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Writer's pictureMary Reed

Tuesday, February 9, 2021 – Lord of the Rings


I walk in a commercial area populated with nondescript brick boxes of buildings. Many have no signs on the front. The only signs for this apparent Audi/VW dealer are the one in the photo to the left and one more small one “Lord of the Rings AUDI/VW Please Use Side Door.” So, is this a car dealer who doesn’t like to advertise with large signs? Or perhaps it is an Audi/VW car repair shop referring to O-rings or piston rings. Maybe it’s simply an owner who is a fan of J. R. R. Tolkien or a slick, criminal operation smuggling diamond rings into or out of the country in Audis and VWs. I must confess that I have not read Tolkien’s book or seen the film trilogy. I have heard celebrities discuss the movies on talk shows. I know it is a fantasy set in Middle-earth, and there is a character named Frodo and small creatures called Hobbits. Let’s find out more about it.


First single-volume edition 1968

According to Wikipedia, “The Lord of the Rings” is an epic high fantasy novel by the English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, the world at some distant time in the past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's book “The Hobbit,” but eventually developed into a much larger work. Written in stages between 1937 and 1949, “The Lord of the Rings” is one of the best-selling books ever written, with over 150 million copies sold.


The title names the story's main antagonist, the Dark Lord Sauron, who had in an earlier age created the One Ring to rule the other Rings of Power as the ultimate weapon in his campaign to conquer and rule all of Middle-earth. From homely beginnings in the Shire, a hobbit land reminiscent of the English countryside, the story ranges across Middle-earth, following the quest mainly through the eyes of the hobbits Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin.

Although generally known to readers as a trilogy, the work was initially intended by Tolkien to be one volume of a two-volume set along with “The Silmarillion,” but this idea was dismissed by his publisher. For economic reasons, “The Lord of the Rings” was published in three volumes over the course of a year from July 29, 1954, to October 20, 1955. The three volumes were titled “The Fellowship of the Ring,” “The Two Towers” and “The Return of the King.” Structurally, the work is divided internally into six books, two per volume, with several appendices of background material at the end. Some editions print the entire work into a single volume, following the author's original intent.


After an initially mixed reception by the literary establishment, Tolkien's work has been the subject of extensive analysis of its themes and origins. Influences on this earlier work — and on the story of “The Lord of the Rings” include philology, mythology, religion, earlier fantasy works and his own experiences in World War I. “The Lord of the Rings,” in its turn, has had a great effect on modern fantasy.


“The Lord of the Rings” has since been reprinted many times and translated into at least 38 languages. The enduring popularity of “The Lord of the Rings” has led to numerous references in popular culture, the founding of many societies by fans of Tolkien’s works and the publication of many books about Tolkien and his works. It has inspired numerous derivative works including artwork, music, films and television, video games, board games and subsequent literature. Award-winning adaptations of “The Lord of the Rings” have been made for radio, theatre and film. It has been named Britain's best novel of all time in the BBC's The Big Read, a survey on books carried out by the BBC in the United Kingdom in 2003, where over three quarters of a million votes were received from the British public to find the nation's best-loved novel of all time.

Dustcover of first edition of “The Hobbit”

Background

Although a major work in itself, “The Lord of the Rings” was only the last movement of a much older set of narratives Tolkien had worked on since 1917 encompassing “The Silmarillion,” in a process he described as mythopoeia. Authors in this genre integrate traditional mythological themes and archetypes into fiction.


“The Lord of the Rings” started as a sequel to Tolkien's work “The Hobbit,” published in 1937. The popularity of “The Hobbit” had led the publishers George Allen & Unwin to request a sequel. Tolkien warned them that he wrote quite slowly and responded with several stories he had already developed. Having rejected his contemporary drafts for “The Silmarillion,”, putting “Roverandom” on hold and accepting “Farmer Giles of Ham,” Allen & Unwin continued to ask for more stories about hobbits.

One Ring grants the wearer invisibility

Writing

Persuaded by his publishers, he started "a new Hobbit" in December 1937. After several false starts, the story of the One Ring emerged. The idea for the first chapter — "A Long-Expected Party" — arrived fully formed, although the reasons behind Bilbo's disappearance, the significance of the Ring and the title “The Lord of the Rings” did not arrive until the spring of 1938. Originally, he planned to write a story in which Bilbo had used up all his treasure and was looking for another adventure to gain more; however, he remembered the Ring and its powers and thought that would be a better focus for the new work. As the story progressed, he brought in elements from “The Silmarillion” mythology.

English & French academic editor Christopher Tolkien 2019

Writing was slow, because Tolkien had a full-time academic position, marked exams to bring in a little extra income and wrote many drafts. Tolkien abandoned “The Lord of the Rings” during most of 1943 and only restarted it in April 1944 as a serial for his son Christopher Tolkien, who was sent chapters as they were written while he was serving in South Africa with the Royal Air Force. Tolkien made another major effort in 1946 and showed the manuscript to his publishers in 1947. The story was effectively finished the next year, but Tolkien did not complete the revision of earlier parts of the work until 1949. The original manuscripts, which total 9,250 pages, now reside in the J. R. R. Tolkien Collection at Marquette University.

First edition of song cycle “The Road Goes Ever On”

Poetry

The poetry in “The Lord of the Rings” consists of the poems and songs written by J.R.R. Tolkien, interspersed with the prose of his high fantasy novel of Middle-earth, “The Lord of the Rings.” The book contains over 60 pieces of verse of many kinds; some poems related to the book were published separately. Seven of Tolkien's songs — all but one from “The Lord of the Rings,” were made into a song-cycle, “The Road Goes Ever On,” set to music by Donald Swann. All the poems in “The Lord of the Rings” were set to music and published on CDs by “The Tolkien Ensemble,” a Danish ensemble founded in 1995 which aims to create the world's first complete musical interpretation of the poems and songs from “The Lord of the Rings.”

Tolkien’s illustration of Bilbo in his comfortable hobbit-hole

The verse is of many kinds, including for wandering, marching to war, drinking and having a bath; narrating ancient myths, riddles, prophecies and magical incantations; of praise and lament or elegy. Some of these forms were found in Old English poetry. Tolkien stated that all his poems and songs were dramatic in function, not seeking to express the poet's emotions, but throwing light on the characters, such as Bilbo Baggins, Sam Gamgee and Aragorn, who sing or recite them.


Commentators have noted that Tolkien's verse has long been overlooked, and never emulated by other fantasy writers; but that since the 1990s it has received scholarly attention. The verse includes light-hearted songs and apparent nonsense, as with those of Tom Bombadil; the poetry of the Shire, which has been said to convey a sense of "mythic timelessness" and the laments of the Riders of Rohan, which echo the oral tradition of Old English poetry. Scholarly analysis of Tolkien's verse shows that it is both varied and of high technical skill, making use of different meters and rarely used poetic devices to achieve its effects.

Tolkien’s hand-drawn map of Wilderland in “The Hobbit”

Illustrations

Tolkien worked on the text using his maps of Middle-earth as a guide, to ensure the elements of the story fitted together in time and space. He prepared a variety of types of illustrations — maps, calligraphy, drawings, cover designs and even a facsimile painting of the Book of Mazarbul — but only the maps, the inscription on the Ring and a drawing of the Doors of Durin were included in the first edition.





Barbara Remington's cover designs

The hardback editions sometimes had cover illustrations by Tolkien, sometimes by other artists. According to The New York Times, Barbara Remington's cover designs for Ballantine's paperback editions "achieved mass-cult status in the 1960s, particularly on college campuses" across America. In the rush to print, Remington had no time to read the book, and surprised Tolkien with details such as a tree with pumpkin-like fruits, and a lion, which was painted out for later editions.

Beowulf’s ogres, elves & devil-corpses inspired Tolkien’s orcs and elves of Middle-earth

Influences

Tolkien drew on a wide array of influences including language, Christianity, mythology including the Norse Völsunga saga, archaeology, especially at the Temple of Nodens, ancient and modern literature and personal experience. He was inspired primarily by his profession, philology — the study of language in oral and written historical sources; his work centered on the study of Old English literature, especially “Beowulf,” and he acknowledged its importance to his writings. He was a gifted linguist, influenced by Celtic, Finnish, Slavic and Greek language and mythology. Commentators have attempted to identify literary and topological antecedents for characters, places and events in Tolkien's writings; he acknowledged that he had enjoyed adventure stories by authors such as John Buchan and Rider Haggard. The Arts and Crafts polymath William Morris was a major influence, and Tolkien undoubtedly made use of some real place names, such as Bag End, the name of his aunt's home. Tolkien stated, too, that he had been influenced by his childhood experiences of the English countryside of Worcestershire near Sarehole Mill, and its urbanization by the growth of Birmingham, and his personal experience of fighting in the trenches of the First World War.

Themes

Scholars and critics have identified many themes in the book with its complex interlaced narrative, including a reversed quest — seeking to destroy an object, the struggle of good and evil, death and immortality, fate and free will, the addictive danger of power and various aspects of Christianity such as the presence of three Christ figures for prophet, priest and king, as well as elements like hope and redemptive suffering. There is a common theme throughout the work of language, its sound, and its relationship to peoples and places, along with hints of providence in descriptions of weather and landscape. Out of these, Tolkien stated that the central theme is death and immortality. To those who supposed that the book was an allegory of events in the 20th century, Tolkien replied in the Foreword to the second edition that it was not, saying he preferred "history, true or feigned, with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of readers."


Some commentators have accused the book of being a story about men for boys, with no significant women; or about a purely rural world with no bearing on modern life in cities; of containing no sign of religion; or of racism. All of these charges have been rebutted by other commentators, who note that there are three powerful women in the book, Galadriel, Éowyn and Arwen; that life, even in rural Hobbiton, is not idealized; that Christianity is a pervasive theme; and that Tolkien was sharply anti-racist both in peacetime and during the Second World War, while Middle-earth is evidently polycultural.


Radio

The book has been adapted for radio four times. In 1955 and 1956, the BBC broadcast “The Lord of the Rings,” a 13-part radio adaptation of the story. In the 1960s radio station WBAI produced a short radio adaptation. A 1979 dramatization of “The Lord of the Rings” was broadcast in the United States and subsequently issued on tape and CD. In 1981, the BBC broadcast “The Lord of the Rings,” a new dramatization in 26 half-hour instalments.

Finnish live action TV miniseries "Hobitit"

Film and television

A variety of filmmakers considered adapting Tolkien's book, among them Stanley Kubrick, who thought it unfilmable, Michelangelo Antonioni, Heinz Edelmann and John Boorman. A Swedish live action television film, “Sagan om ringen,”, was broadcast in 1971. In 1978, Ralph Bakshi made an animated film version covering “The Fellowship of the Ring” and part of “The Two Towers,” to mostly poor reviews. In 1980, Rankin/Bass released an animated TV special based on the closing chapters of “The Return of the King,” gaining mixed reviews. In Finland, a live action television miniseries, “Hobitit,” was broadcast in 1993 based on “The Lord of the Rings,” with a flashback to Bilbo's encounter with Gollum in “The Hobbit.”

Peter Jackson at “The Return of the King” in New Zealand

A far more successful adaptation was Peter Jackson's live action “The Lord of the Rings” film trilogy, produced by New Line Cinema and released in three installments as “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” in 2001, “The Lord of the Rings” The Two Towers” in 2002 and “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” in 2003. All three parts won multiple Academy Awards, including consecutive Best Picture nominations. The final installment of this trilogy was the second film to break the $1 billion barrier and won a total of 11 Oscars — something only two other films in history, “Ben-Hur” and “Titanic,” have accomplished — including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay. Commentators including Tolkien scholars, literary critics and film critics are divided on how faithfully Jackson adapted Tolkien’s work or whether a film version is inevitably different, and if so the reasons for any changes, and the effectiveness of the result.


“The Hunt for Gollum,” a 2009 film by Chris Bouchard, and the 2009 “Born of Hope,” written by Paula DiSante and directed by Kate Madison, are fan films based on details in the appendices of “The Lord of the Rings.”


In 2017, Amazon acquired the global television rights to “The Lord of the Rings” for a multi-season TV series of new stories set before “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings,” based on Tolkien's descriptions of events of the Second Age of Middle-earth.




Impact on popular culture

“The Lord of the Rings” has had a profound and wide-ranging impact on popular culture, beginning with its publication in the 1950s, but especially during the 1960s and 1970s, when young people embraced it as a countercultural saga. "Frodo Lives! " and "Gandalf for President" were two phrases popular amongst United States Tolkien fans during this time. Its impact is such that the words "Tolkienian" and "Tolkienesque" have entered the Oxford English Dictionary, and many of his fantasy terms, formerly little-known in English, such as "Orc" and "Warg,” have become widespread in that domain. Among its effects are numerous parodies, especially Harvard Lampoon’s “Bored of the Rings,” which has had the distinction of remaining continuously in print from its publication in 1969, and of being translated into at least 11 languages.


In 1969, Tolkien sold the merchandising rights to “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit” to United Artists under an agreement stipulating a lump sum payment of £10,000 plus a 7.5% royalty after costs, payable to Allen & Unwin and the author. In 1976, three years after the author's death, United Artists sold the rights to Saul Zaentz Co., who now trade as Tolkien Enterprises. Since then all "authorized" merchandise has been signed off by Tolkien Enterprises, although the intellectual property rights of the specific likenesses of characters and other imagery from various adaptations is generally held by the adaptors.

Sign in New Zealand where film version was made

Outside any commercial exploitation from adaptations, from the late 1960s onwards there has been an increasing variety of original licensed merchandise, from posters and calendars created by illustrators such as Barbara Remington.


In 2015, the BBC ranked “The Lord of the Rings” 26th on its list of the 100 greatest British novels. It was included in Le Monde's list of "100 Books of the Century.”











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