fitzgerald Iliad and Odyssey, to play for my son when he was in the cradle. I hoped it might make a poet of him; but it did not. I also did Malory, and Chaucer; but it was Tolkien that took.

Anonymous said...

Since the Higg's Boson was confirmed we have been able to write an equation that describes our universe rather completely. This Eguation I had put on a T Shirt and wear it regularly. ;)

james said...

Or, if you remember Feynman's Lectures on Physics, U=0

There are details in the expression for U, of course...