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/lit/ - Literature

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3896158 No.3896158 [Reply] [Original]

May we please have a Tolkien thread? Rereading the Two Towers, up to the point where Gandalf Greymane snaps Saruman's staff and sends his flustered fanny to his bedroom.
Also, I picked up the Children of Hurin at the library, and plan on reading it afterwards, opinions on the book?

>> No.3896159

I haven't read LotR since I first read it.

That was during the summer when I was 14.

All my memories of it are now swirled and muddied, but I still think highly of it, and I'm terrified to re-read the series in fear that it'll disappoint the expectation I now hold of it.

>> No.3896173

>>3896159
I am also rereading it for the first time since my early teens and it has aged like fine wine, only now do I appreciate Tolkien's way with words.
"Then Éomer son of Éomund, Third Marshal of Riddermark, let Gimli the Dwarf Glóin's son warn you against foolish words. You speak evil of that which is fair beyond the reach of your thought, and only little wit can excuse you."

>> No.3896179

>>3896158
>Greymane
5/10

>> No.3896185
File: 364 KB, 1280x960, erp.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
3896185

>>3896179
Stormcrow, Olórin, Mithrandir, w/e

>> No.3896206

Silmarillion and Narn i chîn Húrin are both 10/10 books. Seriously, the mythology is perfect. I seriously hope Hollywood doesnt try to convert them into film.

>> No.3896215

It's Greyhame. Jesus man, you bring shame on us all.

>> No.3896216

What are his Tales of Middle Earth etc works like?

I really liked the added history in LOTR but I was bored of the Silmarilion and Children of Hurin.

>> No.3896233

>>3896206
>I seriously hope Hollywood doesnt try to convert them into film.
Tolkien's estate absolutely forbade movie rights for the Silmarillion. (Then again, Christopher Tolkien is already 88 years old...)

>> No.3896235

>>3896158
>May we please have a Tolkien thread?
Bad idea. This board is Downtown Plebcity when it comes to fantastic literature.

(Their pick of 'best sci-fi novel ever' is Asimov's 'Foundation'. That alone should tell you everything you need to know about this board.)

>> No.3896458

>>3896158
Couldn't get into Children of Hurin. It's a lot different to the hobbit and the lord of the rings. It's more like reading a history book.

>> No.3896505

>>3896458
>It's more like reading a history book.
Yeah, and The Silmarillion is like reading the Bible.
The bigger difference is how dark it is.

>> No.3896509

Children of Hurin is an almost textbook aristotelician tragedy, if that's any indication. The "almost" is there because Hurin does a lot of things that seem unrelated but all lead him to his fate, while I guess in a purely aristotelician tragedy there wouldn't be that much room for subplots. But since all the thread lead to the same end and are means to forward to the end, I guess even that wouldn't prevent it from qualifying as excellently aristotelician.

>> No.3896586

>>3896509
gotta say I was dissapointed

>> No.3896593

>>3896458
..what? The revised version or the older one from the Silm? There was an entire book published not too long ago. It was absolutely excellent 11/10 stuff. Fast paced and brief but most definitely a story instead of a textbook.

>> No.3896599

LotR is fairly dull compared to the succinct Hobbit, but still essential reading prior to the masterpiece: The Silmarillion.

>> No.3896609

/lit/ never fails to amaze me when it comes to Tolkien.

tLotR is a fucking masterpiece of such grandness and scope that anyone here has the gall to deny or diminish its greatness is laughable. The violent, hysterical, half mad kind of laughter. You fucking people.

>> No.3896637

>>3896593
The one you're talking about. The first 20 pages are peoples family names. It was like you were getting told something instead of being inside the book and experiencing it. it just felt very bland, all though I only got 70 pages in.

>> No.3896638

>>3896599
The Hobbit is a went there did this story written for children, it's pretty bland/dull. What are you talking about anon?

>> No.3896643

>>3896609
I like it but I never found it as detailed as everyone makes it out to be. I found it really sparse actually and was disappointed, I was hoping for extreme density like people on here were saying it was.

It's still great, I was just hoping for more detail in the actual writing.

>> No.3896648

>>3896637
The first 20 pages being nothing but names simply isn't true. And the story isn't like tLotR where everything is fleshed out. That's part of its appeal imo. The tale is brief and haunting.

And the book functions much like a story being recounted so...what the fuck ever.

>> No.3896693

>>3896648
I was exaggerating with the 20 pages thing, I should have mentioned that.

Exactly I went into it think it was going to be like LOTR. All good, I just wanted more LOTR style writing and I can't have that and that's fine.

>> No.3896708

I'm reading the Silmarillion currently, and honestly I'm just bored with it.

You need a map next to you while reading it in order to keep up with all the different locations and even then you'll have trouble remembering who's who and where's where.

>> No.3896727

>>3896708
I personally think Tolkien could have made the writing more lush and interesting. I too was bored.

>> No.3896738

>>3896708
>I'm reading the Silmarillion currently, and honestly I'm just bored with it.
>You need a map next to you while reading it in order to keep up with all the different locations and even then you'll have trouble remembering who's who and where's where.

I didn't.

>> No.3896747

>>3896727
You have to think of it as a tale of middle earth. It's being told to you by someone. It shouldn't read like a full fleshed novel.

>> No.3896751

The Children of Hurin is one of the most hauntingly beautiful books I've ever read. True mythic tragedy.

>> No.3896752

>>3896747
Well one person could tell it to you a lot more detailed and interestingly than someone else.

>> No.3896782

>>3896727
That's my issue with it. The stories themselves are pretty interesting, but they're told in a boring, monotonous style.

>>3896738
>>3896738
Good on you. I honestly forgot the location of some places quite a lot of times and I had to open the map often.

>> No.3896784

I've never read LOTR but The Hobbit is one of my favorite books but I'm kind of a pussy and afraid about trying LOTR and figuring out how to properly devote time to it. Anybody have any ideas?

>> No.3896787

>>3896782
which surprised me because anon's on here were treating it as god-tier when it really could be a lot better.

>> No.3896790

>>3896784
It's nowhere near as hard as people say, it isn't very dense and is a pretty straight forward read. Just read a couple hours a night.

>> No.3896796

>>3896751
What's the writing style of the book?

Is it more like an adventure like Hobbit/LotR or is it "Bible-style" like The Silmarillion.

>> No.3896823

>>3896796

Neither; it's a fleshing out of a story from the Silmarillion. Its clearest influence is probably Sigurd legend.

>> No.3896839

>>3896609
Don't bother, you're wasting air an energy.

On this board all you're gonna get in response is idiots angrily complaining that Tolkien didn't pander to their ADHD by inserting le sexytime superhero adventure stories and le first world problems existential angst.

(Case in point: the shit posted by idiots above this post.)

>> No.3896927

Anybody got a copy of LotR they want to send me? Both of my local libraries shut down

>> No.3897462

>>3896839
You clearly dont actually browse /lit/ often. None of what you said applies here. Now if you were bitching about hipsters from /mu/ acting like tolkien is beneath them then id agree with you.

>> No.3899532

>>3896927
Get a kindle, brutha.

>> No.3899540

>>3897462
>You clearly dont actually browse /lit/ often. None of what you said applies here.
I'm a regular here.

The undisputed fact is that /lit/'s best sci-fi novel is 'Foundation', and best fantasy novel is 'Malazan'. (According to the hivemind, at least.)

Yes, /lit/ really _is_ that bad.

(At least people still have the decency to troll the retarded GRRM threads; it's the only thing still keeping /lit/ clean.)

This place has atrocious, rock-bottom taste.

>> No.3899562

>>3899540
What.
You have no idea what you are talking about.

Tolkien's prose is generally accepted as rubbish by anyone with an elementary understanding of prose. He set out to write a language (elfish) and was autistic enough that he needed to create a fictional world to justify it. The Hobbit is his best, but it's a book written for children, and that is the only audience it can serve.

This board does not like genre fiction. Tolkien is genre fiction, a bunch of fantasy drivel written by an addled war vet who couldn't string coherent prose together. This boards taste lie in literary fiction (evidently far beyond your reading comprehension), not pleb-tier pulp and genre fiction. Please look at our litia, young pleb.

>> No.3899568

>>3899540
Tolkien bored me. And his fans are worse than bronies, at least where I live.

>> No.3899570

>>3899562
also this

>> No.3899584

>>3899570
What's the point of posting 'this'? Is this a reddit thing or something?

>> No.3899592

>>3899584
What? "This" is used and abused on just about every forum on the internet.

>> No.3899593

>>3899584
what's a reddit?

>> No.3899594

>>3899562
This is /lit/ in one post.

>> No.3899627

>>3896823

Actually the story is mainly based around the legend of Kullervo, a character from the finnish Kalevala.

The Children of Hurin is my favourite from Tolkien after the Silmarillion. It's much easier to read than Silmarillion.

>> No.3899683

>>3899562
Man, cmon. You're exaggerating a lot. To call Tolkien's prose rubbish is ridiculous, they aren't that bad. Sure they aren't amazing, bland at times but cmon.

I think posts like yours are just a backlash to the acclaim Tolkien's writing gets. Yes it may not be the best but what you're doing is taking it too far and you're making your self sound immature.

This is coming from someone that thinks LOTR is written pretty well but blandly and The Hobbit very blandly(it's for kids as you said so it can get excused)

>> No.3899735

>>3899683
Tolkien's prose is bland and archaic. This gets exaggerated to mean "worst possible shit".

>> No.3899746

>>3899735
He didn't win the Nobel because of his prose.

>> No.3899768

>>3899746
most authors haven't won the nobel prize. what's your point?

>> No.3899774

>>3899562
>Tolkien's prose is generally accepted as rubbish by anyone with an elementary understanding of prose.
'Prose' isn't something you 'understand', it's something you experience. (I won't even go into your incorrect understanding of the definition of the word 'prose' in the first place.)

Tolkien deliberately set out to write something that doesn't conform to 19th-century realist aesthetic ideals. He succeeded, since he was a scholar of ancient (medieval) texts and damn good at his job.

>He set out to write a language (elfish) and was autistic enough that he needed to create a fictional world to justify it.
Incorrect both in the historical details and your interpretation of Tolkien's intent.

>This board does not like genre fiction.
You kidding me?? Lurk more, newfag. The most popular authors here are Asimov, Herbert, Erikson, GRRM. Plebtron over 9000.

>> No.3899776

>>3899735
>Tolkien's prose is bland and archaic.
It's archaic on purpose, you nitwit. That's the reason Tolkien wrote it in the first place.

>> No.3900027

>>3899774
>The most popular authors here are Asimov, Herbert, Erikson, GRRM. Plebtron over 9000.

No way man. The most popular are Pynchon, Vonnegut, Dostoevsky, Kafka.

>> No.3901157

>>3899774
>the most popular authors here are Asimov, Herbet, Erikson, GRRM.

HAHAHA. HOLY SHIT YOU ARE SO FUCKING DUMB. AND YOU PROCLAIM TO REGULARLY BROWSE THIS BORED. TOP LEL.

Try James Joyce, Nabokov, Pynchon, Dostoevsky, Melville. None of the turds you have mentioned. They're only praised by summer kids like yourself.

Read this, nimwit:

http://4chanlit.wikia.com/wiki/Recommended_Reading/sub

>> No.3901174

>>3901157

>BROWSE THIS BORED. TOP LEL.

You embraced your autism too much and tripped over yourself in a rush to sperg out.

Better luck next thread m8.

>> No.3901199

>>3901174
>>3901174
>no retort except for minor correction
>2010+20-17

>> No.3902441

>>3899562
2/10

I gave you an extra point for the sheer audacity of claiming one of the most qualified linguistic scholars in history had terrible prose.

>> No.3902456

>>3896159
I first read LOTR when I was 15 or 16, I tried re-reading it a few times when I was 19 or 19 but never made it past The Council of Elrond, I keep meaning to re-read the whole thing one day, maybe I will when I'm done with War & Peace.

>> No.3902458

>>3902456
>Not wanting to read about Andrei the awesome running around looking for Napoleon

>> No.3902473

Anyone The last ringbearer?
How was it?
not Tolkien, but related [\spoiler]

>> No.3902494

>>3902473
>How was it?
Edgy. (Not even kidding.)

>> No.3902504

>>3902456

youre so close to getting to the fun stuff.

>> No.3902531

>>3902456
War and Peace is many times the superior to LOTR. Reread W&P instead of bothering with LOTR. It's trash. Poorly written fairy tales.