The Professor and the Ocean

Long-time readers of The Flotsam Diaries are well-acquainted with my love of Tolkien's work. This passage might help explain the attraction:

"At last, at unawares... he came suddenly to the black brink of Middle-earth, and saw the Great Sea, Belegaer the Shoreless. And at that hour the sun went down beyond the rim of the world, as a mighty fire; and Tuor stood alone upon the cliff with outspread arms, and a great yearning filled his heart. It is said that he was the first of Men to reach the Great Sea, and that none, save the Eldar, have ever felt more deeply the longing that it brings."

J.R.R. Tolkien, Unfinished Tales, pp. 24-25

I've not read elsewhere that Professor Tolkien was, himself, particularly drawn to the seashore. But these are the words of a man with ocean on the brain.

Artwork by Ted Nasmith, illustrator
of The Silmarillion