At the risk of becoming / outing myself as a huge nerd, I’m going to go ahead and do this.
Such a classic. What can I say that hasn’t been said before?
First off, read The Hobbit. It’s a very quick read and it really sets the tone and back story for the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy.
The first thing I noticed when reading Fellowship was the history behind it, not just in the fact that it’s been published since 1954, but in the story itself. From the first chapter you’re immersed in the history of the Shire. Tolkien created an entire world (Middle Earth, in fact) and made a story into it. Or maybe the story created the world? Who knows, but the point is that you can feel the time and effort put into it. This wasn’t something thrown together in a few months, or even years, but over a very, very long time. Tolkien wrote whole genealogies and entire languages, actual speakable languages for this story and the world he created.
I’m fairly sure most people have either read the book or seen the movie, but I’d definitely recommend doing both. The movie was outstanding, but the book has an edge on the movie. The book doesn’t suffer from time constraints or budgets. Tolkien was able to put everything he wanted to into the book. He could put in the fact that after Bilbo’s birthday party, Gandalf was gone for several years before the adventure actually began. Tom Bombadil, a master of the Old Forest, is nowhere to be found in the movie, unfortunately. The most disturbing, though, is the plethora of songs and poems in the book that simply didn’t make the cut to the big screen. That, I think, more than anything gives you the impression of depth and culture to the characters, races, and places in the book. I suppose I don’t blame Peter Jackson for not putting them in. There are a couple dozen songs and poems in the first book alone. Even at two minutes each, you’re talking about close to an hour of that stuff in an already 3 hour plus movie. Even the most hardcore Tolkien fans couldn’t sit through 4 hours of a single movie. But that’s where the book comes in. It gives the opportunity to fill in the cracks that the movie simply could not.
This does pave the way to one downfall that The Fellowship of the Ring falls into. Slow pace. There are a few chapters in the book that just don’t seem to end. It’s not that they are poorly written or anything like that, it just seems like a bit of it could have been cut out. I realize that some of the long winded dialogue is necessary to help with the history of Middle Earth and such, but sometimes I thought that it went a step too far. The page long song written in Elvish was one such occasion. Maybe I thought that it was a bit much because I have already seen the movie and know what’s going to happen, but I don’t think so.
I can see where the first full paragraph and the third full paragraph (in this review) could be seen as contradictions to one another, and I suppose they are. On one hand it’s amazing that Tolkien had the patience and ambition to even write an entire language, but on the other I don’t think it’s necessary to include an entire song in the book that I can’t read unless I go back and get it translated. It’s admirable that he took the time to do it, but a bit…annoying that he included it. I’m not sure if that makes sense, and to be honest, I think I’m a little torn on the issue itself. There is a fine balance between having too much detail and not enough. For the most part, I think Tolkien is right on, but there are times when he steps over the line into drudge where it’s no longer about the pleasure of the read, but about getting through the section of the book.
Bottom line is that The Fellowship of the Ring was definitely worth a read. It’s extremely well written and definitely leaves the a great cliffhanger to get you to pick up The Two Towers. I’ve already gotten a few chapters into it and I think that I’ll have that done before too long.
So go ahead, let the nerdy name calling begin…
