315 From a letter to Michael Tolkien 

1 January 1970

I am not getting on fast with The S. The domestic situation, Mummy's gallant but losing fight against age and disability (and pain), and my own years — and all the interruptions of 'business' do not leave much time. I have in fact so far been chiefly employed in trying to co-ordinate the nomenclature of the very early and later pans of the Silmarillion with the situation in The L.R. 'Stories' still sprout in my mind from names; but it is a very difficult and complex task.

When you pray for me, pray for 'time'! I should like to put some of this stuff into readable form, and some sketched for others to make use of. Also I should dearly love to defeat the Inland Revenue and survive beyond the iniquitous 7 years. (Also I should like time to set down what I know or remember of my childhood and my kin on either side.)