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New Tolkien Book Released 'The Children of Hurin'
Zoolander writes "Christopher Tolkien has completed the last book of J.R.R. Tolkien from notes left from his father." The ultimate question is how much of a quality difference will there be; for instance the difference between Dune and Dune: House Atriedes is a pretty big gap. But in my experience, Christopher Tolkien has always taken a good, cautious approach when it comes to his father's work so here's to hoping.
Heard about this on the radio. According to 'the experts' it features several large battle scenes, and "would make a good movie".
Go figure.
She's his sister.
(Oh come on, you weren't expecting to get through this discussion without finding that out.)
"Like a wine fine, you have to let it age a bit."
Or aging is lowering/fucking up your standards.
By your sixties you may actually like to listen to Barbra Streisand albums...
Good analogy. The difference between, say, The Fellowship of the Ring and any Christopher Tolkien followup (except perhaps the Silmarillion) is about as big.
JRR Tolkien and Frank Herbert were visionaries. Their books are legendary because they're so complete, so consistent, they're practically holographic. While those authors were also brilliant editors, especially Tolkien whose main gig was (as is well known) Oxford English Dictionary editor. Their (genetic, and thereby literary) heirs are undistinguished from a vast host of other second or lower tier of "visionary" authors, and have no special editing talent - nor have acquired any at their cashin publishers. While they also operate at a disadvantage while writing outside the original cultural contexts that produced those seminal works for a different audience.
Ironically, both Middle Earth and Dune are epic tales of the original forefathers of our times (Dune less obviously, sorry for the spoiler). A magical time when a unique individual arrived to set the worlds on the path that led to today's mundane, if relatively safe, existence. Both Tolkien and Herbert themselves portrayed themselves as mere humble quoters of the original stories, originally told by the great actors themselves. Their stories resonate with generations of the public partly because we understand that great storytellers are part of great stories which are part of great ages, come once in a long while, and cannot bequeath their talents and opportunities to their children.
On the bright side, both The Lord of the Rings and the Dune trilogies are so good that they can be reread often over a lifetime, delivering new rewards each time. Reading those later "extensions" is a waste of time that could better be spent rereading the original.
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make install -not war
You know they have really old out when... ... the crosover books start appearing, how about 'Harry Potter and the Children of Hurin' or 'Dune: House Huffelpuff'.
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Except that Tolkien considered LotR the distraction, and the Hobbit's drawing on his mythos something of an accident. His main concern was the Silmarillion, which he tried unsuccessfully to get published alongside LotR.
The Silmarillion is not LotR, but it is, for those that have the patience and appreciation for that sort of thing, a glorious tale. Unfortunately, the published form is in many cases ripped from the Grey Annals, which were a sort concise historical chronology, and not in and of themselves full narratives. Tolkien planned a rather enormous expansion of the work, of which the Children of Hurin was the only part that approached completion. It, and the unfinished version of "Of Tuor and His Coming to Gondolin" that is found in Unfinished Tales are very much like LotR in storytelling quality.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Where do people take tripe like this from?
"JRR built up a whole mythos to draw from when writing LoTR."???
He didn't build up the stories to have background for LotR. He built the mythos for his own enjoyment, as a background history for his invented languages, and in hope of giving back to the English a mythology of their own that was "lost" when the Normans invaded the Anglo-Saxons.
The Hobbit was a story he made for his children. He spiced it up a bit with details from his mythos. He published it because it seemed publishable as a good children's story. Lord of the Rings was written as a commercial follow-up to The Hobbit. Didn't really end up like that but...
I am not disputing the fact that the huge amount of previous writing and pre-existing mythos gave LotR a backstory of unparalleled proportions. It ended up being a large part of the attraction of the book, that you feel this world has a whole history behind it that is barely hinted at.
If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
Try reading Unfinished Tales and the appendix of LOTR, then maybe you'll enjoy Silmarillion more. In my opinion only The Silmarillion reveals full glory of Tolkien's creation, LOTR with is about humans, Silmarillion is about gods. No wonder why Christopher Tolkien despises Jackson interpretation of LOTR, it just ignores Silmarillion completely, downgrading magnificent story to some anonymous D&D quest.
So was his father. That's why you can buy Lord of the Rings in a store. People work to make money...
"Sufferin' succotash."
Christopher Tolkien was a philologist at Oxford like his father before him. He had work, he is an old man now.
As to Tolkien's wishes, he made them very clear during his lifetime. He wanted the Silmarillion completed and published. When he knew he could no longer do it, he left it to Christopher Tolkien to complete it.
And I'd love for you to cite where Tolkien despised his greatest fans. Because you know what, he didn't, and spent countless hours answering their letters. You're just talking out of your ass.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.