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Been waiting for this thread, but too lazy to make it myself. Bravo! Been getting back into Tolkien in a big way because of the Hobbit films. Re-read the original (which took much longer than I'm willing to admit) and enjoyed it just as much as I did the first time as a kid. What really struck me, though, was the massive tonal shift once we arrive at Lake-town. The jaunty fairytale story suddenly becomes grim and foreboding. Not that I'm complaining, of course, it's fantastic. I was just taken aback. I now have a nice hardcover copy of LOTR to replace my beaten paperback copies, and am slowly working my way though the interminable Shire chapters. (I actually enjoy them...) I tried to read the Silmarillion back after the LOTR films came out, and just found it utterly convoluted. It's like reading the Old Testament. But I think I finally have the patience to tackle it... I also wanna start Children of Hurin, and I think I might switch over to that once I hit the Turin chapters of the Sil. Does that make sense? Hatter106 fucked around with this message at 03:35 on Feb 5, 2013 |
# ¿ Feb 5, 2013 03:31 |
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# ¿ May 2, 2024 21:53 |
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Levitate posted:edit: Nasmith's stuff was used a lot for the movies as well. I've never heard him mentioned in any behind-the-scenes for the LOTR movies, the only artists who worked on both the books and the films were Alan Lee... ...and John Howe. They both have their strengths and weaknesses, although I think I prefer Lee by a narrow margin...
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# ¿ Feb 5, 2013 16:06 |
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I want to read some scholastic study of Tolkien, and Tom Shippey's books seem to be a good start. But I can't decide which to read; The Road to Middle-Earth or the later JRR Tolkien: Author of the Century. Apparently he re-uses some material from the earlier book in Century, but the reviews seem pretty good otherwise. Anyone read either? For that matter, has anyone read The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún? I'm not a fan of Tolkien's lighthearted Bombadil poems but his version of epic norse sagas seems pretty cool...
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# ¿ Feb 7, 2013 22:09 |
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Silent Linguist posted:Don't forget Treebeard and Tom Bombadil! This sounds crazy, but I just finished the Bombadil chapters of FOTR and... I didn't hate them. In fact, I thought Tolkien did some really interesting things with Tom. I know some fans sperg over the fact that his true nature is never explained, but I found that to be really appealing. Sure, he's a goof who like to sing silly songs, but then Tolkien will have a melancholy moment where he reminisces about some long-forgotten fact... there's a great quote after he rescues the hobbits from the barrow-wights (chasing off a loving ghost!), he sees some old stonework and mentions it used to be part of a kingdom, but then became sad and would not talk about it further. He's a living embodiment of the "unexplained vistas" that the professor wrote into his work.
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# ¿ Feb 16, 2013 17:55 |
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This was the one I got: Lord of the Rings: 50th Anniversary, One Vol. Edition Hardcover It's not as oversized as the Illustrated Edition, but has a nice heft to it.
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# ¿ Dec 11, 2013 16:16 |