The New York Tolkien Conference took place at Baruch University on July 31, 2025 and I was honored to make a presentation On Dragons, joining a fantastic group of presenters.
Kristine Larsen opened the day with a presentation related to Tolkien’s visit to Cheddar Gorge and its influence on his writing.
Hers was followed by Tom Hillman’s related to the “lost” aspects of the Children of Hurin as retold in the Book of Lost Tales, which includes, as Tom described it, “death, fate and a happy ending.”
Was very glad to catch up with Tom after the event at Churchill’s as we hadn’t met in person previously, despite both being at this event last year and having been in Tolkien groups going back several years. A wise man would have brought his book Pity, Power, and Tolkien’s Ring to have signed, but I didn’t think to do so.
Nicholas Birns discussed Smith of Wooten Major and Farmer Giles of Ham. These are short gems of the Professors that often are overlooked and I’m so glad I had recently listened to them in audiobook form on some of my recent walks to better appreciate Burns’ presentation.
My presentation was after lunch officially titled, “A Brief History of Dragons.” In the presentation I addressed the dragon’s of Tolkien’s Middle-Earth and what we know of him from his writings. I did not venture into influences or other types of dragons but did describe the types, traits, longevity, and origins with specifics drawn from the named dragons of Glaurung, Ancalagon, Scatha, and Smaug from whom we learn the most.
Alexander Retakh took on the character of Ioreth based on a simple fact that I had never considered before – there is no physical description of her whatsoever. He leveraged language, word usage, and comparisons of roles to develop a composite of who she may have been. I had some opportunities to speak with him as well and was glad I did.
Jeff LaSala presented his approach to helping readers through the Silmarillion, which he is currently finishing as The Silmarillion Primer and will be available through Signum University Press. His presentation talked through the challenges readers have and how he tried to mitigate them both in word and illustration.
I had met Jeff at last year’s conference and was bummed not to catch up with him this year, and yet he was kind enough to forward me the picture above of me speaking, thank you, again!
The final presenter was Donato Giancarlo. Beyond being an amazing artist, Giancarlo gave a wonderful presentation on this history of illustrations related to the books, primarily Gollum, which also yielded insights into his approach and craft, but also exposed his fandom since the age of 13 when he first started reading the books.
It was a great ending to a great day. I don’t know what the official attendance was, but there were at least 40 attendees in each session I was in, and a good gathered at Churchill’s afterward to keep the conversation going.
Many thanks to Chris Tuthill the conference organizer, Baruch University, and everyone who helped put this program together.
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