With all the weird retro LotR stuff going around lately,

[huinare]

can we please observe the Ace 1965 covers and how, among other things, a My Little Pony has evidently mated with a bat?



_______*_______

Also, you know, I really actually quite like this one.  Except that it doesn't make sense.  But that's okay.

Comments

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Um - there seems to be a spaceman in the bottom one, wearing a gull on his head - or maybe his head is a gull, what with being a spaceman....

[huinare.livejournal.com]

I was thinking it was an extra-canonical plant!person, but a gull-headed spaceman is an equally good supposition.

And I assume that giant hooded chap is Sauron going "aaaugh I've got an infestation of...of...what even are these?!"

[shadowbrides.livejournal.com]

The last one actually does make sense to me. It has a dark fortress, the Crebain, Shelob and the Nazgul, with one of them drowning in a river. It's somewhat abstract, but a pretty sensible collection of the most evil beings in the book minus Sauron.

Now..the others...are...very artistic interpretations? Not half as mad as this Polish Silmarillion cover though. I've tried to understand the damn thing for years but...nothing.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Well, yeah, the one I linked to does have all the elements you listed and I'd perceived them...I was just confused cause the Nazgul in the river happened in Fellowship, and the river wasn't near a dark fortress, and I don't think any of the dark fortresses looked anything like that, andandand--- /literalist

Re: Polish Silm.
I.
Um.
...
.............
........................ Wha?

[dwimordene-2011.livejournal.com]

No, no, I can see it! Look, the egg symbolizes the fertility of genius, awaiting its entry onto the world! But the smooth roundness and neutral off-white of it symbolize the ambivalence of genius, its non-allegiance with anything but itself.

Moreover, the world is cruel, and so the brown birdlike metal hook/latch/door-holder thingie, representing the fusion of nature and artifice waits to pierce the shell of genius, and unleash it upon the world, to what effect, no one knows, but the shadow looming in the background forebodes Bad Things. And then the people - their pointy form is actually suggestive of a keyhole, and their coloration combines with that to suggest that they are just trouble waiting to be unlocked behind their abstract and naive gazes! Madness! Madness lies within!

I got it! I totally got this cover art! Legomullet --> painful. Plant-head people --> disturbing. My Batshit Pony --> significantly less terrifying than required. But abstract bird-egg art? I go this!

(Yes, I think I am going insane. I blame class prep.)

[shadowbrides.livejournal.com]

Hah! My insane interpretation was the the bird with egg was Feanor, crouching protectively over his one egg, his one true creation, his "children" in a way - the Silmarils.

The hopeless looking people on the next page are the 7. If you look at their faces, they are actually just flat with eyes on them. They don't have beaks! Those are fake things they hold up to their face. I think this represents them trying to emulate Feanor and their trying to find and take back the Silmarils.

[keiliss.livejournal.com]

My best shot was going to be Elwing as a seagull, but I now see my error. This. Definitely.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

You've sold me on the bit about the egg.

Cause it's either that reasonably comprehensible and believable explanation, or else they went into the kitchen of some artist on acid and were like "Make us a Silmarillion cover."

[wheelrider.livejournal.com]

My Batshit Pony! *spews tea*

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Well, I would've left well enough alone, but your poor tea accidentally activated my parody reflex somehow. Of the original theme song I grew up with, of course. (And I fail at left-aligning images to text. Oh well)



<3 <3 <3
––<–-@

My Batshit Pony, My Batshit Pony, what will today’s atrocity be?
My Batshit Pony, My Batshit Pony, will there be haunting sights to see?
Will we not slay them? Pursue and flay them? Letting the Ring’s power be our guide.
My Batshit Pony, My Batshit Pony, you’ll strike fear right by my side…You’ll strike fear right by my side…

––<–-@
<3 <3 <3

[wheelrider.livejournal.com]

HOLY SH&T!!! Brilliant! I totally remember that theme song and this goes so well.

That deserves its own post!


(fortunately I set my tea down before reading)

[huinare.livejournal.com]

If I were to make it its own post, I'd have to go to the trouble of putting the text onto the picture itself all fancy-like...because I'm a perfectionist. And, I'm also lazy. These two qualities are like oil and water. I need a My Batshit Pony to whip me into shape.

[wheelrider.livejournal.com]

Heh, I hear you on the perfectionist/lazy double-edged sword... if you can't do it right, don't do anything at all (but continue to eat cookies and read things on the internet as I am instead of working on starting my Bechdel Test Challenge story).

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Wait, did I write this comment, cause it sounds like I wrote this comment.

[wheelrider.livejournal.com]

:)
[ETA} Hey, what about your Conscience, William Lovelace? Oh there he is, in your icon, looking disdainfully upon the pair of us.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

I swear the man appropriated semblance of some dude who's probably rolling in his centuries-old grave is no help at all. He just gives that disapproving stare and does nothing to help out around here.

Jiminy Lovelace: Now that's unfair. I do exactly what I'm supposed to do. You lack follow-through, you wretch..

[huinare.livejournal.com]

So I thought you should know that the My Batshit Pony theme song is now written in my above comment to WR.

Thank you.
Or, should I say, you're welcome.

Yeah, I'm a lyrical genius.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

That genuinely has just made me laugh out loud - for so long that I now have the hiccups! There are no words to explain it really!

[pandemonium-213.livejournal.com]

The image on the right? I see anthropomorphized tape dispensers.

[aliana1.livejournal.com]

I--so--

This is probably just me, but for the Return of the King cover I saw the giant, pointy rock tower rising up in front of (what is presumably) Sauron, and immediately thought...

*runs away*

[huinare.livejournal.com]

No yeah actually you are so right, and I'm surprised I didn't see it right away.

And all those little plant people or gull aliens or whatever are like OH SHIT GUYS SAURON IS GOING TO COVER ALL THE LANDS WITH HIS--

[aliana1.livejournal.com]

BEHOLD THE MIGHT OF BARAD-DUR!

[pandemonium-213.livejournal.com]

[Dark Muse] Huh. Which would I rather be? A priapic Cyclops or the world's largest lighthouse? *thinks* Priapic Cyclops it is! [/Dark Muse]

I love that "doesn't make sense" cover for purely sentimental reasons. That was the edition (pictured in 1L's post below) that my brother brought home from college in 1968. I immediately grabbed the paperbacks and didn't emerge from my room for a few days.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Ever pragmatic, the Dark Muse. (Huinish!Mairon: "All decent incarnations of us are pragmatic. Which is of course why I fully agree with the DM.")

Cool! I think they're really nice covers whether they make sense or no, which is much more than I can say about Gandalf the Gold, My Batshit Pony, and Cyclopean!Priapic!Sauron above.

[engarian.livejournal.com]

Your link was the cover set that I first had and, in fact, still have (along with at least five additional sets). I thought the covers were so beautiful and I still love them.

The ones that you showed seem to have a thing with outstretched arms and odd rock formations :-) I hadn't seen these before and they are quite odd - especially the dark Pegasus for the Nazgul.

Here's the full set of three in the series I first owned around 1967 or so...(I also had the full poster on my wall).

- Erulisse (one L)

(http://s937.beta.photobucket.com/user/Engarian/media/LOTR%20Community%20Art/JRRTLOTRCovers_zps17feaf48.jpg.html)

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they are really cool-looking (the ones pictured in your comment, I mean). I spent longer than I should have yesterday afternoon trying to find a good version of all of them patched together. Which I assume is the poster you had. =D

Couldn't resist icon-izing a detail of the Tower Towers one myself.

[engarian.livejournal.com]

I saw your avatar and couldn't resist doing one of each of the books as well as the holder which they all came from (sorry, didn't mean to step on your toes but they bring back such happy memories).

The poster was indeed of all of them seamlessly joined. Here's a fairly decent photo of what it looked like...

(http://s937.beta.photobucket.com/user/Engarian/media/LOTR%20Community%20Art/JRRTLotrCoverPoster_zpscea8dfcc.jpg.html)

- Erulisse (one L)

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Oh don't worry, no toe-stepping going on...if anything, you're more entitled to make icons of the covers given your history with them. Glad this post brought back some good memories for you. =]

[engarian.livejournal.com]

Oh heavens, no entitlement at all for either of us. Your example inspired me :-)

- Erulisse (one L)