tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post9180198505357036368..comments2024-03-17T11:05:22.464+00:00Comments on The Life And Opinions of Andrew Rilstone: The Nature of Middle-earthUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-44086847220615490212021-12-28T21:50:42.059+00:002021-12-28T21:50:42.059+00:00According to Wiki, The Hobbit is the second best-s...According to Wiki, <i>The Hobbit</i> is the second best-selling book of all time (with the <i>A Tale of Two Cities</i> taking first place).* Admittedly this is because LOTR was sold as three separate books, making it difficult to assess its overall sales. The Harry Potter series eclipses both easily. Make of that what you will.<br /><br />* and excluding the bible and Chairman Mao’s little red book. Well, naturally.Aonghus Fallonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11414643238115071988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-53979965173115182162021-12-28T07:58:11.090+00:002021-12-28T07:58:11.090+00:00Aonghus, The Lord of the Rings has sold more copie...Aonghus, The Lord of the Rings has sold more copies than the Hobbit and is the bestselling work of the 20th century. It is not (by any means) a "cult book." It's rightly considered his magnum opus. <br />Also, I know plenty of people who can't stand "The Hobbit" because of how absurdly kiddy it is. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-67241238228825991082021-11-25T03:48:13.157+00:002021-11-25T03:48:13.157+00:00No worries! My name gets mangled frequently.No worries! My name gets mangled frequently.Carl F. Hostetternoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-54433569225137027972021-11-25T00:03:51.059+00:002021-11-25T00:03:51.059+00:00Oh god, how incredibly embarrassing. Speaking as o...Oh god, how incredibly embarrassing. Speaking as one who gets called Rillstone, Rilestone, Riddlestone, Ritstone, Rustone and on one Occassion Miss Aril Stone. Sorry....<br /><br />(And my review probably didn't spend enough time saying what a good and meticulous job the editor had done...) Andrew Rilstonehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05786623930392936889noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-72762277343194128842021-11-24T02:34:27.315+00:002021-11-24T02:34:27.315+00:00I read this with interest and even in some cases a...I read this with interest and even in some cases agreement, but I will comment only on this: the appearance of the (fictional, at least as applied to me) surname of "Hofstatter" — and this after having gotten it right five other times. So close!Carl F. Hostetternoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-48161057419957712942021-11-20T11:27:53.897+00:002021-11-20T11:27:53.897+00:00I’ve always much preferred The Hobbit to The Lord...I’ve always much preferred <i>The Hobbit</i> to <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> . <i>The Hobbit</i> is shorter, more inventive, is characterised by a sly sense of humour and has a character that the ordinary reader can identify with - ie, Bilbo is an everyman in the tradition of H. G. Wells (although he mainly reminds me of Mole in <i>The Wind in the Willows<</i>, at least in term of his arc). <br /><br />I’ve heard that Tolkien grew increasingly ambivalent about <i>The Hobbit</i>; that he felt he’d compromised the world he so lovingly created by writing a children’s book set in it. I reckon having to write for an audience - and a young audience at that - forced Tolkien out of his comfort zone. As a result <i>The Hobbit</i> is a lot less portentous than his other works, which, if anything, seem to have got increasingly portentous with time. I also think this is why <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> is a ‘cult’ book (you either love it or hate it) while <i>The Hobbit</i> has more universal appeal.<br /><br />So these latter ruminations are (to me) very much a case of writer slowly disappearing up his own fundament, a process that seems to be pretty typical of most creative people. It’s a rare individual who can invent something new (or better still, reinvent themselves) in old age.Aonghus Fallonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11414643238115071988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-88891086706061669022021-11-17T18:36:38.592+00:002021-11-17T18:36:38.592+00:00One thing that I think really stands out about Tol...One thing that I think really stands out about Tolkien is that in him the world-builder and the storyteller were in constant fecund tension. And it's true from the very early days when a young officer just out of the Somme was scribbling the Fall of Gondolin but then had to write up all the backstories. <br /><br />I think the tragedy of the last two decades of Tolkien's life is that is that the worldbuilder eventually won out and although he scribbled a lot more about Middle Earth, we got a lot less of the storyteller.<br /><br />Also: he was right to abandon <i>New Shadow</i>, since well, Tolkien was fundamentally unsuited to the court-based thriller. AndrewSshihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12092217847584427587noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-75758766562753942692021-11-17T15:38:38.299+00:002021-11-17T15:38:38.299+00:00I agree with Mike Taylor. Tolkien did this rather...I agree with Mike Taylor. Tolkien did this rather than finish up the Silmarillion; but if he hadn't done this, he still wouldn't have been able to finish up the Silmarillion. The idea that Tolkien could have written more books like The Lord of the Rings if he'd only taken the time to do so is fallacious; he wasn't that kind of a writer.<br /><br />But I disagree that there's nothing in NoME that would be of use to, for instance, the writers of the Amazon series. The glimpses into the thought and characters of Morgoth and Sauron are invaluable: the pettiness and self-absorbtion of their minds explains not only why they did what they did, but also how it was possible to defeat them. And also why Tolkien preferred not to put them at the center of his stories.<br />David Bratmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08090662884600828582noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-32009118086708576722021-11-17T14:25:07.435+00:002021-11-17T14:25:07.435+00:00I have an idea for a time-travel story, where a To...I have an idea for a time-travel story, where a Tolkien fan goes back in time repeatedly, changing things in Tolkien's life to try and get more of the Legendarium out of him. But every change they make to Tolkein's process or experiences leads to less (and worse) being produced.Andrew Duckerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06566110014858668221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9987513.post-28693134225051107012021-11-17T10:43:22.570+00:002021-11-17T10:43:22.570+00:00"If Tolkien hadn't wasted his time worryi..."If Tolkien hadn't wasted his time worrying about pedantic detail, imagine what he could have achieved."<br /><br />And of course one perfectly possible answer is that he would have achieved nothing at all.Mike Taylorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06039663158335543317noreply@blogger.com