How did you get involved with LOTR book?

[lord of the mark]

First read - FOTR, for english assignment, in 7th grade (age 13) Later read rest of lotr, Hobbit. Preferred LOTR to Hobbit. Eventually read Silm, have skimmed other works.


Bible also good - note well that if youre looking for something epic, like LOTR, you'll do better with Hebrew scriptures rather than Greek scriptures . For a different epic approach to this material, see Miltons "Paradise Lost"

Russian novels also good Crime and Punishment, War and Peace, Fathers and Sons.

Politics of tolkien complex, since his wasnt really writing politics, though his epic inevitably has political implications. I dont agree 100% with agathon, but I think hes close to right. Definitely not just fanboy approach (but then am i a fanboy? can one really be a "fanboy" of Tolkien? Isnt this stretching the connotations of that word? can you be a fanboy of Milton? Should Jews, Christians and humanists who like bible as lit, be seen as "fanboys" of the bible? fanboys of Tolstoy? )

[Immortal Wombat]

Read the Hobbit at 8 or something. Raced my best friend to the end of LOTR at 11.

Crime and Punishment was dull, but worth reading.

[Bereta_Eder]

LORT trilogy was some of the most boring books Ive ever read. In the end it was an excersise in patience. COme on you can do it, come on you weak ***** take it like a man turn the next page


utterly boring craaaaaaaaaaaaaaaap

[GhengisFarb™]

Re: How did you get involved with LOTR book?

It was required reading in Junior High. They actually made it part of our curiculum.

[Dr Strangelove]

I read LOTR when I was 12 or 13 largely because most of my friends were reading it too. This was in the mid-1960s, when LOTR was just beginning to attract a cult following in the US. I resisted following the crowdat first because I thought the theme of elves, dwarves and orcs was a little bit childish. I was into more adult subjects, like science fiction. Once I picked one of Tolkien's books up and began reading though I got hooked.