Confession: I'm a LotR virgin

[Alinestra Covelia]

Here's a shocking revelation. I haven't read LotR, or seen it in the theaters.

I am currently on my fifth attempt at reading The Lord of the Rings. In fact, LotR was the last thing I bought when I left Britain - I got a nice big fat book and decided to read it at last.

I can't make it past the first 100 pages or so. I'm a D&D fan and I consider myself to be fairly amenable to most fantasy (I read P N Elrod and Alan Dean Foster's Spellsinger novels, to name a few) but LotR is surprisingly impenetrable.

I've been told by friends that it picks up later and all the pieces fall together. But I'm afraid I've fallen victim to Dracula syndrome, where the genre that follows a piece of work eclipses it by changing audience demands thereof.

(Dracula started the vampire genre, but if you look at the best grossing vampire movies and books out there today, they are entire orders of complexity higher than Bram Stoker's creation.)

I am adamant that I will not watch the LotR films until I have read the book. This may very well mean never.

Why is it so hard for me to just lie back and enjoy the pleasure of LotR? It seems to come naturally to everybody else. Am I being too tense? Am I expecting too much? Do I need more lubricant (alcohol)?

Suggestions, comments.

[Az]

I've experimented a bit. "Hobbit", by JRRT.

you're not alone, Alinestra.

[Andrew1999]

Have you read The Hobbit? It's a much simpler introduction to Tolkien's world and you can get to know hobbits and goblins and Gandalf without trying to keep track of battles from 3000 years ago.

[Alinestra Covelia]

I've read the Hobbit. It was a good book. Well-plotted, well-set, and most importantly well-paced.

LotR by contrast seems to prefer going into diversions of staggering length about the practical applications that Hobbits have for their foot-hair and the ambiguities of the Hobbits' Higher Pedantic Script.

I find LotR fairly boring, to be honest. Everybody else says it's great. What am I missing?

[DanS]

With the book, don't be afraid to skip parts that are uninteresting to you--you may just not be in the mood, or you might become interested in a diversion in the future. No need to force it. It was three or four times reading the book before I started to grok (and read thoroughly) the songs.

So, for instance, try skipping the introduction re hobbits. You might also try skipping Bombadil and the Barrow Wights. Chapters 6-8.

[Az]

"The King is naked" -Alinestra Covelia

[Urban Ranger]

Your're are a _ virgin, Aline?

[Felch]

I saw the topic, I saw the starter, and I waited for some perv to make a joke like UR did.

[Ming]

The first 100 pages of the "Fellowship" are probably the most boring stuff in the entire series. Heck, even when I rewatch the movie now, I skip through the early part.

Until the ring wraiths show up, it's just a snooze.

So just keep giving it a try. You will really like it once you get past the boring stuff.

[Kassiopeia]

You need a significant other who is a LOTR fanatic. That's the only thing that made me read it. And don't tell her, but I didn't like it that much. Won't read it again, well, at least FOTR - I've got better things to do. The only spot where I can recall things really pacing up was somewhere around the end of The Two Towers. The ending (returning to Shire) was pretty longwinded as well...

Edit - and it took me whopping four months to read it. Now this is me, I usually read a book in two days, one week tops. I do wonder if it had been quicker if it was in English, the Finnish translation I read allegedly makes the book even more boring and complicated.

[Provost Harrison]

I could imagine Finnish could such the fun out of anything

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Your're are a _ virgin, Aline?

i was waiting for one of those, or a "i'll help pop your cherry! [links to sites]" message

predictable

[TheBirdMan]

I have read the Hobbit 3 times now and the 3 books of LotR twice. And the first book Samil... (heck what wat the title - cant spell it) but the book from the first and second age two times also.

And all I can say is, that you get more and more and more of the story every time you read the books (well I did) .

Because you will with no doubt miss/forget important parts of the story the first and second time you read it.

Reading all them books at least twice or even 3 times isn't that bad at all. IMHO.

[Kassiopeia]

Yeah, that's the reason I've read all five parts of The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy four times in two different languages.

[loinburger]

I'd been on my friend's case to read the books for the past eight years, but he could never make it past that first 100 pages. He saw the movies when they came out though (he's a tremendous fan of swords and 'splosions on the big screen), and it finally gave him the impetus to finish the damn book.

You might want to see the first LOTR movie, just so that you'll be able to figure out what parts to skip in the book.