The Tale of Tinúviel

This is, arguably, Tolkien's dearest story in his mythology and one of his earliest as it was originally penned in 1917. It's the Tale of Tinúviel what we've come to know as Beren and Lúthien's story: the beautiful story of the forbidden love of an Elf and Man. One wonders how much of this story was inspired by true life: on his wife's tombstone (other than names and dates) all that is written is: Lúthien and for the professor; Beren. In fact, when first interested in Edith Tolkien was instructed to not pursue her because of religious differences: another forbidden love story.

Christopher Tolkien notes that the arrangement of these tales is quite difficult. Tinúviel is given in The Book of Lost Tales - Volume II because of his father's shifting ideas of the order of the stories. For example, J.R.R. Tolkien felt the tale of the Sun and Moon should come before the current tale. Tinúviel is one of the longest and most complete Tales so far (Christopher Tolkien notes it's likely the last completed element of the Tales before this approach was abandoned). It's 37 pages and I will not be giving play by play notes. Rather my impressions:

I was quite impressed to see this very early story hold so many similarities to the published work: forbidden love is still present, a suicide mission to retrieve a Silmaril is central, some of the key adventures and characters are fully present (although names differ significantly). Overall it was very easy to see how the published story evolved from Tinúviel. Now for some of the key differences

• As mentioned names are different: Melian = Gwendeling, Thingol = Tinwelint
• Beren is an Elf not a Man. He is one of the exiled Noldoli and still not accepted by Tinwelint
• Dairon (Daeron) was the brother of Tinúviel
• Beren does not enlist the help of Felagund
• Beren is captured by the cats (yes, cats) of Melko sentenced to slave work in the Evil One's kitchen's much to the chagrin of Tevildo Prince of Cats (yes, cats)
• Tevildo is the earliest forerunner of Sauron yet the only similarity he's one of Melko's chief servants. 
• Huan and many of his exploits are present but the sons of Fëanor are not.

I am probably missing some other details but this was a fun read as you can really see how the story evolved from this point. 

In my failed attempt to blog through the History of Middle-earth series last year (as I read it for the first time) one of my few extended blog posts dealt with the idea of Tolkien's clear affection for dogs over cats in light of this tale. You can go here for a look; bear in mind it's a little tongue-in-cheek.