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JRR Tolkien


wichmansand

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8 out of 10
 

Half-way there, but beware the bite of Shelob

 

 

Yes! Get in!

 

Edited by ian
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I have to say what I love most about LOTR books is that for me they capture a world that is ordinary (he was trying to write a history for the English language, I think :) ) and makes it magical. That is not something that I find happens in a lot of books.

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I have to say what I love most about LOTR books is that for me they capture a world that is ordinary (he was trying to write a history for the English language, I think :) ) and makes it magical. That is not something that I find happens in a lot of books.

Vimes, you never said a truer word! :she:

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 Peter Jackson is a crime against books. What he did to Tolkien's masterpieces was just horrible - The Hobbit an unwatchable mess, the LOTR just full of stupidity gratuitously.

 

 What was with the orc full body armor? The Medieval knight was impregnable if he kept his mount or feet (till firearms) - they were the battle tank of the age, yet they fell to sword slashes like grass to a string trimmer.

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Peter Jackson is a crime against books. What he did to Tolkien's masterpieces was just horrible - The Hobbit an unwatchable mess, the LOTR just full of stupidity gratuitously.

 

What was with the orc full body armor? The Medieval knight was impregnable if he kept his mount or feet (till firearms) - they were the battle tank of the age, yet they fell to sword slashes like grass to a string trimmer.

 

I thought they did a cracking job with The Lord of the Rings, perfectly capturing the spirit and scope of the books.  The Hobbit, not so much.  A good example of less can sometimes be more.

Edited by Raven
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LTOR was good with the massive budget, good acting, location, and the book as source. It is the real case where the director brings his self to the end result, and that may not be good. Jackson is a very trivial person with a bit of a mean streak and utterly useless at historical reality. Or so I would guess by his product. I even tried King Kong but had to turn that off in 15 minutes. I have not been able to sit through one Hobbit film.

 

 We were living kind of remote in The Northwest Territories when the first LOTR came out in DVD and watched it in camp about 12 times in a month, we usually had some local guy over for dinner and a movie and he was always to just keep watching it over and over too. Occasionally someone would be going into Yellowknife and would rent a movie, but they never seemed so good, so we would watch it again. One is pretty easily entertained in the bush, and its grandness suited the place.

 

 In the Hobbit - what was with that chase in the underground orc city? Swinging over pits and scattering orcs and leaping over crumbling rocks and over orcs and swinging on ladders over orcs and on and on till it is not a case of suspending belief but just wishing it was ended as the stupidity is wrecking the whole movie - and then do it in barrels, on a dragon, on mountains, on.........

 

 I am waiting for Disney to buy the Tolkien rights for 4 billion and settle down to do a very big re-make which will not be all that good, but will not be wrecked by the hand of Jackson.

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I have read The Hobbit about five times,and LOTR over forty times.

The LOTR films were 'okay' and only lost it when Jackson wandered

away from the book and inserted his own inane meanderings instead.

I watched the first of the Hobbit trilogy with growing disbelief and great

pain spreding from my head to my backside. Unbelievably bad tosh,

dragged out to painful length. I was more or less conned into watching

the second part and I lost the will to live.I will never watch the final part,

and will never be made to re-watch any of the first two,when they

become a regular 'repeat spot' on various TV channels. (This has

already started to happen,by the way!)

Great Book (LOTR) , not a bad childrens book (Hobbit); Okay films

(LOTR), DREADFUL films (Hobbit). Thats where I stand on this!

Edited by timebug
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I am re-reading The Lord of the Rings and it's just as good as it was many years ago when I first read them, before the movies came out. I remember my disappointment when Tom Bombadil did not make it in the movies but I still found them  enjoyable. It's sad that new fantasy movie like The Hobbit or Warcraft can't hold a candle to LOTR.

 

The books are still great to read, though at times it feels like the action drags on too much for no reason. I love the characters and locations and I wish he wrote more in this universe and expand on character and lore. 

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After viewing the first Hobbit I had to mentally tell myself that I had to separate the book from the movie, plain and simple. I knew the movie had strayed FAR down the imagination of Jackson. I just allowed myself to enjoy it as a separate being from the book. IMO, nothing can compare to the LOTR! I love the books, I love the movies and I love the audio. I can do them several times a year. 

 

I actually recently pulled out my copy of LOTR Fellowship of the Rings for my summer read.

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I come to this thread prepared to be slaughtered..

 

I used to consider myself a fantasy fan (not so much anymore unfortunately) and finally got around to reading both The Hobbit and LOTR. I was expecting a lot given my interest in both Fantasy from childhood and in authors who had cited Tolkien as their inspiration.

 

I have to say I was disappointed by LOTR (please don't hurt me).

 

I found the characters one-dimensional. Either you were good or you were bad. There did not seem to be any middle ground. Above all, the elves really frustrated me. It seemed as if to be an elf was to be a perfect being. Any item that had the prefix 'elvish' seemed to have near-perfect properties. I could find no depth in the characters. It felt as if there was a line drawn down the middle of the book, and everyone on one side was 'good' and everyone on the other was 'bad.' There was no escaping your fate. I felt no emotions as I read through the scenes, I gained no insight into the motives behind the actions or insight into the characters lives. I received a lot of facts, a lot of names of villages and cities, great Kingdoms and far-gone Kings.. but nothing about the turmoils that played within the characters lives. It all seemed very factual and straight forward.

 

I know I am missing something very big here. However, I would say that the one thing that stood out for me was the dialogue. Much of it was enchanting to read, almost as if you were opening a book of poetry. I can see why the LOTR films stuck to so much of the dialogue from the books - they seem to open the door to another world just through their rhythm and symmetry.

 

(I am really sorry but..) I have to say that I preferred the films to the books. I felt they captured the magic of Middle Earth in a way that I simply could not grasp through the books. The lack of insight into many of the characters minds just frustrated me so much. I felt like I was reading a history book filled with reams of facts and names yet no offering of humanity or emotion.

 

Perhaps if I return to the series a few years down the line I will be able to view it through more mature eyes. For now though, I would love to hear what makes fans love the book so much (and please be kind to my criticisms).

Edited by Angury
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What a coincidence that you made this post exactly 125 year after his birth 

 

I do agree with most of what you said and indeed, characters are (mostly) one dimensional but that kind of was the point. As far as fantasy goes these days, from almost every other author, to movies, Dungeons and Dragons and certain musicians , his influence can still be seen.

 

His work was heavily influenced by WW1  The good and evil conflict from the book was inspired by the good and evil conflict of WW1 and his participation in it.  Sam Gamgee is actually your average WW1 soldier, a very small person caught in a very big conflict. The story of Beren and Luthien was inspired from himself and his wife. 

 

I don't see why in this case being one dimensional is a bad thing, especially since that is the entire point. Gods are one dimensional too in mythology and religion and Tolkien took inspiration from both as well. 

 

Have you read The Silmarillion and Children of Hurin? Excellent book imo and they explain a lot of the lore from the universe. 

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Yes I agree most of the characters are pretty much either good or bad, the only ones who show some sort of inner turmoil are Boromir and Aragorn, who doesn't want to be King but realises he doesn't have a choice.  But pretty much everything fantasy since has been influenced somehow by LotR.  The Hobbit is very much a children's book so is quite simple (from what I remember of it).

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What a coincidence that you made this post exactly 125 year after his birth 

 

I do agree with most of what you said and indeed, characters are (mostly) one dimensional but that kind of was the point. As far as fantasy goes these days, from almost every other author, to movies, Dungeons and Dragons and certain musicians , his influence can still be seen.

 

His work was heavily influenced by WW1  The good and evil conflict from the book was inspired by the good and evil conflict of WW1 and his participation in it.  Sam Gamgee is actually your average WW1 soldier, a very small person caught in a very big conflict. The story of Beren and Luthien was inspired from himself and his wife. 

 

I don't see why in this case being one dimensional is a bad thing, especially since that is the entire point. Gods are one dimensional too in mythology and religion and Tolkien took inspiration from both as well. 

 

Have you read The Silmarillion and Children of Hurin? Excellent book imo and they explain a lot of the lore from the universe.

I don't wish to underestimate his influence on modern fantasy, and perhaps I am trying to interpret his works outside of their time. I am really comparing LOTR with a lot of modern fantasy that I read and enjoy and that is perhaps where my problem lies.

 

It is interesting to note his influences for his works, and while I agree that one dimensional characters aren't necessarily a bad thing in light of the background of mythology, I guess they are a big problem for me. Character development is one of the main reasons I read novels, and indeed why I enjoy fantasy, so for me it is a big disadvantage to be left with such simple characters. I feel as if I am simply reading a textbook otherwise.

 

Entering into a different world is of course another big reason to read fantasy, but I found it very difficult to enter the world of Middle Earth. I'm not sure if it was Tolkiens writing - while not brilliant, I wouldn't call it bad - or just the fact that I felt as if I didn't feel emotionally connected with the world. I knew the facts about where the cities and villages lay upon the map, yet the feeling of standing in a village, of feeling the wind in your hair and the smell of grass in your nostrils was missing from the books for me.

 

I haven't read the Children of Hurin, and it was initially on my to-read list, but as I came away so disappointed with LOTR I'm not sure if it would be worth reading?

Edited by Angury
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  • 3 weeks later...

I think the problem for a lot of readers is - if you come to the fantasy genre by reading Hobbit or LOTR first, then you're probably going to be fine.

 

So much of what has been written after has at least some comparison with these, that if you're read lots of other fantasy first, then The Hobbit & LOTR will seem derivative!

At least, that's how I've rationalised it to myself.

 

And don't worry, Angury - No one's going to send you into Exile because you don't like a particular book!

 

I'm also not keen on the Hobbit films - I think I annoyed my family when they showed the second one over Christmas. I spent most of it tutting and muttering " that wasn't in the book"

Edited by ian
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I'm also not keen on the Hobbit films - I think I annoyed my family when they showed the second one over Christmas. I spent most of it tutting and muttering " that wasn't in the book"

I did this too when we all watched it together.

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Yeah... The Hobbit movies were terrible. I can still remember how hyped I was when I saw the trailer for the first movie and the major disappointment I felt at the end of the film. I still don't understand how they managed to mess up such and easy and fun book. 

 

edit: Speaking of, I might re-read The Hobbit this year. 

Edited by MrCat
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They dragged it out for 3 films that's how they ruined it!  I watched the first one and had to fast forward some bits, I recorded the second one over Xmas and will probably do the same, they have their moments but one film could have told the story.

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