# Remember Bored Of The Rings? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 28, 2002, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374 "2002-12-28T16:45:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Desmostylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@Desmostylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desmostylus)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2003, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/61 "2003-01-04T07:41:38Z")
O mush-brained maid whose mind decays with every pill I slip her! ---
**Author:** ![partly\_warmer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bc8723/32.png) [@partly\_warmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/partly_warmer)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2003, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/62 "2003-01-04T08:24:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by GuanoLad \* > \*\*Horrible book. Reads like it was written by college kids who think they’re sooooo hilarious, but are in fact just riding on the coattails of people who are genuinely funny. Has a desperate ‘lets force another parody name in here somewhere’ atmosphere. > > It’s like they were Monty Python fans and thought the key to great humour was putting rude or weird words in the middle of sentences. \*\* Not that I don’t greatly appreciate hostile literary criticism (I do), but are you objecting specifically to the BOTR’s writers stealing from Monty Python? They’d already written the book by the time the first episode was aired. My high school pal and I found it on a college bookstore shelf, bought it largely on account of snippet in the front about the elf maiden opening her cloak and asking Frito if he liked what he saw, then were highly amused we’d been taken in. The style was quite unlike anything we’d read, so I’m puzzled you feel it was riding on anyone’s coattails. As for “forcing parody names”, you mean the alternate names for Tolkien’s characters were hokey? Or that all sorts of products/events/people were name-dropped into the poetry, etc.? It’s quite difficult to conjure parody names, in my experience, which I won’t go into just right at this moment. The problem is that the parody names typically have several of the same sounds, a similar number of syllables, and/or similar stress, and must also in addition make some sort of sense, be easily readable, as well as being humorous. It’s pretty limiting. Are there other parodies you prefer? If so, in what way? I’ll close with a quote I chanced upon while researching this post: “Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, It’s off to work we go, Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho . . . ‘Good! Good!’ yipped Moxie. ‘Yes, good! Especially the “heigh-ho” part,’ added Pepsi.” (With apologies to J.R.R. Tolkien, Henry Beard, the National Lampoon, and heck . . . whoever feels they need one.) ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2003, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/63 "2003-01-04T10:57:00Z")
Some parodies work, some don’t. I felt this one seemed to forced and wasn’t particularly creative - but then they set themselves quite a task, to parody an entire story from beginning to end and keep everything pretty similar all the way. I didn’t know if they came before or after Monty Python, but I was just using that as an example - you can see in “Live At The Hollywood Bowl” all the geeky college students that _think_ they’re cool and funny because they like Monty Python. You know? And that’s what “BOTR” feels like to me. In fact, it feels like the SDMB had written it in a post-by-post thread. In any case, the point is I didn’t like it. Maybe if it had actual jokes instead of just a bunch of scene-for-scene character-for-character forced silliness, I would’ve enjoyed it more. Or maybe not. ---
**Author:** ![Desmostylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@Desmostylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desmostylus)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2003, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/64 "2003-01-04T11:32:53Z")
A lot of us are just showing our age, **GuanoLad**. We remember it from the first time around. It was a silly (in the Python sense) parody of an obscure book only just becoming popular decades after _its_ initial publication. But there’s no harm in you expressing you opinion about it. ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Mapp](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miss_mapp/32/369_2.png) [@Miss\_Mapp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Mapp)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2003, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/65 "2003-01-04T11:47:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by partly\_warmer \* > **"Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, > It’s off to work we go, > Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho . . . > ‘Good! Good!’ yipped Moxie. > ‘Yes, good! Especially the “heigh-ho” part,’ added Pepsi."** “And what do you be callin’ that?” asked Spam, who knew few songs.\* - Clean ones, at least. ---
**Author:** ![SolGrundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@SolGrundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SolGrundy)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2003, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/66 "2003-01-04T11:53:59Z")
> [@](#): > > The others awoke and froze with terror. As they watched, the evil hunter goaded his mount, emitted one great and sour fart, and passed on. He had not seen them. How could anyone not like this book? Anyway, yeah, just as a parody it’s not so hot, especially since most of the references are already hopelessly outdated. (Although the running gag about their breakfasts (“After a hearty feast of cherubim and seraphim,”) is classic and a great jab at the book.) But you’ve got to love the segments where they just go off into nonsense. It reminds me of Woody Allen’s books, just unashamedly goofy. Thanks to the OP for reminding me about this book; I’d seen it before but never picked it up. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2003, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/67 "2003-01-05T00:19:26Z")
The map was great, too. The Nattily Wood, the Evelin Wood, the Islets of Langerhans, The Sunnier Clime, and something “(known to but a few)”. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Bullwinkle \* > Also, Gondor was called ‘Gonad’. Wasn’t it actually “Goldarn”? > [@](#): > > _Originally posted by Miss Mapp_ > > > [@](#): > > > > _Originally posted by partly\_warmer_ > > “Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, > > It’s off to work we go, > > Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho . . . > > ‘Good! Good!’ yipped Moxie. > > ‘Yes, good! Especially the “heigh-ho” part,’ added Pepsi.” > > “And what do you be callin’ that?” asked Spam, who knew few songs.\* “I call it ‘Heigh-Ho.’” **GuanoLad** : so what’s your idea of humor? How do you feel about South Park or Beavis and Butthead? No, I’m not looking for a fight, I’m just curious. For reference, I think MST3K is lame. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2003, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/68 "2003-01-05T00:51:44Z")
I used to like South Park, but it’s lost its edge for me, so I don’t watch it as much. Still makes me laugh, though. I have never liked Beavis and Butthead. I do like Monty Python, but I can’t watch it over and over. I like “The Goon Show” if you know what that is. I write and draw some stupid stuff myself, at [http://www.guanolad.com/main.htm](http://www.guanolad.com/main.htm), so you can see that really I _should_ like BOTR, it appears, on the surface, to appeal to my kind of humour. But because it doesn’t, I can see that it has a forced and fake feel to it. Elsewhere on this thread someone said that one of the original writers thinks it’s an awful book. I think he is saying the same as I am - he recognises the flaws in it; It could’ve been timeless and clever, instead of childish and try-hard. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2003, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/69 "2003-01-05T01:06:37Z")
Well, BOTR is definitely a product of its era–most of the pop culutral references are lost on anyone under 30–but it is still a very funny book to people who have a functioning sense of humor. “Any small, slow, stupid creature that turned its back on a crowd of Boggies was looking for a stomping.” C’mon, that’s good writing! ---
**Author:** ![partly\_warmer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bc8723/32.png) [@partly\_warmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/partly_warmer)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2003, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/70 "2003-01-05T01:19:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by GuanoLad \* > \*\*[http://www.guanolad.com/main.htm](http://www.guanolad.com/main.htm), so you can see that really I _should_ like BOTR, it appears, on the surface, to appeal to my kind of humour. But because it doesn’t, I can see that it has a forced and fake feel to it. > > Elsewhere on this thread someone said that one of the original writers thinks it’s an awful book. I think he is saying the same as I am - he recognises the flaws in it; It could’ve been timeless and clever, instead of childish and try-hard. \*\* Excellent layout! Really effective use of space and perspective in your PigeonMan strip! One notes the copyright is 1999. So you’ve moved on to other things? Especially given that you like “The Goon Show”, one has to conclude you weren’t a teen or greater in the 1960s, or that you weren’t much immersed in the popular culture of that time. Except for pacing, BOTR seems slightly similar to “The Goon Show” now that you mention it. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2003, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/71 "2003-01-05T01:41:27Z")
"I wish I was dead’–moaned Moxie. “So do I.”–whined Pepsi “May the Good Fairy what lives in the heavens grant yer every wish.”—growled Spam. _We are the Stealthy Green Toup’es,_ _Stalking nights and sleeping days._ _A team of silent , nasty men_ _Who all think Sorhed’s numba ten_ _Two_ _Four_ _Six_ _Eight_ _Tiptoe, sneak and infiltrate_ _Ch-Cha-Cha!_ 😃 😃 😃 😃 ---
**Author:** ![crinklebat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dec6dc/32.png) [@crinklebat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crinklebat)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2003, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/72 "2003-01-11T09:11:03Z")
I read BOTR on a camping trip with my friend Lissa when we were both ten. Our Tolkienite dads had copies. This was 1995. We got precious little of it (although we managed to figure out that Moxie and Pepsi had impregnated some carrots, and joked about it with each other for years afterward). I reread it two weeks or so ago, and still found that I didn’t understand a lot of the jokes, although I recognized a lot more of it than I did the last go around (I liked how they put in all the things with funny names in American history as random names–Hawley-Smoot, Clayton-Bulwer, etc). I’m assuming this is because I was born in 1985. Don’t get me wrong–a lot of it is funny, and I found myself laughing aloud far too many times. But so much of it is dated references that I don’t think the book can survive once the Baby Boomers are gone. On a related note, I was looking to stir things up and decided to take a copy of BOTR to a signing with Peter Jackson, Sean Astin, Fran Walsh, and Philippa Boyens (for those not as obsessed as I, these are people responsible for the recent FOTR films). Sean Astin didn’t recognize it, Peter Jackson claimed to have purposely refrained from reading it, and either Fran Walsh or Philippa Boyens gave a whoop of recognition and said, “God! This book is GREAT!” So, there we have it, folks. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2016, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/73 "2016-09-29T19:30:19Z")
> [@AncientHumanoid](#): > > I sit on the floor and pick my nose > > and dream of fiendish things > > of devious dwarves who suck their toes > > and elves who drub their dings > > * * * > > I may have it slightly wrong, haven’t read that book since high school, 20 yrs ago. But I may just go out and buy it again, thanks for the memories. So my daughter was married this summer. Wonderful day, wonderful wedding. EXCEPT… One of the readings was Bilbo’s “I sit beside the fire and think…” What do you suppose is running through my head??? You got it: \* “I sit on the floor and pick my nose…”\* ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2016, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/74 "2016-09-29T20:06:44Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > In the original Ballantine editions, there was a green box at the back with a message from Tolkien asking readers to purchase only that edition, because another company (Ace books, unbelievably) had previously published a paperback edition of LOTR without his permission ! Ace? 1960s? What’s unbelievable? > [@](#): > > The Harvard Lampoon has done a number of parodies over the years in just this style. Before Bored of the Rings, they did a spot-on parody of James Bond entitled **Alligator**. Had a copy I had borrowed, but someone stole it. Found it years later (distinctive tears and marks) at a used book store, bought it, and returned it to my friend. Pissed me off that I had to pay for it. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/75 "2016-09-30T02:38:00Z")
\*Alligator \*never got credited above. It was written by Michael Frith and Christopher Cerf in 1962. They reprinted it in the Harvard Lampoon 1966 Playboy parody, probably the best of the many Playboy parodies. It’s unintentionally hilarious today to read commentaries on humor from the late 50s/early 60s in which every single pundit proclaimed humor to be dead and satire impossible. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/76 "2016-09-30T04:24:56Z")
I think it’s in S.M. Stirling’s _A Meeting at Corvallis_ that two copies of the original BoTR play a significant role in the plot. Their respective carriers use them as the basis of an Altendorf cypher. When one is lost things turn ugly. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/77 "2016-09-30T04:43:27Z")
_Mazel tov_, **BrotherCadfael**! All good wishes to the happy couple. I still say “Argle bargle morble whoosh?” to express confusion and bewilderment. ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/78 "2016-09-30T04:50:03Z")
I had a copy of it once, but dumped it in one of my periodic “must reduce reading material” binges. “O Nasa O Ucla! O Etaoin Shrdlu! O Escrow Beryllium! Pandit J. Nehru!” ---
**Author:** ![Sangahyando](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f14d63/32.png) [@Sangahyando](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sangahyando)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 9:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/79 "2016-09-30T09:23:52Z")
Concerning this work, I have to align myself with **GuanoLad**. I haven’t read “Bored Of…”, and from everything I hear / read about it, I don’t want to. (Of course, “each to their own”, etc.) Some while ago, I started a thread about this matter. [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=760970&highlight=Tolkien](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=760970&highlight=Tolkien) ---
**Author:** ![Sangahyando](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f14d63/32.png) [@Sangahyando](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sangahyando)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374/80 "2016-09-30T09:30:00Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > I think it’s in S.M. Stirling’s _A Meeting at Corvallis_ that two copies of the original BoTR play a significant role in the plot. Their respective carriers use them as the basis of an Altendorf cypher. When one is lost things turn ugly. I’ve been amused, since reading the earlier books in Stirling’s “Emberverse” series, by the character Astrid – the ultimate Tolkien geek / addict / impassioned enthusiast: she believes that JRRT’s works are literal historical truth; and she is the leader of a band of “Rangers”, modelled on Aragorn’s guys. Astrid ardently wishes for the blasphemous work “Bored of the Rings” to be banned, and obliterated from the world; and for anyone found in possession of it or reading it, to be terminated with extreme prejudice. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/remember-bored-of-the-rings/145374.md?page=5)