Sadness is, perhaps, not an emotion that is often associated with the myriad feelings surrounding generative AI. Anger, despair, fear, suspicion — these will likely be familiar to some. I must confess, I do not as of yet truly understand the more positive emotions some seem to have toward AI LLMs, and so I will not speak to them. Sadness, though, is perhaps not the most obvious emotion — and yet I think it is the one that best describes how I feel about generative AI, and how I have felt for some time. Or, rather better, how I feel…
Leave a CommentTag: Leaf by Niggle
Niggle was a painter. Not a very successful one… Of all Tolkien’s works, arguably none of them lend themselves so readily to analysis as Leaf by Niggle. The allegory by the man who claimed to hate allegory. A touchingly close examination of a character who may be as close as Tolkien ever came to writing a self-insert. Even, arguably, Tolkien’s most religious and theological work (of his fictional tales, that is…On Fairy Stories is, of course, Tolkien’s theological triumph). As such, Leaf by Niggle is probably the Lesser Tale in least need of yet another analysis, especially one by a…
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Last year, for the month of September, I did a little blog miniseries, focusing on The Hobbit and some of its less-appreciated themes and aspects. And, since I really enjoyed writing those posts, and having a theme to work towards…I decided to do it again this year! So, over the next few weeks, we’re going to be looking at three stories by Tolkien…stories which, actually, aren’t under-appreciated in the same way that The Hobbit is. But they’re also stories that a lot of Tolkien fans might not pay much attention to, or even know about…and that’s a great shame, because…
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I’ll never forget the first time I saw a dragon. I was six years old, a precocious and likely slightly annoying reader, with an overactive imaginat…
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