I saw The Hobbit movie a loooooooooong time ago, and couldn’t tell you a thing about it now, except that some of the characters were short and had hairy feet.
I’ve never read any Tolkien, and I haven’t seen any of the current movies.
Does this make me a failure as a human? Will I lose friends because of this? And should I actually read these things? The closest I’ve come to reading fantasy was the first two Harry Potter books, which I did enjoy very much, but I haven’t seen the movies.
I’ll admit, I am kinda curious about them. They’re pretty classic, after all, and I do like a good classic.
Bear in mind that everyone who has read The Lord of the Rings was at one time someone who had never read The Lord of the Rings There’s no shame in that. Remember, you’re only a failure as a human if you read the books and don’t like them!
Kidding, of course. Seriously, if you enjoyed J. K. Rowling’s books you might well enjoy reading The Hobbit as well. Lord of the Rings is a totally different kettle of fish, even though it has many of the same characters. Those books represent a later stage in Tolkien’s career, when he was more keenly interested in creating an internally consistent, fully realized fantasy world. So those books tend to be a lot more textured. There’s a good reason why they come with a set of appendices.
It’s common to enjoy The Hobbit while not really caring for Lord of the Rings, and vice versa. I’ve heard that some people who love the later books come to dislike The Hobbit, as it is written on a very child-friendly level. Me, I started with The Hobbit and moved on to the others to find out what happened to the characters, and I still love 'em all. So, sure, give 'em a read!
Well, okay, I stand corrected. Apparently there is shame in not having read Tolkien. Yes, people will shun and mock you, you will be cast out from polite society, children will throw eggs at you, dogs will spit on your grave.
“The Lord of the Rings” is a fine story, but it’s not the best novel(s) I’ve ever read, and probably isn’t one of the 20 best. It’s a better story than it is a book, if you can understand that. It’s a great story, but as a work of literature it’s overrated by a factor of about twenty billion. To its credit, it’s the most COPIED story in modern literature. But so what?
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Well, Persephone has read J.K. Rowling’s books, and enjoyed them, though few would argue that any of those fall into the category of Great Literature. Whether Tolkien is overrated or not depends on who you’re talking to. He’s certainly responsible (along with Robert E. Howard and a few others) for the modern fantasy genre, which could be considered a crime.
On the contrary, you should be proud. The Hobbit is a pretty good book. LOTR, on the other hand, is tedious garbage. It appeals to children who liked The Hobbit for an essentially childish reason; the desire to know more–even though this knowledge is an illusion. If it weren’t continued from the previous superior work, it never would have been published. It is rather impressively overlong, however. Save yourself the hassle.
Can I join your outcast club? I don’t watch Friends either, I read The Hobbit and the LOTR trilogy so long ago I don’t remember anything about them, and if it has teenagers screaming over it, I avoid it like the plague (also like the plaque, dental hygiene is important).
On the other hand, I have read all the Harry Potter books.
Persephone, If you can add that you don’t watch Reality (cough) shows either, I can forgive your having not read LOTR. … But you should mend your ways.
As for teenagers screaming for over the books, perhaps they are now. But I would guess that that is a result of the movies. I read The Hobbit and LOTR for the first time as a teenager twenty years ago. There were few among my peers who had also read the books.
I liked The Hobbit. I had to read the first one of the trilogy for eighth-grade English and skimmed the first half before giving up. Hated, hated, hated it. My officemate keeps threatening to get me the trilogy for my birthday but has resisted so far. (This year he got me a cheesy acrylic Dr Pepper laprobe which was infinitely preferable.)
Hating “reality” TV, though – that’s problematical.
