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<blockquote data-quote="fanboy2000" data-source="post: 5846089" data-attributes="member: 19998"><p>My own experience with LotR is more complex. I got into D&D in the mid-90s when I was in the Navy and wanted to read LotR because I was given to believe that it's contents reflected the background info in AD&D books. I started with The Hobbit, and I enjoyed it. When I got to Fellowship, however, I found that I didn't like it. I stopped a little more than half way through Fellowship. Mostly, I didn't like the pacing. But I also felt like I was reading a scholarly work where I didn't know all the terms of art and was missing half the information I needed to enjoy it.</p><p></p><p>My experience with LotR kept me from reading more fantasy. I figured that since most fantasy was inspired by LotR, then I probably wouldn't like it. (I did read Liber's stories though) Recently, I started reading Howard's Conan stories (which, I recently learned, pre-date the Hobbit) and really enjoyed them. I remember working at a game store and a customer saying that Tolkin was the greatest fantasy writer ever I said I didn't think so. He asked me to name someone better. Since I didn't read a lot of fantasy though, I said I didn't have a better one in mind. But that's been pretty much my attitude, I can't really criticize someone's writing if I don't enjoy the genere they're writing in. Now that I've read more, I feel like I can revisit the books.</p><p></p><p>I actually haven't encountered a lot of strong criticism of LotR. I've seen gamers who acknowledge there are aspects of it they don't like, but few people actively <em>dislike</em> it. Mind you, I've seen non-gamers who don't like Tolkin at all.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>It's been awhile since I've last checked the books out, but I think you're wrong. For example, The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan is very fast paced. It was published in the UK in 1915, several decades before LotR.</p><p></p><p>Of course, The Thirty-Nine Steps isn't fantasy, but there's a difference between LotR and other fantasy stories is that a lot fantasy was published in pulp magazines first. This means that the dominate form was short stories or serialized novels or novellas. A novel meant to be serialized in a magazine is going to have different pacing than a novel meant to be published at once, but spread out in three novel-sized books. So, while I can claim out that Howard's Conan stories are better paced than LotR, we run into the problem that Howard was writing for a different outlet.</p><p></p><p>Certainly, most of the stuff I've read that was published before LotR or around the same time is paced, IMO, better. Certainly pulp novels like A Princess of Mars are paced <em>very</em> differently from LotR</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="fanboy2000, post: 5846089, member: 19998"] My own experience with LotR is more complex. I got into D&D in the mid-90s when I was in the Navy and wanted to read LotR because I was given to believe that it's contents reflected the background info in AD&D books. I started with The Hobbit, and I enjoyed it. When I got to Fellowship, however, I found that I didn't like it. I stopped a little more than half way through Fellowship. Mostly, I didn't like the pacing. But I also felt like I was reading a scholarly work where I didn't know all the terms of art and was missing half the information I needed to enjoy it. My experience with LotR kept me from reading more fantasy. I figured that since most fantasy was inspired by LotR, then I probably wouldn't like it. (I did read Liber's stories though) Recently, I started reading Howard's Conan stories (which, I recently learned, pre-date the Hobbit) and really enjoyed them. I remember working at a game store and a customer saying that Tolkin was the greatest fantasy writer ever I said I didn't think so. He asked me to name someone better. Since I didn't read a lot of fantasy though, I said I didn't have a better one in mind. But that's been pretty much my attitude, I can't really criticize someone's writing if I don't enjoy the genere they're writing in. Now that I've read more, I feel like I can revisit the books. I actually haven't encountered a lot of strong criticism of LotR. I've seen gamers who acknowledge there are aspects of it they don't like, but few people actively [i]dislike[/i] it. Mind you, I've seen non-gamers who don't like Tolkin at all. It's been awhile since I've last checked the books out, but I think you're wrong. For example, The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan is very fast paced. It was published in the UK in 1915, several decades before LotR. Of course, The Thirty-Nine Steps isn't fantasy, but there's a difference between LotR and other fantasy stories is that a lot fantasy was published in pulp magazines first. This means that the dominate form was short stories or serialized novels or novellas. A novel meant to be serialized in a magazine is going to have different pacing than a novel meant to be published at once, but spread out in three novel-sized books. So, while I can claim out that Howard's Conan stories are better paced than LotR, we run into the problem that Howard was writing for a different outlet. Certainly, most of the stuff I've read that was published before LotR or around the same time is paced, IMO, better. Certainly pulp novels like A Princess of Mars are paced [i]very[/i] differently from LotR [/QUOTE]
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