News and updates

It’s been a while since I’ve written. I hope some of you are still checking back here for new posts and haven’t given up on me! The purpose of today’s post is just to catch you all up on a few recent news items, mainly to do with me and my Tolkien work.

8th anniversary of Lingwë

I neglected to post anything last month, but a couple of weeks ago, Lingwë turned eight years old. My goodness, that’s a pretty long time in the world of blogging. A few of the Tolkien-related blogs I read have been around longer — e.g., John Rateliff just edges me out at March 2007 and Michael Drout has been blogging since 2002 — but there’s no doubt Lingwë is getting rather long in the tooth. :) Speaking of anniversaries, the day after tomorrow marks three years since I came to work at Microsoft and moved to the Pacific Northwest.

New book coming soon! Really!

I first shared news of C.S. Lewis and the Inklings: Faith, Imagination, and Modern Technology, which I edited with Salwa Khoddam and Mark Hall, back in November. At that time, we thought publication was right around the corner. “Need brooks no delay, yet late is better than never,” as Tolkien said, and we have finally now finished the proofing and indexing. The publisher lists the book as already published (1 June 2015), so we obviously missed that, but it should be available very soon now. The list price is a bit steep at £52.99, but I’m hoping the book will at least end up in some libraries if not on the shelves of too many private enthusiasts and collectors! It’s actually a very good collection, if I do say so myself, so you really should consider it. Here’s an Amazon link in case you want to preorder it or share it around.

The 2015 Mythopoeic Awards — and a couple of streaks!

The Mythopoeic Society recently announced the finalists for the 2015 Mythopoeic Awards. Among the nominees for the Mythopoeic Scholarship Award in Inklings Studies is John Wm. Houghton, Janet Brennan Croft, Nancy Martsch, John D. Rateliff, and Robin Anne Reid, eds., Tolkien in the New Century: Essays in Honor of Tom Shippey (McFarland, 2014), to which I contributed the essay, “Tolkien’s Wraiths, Rings and Dragons: An Exercise in Literary Linguistics.” Tom himself sent me a note when he read the book in page-proofs thanking me for my contribution, which he said was “right along the lines I like to see myself.” You can imagine how gratifying that was! Congratulations to the five editors and to all the contributors of this fine volume.

And I mentioned streaks. With this book, McFarland has now had an MSA finalist in the running every year since their first appearance in 2008 (seven books, eight years in a row), so congratulations to them as well! They're cultivating a really solid portfolio in Tolkien studies and in myth, fantasy, and pop-culture studies more generally. And considering the almost foregone conclusion (my opinion, at least) that Tolkien’s Beowulf will win the award this year, I fully expect the Shippey Festschrift to be a finalist again next year, continuing the streak, and maybe the year after that as well.

Another streak I will dare to mention at the risk of immodesty. This also now makes five years in a row in which an MSA finalist has had a chapter in it by yours truly. In 2011, it was Brad Eden’s Middle-earth Minstrel: Essays on Music in Tolkien; in 2012–2014, it was my book, Tolkien and the Study of His Sources: Critical Essays; and now in 2015, the Shippey Festschrift.

A special conference next spring

As those who follow my antics will know, I’ve attended the C.S. Lewis and Inklings Society’s annual conference seven times; I’ve had chapters in three of their books, two of which I also co-edited, laid out, and cover-designed; and I’ve won their Best Scholar Paper award five times in a row, every year it had been awarded, 2010–2014, until I took myself out of the running from this year on. So I think it’s safe to say I’ve given back as much (or more) as I’ve gotten out of the CSLIS. Giving back in that way pays many kinds of dividends, and the newest is that I’ve been invited to come to the next CSLIS conference (31 March–2 April 2016 in Siloam Springs, Arkansas) as a Special Guest, along with Keynote Speakers Devin Brown and Charlie Starr. I’ll be doing a special presentation and a panel in addition to my conference paper. There’s a real symmetry to this for me, because my first ever conference presentation was also at the CSLIS conference, also hosted that year in Siloam Springs, and it will have been ten years ago next spring. So, if you are in the region, think about coming to the CSLIS conference next year. I’ll share more details (e.g., the conference website) one they are available, but in the meantime, here is a first look at the flyer the conference chair, Jonathan Himes, has been circulating.

Lingwë is four years old today!

Not a proper post, but I didn’t want the day to pass entirely unheralded. I started Lingwë – Musings of a Fish four years ago today, with few clear ideas of what I would end up doing with it. Since then I’ve written some 340 posts, which have been collectively viewed more than 100,000 times by well over 30,000 visitors from more than 150 countries — including some of the most far-flung and alien places I could imagine. 23 visits from Kazakhstan? And not all of them from the same internet cafe either. Most were from the largest city, Almaty, but I’ve also had a few visits each from Astana, Atyrau, and Chimkent. Incredible!

Or to take a slightly more familiar case, there is Japan, with over 800 visits across 85 cities; Ireland, with more than 400 visits from 23 towns; Denmark, with more than 200 visit, from a whopping 78 different localities (most of them small villages, I would think). And many more. It’s a humbling reminder of both how small, and how large, our world really is. A geography lesson every time I dig into my site statistics.

I hope to be at this for years to come, and please keep your feedback coming as well. If there’s one thing I’ve learned doing this and reading all of your comments, always entertaining and insightful (and even sometimes inciteful, hahae), it’s that this is really your blog too.

Not with a bang but a whimper

I realize it’s been pretty quiet around here lately — I’ve been working on the latest issue of Mythprint, the final progress report for Mythcon, the program book for Mythcon, etc., not to mention thinking about a certain someone’s birthday. But in all that chaos, it slipped my mind that as of May 24, I have been writing Lingwë – Musings of a Fish for three years!

I don’t have the time today to say anything more substantial than that (hence the humble title of this post, with apologies to T.S. Eliot). Contrary to the implications of “The Hollow Men”, Lingwë isn’t going anywhere — though it may take a little time to bring it back to the customary verbosity of its heyday. You know it’ll be a lot of work organizing a literary conference when you agree to do it, but you don’t realize quite how much work until you start falling behind! :)

Two years online!

It’s hard to believe I’ve really been writing Lingwë – Musings of a Fish for two years now, but yesterday was indeed the two-year anniversary of my first post. And in the strangest of coincidences, that very first post just attracted a new (and relevant!) comment, two years later to the day, from Harvard professor Marc Zender. Strange are the ways of chance, I suppose — if chance you call it.

I have really enjoyed writing Lingwë — sharing news as well as the occasional internet oddity, trying out theories and arguments, and engaging in thought-provoking conversations with literally tens of dedicated readers, hahae. Actually, perhaps I’ve graduated up to dozens or even a few score by now, if Google Analytics is to be trusted. I’ve also had visitors from well over a hundred different countries — including even Iraq! And the sometimes bizarre search terms that lead people to Lingwë would make for a post all of their own!

I feel I can look back with genuine pride on some of the entries of the past two dozen months. I will resist the temptation to iterate a list of “greatest hits” — and in any case, there have been more than few forgettable posts and greatest “misses” too. And speaking of the greatest missus, I would like to take a moment to mention my partner and inspiration, who has (unfairly to her) been mentioned waaay too rarely here: my wife, Jennifer. She has the patience of a saint — a cliché, but true — and has been nothing but supportive of my extra-curricular work. I wish all of you could meet her. She’s quite simply the best person I know. Thank you for your unwavering support and enthusiasm, darling! (I know, I sound like I’m accepting a Webby or something, hahae.)

So, while looking back, let me also look forward. If you’ve enjoyed what you’ve seen over the past two years, watch this space: I hope to keep bringing you more of the same for many years to come — if this whole “interweb thingy” catches on. ;) As always, I welcome comments, feedback, corrections, and criticisms. So far, I have managed to avoid the radar pings of the trolling bots that would force me to moderate comments (*knock on wood*). And I still receive few enough that I can (and do) respond to each one. Feel free to make requests too — and yes, that is a tip jar. ;)

My 200th Post

It’s silly, really, but I’ve been putting this off. I knew it was going to be my 200th post, and I wanted to save it for something “of special magnificence”, but I’ve just been too busy lately to get anything substantial together (not for lack of ideas).

So, instead, let me simply get my 200th post out of the way, marking it with little fanfare except the promise to bring you some very interesting new posts over the next few weeks. Just as soon as I get one or two (or five :) more pressing tasks cleared from my to-do queue.

In the meantime, reflecting on what writing Lingwë is usually like, have a listen to Daft Punk’s “Technologic” (and yes, that is one very creepy robot!) —

Buy it, use it, break it, fix it,
Trash it, change it, mail, upgrade it,
Charge it, point it, zoom it, press it,
Snap it, work it, quick erase it,
Write it, cut it, paste it, save it,
Load it, check it, quick rewrite it,
Plug it, play it, burn it, rip it,
Drag it, drop it, zip, unzip it,
Lock it, fill it, call it, find it,
View it, code it, jam, unlock it,
Surf it, scroll it, pose it, click it,
Cross it, crack it, switch, update it,
Name it, read it, tune it, print it,
Scan it, send it, fax, rename it,
Touch it, bring it, pay it, watch it,
Turn it, leave it, start, format it

Stay tuned for more Tolkien, Lewis, and philological ruminations. Along with that, some exciting publication news on the not too distant horizon.

One year online!

So now I can say tempus *really* fugit. It’s been a full year since the inception of Lingwë – Musings of a Fish. :)

Some 136 posts on a variety of topics — many of them quite arcane, I suppose, but judging by the growing feedback I have been receiving, welcome nonetheless. My daily traffic hasn’t grown a great deal yet, which may be for the best because it still allows me the freedom to respond to each comment individually. But I’ve had almost 3,500 unique visitors, with more than 10,000 pageviews. And the number of countries to have discovered Lingwë has grown sharply. I’m on the map, so to speak, in 95 countries, including such surprising visitors as Uzbekistan, Martinique, Bahrain, Cameroon, and Saudi Arabia. Still no ping from Iraq (despite hearing from most of its neighbors) — but I suppose the folks there have other priorities.

I should apologize for the sound of crickets around here over the last two weeks. I’ve been busy at work and at home, and I had another cold on top of that — my fourth in six months; what is wrong with my immune system?! But I’m back now and should be posting again regularly.

Six months online!

My, my, tempus fugit. It seems like only yesterday that I finally sat down to create a weblog. I’d wanted to do so for ages, but one thing led to another and that, to something else again, none of which was leading to a blog. But toward the end of last May, I decided it was time: and “Lingwë – Musings of a Fish” was born.

And here it is six months later, and verging on 100 posts. Lingwë seems to be doing well. Some posts have generated a fair amount of commentary (though admittedly, much of it is mine, hahae). A few posts have been on the frothy or gossipy side, but I think a good majority have been a bit meatier and (I hope) more interesting.

It also seems that I have a small, but growing, audience, and I’ve earned a spot on several blogrolls. Lately, I’ve been gathering statistics on the site’s traffic, with fascinating results. On average, it seems I get about 30 visitors a day, which isn’t too bad for a new, and rather arcane, website. The most surprising discovery is the fact that I’ve been visited from 55 different countries, including some really unexpected ones, like Libya, Thailand, Guyana, and even Iran. Here’s the Top 10:

01. U.S.
02. U.K.
03. Belgium
04. Canada
05. Germany
06. Japan (Yes, I’m “Big in Japan” ;)
07. Philippines
08. Australia
09. Finland
10. Bulgaria

Finland — score! Elias Lönnrot would be so proud.