This is not an April Fool’s joke, and I’m not trolling. This is a serious question.
As I’ve watched the thread If LotR had been written by someone else?! continue to live and breath after 352,000 + views and 1,941 responses, I have to admit I don’t understand. It’s 39 pages long, for crying out loud!
Now, there are more threads out there specifically targeted to LotR fans, including Monty Python’s LotR. To a non-fan, this seems remarkable. I have come to the conclusion that this will never end.
And that’s my question. Everyone has interests, and they are as varied as the people on this board. Questions come and go, but there is usually a number of people who are passionate about the topic who read and answer the question as energetically as those that read LotR threads. But there seems to be somethng deeper with the LotR threads. Something I don’t understand. A passion to read everything LotR related, and to continue to read and post to threads LotR-related as long as they have breath in their bodies. Dare I say, an obsession?
I read the hobbit when I was a kid, and I did find it interesting. I was also 11 at the time, and my desire for fantasy material faded into the sunset as I grew older. I don’t mind science fiction (I like Star Wars as much as the next guy), but I don’t see Star Wars threads last for months on end. I’ve known people that were into Dungeons & Dragons, another fantasy genre, but I don’t know enough about either one to make a comparison. What I DO know is that these people seem to have the same passion for their chosen fantasy interest.
So what is it? Am I the only one out there that doesn’t have a need to discuss hobbits? And for you LotR fans, can you explain what you love so much about this topic that you would keep a LotR thread open after 1941 posts?
Thanks for your time. Moderators, if you deem this a poll, please move it.
Tolkien developed an entire world for his story. This world has different languages, cultures, places, histories, mythologies, etc. Middle Earth is as near to a real place as possible, I think, for being a work of fiction.
It’s the reality of the place that’s the hook - I think.
YMMV, I’m sure.
BTW, if this were an April Fools joke, wouldn’t it a bit late?
The explanation for that particular thread is pretty simple: LOTR is allegedly the most-read novel of the last century, so there’s a good chance that anyone who fancies doing a literary pastiche has read it at some point in their lives.
No doubt if something similar were done 50 years ago, it would have used some other widely-known work of popular fiction, e.g. “What if Sherlock Holmes were written by someone else?”
As for obsessing over it, people obssess over lots of things: talentless celebrities, useless collectibles, obsolete pieces of technology, etc. There are people who collect barbed wire. Given that, is it surprising that people obssess over a pretty good book?
I’d like to see a cite for that. There are a number of novels that are required reading in highschool that were written in the last century: Catcher in the Rye, Great Gatsby, many Hemingway novels. Since the majority of the general population does not read regularly for pleasure, I would guess that more people have read these novels in high school, when they were required, than have read LOTR, a really long book, for pleasure.
Tolkien said that and I think it is partially the attraction. I know it assumes a belief in a Creator, but that belief is not a requirement to understand what he means. Humans can create, whether it be works of art, music, architechture, or literature.
His creation of a world is attractive because of its depth.
To add to that, it’s the complexity and internal consistancy of his subcreation that is so appealing, at least to me. The Star Trek and Star Wars universes are patchworks of inconsistancy, with large holes and contradictions. JRRT’s universe tends to hang together.
I tend to view the works of JRRT on par with the works of architect Frank Lloyd Wright. There’s something about it that just feels correct, like it fills something missing from my life (of which absense I am unaware until it is filled) when I contemplate their creations. Both individuals have their detractors, and did produce works with flaws. But overall, I like both of their works. A lot.
I haven’t posted to either of the threads you named, Stink Fish Pot, but, IMO, The Lord of the Rings is one of the major literary works of the 20th Century, a very well-written novel. I think beezlebubba brought out a good point: LoTR creates a new universe and does so convincingly. Even in fantasy terms, I’ve never been able to buy Melnibone and Lanhkmar as real places; I find the Middle Earth believable.
I would say that the LoTR contains much on the bittersweet nature of change, something all humans can relate to.
Boromir dies because of his treachery, Aragorn comes into his kingdom and claims his true love, Gandalf must go into the West because his work is over, Merry, Pippin, and even Samwise become great councillors and the leaders of the hobbits, Gimli and Legolas overcome traditional prejudices to become great friends and eventually pass into the West, Eowin and Faramir find love, Denethor is destroyed by his despair, and Frodo must go into the West because he has sustained incurable wounds to the body and the soul. There are few works of fantasy that have characters change so much over the course of the book.
Isaac Asimov once pointed out that the LoTR begins small (a birthday party), gradually expands its scope until it involves the entire world in a cataclysmistic war, then shrinks the scope and ends small (a man returns home to his wife and daughter). In the course of that, it offers some wisdom and some irony.
It is not surprising that a remarkable book attracts a remarkable amount of attention.
Stink Fish Pot, I think you’re just pulling out a few examples to support a flimsy conclusion that this “will never end.” The “big” thread and no doubt a few others got cross-posted all over the Internet, and many are continually registering to contribute and never coming back.
But to address the larger question, I don’t think there’s anything special about the LotR universe that gives it extraordinary popularity. There are a few “fan-boy” type Star Wars and Star Trek threads lurking in the archives. I think that, with the release of the movies, LotR has just become the latest fad, or revival, if you will.
Enterprise has pretty well beaten Star Trek to death, and the Star Wars movies have been disappointing, to say the least. People got tired of talking about The Matrix after a while. And Harry Potter? Puh-leeze… And, as The Onion succintly put it, Nation’s Love Affair with LotR Threatening its Relationship with Star Wars. So, in time, we’ll find something else to obsess over. Furthermore, no one’s holding a gun to your end to read LotR threads. If you’re not interested, don’t read.
You mean to tell me that you think all (or even most) high school students actually read the novels assigned in English class? I can only imagine that you didn’t go to a public school.
My experience in school was that the list of “required reading” novels varied from one school to the other, and in my case from one teacher to another. I went to two high schools, and neither one had a list of required novels that every student was expected to read in order to graduate. The only books that we really HAD to read (if we knew what was good for us) were the ones our teachers assigned in class. To take Holden’s list: I never read The Great Gatsby. I read Catcher in the Rye on my own, but it wasn’t required. The only Hemmingway novels I had to read were Farewell to Arms and The Sun Also Rises.
I HAD to read (because we covered them in class): Silas Marner, Ethan Frome, Great Expectations, (but nothing else by Dickens, thank God) but I would bet a good many high school graduates of my era didn’t read all of them and the others which I can’t remember.
So I think the list of books that everyone was required to read in high school is very short. Or nonexistent.
av8rmike - I’m not so sure it’s a ‘flimsy’ conclusion. After all, that particular thread has been around for a long time, and has had significant activity. Being cross posted over the internet certainly helped its cause, but that just proves my point. There are people out there that were not members of this board who found this thread through whatever means and decided to not only read the post, but to join the SDMB and post themselves. I have no problem with the volume. But I have never seen anything like this on these boards, and I can’t imagine this is the only cross referenced post on this board. My amazement is the passion/loyalty/volume that this topic generates. My question was a sincere one, not one poking fun at the people who are interested in fantasy genre.
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Thank you for pointing out the obvious. I meant no offense by my OP, but perhaps you took offense anyway. But quite frankly, I don’t have that kind of time even if I was interested.
So true. Stepping in now to give the obvious answer on a woman’s hormonal level: Viggo (drool!) and Orlando (swoon!) as Aragorn and Legolas are enough for me to answer this thread’s question: “LotR - Can someone explain the attraction?.”
No offense taken here. I was just pointing out the obvious, I suppose. I too stopped reading the big thread months ago.
But my point is this: The “fan-boy” devotion I don’t think is in any way limited to LotR/Tolkein. If you do enough scouring, you’ll find fan fiction for any book, movie, TV show, or even musical out there. That “big” thread just stands out here because the SDMB isn’t a special interest board, and also because Fingolfin turned the fanfic genre on its ear by altering the style of writing, not adding new plots or actions. There just seem to be a lot of LotR fans here with some creativity, just as there are lots of fans of Star Trek/Star Wars/whatever.
I’d be willing to bet that if you started a “Re-write Star Wars in a new style”-thread and got it cross-posted at theforce.net and slashdot, you’d see the same outpouring.
Or maybe not. Like I’d said, LotR is just the newest fad (or revival) and maybe people are tired of Star Wars.
Fish: You are correct in pointing out that The Hobbit is, basicallly, a children’s book. If you enjoy sci/fi then pick up Fellowship. I think you’ll be surprised at how “adult” it is if your point of reference is The Hobbit.
Oddly, we had LoTR as req’d reading in my honors English class in high school. We also had to read The Fountainhead. It was by far the best humanities class I had (including college). Our teacher was a task master at giving us writing assignments, but most of the reading was enjoyable.
At the beginning of LOTR, Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin aren’t heroes, and they don’t particularly want to be heroes. They’re happy where they are. They’re not especially strong; they’re not versed in arcane lore; they don’t have any superpowers. They’re little people, in the way that most of us are little people. But when they’re called to fight evil, they go. And it’s hard and scary, but they perservere. And they triumph, even though they’re not super-heroes.
That’s one of the things that makes LOTR special to me. I suspect that most of us would like to think of ourselves in that light. We know that we’re not all that special, but we hope that if we were ever tested like that, we would be worthy. It resonates in a way that stories of glory-seekers and caped crusaders don’t.
LOTR is a very good adventure tale, very well told - if you let yourself get into the style of writing. You are with the characters for so long that their sorrows and failures, as well as triumphs, become meaningful to you. The fact that it’s subject matter is elves or trolls or wizards - and not wall street lawyers or spies or teachers or whatever in a “realistic” setting - just doesn’t matter. To the readers who get swept up in it, it’s basic story of sacrifice, perserverance and love which really matters.
oh bother, I can’t explain why I like it so much…The Peyote Coyote’s response was really good. …
I have to say that I’m inordinately proud of my LOTR Nerd status. lol…The Middle Earth world JRR Tolkien created was so completely palpable and vivid for me. I read a few of the Dune books by Frank Herbert. Really brilliant stuff - and I respect the author and the story - but Dune didn’t resonate with me as much as LOTR. The story just pulled me in and captivated me…As The Peyote Coyote has already put it so articulately, I will just say, “What he/she said!!”
