A rising dislike of Tolkein?

[dornishscorpion]

If the spelling and grammar in online discussions are any indication this seems very likely...

But I think more important reasons are that many younger people are so used to a narrative style close to movies or at least filled with action, gore and sex, that Tolkien will feel slow and quaint to them.

I don't suppose this is the case. What bothered me during my reading of The Hobbit is it's bright and kinda disney like theme and what i particularly hated is it's humor and it's lack of seriousness though as a fellow member pointed out it is meant to be like this for it is a children's book. For me i stopped reading it mainly because i had different expectations. And i am not the type of person that necessarily favors gore and sex in novels nor the type of person that gets "bored" from books that lack action for one of the favorite books is actually pride of prejudice which is known for its realism and my all-time favorite writer is Tolstoy ( war and peace, Anna Karenina ) who is known for his conservatism and i'm telling you that it is by no means light reading.

[Panther2000]

Same here, I had to skip over pages of just land description an such. But over all, I love his work. & the other books, UnfinishedTales, The various History books, & books on the Trilogy itself ( on how things were changed, etc...).

Don't get me started on The Silmarillion. I have Read this book over about 3 times & still get confused. But, it is a great story.

I think that Tolkien work is great ( As you can tell by my Avatar).

I think that people are just now jumping on the GOT bandwagon because of the show. These books have been about for a bit. However, with the show GOT has become even more popular.

LOTR has been around for DECADES.

I truly believe with out TOLKIEN there would be half of the stories/books/ movies that he have today.

[Panther2000]

SPOT ON, I am not of the younger generation. However, as people can tell my sepllngi is horried and grammar, (FORGETABOUTIT). Give me Math & Science any day.

You are so right though, kids/young adults need instant gratification & really don't want to take the time to get to the meat of any story or movie.

I kind of find it ironic because they call George the American Tolkien.

[ultimo12]

I love Tolkien's work for the language mostly. And for the epic scale of the universe he has created. Makes you feel like really important things are happening in his books, especially in the Silmarillion, don't know how to describe it better.

And I don't get why Martin is called the american Tolkien, the two have almost nothing in common, except they both write/wrote fantasy.

[Kalbear]

Kids like the hobbit and LotR just fine. At least some. The difference is that things have progressed since him. LotR is a very basic fantasy with basic morality and basic views of people. People enjoy it - and they enjoy Harry Potter as well. Both are mired in the same absolutism that many enjoy.

And both are mired in the same kind of absolutism that many find fairly dull and uninspiring.

I think the difference is that it's now somewhat acceptable to bash Tolkien and say you don't like his works while still remaining a SFF nerd. Before, say, 1990, that'd be ostracism.

[Panther2000]

Standing Ovation. :bowdown: for Senor Bolton's LL. you hit the nail on the head

[Panther2000]

I think their kind of fantasy they write, it is not the norm & much more meaty than the regular fantasy ( the kind that was written in their time).

They both took it up a notch. Stetting a new Standard I guess.

[Skythe1]

I think it's safe to say that without Tolkien, ASOIAF probably wouldn't exist (at least as we know it).

For me there is actually a few similarities between Martin and Tolkien but (takes deep breath) in terms of pure writing talent and craft Martin doesn't hold a candle to Tolkien! In terms of crafting a story and complex characters, he knocks him out of the park.

I can see why people don't like Tolkien's style though, it's not just written in an archaic way, it's from a different period of literature. The people that don't like the style probably wouldn't enjoy things like Dracula and Frankenstein.

[Jo498]

There is nothing inherently bad/simplistic about black and white characters, I think. About every story has some of them, at least as minor characters. And not every story has to be character-driven, Tolkien shares this aspect with most myths, sagas and fairy-tales. The major characters of Tolkien, Bilbo and Frodo are good guys, but they undergo quite a bit of development. For Bilbo it is overcoming his need for comfort and his fear, for Frodo it is mainly a path of perseverance and suffering.

The big difference to, for example, ASoIaF, is that all those characters falling to temptation or changing sides are comparably minor and we never get their POV: Saruman, Boromir, Theoden, Denethor, Thorin Oakenshield. And, admittedly, most of the time the temptation is pride, power, greed, pretty basic stuff. Not starting a war to protect one's family. Of course this is also connected with the underlying morality.

One should also note that, as long as it is, LotR is rather short compared with the multi-volume sagas of the last 20 years. It is about one and half times as long as the first SoIaF-Volume, I guess.

[protar]

Kids like the hobbit and LotR just fine. At least some. The difference is that things have progressed since him. LotR is a very basic fantasy with basic morality and basic views of people. People enjoy it - and they enjoy Harry Potter as well. Both are mired in the same absolutism that many enjoy.

And both are mired in the same kind of absolutism that many find fairly dull and uninspiring.

I think the difference is that it's now somewhat acceptable to bash Tolkien and say you don't like his works while still remaining a SFF nerd. Before, say, 1990, that'd be ostracism.

Both Lotr and Harry Potter (I'd argue moreso Harry Potter) have undertones of moral ambiguity, they're just not front and centre. Boromir, Gollum and Denethor are prime examples of morally ambiguous characters and in many cases the ambiguity is more subtle than a few of the characters in ASOIAF (Though I'd argue in general ASOIAF has better characters.). From Harry Potter there's Snape most prominently, but also Dumbledore and pretty much the entire Ministry of Magic as early as Chamber of Secrets (but especially in OoTP onwards.).

[Skythe1]

Both Lotr and Harry Potter (I'd argue moreso Harry Potter) have undertones of moral ambiguity, they're just not front and centre. Boromir, Gollum and Denethor are prime examples of morally ambiguous characters and in many cases the ambiguity is more subtle than a few of the characters in ASOIAF (Though I'd argue in general ASOIAF has better characters.). From Harry Potter there's Snape most prominently, but also Dumbledore and pretty much the entire Ministry of Magic as early as Chamber of Secrets (but especially in OoTP onwards.).

Potentially in LoTR you could even say Aragorn is morally ambiguous. The guy could have fought for his place as the rightful king, unified the world of men and staunchly defended Gondor against Sauron instead of leaving it until last minute.

[Night's_King]

Most people need to have the "complexity" of characters thrown in their faces. Like in Ice and Fire.

The complexity in LotR seems to be too subtle for many...

[Kalbear]

Moral ambiguity implies that there is not a clear right and wrong. And that is not remotely the case in lotr. We know that boromir is wrong for falling to temptation. We know that Aragon would be wrong to forsake his kingly duties. Etc.

Same, mostly, with Harry potter - though she admittedly gets better with the later books. Even then there is decidedly the right and the wrong thing to do. There's a dark lord! And you can be a dark wizard, and when you do you're just totally bad.

[Lyanna Stark]

Frankly, I find that too much PC/modern gender roles makes many fantasy worlds often highly unattractive and implausible. In ASoIaF the "non-traditional" female characters, especially Dany and Arya are also the least realistic, plot-armored (I have not quarrel with that, Arya may still be my favorite). But better (almost) no female lead characters as in Tolkien than tired clichees like Leesha(sp?) in "Painted Man". Abercrombie can be fun to read for a while, but his world does not even start to evoke any fantasy-world emotions for me. It is so thoroughly modern, often literally like a film script of our days (casual sex for anyone, lots of gore and the action sequences for the "Eaters" are from the Matrix with Neo snatching bullets from the air)

Oh please. Misogynism doesn't make good Fantasy.

Whining about Dany and Arya being plot armoured is also totally and utterly ridiculous when characters like Jon Snow and Tyrion are so much more in the land of plot armour.

Besides, most of GRRM's female characters are transgressive when it comes to smashing fantasy tropes. The fact that you missed that Cersei, Sansa, Cat and Dany are brilliant feminist characters is just fail @ reading, as it were.

[Night's_King]

Oh please. Misogynism doesn't make good Fantasy.

Whining about Dany and Arya being plot armoured is also totally and utterly ridiculous when characters like Jon Snow and Tyrion are so much more in the land of plot armour.

Besides, most of GRRM's female characters are transgressive when it comes to smashing fantasy tropes. The fact that you missed that Cersei, Sansa, Cat and Dany are brilliant feminist characters is just fail @ reading, as it were.

If I read correctly, he never said anything about Jon or Tyrion. Of course they have plot armor. But that doesn't make Dany or Arya more or less unrealistic.

I can't really understand the whining about the lack of complex female characters. Or is almost everything written pre 20th century bullshit? Because you would have trouble finding complex female characters in those stories...

[Arataniello]

I think it is always important to put any comments about "rising dislike" of any author into context.

In the case of Tolkien, there is increased and more visible (internet, mainly) discussion of Tolkien, ever since the release of the Fellowship movie back at the start of the century. This has been compounded by the release of new JRRT books by Christopher Tolkien.

There was always a dislike of Tolkien's work ever since the primary works were published. Now there is simply MORE Tolkien to discuss, disagree with and 'dislike', as well as many more ways to document one's feelings.

[sologdin]

'PC' is unrealistic, but dragons and zombies are realism.

'whining' is not at all a charitable way to describe the political critique.

[protar]

Moral ambiguity implies that there is not a clear right and wrong. And that is not remotely the case in lotr. We know that boromir is wrong for falling to temptation. We know that Aragon would be wrong to forsake his kingly duties. Etc.

Same, mostly, with Harry potter - though she admittedly gets better with the later books. Even then there is decidedly the right and the wrong thing to do. There's a dark lord! And you can be a dark wizard, and when you do you're just totally bad.

Moral ambiguity can be on a smaller level than the fate of the world. Boromir is wrong to try and steal the ring from frodo but is he an inherently bad person because he has ambitions that a magical artifact can exploit? Even though Snape is working with the world's best interests at heart but he was still a bitter man who bullied children.

[HexMachina]

Moral ambiguity implies that there is not a clear right and wrong. And that is not remotely the case in lotr. We know that boromir is wrong for falling to temptation. We know that Aragon would be wrong to forsake his kingly duties. Etc.

Same, mostly, with Harry potter - though she admittedly gets better with the later books. Even then there is decidedly the right and the wrong thing to do. There's a dark lord! And you can be a dark wizard, and when you do you're just totally bad.

I would disagree, there are some very morally ambiguous moments, once you give more thought to them. Gollum and Sam's interactions stand out to me as an example of this. Gollum was clearly on his redemption path, but Sam could not see him as anything but rotten and corrupted. Arguably, Sam's treatment of Gollum prevented him from ever fully redeeming himself. Its less clear cut whether Sam's treatment was right or wrong, because Sam is immediately thought of as a "good" character. And Denethor's decisions...I don't know, I still remain undecided on that front. He looks into the Palantir for the good of his people, everything he does is arguably for the good of Gondor. But he is influenced by Sauron, and what's more opposes our "heroes" in their goal (putting the heir of Isildur on the throne), so we naturally think badly of him

[HexMachina]

Moral ambiguity can be on a smaller level than the fate of the world. Boromir is wrong to try and steal the ring from frodo but is he an inherently bad person because he has ambitions that a magical artifact can exploit?

Is it also wrong that Boromir wants to take this artifact and use it for the good of Gondor? Its a very good point