Is it me or is it Tolkien?

[paranoid marvin]

Tolkein could quite easily have crammed the contents of the LOTR trilogy into a novel the size of TFOTR by omitting 'irrelevant' parts of the story like the meeting with Bombadil and created a roller-coaster thrill-a-minute action packed blockbuster

Thankfully he DIDN'T , and held the reader's hand on a journey through the magical land of Middle Earth. In fact the action sequences are made even more exciting after a period of leisurely paced inactivity

Many modern authors would do well to remember that something exciting or dramatic doesn't have to take place on every other page of their novel. However most literature these days is tailor made for the consumer's needs these days , with profit margins being the overriding consideration. Perhaps it's time to give the current geneartion of readers something different

[Blue Mythril]

Originally Posted by TheEndIsNigh

I never read a book of the film I've seen.

See, for me it was always that I had read the book first, and saw the film second. I think the generational thing that J.D. brought up is really interesting. It's not a bad thing, just diffeent to the ways in which many of us oldies grew up. It's very hard going from the fast paced movie to the book unless the author has written it in a style similar to a movie (the success of the Davinci code is possibly an example. I haven't read it still, but I have friends in the 'literature' camp, and friends who just like a gripping read camp, and my general impression is that it wasn't written with anything people would call true literary skill. However, a new skill which is gaining recognition, is the ability to tell a tale that reads like a film, that's all action and plot and races so fast you don't realise it isn't fully fleshed out yet). All of these recent film remakes of novels I believe are great, as they get wonderfull tales out to people who don't normally read, or who wouldn't normally read in that style. By the way TheEndIsNigh, I will strongly reccommend you read the Harry Potter books if you enjoyed the films so much - J. K. Rowling's style is worth it, and the books have so much more in it than the films. The Potter Films are great or many reasons, but in the end they are just shadows of cardboard puppets when compared with the originals. The films just didn't have time to explore all the quirks of setting ad character that the books have... But I digress.

Originally Posted by Marky Lazer

The charm in LOTR to me lies in the slow-paced (endless) descriptions of landscapes, really. Not even taking his stories into consideration, Tolkien created such a detailed world that even if the story itself was rubbish, I would probably have enjoyed it...

I think kinda sums up my perspective with Tolkien.

See, I can see where J. D. is coming from with the generational thing, but with Tolkien it's even more different. Tolkien's much harder to read at first. Mainly I believe, beause in many places, especially the beginning (bah, who needs to know what sort of weed they grew in which part of Hobbiton, and the relations of which hobbits to which families!), Tolkien reads more like a boring History book from the olden days when they thought history was about collecting 'facts.'

I started to read LOTR when I was 12, and put it down with disgust the first time. It wasn't until my mother started reading it out to the family, and finally got past the slow beginning, that I finally stole the second family copy and started to read ahead.

It does get you, eventually, and it is quite a beautiful read along the way. Tolkien is a good place to start testing your imagination.

My advice is to pick a point a couple of chapters in (maybe when they meet Tom Bombadil, seeing as he was a quirky character the films missed out on), and start from there. You know the general gist of the beginning, get started just a little bit in, skip the introduction. Yes, the build up is important there, butn if it's between having the background and not making it past the first few chapters, and not having the background and being able to truly read and enjoy Tolkien's tale. Well, I'll leave that choice to you...

[paranoid marvin]

Originally Posted by Blue Mythril

See, for me it was always that I had read the book first, and saw the film second. I think the generational thing that J.D. brought up is really interesting. It's not a bad thing, just diffeent to the ways in which many of us oldies grew up. It's very hard going from the fast paced movie to the book unless the author has written it in a style similar to a movie (the success of the Davinci code is possibly an example. I haven't read it still, but I have friends in the 'literature' camp, and friends who just like a gripping read camp, and my general impression is that it wasn't written with anything people would call true literary skill. However, a new skill which is gaining recognition, is the ability to tell a tale that reads like a film, that's all action and plot and races so fast you don't realise it isn't fully fleshed out yet). All of these recent film remakes of novels I believe are great, as they get wonderfull tales out to people who don't normally read, or who wouldn't normally read in that style. By the way TheEndIsNigh, I will strongly reccommend you read the Harry Potter books if you enjoyed the films so much - J. K. Rowling's style is worth it, and the books have so much more in it than the films. The Potter Films are great or many reasons, but in the end they are just shadows of cardboard puppets when compared with the originals. The films just didn't have time to explore all the quirks of setting ad character that the books have... But I digress.



I think kinda sums up my perspective with Tolkien.

See, I can see where J. D. is coming from with the generational thing, but with Tolkien it's even more different. Tolkien's much harder to read at first. Mainly I believe, beause in many places, especially the beginning (bah, who needs to know what sort of weed they grew in which part of Hobbiton, and the relations of which hobbits to which families!), Tolkien reads more like a boring History book from the olden days when they thought history was about collecting 'facts.'

I started to read LOTR when I was 12, and put it down with disgust the first time. It wasn't until my mother started reading it out to the family, and finally got past the slow beginning, that I finally stole the second family copy and started to read ahead.

It does get you, eventually, and it is quite a beautiful read along the way. Tolkien is a good place to start testing your imagination.

My advice is to pick a point a couple of chapters in (maybe when they meet Tom Bombadil, seeing as he was a quirky character the films missed out on), and start from there. You know the general gist of the beginning, get started just a little bit in, skip the introduction. Yes, the build up is important there, butn if it's between having the background and not making it past the first few chapters, and not having the background and being able to truly read and enjoy Tolkien's tale. Well, I'll leave that choice to you...

You hit the nail on the head - LOTR IS a history book

but starting from Bombadil would be a major mistake - firstly you would miss out on much of the reason WHY they're on a mission , secondly the escape from the Shire is one of the most exciting and scary parts of the trilogy

[paranoid marvin]

[quote=paranoid marvin;1114778]You hit the nail on the head - LOTR IS a history book

but starting from Bombadil would be a major mistake - firstly you would miss out on much of the reason WHY they're on a mission , secondly the escape from the Shire is one of the most exciting and scary parts of the trilogy[/quote}

Oh , and the type of weed grown in The Shire is extremely important when it comes to the latter part of the story...

[Blue Mythril]

I knew there would be someone who piped up with that

I agree with you actually, on both counts. What I was suggesting though, especially for someone who at this point is looking like not even reading LOTR because the beginning is such a struggle, is some perspective. If you've seen the movies, you'll have a minor bit of background to get started, so you can skip ahead a bit. If skipping ahead means you'll be able to get into the whole book, then it seems like that's the way to go - once you've been caught by the book, then yu can go back and explore the beginning. Where you jump to is the point of debate I guess. Where the pace starts to get cracking some may say is when they meet Strider, others may argue it's back when they sneak out of Hobbiton, others at the party when Bilbo vanishes. I think all of that is important, especially Frodo's isolation in the village, but if it's these sections that are dragging you down, maybe you should skip ahead.

On the other hand, if you skip head and it just isn't working for you, maybe you should just move on. Tolkien I think is a ust read for fantasy fans, as it's the point where it all started, and absolutely no one has been able to create such an epic, or a world of such thoroughness, since Tolkien - though many have tried. He really set the way for people making their own complete worlds, he was the master at it. BUt he is quite tough to read at times.

For me, I just skipped the history bit, and started reading at the pooint where it seemed like Tolkien had decided to start the actual telling of the tale.

I've also read LOTR twice, and probably won't ever read t again.

[Hilarious Joke]

Strangely enough, considering that I'm one who read the books before the movie, then tried again after and didn't enjoy it - that is, one who seems to be being categorised in this thread as someone who likes constant action - I actually really enjoyed the beginning of the books. In fact I was at first a bit disappointed that they rushed through it so quickly in the movie. I love the picturesque description of Hobbiton, I love the party, I love the innocent adventure, Tom Bombadil, the barrow wights, getting to know Merry and Pippin. When it started to get bogged down for me was in Rivendell when Elrond is explaining some of the history.

Thinking about it, I think it's a combination of masses of heavy content that's hard to remember (all those names and such - well it's hard for me anyway) and the fact that I knew how much suffering and torment the main characters had to go through before they were triumphant that meant I didn't finish rereading them.

Cecilia Dart-Thornton's The Iron Tree is often criticised for being slow and having at least one long segment when nothing much happens, but it's one of my favourite books, because of the lavish descriptions of the people and places that really make it real in my mind. So I'm not anti-background/description, just something about the way Tolkien does it doesn't make it worth it for me.

[TheEndIsNigh]

Originally Posted by j. d. worthington

Ummm... "academic"? "authoritative"? say what????

Iorek: I agree with P.B. -- that's a very good point, and most likely has a fair amount to do with the falling-off of well-constructed, densely-textured prose (overall) as well....

Yes I think the way it gets behind the chracters perfectly. I'm sure that is the way ol' Tolky baby would have written it if he had had the imagination. Sometimes yoo know a good story needs a good editing staff to make it more presentable.

Originally Posted by Blue Mythril

.....

Blue: Yes read the book first that's ok you can look forward to the film then. Usually disapointing though as with the first LOR effort and the first Dune.

LOR trilogy of films I thought was excellent by the way.

Film first book later is too much like reading the butler did it; how he went about it is not really of much interest.

Originally Posted by Hilarious Joke

... So I'm not anti-background/description, just something about the way Tolkien does it doesn't make it worth it for me.

So skip those parts. If I find myself bogged down in the details of the colour of the lilies, I suck my feet out of my wellies and get to the next bit. (Is this a terrible confession)

[Blue Mythril]

Originally Posted by Hilarious Joke

Cecilia Dart-Thornton's The Iron Tree is often criticised for being slow and having at least one long segment when nothing much happens, but it's one of my favourite books, because of the lavish descriptions of the people and places that really make it real in my mind. So I'm not anti-background/description, just something about the way Tolkien does it doesn't make it worth it for me.

Mm, excellent point, and excellent analogy. I felt similar about the Ill-Made Mute - it was just such a beautiful read. Poetic without being pretentious.

[Hilarious Joke]

Thanks, Blue, nice to see another CDT fan in here. Hooray for Australian fantasy authors, ay?

[Marky Lazer]

When did they start becoming literate in Australia?

[Blue Mythril]

About the time when all the real Irishmen were shipped over here by the English

[Grimward]

My friends, play nice (and have another in the bargain!).

Would like to touch on something I'd never recognized (or, perhaps, never looked at that way) until my boss, who'd never read the LOTR trilogy, asked me about it after seeing TFOTR on the big screen. He thought the character of Frodo was weak, and needed more development. We kicked around a few other points, and then I realized that much of Frodo's early development as a character comes from the Old Forest, Bombadil's House, and The Barrow Downs, the most significant chapters omitted from the movie. Facing down Old Man Willow (or trying to), questioning Tom Bombadil, realizing that he's the only chance for the four hobbits to escape the Wight and acting on it, these all helped take Frodo from being just the nephew of Bilbo to a figure of determination in his own right. Accordingly, I vote that we not be too quick to take the shears to "old Tolky Baby's" stuff; most of it has a place and a reason to be!

[j. d. worthington]

Considering the endless amount of writing, rewriting, revising, rethinking, recasting, etc. he did... yes, all of it is there for a very good reason. It may or may not strike a particular reader's fancy, but there is damned little in that book that is "wasted space". In its own odd way, it is one of the most tightly-structured books that I've read, because even those little divagations from the "main" story play a part in the texture of the world he's creating, and that entire world plays a part in the "main" story.

The fact is, there are tons of things that Tolkien wrote and removed from the book, not to mention those things that he never fully developed, but which are nonetheless closely related to the main thread in one way or another, yet which it was not essential to tell in their full form. These he hints at, gives sketchy information on, etc. They aren't truly superfluous. Tolkien is a much more subtle and careful craftsman than that, and there's a lot more depth to his books than to the majority of fantasy.

Though he avoided direct or "simple" allegory, Tolkien is conveying a very genuine (and complex) worldview through this and his other work, and every bit of what is there is in some way important to getting across that "message".

I've used this quote from William Godwin before, but it seems germane to this discussion as well, so I'll repeat it here:

It is the refuge of barren authors, only, to crowd their fictions with so great a number of events, as to suffer no one of them to sink into the reader's mind. It is the province of true genius to develop events, to discover their capabilities, to ascertain the different passions and sentiments with which they are fraught, and to diversify them with incidents; that give reality to the picture, and take a hold upon the mind of a reader of taste, from which they can never be loosened.

[Grimward]

'Tis not for a pittance that they named you "Moderator", J.D.! Excellent quote.

Brian, double this man's salary!

[j. d. worthington]

Originally Posted by Grimward

'Tis not for a pittance that they named you "Moderator", J.D.! Excellent quote.

Brian, double this man's salary!

Now, that's the second time someone has claimed there's "big bucks" to be had for this job.... I'm beginning to get the feeling I've been rooked!