When you are outside and reading his prose, you yourself can better taste the nature around you. You can feel the slight breeze on your skin combined with the dense humidity and the smell of various plants next to you. I get goosebumps just thinking about it. The point of including such intimate descriptions of the environment is to make Middle-Earth seem more familiar. On top of the detailed scenery, Tolkien also goes the extra mile to describe the food the characters eat.
Most of the descriptions of the landscape are based on England and Western Europe, and many of the meals that the characters eat are eaten in the real world too. These aspects contribute to a world that feels new for readers, but also familiar — like it comes from someplace not far away. The protagonists start out scared of what lies outside of their neighborhood, and they are dragged into an epic quest that takes them across Middle-Earth, where they meet many new characters and creatures.
The exposure to the outside world leads them toward newfound desires for adventure. The great wizard Gandalf leads a band of dwarves to the property of Bilbo Baggins to discuss the journey that lies ahead of them: traveling to the Misty Mountains to reclaim the gold from Smaug the Dragon. Tolkien does a great job of highlighting the complicated emotions that go into adventures. I have to admit that for all I love fantasy — for all I love epic fantasy — I struggle with the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
A couple of years ago, I decided I was going to re-read the trilogy. I have all three books on Audible, and I even managed to read the first one. But I regret nothing. When the The Fellowship of the Ring premiered back in , it was well received by general audiences, but got some backlash from Tolkien fans. Because where was Tom Bombadil?
Where was Goldberry? These are little treasures only readers of the books will see. So while I will fully admit that the Lord of the Rings series is, frankly, a chore… I still encourage people to read the trilogy.
The stories are incredible, filled with meticulous detail and thrilling side quests. So give it a try. Buddy read them, if it will help. Force yourself through the eternal Council of Elrond. I agree to have my name, email address, and comment information stored. Notify me of follow-up comments by email. Notify me of new posts by email. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed. The vast majority of my friends, actually.
However, in a letter No. This was confirmed when The Lost Road was published in Proudfoot and no doubt his family has large feet for a Hobbit and both were on the table but no other Hobbit is described as having big feet. The idea that Hobbits have big feet seems to have begun with the Brothers Hildebrant, who did numerous popular illustrations in the s and s. They also showed Dwarves with very large feet. Tolkien did not. Their height is variable, ranging between two and four feet of our measure … Bandobras Took … was four foot five and able to ride a horse.
He was surpassed in all Hobbit records only by two famous characters of old. That story is told in The Lord of the Rings. No: it was the Entdraught that did it, and Pippin grew too.
The four Hobbits of the Fellowship appear to have been Harfoots with in the case of Merry, Pippin and Frodo at least some Fallohide ancestry. Humans who go barefoot all their lives often develop feet wider and stronger than modern feet, but not feet which are abnormally long or rubber.
As for being stout, Tolkien says often that the Hobbits enjoyed eating and drinking. People who do hard physical work like farming can eat lots without becoming fat. The average Hobbit however appears to have been at least well-covered. But they were not always stout. Like humans, they were inclined to expand as they got older. And running. He was wrong about growing upwards, though see above, Entdraught.
It is a tradition among film-makers and some illustrators to make Sam Gamgee fat. In the story, Sam is never called fat, and as a young Hobbit and a hard worker is probably fitter than any of them. In the book, Gollum calls Sam cross, rude, nasty, suspicious, not nice and Nasssty. But never fat. Why make Sam fat? In Sherlock Holmes movies not in the books , Dr. Watson is sometimes made into a stout, bumbling fool, apparently for a low-cost laugh.
However, Sean dutifully put on weight and remarked to one interviewer that he stopped when he realised that PJ would be happy for him to go on getting fatter indefinitely. The movie does not explain why their Sam is more or less the same size when he leaves Hobbiton and when he reaches Mouth Doom after some weeks of semi-starvation.
Yes, although the depiction of Orc reproduction at Isengard in the Peter Jackson films has created rather a strange impression of Orcs being bred in pods. The original readers of The Lord of the Rings were not much more enlightened. Later, at the battle of the Hornburg Gamling refers to half-orcs and goblin-men, and subsequently Aragorn also mentions half-orcs at Isengard.
These remarks, if Gamling and Aragorn are correct, imply that Orcs had similar reproductive qualities to mankind.
This reveals that under Morgoth Men could be made to mate with Orcs, producing larger and more cunning breeds. Saruman rediscovered this and did the same resulting in larger cunning Men-orcs and treacherous and vile Orc-men. Incidentally, during the course of this essay Tolkien reveals that Orcs were not immortal, on the contrary they were short-lived in comparison with men of higher race, such as the Edain p. But in stories that seldom if ever see the Orcs except as soldiers of armies in the service of the evil lords we naturally would not learn much about their lives.
Not much was known. However, Tolkien was aware of this question at an early stage, especially after reading the first film storyline for The Lord of the Rings in He knew for the strength of the story that they should be used sparingly.
The Eagles already had a prescribed role, so they were not always at the beck and call of Gandalf. On a mission in which secrecy was a key element employing a giant Eagle to carry the ring is not the most sensible option. Every reader is different. If you are a child of 9 then the first book should definitely be The Hobbit. The Silmarillion is quite a dense read, and should probably be tackled a little later. Even this is a bit prescriptive.
One reader might particularly enjoy epic poetry, so they may prefer to read The Lays of Beleriand much earlier than someone who dislikes verse. The most obvious order in which to read the Middle-earth books is probably to follow that in which the books were published. This is:. They should be read in any order the reader chooses, but most of all they should be enjoyed.
He is a perfect example to aspiring authors that if you believe in a story strong enough, put in the work and good things will happen. Actually, he started to write what would become The Silmarilon in , many years before the Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings was even a dream. In fact, he originally intended for it to be its own work and not a part of the lore of The Hobbit or Lord of the Rings, the fact that they are connected kinda happened by accident as many great things do.
Good hub though, Tolkien is one of the greats. An excellent hub. I remember reading 'The Hobbit' for the first time, and I couldn't put it down, the imagination that he had was truly astounding. I love walking through the woods that inspired him, sometimes I can almost imagine the dark shadows of the Nazgul following me.
A wonderful place, but sadly surrounded by the urban sprawl of Birmingham. The story has this timeless quality to it. No matter how time passes, the beauty, the horror, the helplessness and courage will always live on and inspire a new generation. A great story should not be forgotten. Party Games. Drinking Games. Lawn Games. Creative Writing. Card Games. Magic: The Gathering. Comic Books. Harry Potter. Board Games.
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