Lord of the Rings

The key to the whole Beren and Luthien story (and its echo in Aragorn and Arwen) is that Tolkien's wife, Edith, converted to Catholicism in order to marry him. Effectively, she gave up what she and all her family considered immortality for love of him. And like Arwen, Edith later somewhat regretted her choice, though she remained a Catholic throughout her life.

I take it you folks have seen the Epic Rap Battles of History... rap, let's say, where J.R.R utterly schooled G.R.R Martin?

I like both authors equally including their stories but yeah Tolkien schooled GRRM and I'm okay with that.

In a time where Tolkien is trashed as being kiddie or passe, it's nice to see something speak to the virtues of his work and his talent as a writer, rather than have to read dozens of reviews by pimple-faced, snot-nosed neckbeard edgelords about how ASOIAF is "better" because "it's darker, and uh, edgier, and uh, more realistic, and it's so dark, guys!"

I enjoy both authors, but I utterly despise how Tolkien has become a punching bag for fans of Dark Fantasy. Bitch, he was writing Dark Fantasy in the trenches of WWI. He lived it, man.

I have literally never seen this happen. Every fan I've ever met of any kind of fantasy only has positive things to say about Tolkien's work.

....ASOIAF is realistic? Did the readers miss the part where Winter averages twenty years and yet people are still somehow able to farm?

I didnt like the rap battle, it didnt have to much disses and fel ore like too nerd arguing who is better, I feel Stephen king vs Poe was better

@bl Realistic in the sense that major characters are actually human instead of kinda flat like most of the prominent characters in LOTR. Most not all.

To be fair.

All of the perspective characters in LOTR are quite human. Sam is incredibly human, as are Merry and Pippin. Most of the story we watch unfold we see from their eyes.

I kind of enjoyed how the films moved Aragorn into perspective, as well as Gandalf.

I always really liked Ian Mckellen's Gandalf. To the point that I react poorly whenever I see anyone else's interpretation.

But it is true that ASOI&F does portray characters more realistically on the whole. I say this from what I gleaned from the Game of Thrones show; I haven't read the books yet.

I don't think "gritty" is the same thing as "realistic".

It's not. But ASOIAF isn't just "gritty". It gives each character traits aside from "heroic".

I read the books through A Feast for Crows and then came down with a case of Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy. I'm well aware the characters have plenty of non-heroic traits. I liked the series but eventually found it too dark to want to continue further. I figured I didn't need to read about the latest horrible, horrible things to happen to people I kind of liked, with no reasonable end to the series in sight.

And as you said, all of the hobbits in LotR are quite flawed and "human", with non-heroic traits.

edited 21st Jun '16 9:44:09 AM by Bense

The humans are also flawed as well (e.g. Denethor, Boromir).

There's also a fair amount of Values Dissonance that goes into any reading of LOTR that might make it seem simplistic if divorced from the time and mindset through which it was written. Tolkien was a staunch Catholic and a Divine Right monarchist living in a more conservative time. I mean, most fantasy these days isn't as gritty as ASOIAF, but even they will try to have a monarch justify their power by giving them a common touch in a What's Up, King Dude? kind of way, or have them flat out reject their power until the responsibility is forced on their shoulders. The idea of a king being innately kingly and pursuing power because it is his by Divine Right, and being right in doing so, is a Dead Horse Trope. Book Aragorn's active pursuit of power and invoked Divine Right to kingship (and unlike real monarchs, his line is literally the last bit of divinity left on Middle-earth in the Fourth Age; to deny him is to abandon your soul to damnation) invokes a bit of Leviathan, and would especially seem odd to Americans, where salt-of-the-earth republicanism is the stated ideal.

edited 21st Jun '16 12:25:30 PM by CrimsonZephyr

Here's some non-heroic traits of the Fellowship:

• Frodo ultimately fails his quest, and then can't overcome the trauma enough to enjoy life anymore. He also fails in resisting the Ring at Weathertop.
• Sam's suspicion of Gollum leads to Gollum loosing his only chance of redemption.
• Pippin foolishly stirs up the orcs in Moria, and then can't resist the urge to look into the Palantir.
• Merry decides to go out alone for a walk at night in Bree, despite knowing they've been pursued by Black Riders.
• Gimli and Legolas are both prejudiced against the other's kind.
• Gandalf has a temper, and tends to be a little too secretive even to his allies. Oh and he's a heavy smoker.
• Boromir of course is prideful and unable to resist the lure of the Ring.
• Aragorn comes off the most heroic of the nine, but he doubts his own judgement after Gandalf falls in Moria, and sometimes he plays jokes on others (playing with Sam's suspicions in Bree, pulling Merry's leg about his pipe in Gondor, and how he tells Beregond about his new post are notable examples of Aragorn messing with people just because he can).

Mhmm. Saruman was once a force of good but fell to despair after seeing the incredibly power and charming voice of the enemy.

Man, it would have been fantastic to read a story written from HIS point of veiw.

Even them are minor thing that dosent afect THAT much the chararter as whole

That is another thing, a lot of author try to disloge of more...unpleasent aspect of time period or some concepts, somethign thar GRRM play out in complexity

We know that GRRM highlights the unpleasantness of pre-modern life. My point was that Tolkien doesn't shy away from it either, even if the Shire is unrealistically idyllic. If we're going to reject unrealistic depictions of medievalesque settings, we really should be criticizing works like Ivanhoe, not LOTR.

A Song Of Ice And Fire and The Lord Of The Rings have completely different narrative purposes.

The Lord Of The Rings is myth; one element of Tolkien's invention of Middle-earth's history was as a mythology for England. And myths by their nature include some larger-than-life characters. But The Lord Of The Rings is also myth merged with humbler elements; victory comes not through physical or magical power, but through mercy, self-sacrifice, and grace. And the hobbits in particular do have excellent character development over the course of the story. Further, The Lord Of The Rings does not aim at realism in the sense of depicting a copy of middle ages (plus dragons and accentuated brutality); Tolkien's conception of "faerie-stories" is that their value lies in depicting things higher and greater and deeper than what we may see in everyday life - things that are more than real, they are true. Being "gritty" is entirely contrary to his purpose - he lived through two world wars, and his fantasy was written partially as antidote to that world, not a depiction of it.

Martin is writing a completely different kind of story, where the fantastical elements are more of a side dish to the main plot of a War-of-the-Roses-style conflict. He is talented at writing a diversity of characters, but he lacks the ability to rein in his plot, and his prose is deeply inferior to Tolkien's.

edited 21st Jun '16 2:25:49 PM by Galadriel

Prose:

Tolkien >>>> GRRM

Dialogue:

GRRM >>>>Tolkien

When I said Tolkien had mostly flat characters, I wasn't including the hobbits in there.

I'd say that GRRM is much more overly ambitious for his series than Tolkien was which leads him to overreach.

edited 21st Jun '16 4:04:49 PM by MadSkillz

@Galadriel While this is true, GRRM is responding to LOTR.

He's said as much in his own words.

edited 21st Jun '16 5:11:47 PM by MadSkillz

It's too bad that GRRM and Tolkien were never able to converse. I wonder what Tolkien's reply would have been

Well as I've said before. GRRM is reconstructing fantasy but that part is coming in slowly and it's less noticeable than the deconstruction.

People tend to hone in on the bad more than the good.

Frankly, I think Tolkien would've found GRRM's books too depressing.

From what I understand, that's a pretty universal assessment.

Oh, Tolkien was FAR more ambitious than Martin. It's just that he was also a perfectionist, so the vast majority of his ambitious plans for Middle-Earth never quite got to the final draft stage.

Which consider how much the montain that dosent write seen to get with other books, he is getting very closet to tolkien lever of perfectionism