March 14, 2004

JRR TOLKIEN

After Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring was released, I thought to buy the books because (1) I like reading and (2) I want to read the story of the movie. I thought he’d be another David Eddings or Robert Jordan or one of the fantasy authors that I’ve read since, after all, all fantasy authors stemmed from what JRR Tolkien began. And isn’t the best compliment one can give a fantasy author is to say “he/she continues what JRR Tolkien began” or something to that effect? I wouldn’t say I was disappointed in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but it definitely wasn’t what I expected. Oh hang it all, I was disappointed in it. After all, fantasy authors write their books like they are writing stories. There’s a climax, there’s an introduction, there’s an excitement, there’re description of unknown worlds and races and such. And there’s enough information for you to know the characters so you know what drives them but that’s just it. Tolkien, on the other hand, writes books as if he were writing history. All these information – background information! – about everything and anything in his world. Now that’s all fine and dandy and I have nothing but admiration for the man, and I do like his story, but let’s all face it. The mass population can’t keep their eyes open when reading the history of the known world, how can they be expected to thoroughly enjoy a history of some fantasy world that is supposed to symbolize prehistoric Earth? History books have the distinguished talent of turning the most vicious battle in history as an incredibly boring many-paged monologue. Tolkien’s kind of like that, which makes sense, I guess since Tolkien was a professor of history. But still. I sort of expected a little bit more from Tolkien, I guess. I have nothing against rich histories and giving a complete and profound history of each and every single person and place in your make-believe world. But I wish he had written his story not so much as he was writing down a history book but as if he were writing down a book that would be placed in the fantasy/fiction section of a bookstore or library. But for crying out loud, he makes even wars sound tedious! And I’m sorry, but his main character, Frodo? There’s nothing about him that’s likeable. I thought main characters were supposed to be likeable? Well, Frodo’s not. He’s the most useless of the lot. Of course, I can’t say for certain if Tolkien really writes that way since the Rings trilogy are the only books of his that I’ve read. Although considering that it is his life’s work (14 years in the making) and his best selling novel/s… that doesn’t really bode well for all his other works, eh?