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Tolkien stuff

Mr. DarcyMr. Darcy
edited 2012-12-18 01:27:07 in General Media

Since the movie thread was getting taken over by Middle Earth stuff unrelated to the movies, here's a thread for Tolkien.

I have a question. What's up with "ages"? The Lord of the Rings takes place at the end of "the Third Age." Apparently the Second Age was when Sauron was incarnate in the world (and they're just fighting his ghost in LotR)? And the First Age ended with Satan Morgoth getting cast into the void forever and the elves being told to leave Middle Earth for Valinor (seems like the elves are always being summoned somewhere and not going. as some stay behind after they're supposed to leave at the end of the Third Age too). But before the First Age began, Melkor had already been released from a prison sentence of three Ages and rebuilt Angband? Does that mean the Ages are numbered Minus Second, Minus First, Zeroth, First, Second, Third, Fourth?

IT MAKES NO SENSE

Comments

  • Salix BabylonikaSalix Babylonika
    https://i.imgur.com/IoGc2jA.jpg
    BC/AD?
  • TachyonTachyon
    edited 2012-12-18 01:37:32
    imagei will watch the heck outta this pumpkin patch
    The numbered ages are the Ages of the Children of Ilúvatar, but Arda existed for centuries prior to that.

    Actually millennia, since one Elven yen = 144 regular years (for much of that time there was no Sun so other forms of measurement had to be used).
  • Unknown
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  • Obā-sanObā-san

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  • Mr. DarcyMr. Darcy
    "It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
    So in The Lord of the Rings, all the remaining elves in Middle Earth are supposed to be sailing West. Now Middle Earth is supposed to be prehistoric western Europe. So are the Undying Lands America, or is magical west a different direction from physical west? 
  • Princess AlicePrincess Alice
    You are the end result of a “would you push the button” prompt where the prompt was “you have unlimited godlike powers but you appear to all and sundry to be an impetuous child” – Zero, 2022
    I read The Hobbit about 10 years ago--I got a copy for Christmas in 6th grade and spent the rest of the year glued to it--but I couldn't really "get into" The Lord of the Rings.

    So...should I give it another try? I figure just because it didn't keep my interest when I was 11 doesn't mean it won't now...
  • Mr. DarcyMr. Darcy
    "It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
    Well what sort of novels do you like to read now?
    It's somewhat amazing to me that LotR spawned a whole subculture when it doesn't much resemble the sort of books that people tend to like. Like War and Peace, it's an epic story lacking all the economy of epic poetry.

    Our heroes do a whole lot of walking around and meeting people who tell them bits of ancient history, so the author can convey to the reader how much is at stake and how much will be lost even if we win. You could call it Good vs. Evil: The Travelogue.
  • One-Winged EagleOne-Winged Eagle
    Man is a most complex simple creature: see what he weaves, and how base his reasons for doing so.
    It's the sort of thing that you should read when you're older. Not because somehow it's loftier, but because then you sort of understand what was trying to be done. 

    Also, I'm pretty sure that every other continent besides Middle Earth is claimed by the Valar and the Maia.
  • Mr. DarcyMr. Darcy
    "It is a matter of grave importance that Fairy tales should be respected.... Whosoever alters them to suit his own opinions, whatever they are, is guilty, to our thinking, of an act of presumption, and appropriates to himself what does not belong to him." -- Charles Dickens
    Yes, LotR is so different from prose fiction that came before it that trying to understand what he's trying to do is the first hurdle. It's not a novel. I'm not even sure it's a romance, despite CS Lewis' insistence.

    The least charitable way to accurately put it is that it's a travel narrative made to show off Tolkien's worldbuilding. But there's more to it than that. There were constructed world romances before him, like Barsoom. LotR is more like Morte D'Arthur without the love stories, a Wagnerian attempt to write a national epic in a medium other than poetry. And crucially, it puts his precious elves on the sidelines and makes the little guy the hero.
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