I’m sure we all know Peter Jackson’s movie The Fellowship of the Ring comes out this Christmas, to be followed by The Two Towers for Christmas 2002 and Return of the King Christmas 2003.
I intend to read the relevant book in each year before the film hits the cinema, so the story’s fresh in my mind. I haven’t read them since high school, when I read them over and over.
So I’ll be reading The Fellowship of the Ring between now and December. But, should I read The Hobbit first? Of course the stories are only tangentially related, and even the literary styles are very different (The Hobbit being a children’s book, after all); contrariwise, important plot elements and characters, like Gollum, Rivendell, Elrond, Gandalf, and Bilbo’s discovery of the Ring, all originated with The Hobbit. Contrariwise again, I’ve got over 150 books on my unread shelves; I really don’t have the time-budget to spend on another book I’ve already read.
I can’t be the only Doper facing this conundrum. What would/will y’all do?
Having read The Hobbit and LOTR at least four or five times, all I can say is: read it again! I found that I noticed subtle hints that came back in the LOTR saga that I would have otherwise looked over. Ofcourse, you don’t have to read it, but if the last time you read both of them is years ago, I definately recommend it. Afterall, it can’t take you longer than two or three days to read though The Hobbit, can it?
Given your criteria listed, I would say no, do not read the Hobbit. The introductory pages of Fellowship have a quick summary of the most relevant bits. When I first read Fellowship, oh so many years ago, I didn’t realize that the Hobbit was part of the same series and skipped it. Reading it several years later I understood several references better. But it is by no means vital.
Having said that, by all means if you can fit it into your schedule, I heartly recomend a re-read. Tolkien’s works are one of the very few books I read every few years.
Wow! Yes, reread The Hobbit, then zoom back into the others ones as you will. You’re right, it’s not directly related to the the rest of them, but there’s so much cool stuff in the prequel that you’ll appreciate the background.
Actually, the prequel and the other three are related pretty closely, aren’t they? You get the full story of the origins of the ring in the three main books, but the prequel sets them up nicely…
[hijack]
I wish they’d gotten Peter O’Toole for Gandalf!
[/hijack]
Oh, I can’t imagine anything more dreadful. I realize that many people like Peter O’Toole, but for some reason, he annoys me to no end. I don’t know what it is about him, but ever since having to watch Pygmalion in my high school senior english class, I’ve denounced Mr. (Sir?) O’Toole and everything he stands for.
[hijack]Nay, I can think of none better to play him than the gimlet-eyed, weathered, quite-old-looking O’Toole. I picture his performances in such movies as The Stunt Man, Lawrence of Arabia, The Ruling Class, and Lion in Winter; movies in which he played larger-than-life characters with overweening egos. [/hijack]
I have to disagree. Peter O’Toole is a wonderful actor, but he’s got an impish quality, a refusal to take himself too seriously, that I think is inappropriate to the character. O’Toole’s a rakish playboy-type; for Gandalf I think you need someone to play dignified and wizened.
Someone like Ian McKellen, in fact. I think he’s perfectly cast.
(Can I hijack my own thread? “Sit down and shut up, everyone! This thread’s going to Cuba!”)
Based on the replies thus far, though, I think I will go on and re-read The Hobbit. Maybe we can even re-read it together and have a discussion-salon thread about it.
Until last month, I’d never read either The Hobbit or the Ring trilogy. My best friend mentioned that she tries to re-read the trilogy every year, and I’d always sort of known I should have read them somewhere by now (I’m 27), so I bought the set. Reading The Hobbit for the first time took about one dedicated weekend, but I enjoyed it so much I didn’t want to put it down, and took it up again at every opportunity. School just started back and work’s been pissy, plus I’m moving soon, so I haven’t had a chance to start on The Fellowship Of The Ring yet, but I plan to in the next month or so.
Even if the stories are only tangentially related, The Hobbit is such an engaging story that it is definitely worth a reread. Your 150 as-yet-unread books can wait the extra couple of days it will take. Re-introduce yourself to the characters in The Hobbit, and consider it a warm-up lap for Fellowship.
And just how long does it take you to read a book? If you are spending between June and December just to read TFOTR, I’m sure you can sneak in a few days to read The Hobbit.
[Warning - humble opinion and unrequested advice alert. No sarcasm intended.]
Sounds like your a little too busy to enjoy your reading. Take a day off. One day to yourself. A good reading day must be planned ahead.
Call in sick to work, contact your friends, tell them you will be completely unavailable for that day.
Hire someone to clean the house the day before ‘your day’, so that is one less thing to think about (“I can’t be reading, I have to do laundry!”).
Go to the store, stock up on your favorite beverages and snacks (milk, soda, cookies, chips, fudgy brownies, etc.)
The day of ‘your day’, unplug the computer, disconnect the cable (or use the VCR to tape the shows), and turn the ringer on the phone to off.
Overload the pet’s dishes with food so you do not have to get up to feed them, or keep their bag of snacks nearby (but well away from your snacks - this is not the time to be messing up snack bags).
Sit on the couch, hammock, bed, wherever you like to read.
Arrange the pillows just so.
Ignore everything around you except the smell of smoke, the sound of gunshots or a fire alarm.
Read and relax, dammit!
Books should be read at leaisure, not as part of a race.
As far as the 150 on the shelves, I thought I was bad with 14 unread books!
“This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force” --Dorothy Parker
“Some books are to be tasted; others swallowed; and some to be chewed and digested.” – Francis Bacon
“Some books are undeservedly forgotten; none are undeservedly remembered.” – W. H. Auden
You’re probably right. Gandalf wouldn’t put up with monkey business (as he didn’t with Pippen, for example). It’s just that while I was reading the trilogy, I saw him as Gandalf. But hey, I have no problemo with Ian McKellen. [BTW, contrary to a popular belief that included my own, “wizened” doesn’t mean “knowing, wizardly, intelligent”; it means “dry, shrunken, and wrinkled as a result of aging”. (M-W Collegiate Dictionary, 10th ed.)]
Ian McKellen is a good choice, but I think Richard Harris (Marcus Aurelius in Gladiator, in case you have forgotten) should have been Gandalf. Most friends and I agree Harris was born to play the part. It was his destiny.
Where on God’s Green Middle Earth did you get this misconception? If you think it is a children’s book, then you owe it to youself to reread it; you’ll find you’re mistaken.
The Hobbit was indeed written by Tolkein as a tale for his two children.
Yes it’s scary. Yes it’s long and contains big words. Yes characters get killed. But it was still created for children.
Just because we can’t allow our children these days to witness anything that hasn’t been sanitized of anything negative without being accused of neglect and abuse, doesn’t mean that children have always been raised that way.
I think it’s on you to show that it isn’t a children’s book, RealityChuck. It is marketed as a children’s book. It is usually read for the first time by or to children. It contains scenes unambiguously meant to appeal to children, like the unexpected party and the encounter with the trolls.
It has been adapted into a children’s animated cartoon and as a children’s puppet show. When someone does that with Portnoy’s Complaint you can argue the point.
I just finished rereading The Hobbit and The LOTR, and am glad I read The Hobbit again. It adds depth and history to all the common places Frodo and Bilbo visit.
Can’t wait for the movies to come out, but I hope they’re true to the tale. The Liv Tyler crap has me up in arms.
The Hobbit is definitely a children’s book; you can tell the difference in Tolkein’s writing between it and The LOTR.
I don’t know…I say give her a chance. Everything else I hear about the movie is that it’s going to be a faithful adaptation, and I can’t wait to watch it. She doesn’t bother me at all in that role, provided she doesn’t totally blow it.
And I’m about to finish Two Towers for the first time ever. I didn’t ever read Tolkien until last month, and I’m wishing that I had read these books 15 years ago. They’re incredible!
Slightly off topic, I read Eyes Of The Dragon, by Stephen King, just before I started the Hobbit, and noticed a very strong Tolkien influence in King’s storytelling style. Anybody else think so? I mean, sure, Tolkien INVENTED the whole fantasy thing as it is now, but EOTD seemed like a real tip o’ the hat.
You wanna talk about a real tip o’ the hat? Check out The Sword of Shannara, by Terry Brooks. Actually, if you have already read The Lord of the Rings, then you don’t need to read The Sword of Shannara, since it’s pretty much Tolkien’s story with the names and some details shuffled around. I’m not sure if it was intentional or not, but I always thought that the similarities were too much to be coincidental. I only read it once, and that was years ago, and was too annoyed with the similarities to read it again.
Ditto, Atreyu. I don’t mind a tip o’ the hat kind of thing (for example, in one of the Wheel of Time books, it’s mentioned that one of Rand’s favorite stories is “The Tale of the Nine Rings” or something like that). But I just wasn’t able to get into the Shannara books. I’m a big Tolkien fan and I was annoyed with Brooks for what seemed to be blatant rip-offs.
Which is not, btw, to say that the Shannara series is bad. I know folks who enjoy the books a lot; I just happen to prefer Tolkien.
Fiver, if you really want to do a discussion thread about The Hobbit, count me in! I’ve been planning to reread the LOTR trilogy before the movies too.
[sub]Now if you’d all like to gather 'round, Rosebud, Queen of the Geeks, will tell you how she and her friend Kat actually got teary-eyed watching LOTR trailers at DragonCon…[/sub]
I just read all four books in the last week and a half. (Why, yes, I do have a lot of time on my hands. Thanks for noticing.) What can I say that hasn’t already been said? I hadn’t read them since I was in high school, and I enjoyed them far more this time through than I ever have before.
Oh, and someone mentioned the Liv Tyler stuff. I was worried about this too, until I saw an interview with Peter Jackson, the director, on http://www.lordoftherings.net. He was asked exactly what the deal was with her. He said everything he’s read on the internet has been blown way out of proportion. Arwen is not going to be part of the Fellowship, and she is not going to be a “warrior princess,” which is how some sources have described her part. In fact, nearly all of the added material will come from Tolkein’s own Appendix, which contains a section on the story of Aragorn and Arwen. I felt much better after hearing that.
Oh, that site also has the new trailer available for download. It’s looking better and better the more I watch it.
[/hijack]