SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion
What Else Are You Reading?
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Should I start reading the LOTR series?
I loved the movies and the books. The Fellowship of the Ring does start off slow, but it picks up. I was completely engrossed by the time they left the shire. In my opinion, it's definitely worth reading.
I have to agree about the Hobbit movies. If I have never read the books, I would have enjoyed them. But, all the changes that were made to them, it's not even Tolkien's book anymore.
Of course! You should read them and I'm sure you'll enjoy them! They are among my favourite books and for it's the best fantasy series!
Well... given that it is widely held to be the finest example of the genre, continually features near the top of genre and non-genre polls alike and is often the yardstick against which all other fantasy sagas are measures then yes. Basically, if you're a fan of fantasy and heven't read LOTR then you're doing it wrong ;-)As far as the LOTR films... I've been a fan of the books since I first read them over 30 years ago and I thought they were excellent. I have some minor niggles but that's all they are really. On the whole, Jackson did a fantastic job of bringing the story to life
Unfortunatley the same can't be said of The Hobbit. Sure it looks awesome but trying to spin out a 300 page children's book into an epic movie trilogy was a ridiculous idea.
You can see from the comments that the books are entirely different from the movies. They are not even the same phylum, okay? So do not expect them to be the same.However -- assuming that you can let the books be what they are -- the answer to your question is yes. Yes, you should read LOTR. You do not have to read HOBBIT first. Just pick up FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING, page past all the prefaces, forewords, prologues, maps, and front matter, and start in on the first page of chapter one. I envy you, the pleasures before you.
This is one of the seminal fantasy novels of all time. Tolkien's handprint is on not only those movies (sorta), but on very nearly ever fantasy writer of the past two generations. There is no fantasy author alive today who is not influenced (for good or for ill) by JRRT. Furthermore, his influence extends into gaming (there would be no D&D, no roleplaying games, without LOTR) TV (GAME OF THRONES is a reaction to LOTR), even theology. C.S. Lewis and Charles Williams would probably not be read today, except for their Tolkien connection.
Honestly, I was not particularly taken by the written Lord of the Rings. I adored The Hobbit but I found the writing in Lord of the Rings a bit too ponderous to really grab me. Added to that, the main villain in Lord of the Rings is undermined almost completely by an unnecessary character named Tom Bombadil early on and it deflates the conflict a bit.The world is very immersive and I honestly loved the movies, but the Lord of the Rings as a written work just didn't do it for me. I found the Hobbit much more readable, fun, and engaging.
Oh, the other thing about reading LOTR? Skip. Skip all the poems if they do nothing for you. Skip Tom Bombadil's songs. (The movies did the right thing, omitting Tom.) The fascinating thing about LOTR is that it is pure. Tolkien was famously un-editable; his buddy Lewis complained that you might as well give advice to a bandersnatch. The work is what he wanted it to be, a pure creation wet with his heart's blood. Yes, it would be unpublishable today. That is a flaw of the modern publishing world, not him. it is a masterpiece.
Yes, read LotR, whatever. I just couldn't get into it at the age of 15 when my BFF suggested it.Took me to 35 plus, when I took the advice of my mother and read the Hobbit first. Progressed to LotR without any problem :) But, then again, I'd read a lot more fantasy by then, so my mind was more open to the world-build.
Ignore the poetry (unless that's what you like) - I consider it a 'space-filler' (OK, guys, don't shout at me!), but it does become unnecessary the longer you read :)
William, you're not alone. 'One of these days' I'll try *again* to read the trilogy. I'll very likely reread The Hobbit long before then, though.Once I did get as far as Tom B. and remember liking him, though, so maybe I've got my priorities messed up and I'm really not the target audience....
Get past all that stuff. The book starts slow, slower than most modern books (but no slower than was in the period). Stick with it at least until they are out of Hobbiton before you give up. If he has not hooked you by then, it isn't going to happen.
Michelle, if you are a "harry potter fan" then you have to read "Lord of the Rings" few things influenced Rowlings series more than Tolkien's masterpiece. But LOTR's is crafted literature and not fast food.
Dear Brenda, please expound upon "unpublishable" nowadays statement. I would like to know what you mean.
is that which follows the Bandersnatch you or Lewis?
Oh sure. Totally unsale-able in today's market. No female characters hardly at all -- you notice that even the movie versions had to amp that up a bit. No romance, no sex. A very slow beginning, two or three chapters of talk, my god! Poetry! In -Elvish- no less! So that the readers have to fish up a translation!
I read through the Lord of the Ring series last fall and I rated it 3 stars. The books can be pretty slow going. There are interesting bits mixed with very dull, slow bits. I’m not the sort of person who will just happily skim past the things that don’t interest me, because I hate to miss anything that might be important. Besides, I probably would have ended up skimming through so much that it would hardly have qualified as “reading” the book. So I tried to plow through the dull bits and I often ended up falling asleep instead. But, to be fair, I didn’t have much time to read last fall. I was reading at the end of the day, in bed, when I really should have been sleeping anyway. In any case, it took me weeks to get through the series. If you’re going to read the books, my recommendation would be to read the books before you watch the movies. I read them after seeing the movies a couple times, and that probably didn’t help. I already knew the story, so there wasn't any suspense to keep me motivated when things got slow. The books contained material that wasn’t included in the movies, and I enjoyed reading those parts more than the familiar parts. I’ve read my share of bad or slow books, but my curiosity tends to propel me through them in spite of myself. Trying to get through a slow book when I already knew what was going to happen proved to be another matter altogether.
I loved the Lord of the Rings movies, though. (The Hobbit movies are ok, but not as good in my opinion.) One of the things I liked best about the movies was the characters and their interactions with each other. I’m used to books having far more meat to them than movies do, especially in terms of character development. So I decided to read the books because I thought I would get to know the characters even better. But I thought the books lacked character depth. They’re heavily focused on world-building first and foremost – the scenery, the history and cultures of the different races, and so forth. The next biggest focus was on the story itself which, despite its slowness, is a pretty good story. The smallest focus was on character development, which is not to say that there wasn’t any, but it seemed to take a backseat to everything else. For me, that’s the exact opposite order in which I would rank the importance of those three book elements. Ideally I would like to see an even balance of the three, but character development is the hardest one for me to live without.
Maybe if I had read this when I was a child, I would have appreciated it more because it would have seemed newer and fresher. As an adult who’s been exposed to many fantasy elements that built off of Tolkien’s work, it just didn’t stand out for me. I understand that, without Tolkien, the genre I enjoy so much today might not exist in its present form. I realize that Tolkien created many of the fantasy tropes that we all hold dear. And I can appreciate Tolkien’s cleverness and be grateful for the influence he had. I can also appreciate the cleverness of the first human who told a story by drawing stick figures on a cave wall, but that doesn’t mean I want to do all my reading from a cave wall.
no no no... it is a seminal work of literary fiction. Brenda says so and as is often the case she's right. a that thing about Tolkien's heart blood... s' right! every sentence is crafted and optimal or near to it.
Brenda, thanks for your response. I don't agree but I've overestimated the consumer nation before and you are in the business sooo....
Well, clearly it is not for everybody. No book is. But in the genre, this is at the core. Just like Georgette Heyer is at the core of modern romance novels -- everyone loved her books so much that people began writing more. In the same way, people wanted more Tolkien, and authors stepped up to meet that need.
Well, clearly it is not for everybody. No book is. But in the genre, this is at the core. Just like Georgette Heyer is at the core of modern romance novels -- everyone loved her books so much that people began writing more. In the same way, people wanted more Tolkien, and authors stepped up to meet that need.
See how this thread is going??? THAT is why you should read Tolkien...because to be able to talk about fantasy as a genre, you need to know Tolkien!
I have a friend who's very dyslexic and has felt unable to read most of his life. Now he's discovered audio books and is working his way through LoTR (after listening to The Hobbit) and I'm like totally chuffed by his reaction. He's having literarygasms all over it and I'm getting to relive it through his reactions.So my take is: Read the books and know that they are books about a journey, not just wham-bam action. And the deeper you know them, the more respect you'll have for them. They were written as an act of personal obsession and love, rather than a commercial venture. They're art.
The movies? Well, there was a rumor that Lord of the Rings was being adapted as films, but that turned out to be just a rumor. Some bozo made films with the same titles, but they have nothing to do with these lovely books.
Micah, interesting that you mention audio books, because I know (as a parent who read a lot to her kids and before that, to her younger brothers) that The Lord of the Rings reads very well aloud. (That's leaving aside the fact that Tolkien is one of the major formative influences of my life... How relevant is that to someone coming at the book for the first time?) Anyway, I always think that's a touchstone for good writing.
My wife and I have read LoTR to each other several times. It's especially good if you can do different accents (or just silly voices). ;>But I mentioned the audio books because some things are better heard out loud than read to one's self. Tolkien's long descriptive passages can (I admit) get a bit tiresome when you're slogging through them yourself. Hearing them in a well spoken British accent, though, can bring them alive.
The unabridged audio books of The Hobbit and LoTR aren't perfect, but they're a lot better than most readings.
Yes it's classic, don't feel bad about skipping all the poetry unless you really like that.Skip Tom Bombadil too.
One of the main things you have to remember is LOTR was written in the days before easy computer editing and Tolkien must of had some pretty strong OCD to write his lore so heavy and deep without really contradictions(that I know of). Unfortunately if you're reading especially the unabridged edition it can get a bit wordy at times.
Also Micah as far as book>movie adaptions LOTR was one of the more faithful ones.
But yes, certainly read it it's one of the most influential works of fantasy.
Aaron wrote: "Also Micah as far as book>movie adaptions LOTR was one of the more faithful ones..."If that's the case, then it doesn't say much about book to movie adaptations. ];>
I won't go into it here, but believe me, I could write dissertations on how badly PJ perverted Tolkien's work.
(And though I can kind of understand leaving Bombadil out of the movies, I actually really loved those scenes. They're Tolkien's nod to English folklore where usually he vested mainly in Norse mythology. Plus, leaving out the Barrow Downs scene at the end of the Bombadil episode was really a mistake.)
the audio LOTR's is excellent. for a by the way
Yes, in the old days writers were trained to think about how the words would -sound-. As a philologist Tolkien was particularly into this, and his prose reads like a dream. And an unabridged audio book might even make the Elvish poetry haunting. The one thing that really impressed me about the first HOBBIT movie was the song of Thorin and his dwarves. On the page, eh. When they're singing it, wow!!
Thank you, Don. I forgot about the audio! I used to have it on cassette tape!
The one thing you should not do is =begin= with the SILMARILLON. That is a book you go to after you have read HOBBIT and LOTR. If you begin there, you will be sadly disappointed and probably be put off fantasy fiction for a decade.
The one thing you should not do is =begin= with the SILMARILLON. That is a book you go to after you have read HOBBIT and LOTR. If you begin there, you will be sadly disappointed and probably be put off fantasy fiction for a decade.
The one thing you should not do is =begin= with the SILMARILLON. That is a book you go to after you have read HOBBIT and LOTR. If you begin there, you will be sadly disappointed and probably be put off fantasy fiction for a decade.
Look, everyone else has sort of missed the point.Yes, you should read Lord of the Rings, but not because it's the most important work in the fantasy genre (though it is).
You shouldn't avoid the series because most of the characters are male (though they are).
You shouldn't avoid the series because it's slow (though it is).
You should read Lord of the Rings BECAUSE it is slow.
Hear me out.
I re-read the books every year, and I wait to do it until I am so stressed and anxious about something that I need a complete distraction. LotR can provide that if you approach it with the right mindset.
The greatest strengths of the series are the author's style and tone. The story isn't told in the fast-paced style demanded of most modern genre authors. Instead, it reads like you've sat yourself down in a wood-paneled library in some English country manor with a kindly old man who is telling you stories of the local history.
In the beginning of the novel, you are transported to an idyllic, slightly backward country village where life moves much, much slower, where people have known everyone else for their entire lives, where family history is very much a part of the present. Fantasy settings aren't all castle walls and foreboding mountains. In our modern, hectic world of instant information, instant gratification, what could be more fantastic than The Shire with its good-natured, though suspicious hobbits?
As the journey takes the characters from the charming safety of The Shire, you are slowly(!) introduced to a much larger world. Layers of depth are revealed as hints of heroic and tragic events of the past are revealed in the encounter with Bombadil and the barrow wight. Soon we learn some truly ancient history and how its sometimes tragic, sometimes noble deeds have influenced the present for the characters. The best part is that several of the main characters are learning this for the first time, as well, so you can share in their wonder and bewilderment.
The storytelling is masterful in that Tolkien doesn't just outright tell you things. Instead, he hints at them and reveals them little bits at a time. For instance, at the beginning, Gandalf is a mysterious but kindly old maker of fireworks. In Rivendell, you learn that he has powerful and ancient friends. In Moria, you glimpse the first unveiling of a portion of his power. Later in the series, you see more. You don't find out his full history until you read The Silmarillion.
The same pattern of characterization happens with Strider.
Everything is perfectly worded to pull you out of your own worries and into Middle Earth. Allow your imagination full reign as you picture the landscape and characters.
Don't lament that the book is slow. Savor each poem and love story about some river the characters cross and then never visit again.
LotR isn't a shot of vodka. It's fine, deep, complex tawny port. Enjoy it!
Or, you know, close the book and go back to playing Candy Crush.
Well said StanSometimes you just need to get clean and have a quick shower. Sometimes it's best to soak in a hot bath with a glass of something pleasant and a good book.
Never confuse the two occasions :-)
LotR is a book to be lived in and savoured :-)
If you want a short cut the BBC did a brilliant radio serialisation of it in the 1980s, it is available on CD from Amazon
http://www.amazon.co.uk/LORD-OF-THE-R...
Maybe part of my problem comes from how I have only ever read the unabridged version. Bombadil would of been fine if that was like 1/2 the length. Overall though LOTR isn't really that slow of a series either, because with a few exceptions things are actually happening.Micah wrote:If that's the case, then it doesn't say much about book to movie adaptations. ];>"
It really doesn't, even clear cut book > movie adaptions that should be easy have problems. Considering the difficulty in doing LOTR actual justice on screen. Only one I really liked recently was Edge of Tommorow which was also one of the biggest deviations from the book I have seen since The Walking Dead.
The forces that drive movies are so very different from what drives novels that they should be considered as something completely different. I think we all agree that the HOBBIT movies have only a distant flavor of the novel. It is idle to complain or compare; it's like comparing horses to pink highlighters.The books themselves must be read by anybody who wants to work in the form. If you study fantasy fiction or want to write it, you work in JRRT's shadow, just like all playwrights work in Shakespeare's footprints and all evening gown designers know Chanel.
Aaron wrote: "even clear cut book > movie adaptions that should be easy have problems..."Yes, but even difficult book > movie adaptations should not betray the personalities and motivations of the characters. And that's what PJ's LoTR did. Frodo is consistently denied his character development and is played as weak and helpless. Sam turns his back on Frodo when Frodo needs it most. Aragorn is self-doubting rather than self-assured. Faramir is no wiser or kinder than his brutish brother Boromir...It's so chock full of character assassinations that by the end of Two Towers I didn't know what I was watching.
Micah wrote: "Aaron wrote: "even clear cut book > movie adaptions that should be easy have problems..."Yes, but even difficult book > movie adaptations should not betray the personalities and motivations of th..."
Agreed. I can handle changes to the plot. Changes to characters are unforgivable.
William wrote: "Honestly, I was not particularly taken by the written Lord of the Rings. I adored The Hobbit but I found the writing in Lord of the Rings a bit too ponderous to really grab me. Added to that, the..."How is Sauron undermined by Bombadil? The book makes it clear through Gandalf: "Could that power be defied by Bombadil alone? I think not. I think that in the end, if all else is conquered, Bombadil will fall, Last as he was First; and then Night will come."
I love the books - if they're slow going, listen to Rob Inglis's narration on the audio book (available on Audible (http://bit.ly/1jQTwuE). It's usually cheaper to buy the Kindle version then the Audible than just the AudbileI (mostly) concur. Faramir never fell so his recovery of character (that was too slight) in Return of the King wasn't needed. Frodo and Aragorn were misled emphasis: they had some of the "weakness" in their character but they themselves shut them down and soldiered on quickly. For more on this point: http://joesgeekfest.wordpress.com/201...
The original BBC adaptation for radio is wonderful (if you can get hold of it).
Mark wrote: "The original BBC adaptation for radio is wonderful (if you can get hold of it)."I suspect that is this one Mark http://www.amazon.co.uk/LORD-OF-THE-R...
I agree with you,it is brilliant
Michelle wrote: "So would it be worth my time reading the LOTR series?..."Give it a shot, certainly. I'd suggest reading all of Book I and seeing how you feel about things at that point. Though I must warn you Book I ends on a bit of a cliffhanger. :) In any event, I think it is about 150 pages, possibly a bit closer to 200. Nothing at all by ASoiF, WoT or even Harry Potter standards, certainly, as all three series dwarf LotR by page count.
And note that by "Book I" I am not referring to all of the The Fellowship of the Ring. Rather confusingly, the whole of the Lord of the Rings is divided into six books plus a series of appendices that are traditionally split into three volumes. (The entire series has also been done in a one volume collector's edition at least once that I'm aware of.)
I personally love the series, and have read it several times. But I also know several people who's opinion I respect that don't care for it.
You should definitely read the books, but be careful approaching any book that's hyped by so many rabid fans. It's really easy to fall into the "this isn't as good as everyone says it is" trap, which then leads to a complete lack of enjoyment as you contemplate how completely insane the rest of the world must be.Don't get me wrong, they're great books. It's just not wise to approach any book expecting your mind to be completely blown.
Oh, and if you feel like you might miss a lot of the depth of these books I'd advise listening along to the Tolkien professor podcasts. I don't think I fully appreciated LOTR until I listened to that guy.
http://www.tolkienprofessor.com/wp/le...
Brenda wrote: "The books themselves must be read by anybody who wants to work in the form. If you study fantasy fiction or want to write it, you work in JRRT's shadow, just like all playwrights work in Shakespeare's footprints and all evening gown designers know Chanel. ..."I used to think that, now I'm not so sure. As a F'rinstance J.K. Rowling...
The most popular living fantasy writer in the world doesn't even especially like fantasy novels. It wasn't until after Sorcerer's Stone was published that it even occurred to her that she had written one. "That's the honest truth," she says. "You know, the unicorns were in there. There was the castle, God knows. But I really had not thought that that's what I was doing. And I think maybe the reason that it didn't occur to me is that I'm not a huge fan of fantasy." Rowling has never finished The Lord of the Rings. She hasn't even read all of C.S. Lewis' Narnia novels, which her books get compared to a lot.
And, of course, we can't forget Michael Moorcock's supreme exercise in snark, Epic Pooh...
The Lord of the Rings is much more deep-rooted in its infantilism than a good many of the more obviously juvenile books it influenced. It is Winnie-the-Pooh posing as an epic. If the Shire is a suburban garden, Sauron and his henchmen are that old bourgeois bugaboo, the Mob - mindless football supporters throwing their beer-bottles over the fence the worst aspects of modern urban society represented as the whole by a fearful, backward-yearning class for whom "good taste" is synonymous with "restraint" (pastel colours, murmured protest) and "civilized" behaviour means "conventional behaviour in all circumstances".
Though I suppose to write as Moorcock did you'd have to have read LotR. But, as someone who's certainly ground out his share of high fantasy novels, he seems to have only seen LotR as something to disdain and ridicule.
I suspect that in that Moorcock is merely a function of his place and era
Yes, read the books the way you would read Shakespeare. There is no use complaining that HAMLET is an awful lot like LION KING only without animals. HAMLET came first.You know that LOTR is titanic, because it has influenced writers who haven't even read it. I do solemnly assure you that even if Rowling has never read it the imprint of the work is on her novels. Literature is like a conversation. I read a book, and write an answer to it; someone else reads that answer and says, "Wait a minute, have you considered this angle?" and writes another book.
SciFi and Fantasy Book Club
Books mentioned in this topic
The Hobbit, or There and Back Again (other topics)The Silmarillion (other topics)
I thought that the movies were a well done adaptation of the books and the actors that played the parts did it justice.
Definitely, read them. You won't be disappointed!!