There is not nearly enough said about Tolkien's ability to encompass volumes into very short sentences. Mostly because, yes the man was a master of lush descriptions and certainly he loves to wax long and poetically about stars and trees and far green fields under the wind...
But the skill with which he can pack an emotional punch into a couple of words...
"Then Fingolfin beheld (as it seemed to him) the utter ruin of the Noldor, and the defeat beyond redress of all their houses; and filled with wrath and despair he mounted upon Rochallor his great horse and rode forth alone, and none might restrain him. He passed over Dor-nu-Fauglith like a wind amid the dust, and all that beheld his onset fled in amaze, thinking that Oromë himself was come: for a great madness of rage was upon him, so that his eyes shone like the eyes of the Valar. Thus he came alone to Angband's gates, and he sounded his horn, and smote once more upon the brazen doors, and challenged Morgoth to come forth to single combat. "
And the final sentence "And Morgoth came."
All of that imagery of Fingolfin coming upon Morgoth like a Vala himself and throwing down his figurative gauntlet and then the fallen Vala coming forth with just a three word sentence.
Or the entirety of the Duel of Sauron and Finrod (that is renowned) all gorgeous imagery, the Lord of Wolves against the disguised king of Minas Tirith...
"Reeling and foundering, as ever more strong
The chanting swelled, Felagund fought,
And all the magic and might he brought
Of Elvenesse into his words."
"The wolf howls. The ravens flee.
The ice mutters in the mouths of the Sea.
The captives sad in Angband mourn.
Thunder rumbles, the fires burn"
And the final line "And Finrod fell before the throne."
The brevity and the switch from Felagund to just Finrod, from the dwarf-given title to his Telerin-originated father-name as he falls defenseless to the reminder of the kinslaying is devastating in its simplicity.
There is a time for lush descriptions and a time for brevity, a time for gorgeous, expensive imagery and allegory and a time for literary simplicity and Tolkien knew it...
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