by Stanley Anderson » June 2nd, 2008, 8:27 pm
I "know" that fact about the trilogy and later seven too. I think it was in one of his letters where he said LWW was just going to be itself, and then turned into the three, and then to seven (noting in the letter at the same time the "fittingness" of having the numbers three or seven as a form of completeness. I think he also said in the same letter (or whatever it was) about how you can only quit in two places -- leaving them wanting more, or overdoing it (ie, implying that it is impossible to stop at exactly the right point), and that it is thus better to stop at the former.
But perhaps the quote-master Sven can come up with the exact reference?
--Stanley
…on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a fair green country under a swift sunrise.