Am I the only person here who hasn't read LOTR?

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by loinburger
Ugh. The Silmarillion read like a poorly written history book.

Right, loiny. It was soooo boring it was actually painful to read. I read it all the way through tho.

LOTR was okay, but I never saw what the big deal was. The movie is so much better than the book.

The work of Tolkien I admire most is "The Hobbit." Bilbo Baggins in one of the most interesting characters ever a soft, rotund little guy who only wants to putter around his own place and be merry but who instead is shoved into the middle of an adventure (nasty, disturbing things that make you late for dinner) and who overcomes all obstacles with a good dollup of common sense (oh yeah, and a magical ring ).

[Jules]

Don't feel bad, Dan, I haven't read LOTR either, nor have I seen the film.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Ramo
Yeah, I know that "Twin Towers" is supposed to be much more interesting, but the same people who say that believe "Fellowship" was a great book.

Perhaps you should have read "The Two Towers" instead, you might have enjoyed it more.

[Sikander]

I didn't read them either, a bit of the Hobbit was enough to make an impression.

[Dis]

I have seen the movie

[Tingkai]

I still think Simarillion is a great book. There's some great stories in it. The beginning is incredibly boring, but then it picks and creates a great epic.

[Skanky Burns]

Originally posted by Dan Severn


The first is for that purpose.

The default is 4 choices; my internet is too slopw to change them.

Yes
No
Maybe
Banana



I haven't read the book, plan to but haven't gotten my hands on a copy yet. I prefer science fiction to fantasy though.

[Gangerolf]

It's Bilbo.

I've read it 3 times, in 3 different languages.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by loinburger


Ugh. The Silmarillion read like a poorly written history book.

It wasn't intended for publication.

[Adalbertus]

I've read it, in English only. I read the Hobbit in English and in German and found my prejudice confirmed that translations are a bad thing.

Yes, the story starts very slow, and Tolkien likes to stroll around in descriptions. I like that, and I like also the incredibly slow end. But that's a matter of taste, I can well imagine that there are people who simply need more action. Maybe Tolkien better made a film, with a limit of 10 hours or so - I guess he could do a good job on creating atmosphere.

[des-esseintes]

Any book that makes you hyperventilate when it's over gets my vote.

[Vlad Antlerkov]

I actually haven't read the books. I do know the basic gist of the plot, though (thanks to Favoured Flight's LOTR Civ2 scenarios).

[Kassiopeia]

I only read it because I was going to see the film and wanted to read it before the film to have my own concept of it in my head. Took me four months; I read it in pulses of maybe three hours of intense reading but just couldn't touch the book again for a week or two. I finished it one Sunday by reading six hours straight.

[Mr. President]

The film doesn't do justice to the book. There are so many things that they had to leave out.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Tried once, about 100 years ago when I was in high school. Got bored, never finished it.

But has anybody read the new Seamus Heaney translation of Beowolf? Tolkein was a Beowolf scholar (one of the most significant of his time), and there's lots that he borrowed from the poem for LOTR. Most Beowolf translations are a snooze because they are overly "poetic," but Heaney's seeks to restore a sense of the direct, blunt Anglo-Saxon language of the original, and he succeeds. It's a great read. LOTR fans should check it out.