It’s the job that’s never started as takes longest to finish (…)

It’s the job that’s never started as takes longest to finish (...)

[Samwise Gamgee; The Lord of the Rings, Bk. II, Chp. 7, The Mirror of Galadriel]

— J.R.R. Tolkien

Please note that many Tolkien-related quotes on the internet are truncated, misappropriated, wrongly attributed and/or taken out of context.

The full version of this quote is:

It’s the job that’s never started as takes longest to finish, as my old gaffer used to say. And I don’t reckon that these folk can do much more to help us, magic or no. It’s when we leave this land that we shall miss Gandalf worse, I’m thinking.’

Marcel Aubron-Bülles

A Tolkien fan for thirty years (and more to come...) Founding chairman of the German Tolkien Society, Co-Founder of Ring*Con, Co-Founder of the ITF, host, presenter and fantasy expert