Tolkien Fans, Enthusiasts, Geeks, and the Antithesis

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necron99

Starting to Get Obsessed
Mar 4, 2014
268
0
Sound off, and rave or rant.

Much of my philosophy of life can be found in the morals and ideas espoused in Tolkien writings.

 

conlejm

Lifer
Mar 22, 2014
1,433
8
Amen Brother! Very big fan here. Re-read the whole shebang every few years. My favorite is the Silmarillion.
The movies are entertaining, but deviate very much from the book; the second Hobbit movie in particular was a completely different story that had little to do with the book.

 

werebear

Starting to Get Obsessed
May 13, 2014
264
0
Instead of re-reading Tolkien, read Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time series. Just as amazing, if not more so, IMO.

 
May 31, 2012
4,295
34
A pound of Capstan please.
https://m.bonhams.com/auctions/20135/lot/221/
One of my favorite things about Tolkien was his love of language,

and his very serious study of it.

Elvish was based on Finnish and suomi on hyvin vaikea kieli ymmärtää millään

kokonaisvaltaisemmin, jos olet kasvanut vain puhuu yhtä kieltä.

.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOZPWpUAX0U

 

kibo

Starting to Get Obsessed
Mar 22, 2014
239
0
SW PA
I've always enjoyed Tolkien's stuff...but I prefer Robert E. Howard's Conan/Bran Mac Morn /Kull of Atlantis stories.

 

conlejm

Lifer
Mar 22, 2014
1,433
8
I read about seven of the fourteen books in the Wheel of Time series and lost interest after the third book. Fourteen books?! Tolkien told the greatest epic story in five books (Hobbit, LoTR, Silmarillion). Just my opinion; I thought Wheel of Time started off well and had a lot of potential.
Some other Fantasy series I enjoyed are the Conan, Elric of Melnibone, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, and The Earthsea series. But none so much as Tolkien's works.

 

fearsclave

Starting to Get Obsessed
Mar 9, 2014
209
0
Was raised on Tolkein here. Love the books, and I've read most of his other stuff too. Thought the LoTR movies were OK, but I don't think I'm going to bother with the last Hobbit movie. Jackson is murdering the book.

 

lincolnsbark

Part of the Furniture Now
Apr 11, 2013
641
0
Instead of re-reading Tolkien, read Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time series. Just as amazing, if not more so, IMO.
I am currently on book nine of Wheel. I actually started reading Wheel around the same time I picked up the pipe last spring. Love the series. I do see how it's not most people's cup of tea and also see how it is completely different in some ways than Tolkien. It does, however, weave an incredibly rich world (pun intended with 'weave'). The audiobooks are fantastically read as well.

 

yazamitaz

Lifer
Mar 1, 2013
1,757
1
I have been a HUGE Tolkien fan since I was 12 and I have to disagree with those who say Jackson is "off book" or "murdering" it with the movies. Jackson is making a movie and most movies don't follow the book. With that being said I like the fact tha he is filling in blanks that the books don't account for. My favorite example is after Gandalf leaves the Company at Mirkwood and says he has business to attend to. I LOVE the way Jackson filled that in. You can poke fun at the love story with Aragorn and Arwen or the side story of Tauriel but you HAVE to admit it is drawing in a new audience that never existed. The fact that I get to explain the whole story to my 11 yr old son and 9 yr old daughter ( that I have introduced to D&D by the way) with a pipe in my mouth is AWESOME. I got into pipe smoking because of the Tolkien stories and it is fitting that I can fire up a bowl and talk about Middle Earth and my kids think that the pipe is part and parcel of the collective.
I probably got off topic but I just cracked a new bottle of Knob Creek and my Winslow is LOVING my Z fold of Wessex BCDF.

 

reichenbach

Part of the Furniture Now
Jan 5, 2012
552
2
West Park, NY
I'm currently re-reading The Hobbit / LotR for the 4th time in 3 years. Sadly, I saw the movies first so I'll never have a genuine idea of the characters 'look' like based on the descriptions and my own imagination.
I love that world that Tolkien created and it makes me wish that I could inhabit it. I also think that is one of the hallmarks of great storytelling. I know that I am not alone in feeling that way because of the devotion that his writing still enjoys. I'm looking forward to sinking my teeth into his translation of Beowulf.
I heard from a bona fide fantasy nerd that the internet has made The Wheel of Time more enjoyable because you can research which books you don't need to read and can skip. I'm a completeist though so when I endeavor to to under take that tall order, I'll read all of them. Even the one that (SPOILER) ends where it begins.

 

simnettpratt

Lifer
Nov 21, 2011
1,516
2
Tolkien wrote the greatest fiction I have ever read in my life. I also re-read The Hobbit, LOTR and The Silmarillion every few years. I can write in Elvish. Sometimes it would be hard to figure out what my Tolkien buddy would write back because he wrote with an American accent. I have the second half of the beautiful Silmarillion chapter Of Beren and Luthien memorized. Someday (in my dreams anyway), some girl's going to ask me to tell her a story.
Unsurprisingly, while I've seen them all, the movies really annoy me. Just a constant stream of that didn't happen, this whole scene is made up, the other dude did that, this character didn't even exist etc. The second Hobbit movie was disgusting. Literally not one scene was in the book. Completely made up. To call it The Hobbit, and to give such disrespect to one of the greatest writers of fiction who ever lived, really pissed me off.
That said, a lot of folks love the movies, and that's right for you, I'm just some dude, your mileage will vary. Puff on bros.
PS If you haven't read The Silmarillion, here's what Tolkien wrote when Beren saw Luthien for the first time:
Blue was her raiment as the unclouded heaven, but her eyes were grey as the starlit evening; her mantle was sewn with golden flowers, but her hair was dark as the shadows of twilight. As the light upon the leaves of trees, as the voice of clear waters, as the stars above the mists of the world, such was her glory and her loveliness; and in her face was a shining light.

 

condorlover1

Lifer
Dec 22, 2013
7,995
26,613
New York
My English lecturer knew Tokien as he was her lecturer at University but since he was making so much money from Hobbit books she never saw much of him. Interesting chap as he unlike many survived the Great War.

 

yazamitaz

Lifer
Mar 1, 2013
1,757
1
Simnettpratt,
I love your devotion to the written word and while I would disagree from a feeling standpoint on how "The Desolation of Smaug" so differed from the book, I have to throw in my cheesy experience. Tolkien derived many of his thoughts while participating in WWI. I had had read "The Hobbit" and the LOTR trilogy many times from 10-18 yrs old. I never read "The Silmarillion" until I was imbedded in Iraq during Desert Storm. For some reason that I cannot explain allows me to let Jackson have a long leash but keep within the spirit of the written tomes. Again, just my opinion.

 

conlejm

Lifer
Mar 22, 2014
1,433
8
This is such a great brotherhood! Pipes, tobacco, and great storytelling (and whiskey!). It doesn't get any better than this!

 

simnettpratt

Lifer
Nov 21, 2011
1,516
2
Brother yaz, we disagree on this one. If you say you're going to make a painting based on a Seurat, my favorite painter of all time and one of the Masters, and he painted a house but you paint a boat, then say it's 'within the spirit' of the painting, that makes no sense to me. If you make a movie called King Lear, but it's about spies blowing stuff up or whatever, then say it's 'within the spirit' of the play, that makes no sense to me.
Maybe I'd feel differently if I'd read The Silmarrillion embedded in Iraq during Desert Storm? Guess it's too late to know now.
So we disagree. I feel Jackson is completely disrespectful to one of the greatest writers that ever lived. But like you said, that's just my opinion. We're not going to agree all the time :) Puff on, bro.
PS You smell.

 

lochinvar

Lifer
Oct 22, 2013
1,687
1,632
I love Tolkien, his concerns are my concerns, loyalty, honor, doing right in the face of defeat. I especially love the Silmarillion, it is so sweet and heart wrenchingly sad it could almost be an Irish or Scottish tale.

 

ravenwolf

Can't Leave
Mar 18, 2014
302
0
I'm about to re-read the entire LotR series, from The Hobbit to The Silmarillion. Quite excited about it. Gets better every time somehow.
I'm envious of the chap that can read and speak Elvish. I can speak English, German, French, Arabic, and some Pashtu... I need to fix the lack of Elvish.

 

necron99

Starting to Get Obsessed
Mar 4, 2014
268
0
I find Jackson's "twist" on the Hobbit to be very disappointing. From story to character development its like he never read the books but rather listened to someone try to explain the story while high on self absorbed faux intellectualism.

 
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