Is 'Lord of the Rings' really that good?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I am reading The Lord of the Rings again. This is the second time I’ve read it, the first being about 20 years ago when I was 12 or so.

At that time, I wasn’t very widely read, and hadn’t read anything that was longer than a hundred pages. Somehow I picked up my brother’s copy of LotR and ended up captivated by the Hobbits’ journeys.

However, there were parts of it that were a bit much for me - all the battle scenes confused me - I couldn’t remember who was who, there was the whole political aspect and historical detail that made my head spin. So I skipped those bits and just read the Sam and Frodo adventure. I enjoyed those parts very much at the time, and it sparked a lifelong interest in Fantasy Adventure tales.

Since then I have read many many more fantasy books, but no more Tolkien (except for The Hobbit once). I have come to recognise that, in Fantasy, I still continue to dislike such factors as:

  • long unpronounceable character names with heaps of apostrophes, to the point where I can’t differentiate one character from another
  • too much political intrigue and corruption
  • huge complicated battles with detailed strategy descriptions
  • soppy romance (a la Melanie Rawn)
  • explicitly described gratuitously violent acts committed by the good guys

Here I am now, twenty years older and more familiar with the genre. The LotR movies will start to be released starting from December this year. I wanted to be prepared and I was curious about the book again - and most of all, I wanted to read the whole thing this time.

It’s considered not just a classic novel, but THE classic of the genre. It’s lauded as one of the best books ever written. It has overwhelming popularity, and obsessive fans. It has had more posthumous sequels/accompaniments written than is surely physically possible.

But you know what? It’s not really very good.

I’ve almost reached the part where they get to Rivendell. That’s almost the end of Book One. And the pacing is awful, the writing is stilted, the characters are dull, the journey is uneventful, and Tom Bombadil is annoying as all get-out.

I seem to recall it gets better from here on in, with more character interaction, more interesting locations to traverse, and more dangerous events occurring - but if his writing is at all consistent in style, I’m gonna fall asleep.

Is it that I’m too used to modern Fantasy writing? Is it that I didn’t grow up enjoying these books like others did? Is it because I tend to dislike what other people do like (I’m a bit unusual that way)? Or am I accurate in my observation, and other people overlook the flaws that I’ve noticed just because obsession tends to be all-encompassing and blinding?

What do others think of this book?

2

I read LotR for the first time a couple of years ago (in my late twenties). I LOVED it. I name it was one of my favourite books, ever. The battle seens didn’t confuse me, I had no problem telling the characters apart, I thought the historical detail enriched the story, and I don’t recall the political aspects. What were the political aspects?

I don’t know about the obsessed part blinding one to the books faults. I don’t feel obsessed by the book. When I was reading it, it was the first time in many years that I felt compelled to stay up until 4 or 5 in the morning every day to keep reading. Even though I enjoyed it that much, I haven’t read it over and over again, I don’t post to sites devoted to it, I don’t buy anything related to it (I looked at one of the sequels, and it looked dry as toast, so I didn’t buy it). Obsessed? No. I just really enjoyed the book.

Maybe you are too familiar with modern fantasy writing. I’ve tried to read other fantasy books (the plots always look good), but I still haven’t been able to finish another fantasy.

I just didn’t have any of the problems with the book that you listed.

3

I read LotR two years ago. (erly 30’s) I thought the first book was a slow and dull. ‘We’re walking, we’re walking, we’re walking, we hide behind a bush.’ But please recall that it is not really three books but one book that chopped into three. All the meals in book one, which bored the heck out of me, makes the hardship of book three more real as there aren’t very many meals in that part.

You may come back to the book in another 20 years and see different things at that point in your life. One thing I do know is that the books will be around in 20 years for you to do so, which can’t be said about most of the fantasy books in the bookstore now.

4

I read LotR for the first time in 7th grade, back in 1983. I loved it then, and have read the series at least 10 times since then.

Keep with it GuanoLad, I’ll admit that the beginning can be a little slow (and yes Tom Bombadil can be a bit annoying), but things will be picking up soon. Quite a bit.
[Brief aside]
I can’t wait to see the how the Gandalf vs the Balrog scene comes out!

[Big Bad Wizard Voice]

You shall not pass!

[/Big Bad Wizard Voice]

[/Brief aside]

5

The pacing does begin to pick up considerably after Rivendell. It’s not so much a matter of consistency as of background–Tolkien wrote the first segment on the assumption that readers would have no prior experience with hobbits/Middle Earth, so he spent a lot of time introducing them and providing material that would demonstrate the characteristics of hobbits. There’s also considerably more exposition in the beginning, with Gandalf providing the backstory–you don’t get another lecture like that one until you hit Fangorn, and even that one has more action in it.

That said, I personally even enjoy the beginning of the story. I don’t consider myself blinded or obsessed any more than lola does–in fact, I will freely claim that I have read better (and equally original) fantasy by at least one other author. Nevertheless, I regard LotR as some of the best fantasy out there.

6

I’ve read LotR about a dozen times since reading it for the first time as an eighth grader back in early 1968. I didn’t have a problem with its pacing at the age of 13, and I don’t now.

Tolkien was the first modern fantasy writer to create not just a gripping story, but a whole world with past and future, depth and nuance. The ‘travel’ posters from my youth that said “Come to Middle Earth” sprang up because of that quality to Tolkien’s world - the sense that you could walk into it and keep going, in many other directions besides those where the plot took place. This alone set a standard that few fantasy writers have been able to match.

There’s a great deal of depth of meaning to his story, too - it took me maybe ten readings before I stopped feeling like I was seeing new things in the story every time.

And it’s worth putting in a word for the high quality of Tolkien’s prose, another area where he set a standard that few can match.

I’d say LotR has earned its reputation, and then some.

[sub]Besides, if you don’t read LotR, how can you fully appreciate Bored of the Rings, the Harvard Lampoon parody?[/sub]

7

I made the mistake of checking out LOTR on audiotape for a long car trip from DC to Maine. I was almost asleep before I left Maryland, and I was driving!

8

I first read LOTR in 1970, and loved it. I think I read it at least once a year for the next dozen years or so, and I’ve read it several times since. I can’t agree that it’s badly paced, or too political, or the battle scenes too confused. Those criticisns DO seem to apply to a lot of other fantasy I’ve read or tried to read, including those of other “Masters”. Try reading E.R.R. Eddison’s The Worm Ouroborus series sometime, or any of William Morris’ books. Or even Tolkien’s other fantasies – I find The Silmarillion incredibly dull, ditto the “Lost Tales” books, and “Leaf by Niggle”. I DO like The Hobbit, despite its “listen to father” style. But I find LOTR well-written and engaging.
And I agree wholeheartedly about “Bored of the Rings”. Somkeone told me about it before I even started LOTR, while I was still reading The Hobbit, so I sought it out, and loved it. The perfect antidote to Tolkien when he gets too learned or too cloying.

“The ground was rich with many an oast and tilth, not to mention rippling rilns and rolling ferndocks!”

9

I re-read The Hobbit and/or the first book of Lord of the Rings about every 8 years or so. I keep looking for what makes them so great, and I just don’t see it. They’re DULL! I don’t need a fast paced book or dislike in-depth military technicalities, but I just don’t see what people see in these books. I keep re-reading them in the hopes that someday I’ll get it, but so far it hasn’t happened. I like a lot of fantasy, but these just don’t do it for me.

10

I have enjoyed quite a few fantasy novels (many of the Dragonlance books, for example). LoTR wasn’t one of them. I do appreciate it, but I had much higher expectations of it when I first read it than perhaps I should have. It seemed a bit boring to me.

I expect that I’ll read it again, with a different viewpoint – it is a Literary Work, after all! Give it time, and another chance.

11

The Hobbit is one of my all-time favorites, but I’m not sure if LOTR is in the same league. Just like GuanoLad I’m rereading LOTR, but I’m a little farther along than he is (just ended the Balrog scene).

I’m okay with the pacing. It’s not the best fantasy I’ve ever read (I far prefer anything by Joel Rosenberg), but it’s solid… and definitely in the top half.

I think it’s important to remember that LOTR launched a genre, and spawned a whole game industry on top of that. Don’t like dwarves and elves because you’ve seen them before? Hey, you gotta remember (like the Gap ads) This is Original.

I find it’s like listening to original Jazz or Blues. You pop that old Johnson album on, or some Armstrong, and you hear riffs, and themes, that are everywhere, and you think: What’s so great about this? I can here this everywhere.
Well what’s great is that these guys created this stuff.

That said, the first time I picked up LOTR (I was 10 or so) I was so bored I couldn’t finish. a decade later it was good reading… and a decade after that it’s still good reading.

12

I have to vote with the “my god, that’s dull” camp. I’ve tried reading the series several times, and each time have given up around the middle of the third book, in the realization that not only did I not care about any of the characters, I was dreading sitting down to read the book.

And as to Tolkien being the first author to fully flesh out a fantasy world, I’d like to refer you to the works of Lord Dunsany, H.P. Lovecraft and James Branch Cabell. Tolkien began writing “The Silmarillion” in 1917, and completed The Hobbit in 1936.

By 1919, James Branch Cabell had made national headlines for the risque portions of “Jurgen”, part of his 18-volume “Biography of the life of Dom Manuel”. The kingdom of Poictesme from this series is as fully fleshed-out as Middle Earth, easily, and Cabell writes with a wit that Tolkien never thought of approaching.

All of Lovecraft’s writing was done before the publication of “The Hobbit”, and if you don’t think his DreamLands were a complete world, with depth and nuance, I refer you to “The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath”, post-haste.

And lastly, Lord Dunsany. A master of fantasy, in 1905 Lord Dunsany published The Gods of Pegana, a brilliant exploration of a fictional land ruled over by a fantastic pantheon. The prose outstrips Tolkien by miles, and the imagination and humor that went into the series has kept me addicted for years.

I tend to think of Tolkien, not as the first real fantasy author, but as the capstone on the well of fantasy that was beginning to build at the beginning of the century. He did redefine the genre, but to my mind, he sent it in a direction of heavy-handed overblown drama, instead of the almost whimsical approach it had taken up until his time.

13

First!= good.

Being first just means you can’t say ‘this is so derivative’. (Which none of the LotR detractors here have said.) You can, however say ‘Other people have done this same sort of material better’.

14

I’m currently re-reading LOTR, after not having read it for at least 15 years (The main reason for this current reading was to prepare myself for the upcoming movies).

When I was a kid, I probably read it 3 or 4 times. I remember finding the descriptions of each little hill and twist in The Road to be a little tedious back then. Now I find myself reading these descriptions a little more attentively. I think what Tolkien is trying to do is capture an overall feeling of melancholy. Each character seems to be trying to take in all that is Middle Earth one last time, before it fades forever. It’s really a sad story, and I think one reason people keep going back to read it is to enjoy walking through that rustic, beautiful world again, until in the end it is lost and we have to return to our own complicated and not always lovely world.

15

I read LotR when I was in 5th or 6th grade and absolutely loved it. What I admired the most was the invented languages - they are genuine and convincing (mainly because Tolkien was a linguist and based his fantasy languages on actual languages). I am not a huge reader of fantasy, but I did try reading some after LotR, hoping for similar quality. The “foreign” names in these books tended to be silly and any fantasy language seemed stilted and incidental, just sort of inserted here and there into the English text.

After re-reading LotR years and years later, the only shortcoming I can think of is that it seems too short. The events culminating in the fall of Sauron seem too rushed and coincidental at times. And I hope I don’t open a can of worms by stating this, but I always thought LotR was racist - the “good” people are pale, the “bad” people are dark or sallow. Real subtle.

16

mrvisible has a point.

And as long as you’re listing early fantasy, don’t forget Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Pellucidar series, the first of which, At the Earth’s Core, was published in 1914.

17

I loved The Hobbit and LOTR, and even at age 44 reread them with pleasure. During my last rereading, I was struck by some of the very vivid imagery that Tolkien used so well: the reflection of red flames flickering on the glossy black columns in Mordor, the multitudes of orcs surrounding Helm’s Deep looking like a field of black corn being tossed by a strong wind. Writing like that gives me the shivers.

Nekochan, you have a point. These books were written, when, in the '30s, and this way of “coloring” the characters was common.

I sometimes get fed up with the elves and their taken-for-granted superiority. I know that they represent a chivalric element that is disappearing, to be replaced by us dirty old human beings, but sometimes I’d still like to slap them. I think Cate Blanchett has her work cut out for her to make Galadriel more of an accessible being in the upcoming movie.

18

Loved all things Tolkein when I was a kid but haven’t enjoyed any of his stuff when rereading it as an adult. As mentioned, it isn’t derivative, but it has been done better elsewhere.

What has always surprised me about it when rereading as an adult is how it seems more like juvenile fiction. I know I am way in the minority on this one, but I just don’t get the fuss anymore.

19

Why hello again, GuanoLad. It’s nice to see your words again.

Regarding LotR, I know what you mean. My perspective was a bit different, though. I grew up being a complete bibliophile, but was pretty narrow in my genres. I had never read, or wanted to read, a single SciFi or Fantasy book until the last year (I’m in my early 20’s). About 6 months ago I bought the super-awesome LotR board game; as a board game alone it is really fantastic and unusual. However, whenever I played it with other people I was the only one who was completely unfamiliar with the plot, characters, etc. . . so I picked up the Hobbit, and yesterday I just finished LotR.

I think, on the whole, the book was one of the most thrilling, complete adventure stories I’ve ever read. But I will admit that about halfway through the second volume I began to get a bit bored and took a break to read a couple of other books where there was more “movement”. I guess part of the sweeping nature of the book is that there are segments of the story more involved with plot and movement, and others more detailed and plodding. I noticed that in each volume, I went through a phase of boredom for about 50 pages, where I kept wondering when the plot was going to start again.

But it always started again, and I found the whole experience to be pretty great. I’ve been eyeing some other Tolkien stuff at the bookstore, as well as a really nice-looking set that’s basically a bunch of background compiled by Tolkien’s son. I’m so excited about the movie!

20

I love The Hobbit. Love, love love. That said, I have read LotR once. Probably not going to repeat the experiance any time soon. If I’m that bored I have other neat elves/dwarves/fantasy stuff to re-read. Its was good, but… I read for fun, if it starts getting hard to read, I put it down.