The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien Summary and Reviews
|
List Price: Our Price: $24.95 You Save: $55.05 (69%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $20.99 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of The Lord of the Rings
Book Review: I Read The Series After I Watched The Awesome Movies... The Plot Was There, But Where Was The Exitement?
Summary: 3 Stars
The plot of these books is so genious I cant believe it, thats why the movies where so good, they took the already good books and made them into exiting, interesting movies. The books, well, they are classics, but I can't seem to get more than 10 pages read at a time.
Its not that I don;t worship the work this guy has done, but when I read the books, the exiting adventure that captures my immagination and creativity, and brings me into a new world, is litterly butchered by the ridiculous ammount of pointless details, that end up closing my eyes.
In a scene this book will...
-capture you into a cool new setting
-give you atleast 40 descriptions that make no sense to explain what it looks like.
-give you about 40 more, as the first sentence of dialouge begins.
-Then, it scripts some moderately interesting dialouge, and then kills it again, with descriptions that are, again, unnesecary.
-as if this isn't enough, the exitement is killed by the fact that you can;t tell whats happening, you start confusing descriptions with the story, and get mixed up with the dialouge, and then are again, lost, when he drags in the second wave of descriptions. I mean, where is the fun? I would like it if someone would rewrite this with the same dialouge and plot, but change the descriptions into interesting details of the surroundings, that catch your interest rather than make you sleep with your eyes open.
The movie is better.
Book Review: Wonderful
Summary: 5 Stars
I love these books. I will never get tired of reading them, and The Silmarillion.
Thanks to the author for providing readers with this material, and the screenplay for the excellent movies made therefrom.
FIVE STARS is not enough, they deserve 15 (five for each one).
Book Review: ENOUGH ALREADY!
Summary: 3 Stars
The first time I read Lord of the Rings as a child I liked it. Nice poems, cool chase through Mordor and Saruman, Gollum and the Ents were pretty nifty.
Look, all you writers out there: All fantasy books don't have to be set in some pseudo-medieval European setting where everyone is remarkably clean, healthy and odor-free despite a distinct lack of basic sanitation devices.
I acknowledge that this book was revolutionary forty years ago, but the world has changed since then and our writing could stand to reflect that.
Not that Lord of the Rings is a bad book-- it's not-- but not everything about it is so unquestionably wonderful.
First off: The ending sucks. I still haven't figured out what Haven is meant to be, (Heaven?) and why Frodo and the elves had to go there. What? Is it that they were too good for our world. If so then that is really lame.
Second: The unquestioning faith Tolkien places in the superiority of high birth and the unfailing belief in a rigid class system, (something which I am surprised to see most modern readers simply don't notice) was old fashioned and retrograde even in his own time. I mean why should Strider/Aragorn be automatically made king? How come no one questions this? The idea that without the true blue-blood king the land would falter is ridiculous. Whatever happened to democracy? This odd yearning for the old class system can be seen in Sam's servile obedience to Frodo and Frodo's servility to Aragorn, the Elves and other high born humans.
4. How did Gandalf get out of the pit in the mines? No explanation in either the books or the movies.
5. Pure good vs. Pure Evil: There are reasons why Saruman and Gollum are the best characters in the books. They're the most like real people, with multiple facets and real motivations for their deeds. I mean what's Sauron's deal? He's a big flaming eye of pure evil. Not much characterization there. And the Orcs-- probably the worst scene in the book is when Gimli and Legolas brag to each other about how many Orcs they each have killed and this goes on without the disapproval of any character. Yeah, lets see all our enemies at war as subhumans agents of pure evil, right. This is a complete cheat. If ever we needed to hear the message that those we fight on the battlefield are people just like us, with families, desires and loved ones-- now is the time. How convient that Orcs are created out of mud and have no little Orc children to mourn them when they fall to serve as another notch on Gimili's belt.
5. In the same line of thinking the character development is lacking-- characters like STrider, Legolas, Gimli, Boromir and others seem remote and unhuman.
While I understand that Tolkien sought to copy the episodic style, characterization and epic tone common to such early Northern European myths as Beouwulf, for modern readers not to see the faults inherit in these forms is to be ignorant.
Book Review: A Classic Among Classics
Summary: 5 Stars
I've read the trilogy over three times and each time it gets better and better! This edition is PERFECT because of its hardcover! It ensures more and more enjoyable reads!!! I love to escape with these books!Book Review: On The Lord Of The Rings And Tolkien's Writing
Summary: 5 Stars
I don't actually own this particular edition of the series so I can't review it as I normally would, but I couldn't find my edition. So I would just like to express my perception of the story to perhaps change the perspective people view this with. Read on.
Okay, I'm seriously tired of people not understanding why the content is as it is. What I mean is people complain about the lack of stylized storytelling as they are accustomed to in modern literature. One person said that there shouldn't be an introduction describing the hobbits because those details should be unfolded in the story, one said that there are characters with backgrounds that aren't expanded on, many say the language is too flashy and complicated.
Of the language problem, all I have to say to that is: So's the Bible. Really, you have to look at them kind of the same. While The Silmarillion may be the one that is stylized after the Bible, this "trilogy" (really one story and not a trilogy) is also a historical document, but just of Middle-Earth. Historical documents are often written in language uncommon to our own; they sound more dated and mostly are. The misunderstanding of this not being an actual series of isolated novels actually answers the other questions as well, and this is something Peter Jackson clearly did not understand when making the movies. The Lord Of The Rings is not the story of Frodo, the Ring, and the Fellowship, but actually a part of the story of Middle-Earth that focuses on them. That is why the back story is not revealed in the text; it's already covered in past sections of this big story that the series fits into. In the original DVD of The Fellowship Of The Ring, I remember Peter Jackson talking about why he decided to cut out stuff like Tom Bombadil. His reason was that he had to look at it and say, "What relevence does this have to the story of Frodo and the Ring?" If you can see it from my point of view, that is the wrong question. I think it is ludicrous to cut out plot pieces that could only make the story bigger, better, and more expansive (and Tom's appearance would have been a fine piece of cinema. It could have added to a sense of surrealism and some mystery in the story of the first movie, plus I would love to see his dwelling - accurately - translated onto the big screen).
Let me reiterate. There are so many parts of the book irrelevent to Frodo and the Ring because they are not the real subject. You read the Silmarillion and it does not seem as though you are reading a collection of single stories about events in Middle-Earth, instead you feel you are reading the history of the world. You must look at these the same way. Someone may quip that The Hobbit was practically a novel, and I agree there and would have to say I think I like it better for that, but I'm just saying you must understand the context of these stories. Why Tolkien didn't supply us all this backstory information beforehand I do not know, but I think it may have to do with the fact of how it was published. See, the appendix was supposed to be put in The Fellowship Of The Ring after the decision was made to split the one story into three smaller editions because of the post WWII publishing costs. But time and money didn't allow for this to happen so it wasn't until months later when The Return Of The King was published when the appendices were available. So perhaps the backstory was meant to be summarized for you from the beginning but it just didn't end up that way.
If you can see it this way I can't guaruntee more enjoyment, but maybe a better understanding as to why it was written in this style and won't complain about it using language you don't understand and not being very traditionally written (although its language style is very traditional). But anyway, to make this a review, I see this as definately being 5 star material and I'm sure just about everyone else in the world does. Who hasn't read these books now? If you haven't, do it soon.
Clearly from the vastness and style of these stories this was meant to be no ordinary novel and I hope that someone out there can read my view and maybe adapt theirs before my review becomes inevitably covered and lost in other people's.