Survivor Appendix N Authors- LEIBER WINS!

[Dioltach]

There's also Benjamin Bagby's recital of Beowulf in the original Old English. I saw him perform it live about 25 years ago, and luckily it's been released on CD since then. It really shows the power and beauty of Old English and alliterative poetry (which also comes through, to a slightly lesser extent, in Tolkien's Rhohirric poetry and songs).

 

[Prakriti]

Considering RE Howard, Jack Vance, Poul Anderson, and HP Lovecraft were some of the first people to be knocked out, maybe we can just all agree that the final list should be read in reverse order.

 

[TiwazTyrsfist]

Bellairs, John 11
Burroughs, Edgar Rice 16
Carter, Lin 14
de Camp & Pratt 11
Dunsany, Lord 17
Fox, Gardner 15
Leiber, Fritz 18
Merritt, A. 18
Offutt, Andrew J. 14
Pratt, Fletcher 12
St. Clair, Margaret 14
Tolkien, J.R.R. 7
Wellman, Manley Wade 14
Williamson, Jack 18
Zelazny, Roger 20

 

[Ed Laprade]

Bellairs, John 11
Burroughs, Edgar Rice 16 +1 = 17
Carter, Lin 14
de Camp & Pratt 11
Dunsany, Lord 17
Fox, Gardner 15
Leiber, Fritz 18
Merritt, A. 18
Offutt, Andrew J. 14
Pratt, Fletcher 12
St. Clair, Margaret 14
Tolkien, J.R.R. 7 -2 = 5
Wellman, Manley Wade 14
Williamson, Jack 18
Zelazny, Roger 20

 

[Hriston]

Bellairs, John 11
Burroughs, Edgar Rice 17
Carter, Lin 14
de Camp & Pratt 11
Dunsany, Lord 17
Fox, Gardner 15
Leiber, Fritz 18
Merritt, A. 18
Offutt, Andrew J. 14
Pratt, Fletcher 12
St. Clair, Margaret 14
Tolkien, J.R.R. 6
Wellman, Manley Wade 14
Williamson, Jack 18
Zelazny, Roger 18

 

[tglassy]

You are killing Smeagol a little more with every down vote! Even Frodo took pity on him!

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Toledo]

Bellairs, John 11
Burroughs, Edgar Rice 17
Carter, Lin 14
de Camp & Pratt 11
Dunsany, Lord 17
Fox, Gardner 15
Leiber, Fritz 18
Merritt, A. 18
Offutt, Andrew J. 14
Pratt, Fletcher 12
St. Clair, Margaret 14
Tolkien, J.R.R. 6+1=7
Wellman, Manley Wade 14
Williamson, Jack 18
Zelazny, Roger 18-2=16

 

[squibbles]

Seriously dude? Chainmail, the foundation for D&D literally had Balrogs, Ents, elves, dwarves and Hobbits and you think Tolkien wasn't an inspiration for the foundation? The fact that Tolkien's world wasn't about killing creatures for their loot isn't relevant to whether or not Tolkien was a huge inspiration. Inspiration does not equate to mirroring exactly. If it did, it wouldn't be inspiration, it would be plagiarism.

Yeah, you're right about inspiration. That's why I noted that 'D&D borrows a lot from Tolkien'. The influence is clear; the Balor in the 5e Monster Manual has a sword and flaming whip just like LotR's Balrog.

Maybe I'm just being contrarian, but it seems to me like the Tolkien influences are all very surface level. They are a big part of the game's content, but the activities that PCs get up to and the motivations that PCs have for those activities are intended (by Gygax) to be a lot more like Cugel the Clever's than Bilbo and Frodo's.

That's not to say that Bilbo and Frodo don't do any dungeon crawling, they clearly do. The difference is that both hobbit characters end up in dungeons mostly by accident (the goblin tunnels, the wood elf dungeon, Moria), don't want to be in them, and flee from them at the earliest opportunity.

Squibbles said that Gary consistently argued that D&D's foundational inspiration came from other sources. That is true. Gary has said that. Gary never said that Tolkien wasn't an inspiration

This guy gets me! It's always nice to have one's intended meaning correctly understood.

 

[Rydac]

Bellairs, John 11
Burroughs, Edgar Rice 17
Carter, Lin 14
de Camp & Pratt 11
Dunsany, Lord 17
Fox, Gardner 13
Leiber, Fritz 18
Merritt, A. 18
Offutt, Andrew J. 14
Pratt, Fletcher 12
St. Clair, Margaret 14
Tolkien, J.R.R. 6+1=7
Wellman, Manley Wade 14
Williamson, Jack 18
Zelazny, Roger 17