# Why has Middle Earth not gained/held the same cultural cachet that Star Wars has? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** middle-earth\ **Created:** [September 23, 2019, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697 "2019-09-23T13:04:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Telperion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telperion/32/509_2.png) [@Telperion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperion)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/101 "2019-09-29T19:16:10Z")
> [@EllisDee](#): > > All three of them? A king and his subjects sure seems like a society to me. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/102 "2019-09-29T19:25:27Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Simple. > > LOTR was a book franchise. > > SW was a movie franchise. > > More people go to the movies than read books. > > LOTR was a very successful book series, but fewer people have read it than the number of people who have seen Star Wars. By the time the LOTR movie came out, SW had been a well merchandised phenomenon for almost a quarter of a century. When I went to college, 50 years ago, LotR was ubiquitous. Everyone read it, everyone knew who Frodo was. See Bored of the Rings. I even have LotR jigswa puzzles. But I wouldn’t call it a franchise. There might be a bookshelf full of LotR related books, but there is a bookstore full of Star Wars books. If LotR was a franchise there would be an Orc Hunters series and set of movies, there would be Gandalf the early years, there would be something about Bilbo’s early adventures, there would be something about Bilbo’s grandfathers early adventure, and there would be sequels with Sam fighting off leftover orcs. And video games. And theme parks. At least we have something to be grateful for. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/103 "2019-09-29T19:28:53Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > And video games. To be fair, there have been [a number of successful Middle-Earth video games](https://www.gamesradar.com/10-best-tolkien-games/), including the long-running _Lord of the Rings Online_ MMORPG. But, point taken. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/104 "2019-09-29T20:48:16Z")
> [@Telperion](#): > > A king and his subjects sure seems like a society to me. If you’re saying that three guys qualifies as a “society” I’m thinking my original impression of “deliberately obtuse” was spot on. ---
**Author:** ![Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malleus_incus_stapes/32/3293_2.png) [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/105 "2019-09-29T21:11:27Z")
> [@Crossbreed](#): > > Science fantasy is a hybrid of science fiction & fantasy. Its sci-fi aspects are expected to be technically feasible/rationale. (That inherent limitation calls for more clever solutions to a problem.) > > Straight fantasy relies more on magic and succeeds “just because” with little to no attempt to justify its results. For fans of the former, that is too deus-ex-machina (and lazy). I would disagree on a number of counts. 1. All but the hardest of hard SF basically uses magic. It’s dressed up in the trappings of Sufficiently Advanced Technology, but when you get right down to it, it’s magic. Faster-than-light travel is possible because something something dark matter something engines, say. Or laser-swords end in a discrete point rather than the light beams continuing into infinity because shut up, it looks cool. How is a lightsaber really any different than a magic sword? That being said… 2. Just because a story has explicit magic doesn’t mean things happen “just because” or that problems get deus-ex-machina’d away. Yes, there are lazy fantasy authors-- and lazy sci-fi authors, and lazy romance writers, etc-- but the _good_ ones work hard on making an internally-consistant world. There are fantasy writers whose magical systems are more scientific than anything in Star Wars-- not in the sense of relating to physics and chemistry, but in the sense of foundational rules that are used in an understandable way to build the whole system. Brandon Sanderson exemplifies this approach, especially in _Mistborn_. Fans were able to figure out what some of the metals did that even the characters didn’t know, because it all followed a logical progression. Speaking of Sanderson, [Sanderson’s First Law](https://brandonsanderson.com/sandersons-first-law/) is “An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic.” In other words, if your magic system is rigorously defined and the Hero finds a clever way to use magic to save the day, you have a clever hero. If your magical system is vague and mysterious and the Hero uses magic to save the day, you (often) have a deus ex machina. Vague mystical magics are better employed as a source of problems rather than solutions. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/106 "2019-09-29T21:31:39Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Not that I should argue Middle-Earth semantics with someone named [Telperion](http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Telperion), but… 😃 > > All of those things were foretold to happen in _The Lord of the Rings_, as the Third Age transitioned into the Fourth Age (a.k.a. the “age of men”), but by the end of _The Return of the King_, none of them had entirely occurred _yet_. > > The elves had been leaving Middle-Earth for many years, and though the final chapter of _The Return of the King_ showed two of the most powerful remaining elves (Galadriel and Elrond) finally departing, there were still elves left in Middle-Earth. Cirdan the Shipwright appears in that scene, but he was said to have planned to be on the last ship to sail for the West, at some point early in the Fourth Age. > > Hobbits and dwarves are still, apparently, thriving, and interacting with men, at the end of the book, even as it had been foretold that they would eventually fade from view. Presumably, the ents are still continuing their fruitless search for the entwives at that point, but, too, are fated to fade away. So, I don’t know how many non-human humanoids there are in this world (and I’m only part way through, and trying to avoid spoilers) but the world clearly has a history of non-humans. Giants helped build the wall. A treaty was made between the first men of Westeros and the Children of the Forest. The carvings the Children made are still present, all over the place, in most every godswood. Humans didn’t see a lot of non-humans in LotR, either. And as someone pointed out, the other types were going away at the end of the story. I mean, if you are just saying that you prefer fiction where the POV characters are all human, sure, that’s a difference between GoT and LotR. But if you are arguing that the worlds are somehow different, and GoT isn’t in the tradition of LotR, I have to strongly disagree with you. (Oh, and the others/white walkers aren’t all that different from the wraiths in the barrow downs, if you want to look at the bad guys.) ---
**Author:** ![Telperion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telperion/32/509_2.png) [@Telperion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperion)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/107 "2019-09-29T21:38:26Z")
> [@EllisDee](#): > > If you’re saying that three guys qualifies as a “society” I’m thinking my original impression of “deliberately obtuse” was spot on. We don’t know that three is the entire number of giants in that world, just that three is the number of giants we know of. The fact that they appear to have a complex social structure certainly suggests they’d be part of a larger society. But I guess you’re the kind of person that requires every single thing be spelled out to them. ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2019, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/108 "2019-09-29T23:39:47Z")
> [@Telperion](#): > > We don’t know that three is the entire number of giants in that world, just that three is the number of giants we know of. The fact that they appear to have a complex social structure certainly suggests they’d be part of a larger society. But I guess you’re the kind of person that requires every single thing be spelled out to them. We know it’s only three because [spoiler]the army of the dead drove every living thing south of the wall with Mance Rayder’s army, except of course the ones they killed outright and conscripted. We saw Mance Rayder’s army had three giants. It was kind of the whole point of the Night King story, and the whole reason for Mance Rayder’s existence in the story: The dead killed EVERYONE north of the wall. That’s how they formed their army, and that’s also why it took so long to head south. We know this because Hardhome is way out of the way; the dead wouldn’t have gone in that direction unless they were clear-cutting every breather north of the wall.[/spoiler] > [@puzzlegal](#): > > So, I don’t know how many non-human humanoids there are in this world (and I’m only part way through, and trying to avoid spoilers) but the world clearly has a history of non-humans. Giants helped build the wall. A treaty was made between the first men of Westeros and the Children of the Forest. The carvings the Children made are still present, all over the place, in most every godswood. The show never established that the Giants helped build the wall, but let’s grant that. The people in the show say the wall was built 10,000 years ago. The children of the forest are also thousands of years old. Saying that the carvings are still present and therefore GoT depicted that society is like saying cro-magnon and neanderthal societies are depicted in a story where we see modern day people discover cave paintings. Such an assertion would be absurd. Remember, the point was not that non-humans _never existed_ in the GoT universe. The point is that part of the Tolkien legacy is DEPICTING non-human societies. We meet the hobbits, and learn all about their houses, social interactions, and society as a whole in loving detail. We meet the dwarves. We meet the elves. That legacy of depicting non-human humanoid SOCIETIES is wholly absent from GoT. ---
**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2019, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/109 "2019-09-30T00:12:35Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > While _The Hobbit_ was definitely written with a child audience in mind, I’d dispute the idea that Tolkien’s other Middle-Earth works (_The Lord of the Rings_ and _The Silmarillion_) were written for children – they’re long and dense, and challenging for many adult readers, much less kids. I think children were different in terms of reading levels decades ago. ---
**Author:** ![Telperion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telperion/32/509_2.png) [@Telperion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperion)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2019, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/110 "2019-09-30T00:27:58Z")
> [@EllisDee](#): > > We know it’s only three because I could well imagine them missing a few places, especially since [the area above the Wall](https://atlasoficeandfireblog.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/westeros-size-estimates.png) is basically the size of Canada. Besides, there’s that whole other continent that’s significantly larger than Westeros which also has several mentions of giants. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2019, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/111 "2019-09-30T01:00:59Z")
> [@ralfy](#): > > I think children were different in terms of reading levels decades ago. Do you have any cites at all to show that Tolkien specifically had children or young adults in mind when he wrote _The Lord of the Rings_? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2019, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/112 "2019-09-30T02:40:15Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Do you have any cites at all to show that Tolkien specifically had children or young adults in mind when he wrote _The Lord of the Rings_? He explicitly said otherwise in a 1950 letter to his publisher (_Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien_, p. 136): “an immensely long, complex, rather bitter, and very terrifying romance, quite unfit for children”. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2019, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/113 "2019-09-30T04:08:10Z")
> [@EllisDee](#): > > The people in the show say the wall was built 10,000 years ago. The children of the forest are also thousands of years old. Saying that the carvings are still present and therefore GoT depicted that society is like saying cro-magnon and neanderthal societies are depicted in a story where we see modern day people discover cave paintings. Such an assertion would be absurd Well, if we had cro-magnon paintings all over the place, and they were the standard iconography used by a major religion, then it would be sort of comparable. > [@EllisDee](#): > > Remember, the point was not that non-humans _never existed_ in the GoT universe. The point is that part of the Tolkien legacy is DEPICTING non-human societies. We meet the hobbits, and learn all about their houses, social interactions, and society as a whole in loving detail. We meet the dwarves. We meet the elves. > > That legacy of depicting non-human humanoid SOCIETIES is wholly absent from GoT. If you read the appendices of GoT, or if you watch the bonus features in the blu-ray disks (both of which I’ve done some of) you kinda DO meet the Children of the Forest and the Giants. Maybe that didn’t make it into the main TV show, but it’s part of the GoT universe in an important and integral way. ---
**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2019, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/114 "2019-10-01T03:28:39Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Do you have any cites at all to show that Tolkien specifically had children or young adults in mind when he wrote _The Lord of the Rings_? Probably [“How a 5-year-old boy inspired J.R.R.Tolkien’s ‘Lord of the Rings’”](https://aleteia.org/2017/11/13/how-a-5-year-old-boy-inspired-j-r-r-tolkiens-lord-of-the-rings/) ---
**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2019, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/115 "2019-10-01T03:56:15Z")
[J. R. R. Tolkien discussing The Lord of the Rings (1960s Interview)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFexwNCYenI) [“BBC Archival Footage-In Their Own Words British Authors J.R.R. Tolkien Part 1”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR-4vMEiQ_U) [BBC Archival Footage-In Their Own Words British Authors J.R.R. Tolkien Part 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ca5TUYB1nlw) ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2019, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/116 "2019-10-01T17:48:41Z")
> [@ralfy](#): > > Probably [“How a 5-year-old boy inspired J.R.R.Tolkien’s ‘Lord of the Rings’”](https://aleteia.org/2017/11/13/how-a-5-year-old-boy-inspired-j-r-r-tolkiens-lord-of-the-rings/) Thank you for the links. I don’t have time to listen to the interviews, but while the article above notes that he didn’t necessarily exclude children from being the audience for the books (and that his own children were an inspiration for the books), it also doesn’t say that they were his primary audience. I think we may ultimately need to agree to disagree on this one. As I noted earlier, I think that _The Hobbit_ was written more in a style like a fairy tale (and, thus, more accessible to children), but that _The Lord of the Rings_, with its length, complexity, and dark themes, wasn’t really written with children in mind as the audience (as Kimstu’s quote notes). ---
**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2019, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/117 "2019-10-02T02:16:49Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Thank you for the links. I don’t have time to listen to the interviews, but while the article above notes that he didn’t necessarily exclude children from being the audience for the books (and that his own children were an inspiration for the books), it also doesn’t say that they were his primary audience. > > I think we may ultimately need to agree to disagree on this one. As I noted earlier, I think that _The Hobbit_ was written more in a style like a fairy tale (and, thus, more accessible to children), but that _The Lord of the Rings_, with its length, complexity, and dark themes, wasn’t really written with children in mind as the audience (as Kimstu’s quote notes). The article shows that the books were not only inspired by his children, but that one even helped him with the content. Also, I think one of his first publishers gave the go-signal for publishing his first book thanks to feedback from one the latter’s children. Finally, the interviews show that young adults were enthusiastic about it. All of these show that Tolkien had children in mind when he wrote them, and that young adults followed because that were the same kids who were moving towards young adulthood (together with the author’s) as the LOTR (which started off as a sequel to _The Hobbit_ but ended up otherwise) was written in stages across more than a decade. About the quote, if you read the words of the letter before and after it, you will see that Tolkien was writing to the publisher, complaining about the cost of typing the manuscript and the “magnitude of disaster” because he had created something out of his control, leading to a work that is “quite unfit for children (if fit for anybody).” He continues by saying that it contains around 600,000 words, that it has become “impracticable,” and that he is tired of it. In response, the publisher suggested that the two books (i.e., including _The Silmarillion_) be divided into three or four volumes, a point that the author addresses in a letter written a few days after. No point was made by either about unsuitability for children due to the content. It seems that their concern was the sheer length of the project, worries about typing and even revising, and how to publish the material. Finally, this is a difficult point because one can always redefine the meaning of a child, what is suitable or not (too dark?) for children, etc. Given that, if one’s standards are high enough, then even a work like LOTR (compared to several of the European myths and oral literature that inspired it) can be considered for adults only. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2019, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/118 "2019-10-02T02:59:40Z")
One thing is star wars was a light in what had become a very dark era in America … One that wouldn’t be over until after a sequel that was dark its self I mean if you ask someone if there were any cultural bright spots in the 70s and you’ll get Americas bicentennial and star wars … ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2019, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/119 "2019-10-02T05:54:07Z")
> [@nightshadea](#): > > One thing is star wars was a light in what had become a very dark era in America What was so dark about 1977? Disco, certainly. Anything else? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2019, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697/120 "2019-10-02T07:24:20Z")
> [@ralfy](#): > > The article shows that the books were not only inspired by his children, but that one even helped him with the content. I think there’s confusion here that stems from your lumping “the books” together as a single unified creation, when Tolkien’s correspondence and interviews over many years show that they were quite different strands of his lifelong “Middle-earth” worldbuilding, emerging at quite different times. To summarize very briefly: Tolkien began constructing his imaginary languages and a mythical realm for their context during his late adolescence. This was the background that ultimately grew into what was published posthumously as _The Silmarillion_ and all the other supporting “tales” of Middle-earth. Nothing about it was originally intended for children: in fact, Tolkien was rather fiercely antagonistic to the Victorian notion that “Faerie” or fable containing what we now refer to as “fantasy” should be relegated to kiddie-lit. According to [Tolkien himself](https://www.tolkienestate.com/en/writing/letters/letter-163-to-wh-auden.html), when he spontaneously started the story of _The Hobbit_ in deliberately “kiddie-lit” form as a family man in his thirties, it took him a while to figure out that it could actually be part of his far more complex and erudite Middle-earth storyverse: > [@](#): > > But the beginning of the legendarium [i.e., the whole Middle-earth corpus], of which the Trilogy [i.e., LotR] is pa[rt] (the conclusion), was in an attempt to reorganize some of the [Finnish saga] Kalevala, especially the tale of Kullervo the hapless, into a form of my own. […] > > I went on after return; but when I attempted to get any of this stuff published I was not successful. The Hobbit was originally quite unconnected, though it inevitably got drawn in to the circumference of the greater construction; and in the event modified it. It was unhappily really meant, as far as I was conscious, as a ‘children’s story’ […] > > Since The Hobbit was a success, a sequel was called for; and the remote Elvish Legends [i.e., the core material of The Silmarillion] were turned down. […] Anyway I myself saw the value of Hobbits, in putting earth under the feet of ‘romance’, and in providing subjects for ‘ennoblement’ and heroes more praiseworthy than the professionals […] > > All the same, I was not prepared to write a ‘sequel’, in the sense of another children’s story. […] As I had expressed the view that the connexion in the modern mind between children and ‘fairy stories’ is false and accidental, and spoils the stories in themselves and for children, I wanted to try and write one that was not addressed to children at all (as such); also I wanted a large canvas. > > A lot of labour was naturally involved, since I had to make a linkage with The Hobbit; but still more with the background mythology. That had to be re-written as well. The Lord of the Rings is only the end pan of a work nearly twice as long which I worked at between 1936 and 53. > [@ralfy](#): > > All of these show that Tolkien had children in mind when he wrote them This is only partly true, in that Tolkien had children (especially his own, along with a received idea of what a “children’s story” should be like) in mind when he wrote _The Hobbit_. He began the overall worldbuilding of Middle-earth decades before _The Hobbit_, and did not have children in mind as a potential audience at all. He originally attempted to get these earlier legends published as his proposed sequel to _The Hobbit_. And he completed LotR decades after _The Hobbit_, deliberately choosing to make it “not addressed to children at all”. > [@ralfy](#): > > No point was made by either about unsuitability for children due to the content. It seems that their concern was the sheer length of the project, worries about typing and even revising, and how to publish the material. :dubious: I don’t see how you can look at the words “complex, rather bitter, and very terrifying” in that sentence and say that it’s not making a point about the content. And if you look at the rest of what Tolkien wrote about his work (especially his letters), it’s quite clear that he **did** consider, and **intend** , the content of LotR to be fundamentally unsuitable for children. So getting back to your original claim: > [@ralfy](#): > > Tolkien was said to have been inspired by European epics and legends but watered down somewhat for kids. He was definitely inspired throughout by European epics and legends, and you can argue that there’s a sense in which the “children’s story” genre of _The Hobbit_ is “watered down somewhat for kids”. But that does not at all apply to the rest of the stories, most of which were originally conceived long before _The Hobbit_. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-middle-earth-not-gained-held-the-same-cultural-cachet-that-star-wars-has/840697.md?page=7)