LOTR's sense of history

[Mithadan]

New here. Good to see a new Tolkien board that gets lots of traffic.

Not long after I first read LOTR, I came across Tolkien's obituary in the newspaper (yeah, I'm that old). When I read it again, I took notes on all the other "historical" works it referred to, such as the Fall of Gondolin, etc. and went to a bookstore to order them. To my surprise, at that time, none of them existed.

LOTR was the first fantasy that I read (I was a science fiction fan) and I have almost invariably been disappointed every time I read any other work of fantasy. Is it the sense of history or depth that sets LOTR apart from every other work of fantasy or do you think its something else?

[bmilder]

Welcome to the board :) .

Oh, definitely. The fact that twelve volumes of additional history could be created outside the actual novels is a testament to the depth of Tolkien's Middle Earth. I've noticed that in other, "copycat" fantasy books, there is often a Gandalf-like character who tells the Frodo-character about the history of that particular world, like in Chapter Two of LotR, but Terry Brooks and his ilk never devised entire languages for his world, now did he? ;)

Now, since I love LotR, I also enjoy the later fantasy stories that may borrow from him, but of course Tolkien is still the master.

[IronParrot]

While I find that Middle Earth is described in more detail than how reality can be described through photographs, I must admit that the history is certainly a much harder read than the core stories of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings themselves. They bore me easily simply because of all the names I have to remember, which don't have as much of a sense of significance to me.

Anyone else notice this?

[Hernalt]

I'm on the opposite side of that fence, IronParrot.

I see names come out of nowhere, but accompanied with one tiny shrivel of information, and I can picture the entire person, with their own thoughts and perspectives, and all that rot.

[Eruve]

IP, my dad thinks like you! I convinced him, to read LOTR when I was a teenager. He liked the story. Then I told him he should read Sil., but he said he had trouble keeping all the names straight. I had trouble getting into Sil. when I first tried to read it. It's told from such a different perspective, and I couldn't get past the beginning stuff to the "good part". But then I gave it another shot and I was hooked! I have problems reading HOME because Christopher always has to break in about every other word and tell us what emendations were made to the text. Not exactly my cup of tea (get on with it, already, can you tell I'm not patient?) but I know there are people who like to have all this. What I do like about HOME is all the little tidbits, expansion of stories, background, whatever that didn't make it into the origianl published material.

To answer the first question, I don't know what it is about Tolkien. Certainly, the sense of history has to do with it. Perhaps it's the fact that the early history of ME was there (although the published LOTR caused changes to be made to the stories of the past) and in a way channeled the action of LOTR. The world was so fully developed and influenced the story, rather than the author creating a world to fit his idea of how the story should turn out. Does this make any sense at all???

[Anteater]

I love the flow and richness of LOTR, but I too had a hell of a time with The Silmarillion. I found myself reading and re-reading countless sentences and paragraphs... often flipping to the back of the book for a reminder of just "who the hell Finrod or Finwe were again???". Too many "F's" for me to keep the characters straight; LOL!!!

I for one, marvel at the painstaking chore that J.R.R. set himself too... way to much detail for me to manage!!!

Later!!!

[Finduilas]

I have to agree on the number of names, but I find (at least now) that I have no trouble remembering them (no guarantees for the HoME series though). The HoME are a long slow read, but I find many volumes to be well worth the time. My biggest problem with the History of Middle-Earth books is simply the number of times he repeats a portion of text with few changes (Return of the Shadow is a good example of this).

[anduin]

Eruve, I think you hit the nail on the head when you said: The world was so fully developed and influenced the story, rather than the author creating a world to fit his idea of how the story should turn out. I believe that to be the very reason LOTR has taken in so many readers. :)

[IronParrot]

Eruve, I've had that exact problem with Sil... I'm having trouble getting through the beginning... same goes for Appendix A in LOTR - the best I've done is half-skimming the history of Numenor.

[Darth Tater]

I'm a little late, but anywho, welcome to the board!
Tolkien is a genious, period. Everything about LOTR and his other works make them the best fantasy could ever offer. They're the most complete, the most interessting, the best use of alligory (even better then Narnia in my opinion.) They're just perfect.

[emilsson]

When I start to think about it, the sense of history of LOTR is what makes me hold it as my favorite book. It gives the story a deeper meaning and knowing what has happened in Silmarillion just adds to the dramatic story in LOTR.