<story><title>Things JRR Tolkien has never said, done, written or had anything to do with</title><url>https://thetolkienist.com/things-j-r-r-tolkien-has-never-said-done-written-or-had-anything-to-do-with-an-on-going-series/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>KineticLensman</author><text>As well as misplaced quotes, a lot or people like to identify connections between places that Tolkien lived in or visited and places in Middle Earth. Clearly, there are likely inspirations, for example, young Tolkien&amp;#x27;s walking holiday in the Alps may have informed some of his descriptions of the Misty Mountains, and World War one battlefields may have inspired the Dead Marshes and Mordor. But did &amp;#x27;The Hollies&amp;#x27; park in Leeds [0], where Tolkien was a professor, inspire Hollin, just outside the gates of Moria? Who can say?&lt;p&gt;Incidentally, I have lived in two of the cities that Tolkien did: Leeds and Bournemouth. As a post grad at Leeds University, the small office (just east of the current Student Union building) that I shared for a while had reputedly been used by Tolkien long before I was born. We joked that it was the inspiration for the damp, dark, twisty caves of the goblins in the Hobbit.&lt;p&gt;[Edit - just checked - Tolkien explicitly references his Swiss walking tour as an inspiration for parts of the Misty Mountains]&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.headingleyleeds.com&amp;#x2F;parks-hollies&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.headingleyleeds.com&amp;#x2F;parks-hollies&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;J._R._R._Tolkien#Youth&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;J._R._R._Tolkien#Youth&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>101008</author><text>I may consider myself a Rowlingologist (because of JK Rowling), and it is a constant fight. A lot of places in the UK claim to have inspired JK Rowling, just because they are similar in the way they were portrayed in the films (which is very different from the books).&lt;p&gt;There is also the case of Livreria Lello, in Porto, Portugal, who spent years claiming JK Rowling visited it and got inspired for Hogwarts (they seem to have a similar staircase). They even held a Harry Potter event with signed books (most of them fake, probably the bookshop didnt know it, but they didnt do their dilligence).&lt;p&gt;Fortunatelly, Rowling denied knowing that place at all on Twitter [1], but as far as I know, the Livreria keeps telling its visitor about Rowling connection.&lt;p&gt;The same happens in Edinburgh (JKR city for the last 30 years), where if you do a tour, the guide will try to make a Harry Potter connection on every corner. Which is not completely true.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;twitter.com&amp;#x2F;jk_rowling&amp;#x2F;status&amp;#x2F;1263377779338481665&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;twitter.com&amp;#x2F;jk_rowling&amp;#x2F;status&amp;#x2F;1263377779338481665&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Things JRR Tolkien has never said, done, written or had anything to do with</title><url>https://thetolkienist.com/things-j-r-r-tolkien-has-never-said-done-written-or-had-anything-to-do-with-an-on-going-series/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>KineticLensman</author><text>As well as misplaced quotes, a lot or people like to identify connections between places that Tolkien lived in or visited and places in Middle Earth. Clearly, there are likely inspirations, for example, young Tolkien&amp;#x27;s walking holiday in the Alps may have informed some of his descriptions of the Misty Mountains, and World War one battlefields may have inspired the Dead Marshes and Mordor. But did &amp;#x27;The Hollies&amp;#x27; park in Leeds [0], where Tolkien was a professor, inspire Hollin, just outside the gates of Moria? Who can say?&lt;p&gt;Incidentally, I have lived in two of the cities that Tolkien did: Leeds and Bournemouth. As a post grad at Leeds University, the small office (just east of the current Student Union building) that I shared for a while had reputedly been used by Tolkien long before I was born. We joked that it was the inspiration for the damp, dark, twisty caves of the goblins in the Hobbit.&lt;p&gt;[Edit - just checked - Tolkien explicitly references his Swiss walking tour as an inspiration for parts of the Misty Mountains]&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.headingleyleeds.com&amp;#x2F;parks-hollies&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.headingleyleeds.com&amp;#x2F;parks-hollies&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;J._R._R._Tolkien#Youth&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;J._R._R._Tolkien#Youth&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>p_l</author><text>I&amp;#x27;d love if someone fact checked whether the salt mine of Wieliczka was really the inspiration for Moria (the guides do imply so, based AFAIK on a visit by Tolkien there). It does seem to fall under the &amp;quot;likely inspiration&amp;quot; case (if you ever visit Wieliczka, you&amp;#x27;ll get it :D)</text></comment>