Warm Beds are Good: Sex and Libido in Tolkien's Writing

An Essay by Tyellas

Click here to read the essay Warm Beds are Good: Sex and Libido in Tolkien's Writing in .PDF format.

This essay is an attempt at a serious, scholarly analysis of sex in Tolkien. It takes a more serious view than my factual yet light piece What Tolkien Officially Said About Elf Sex, and has a wider scope. There may be other essays extant on this, and I am aware that some of the topics I mention, such as Sam and Frodo, are often hotly debated by fans.

In 2003, this essay won the Best Critical Essay award in the Mithril Awards for Tolkien fan writing. In 2005, this essay was published in Issue #42 of Mallorn, the journal of the Tolkien Society. In the improbable event that you would like a print copy of this essay, you can order this issue of Mallorn through the Tolkien Society's web site.

This essay can be read translated into Italian here, and into German (PDF file) here. Thanks to the wonderful translators!

Warm Beds are Good discusses the following:

  • Tolkien: Old-Fashioned In His Day

  • Central Concepts of Sex in Tolkien's Writing

  • Libido as Reward in The Lord of the Rings

  • Sam and Frodo: Gay? Or Victorian?

  • The Censored Silmarillion

  • Laws and Customs Among the Eldar: Everything Under Control

  • The Great Tolkien Sex Story, Aldarion and Erendis

  • Modern Readers' Reactions: Updating the Myths

  • Where's the essay? Well, it's in .PDF format only, so....click here to read Warm Beds are Good: Sex and Libido in Tolkien's Writing.

     

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    Some of my other essays, including another Mithril Award winner, The Unnatural History of Tolkien's Orcs

     

    Starred recommendations for content by other writers:

    Love, Intimacy, and Desire Among Hobbits – Most excellent essay by Cara Loup about hobbits.

    Twenty-Two Words You Never Thought Tolkien Would Provide - From the Silmarillion Writers' Guild!