The Good and the Not So Good

As I said, the vast majority of fantasy literature is utterly derivative crap. But when you do find that diamond in the rough, there is no greater feeling. It validates all the time wasted with horrible characters, paper thin plotting and inane dialogue. When fantasy lit. is good, it's really really good. When its bad, it's abominable.

So, lets start with the Good, and then we'll venture out to stuff you shouldn't touch with a 10 foot pole.

The Good.

You can say that modern fantasy fiction begins and ends with JRR Tolkien. There are others, like CS Lewis, ER Eddison and Mervyn Peake, but Tolkien's influence on what followed him borders on the ridiculous. And while many modern hacks copy Lord of the Rings down to the hair on their halfling's feet, what many of them don't (or can't) copy is being able to tell a good story. In the end, that's the appeal of Lord of the Rings. It's a breath-taking (and I mean that literally) story. And it does this with a largely unremarkable cast of characters. (Gandalf being a major exception) Sure they all get their moments to shine, but they are all more or less instruments of the plot. But when the plot is this finely constructed, I can live with ho-hum characters. I can even live with Samwise Gamgee...barely. Sam was portrayed nicely in the movie. In the book, it's a different story. His love and devotion to Frodo is so single-minded, so all consuming, it's frightening. It's not a sexual love at all, just a fanatical need to serve. Maybe this type of master/servant relationship was common as the Victorian age came to an end, but to modern audiences, it just seems bizarre and oft-putting. Now Sam's love of Frodo does help explain some of the rather heroic deeds Sam is able to accomplish later in the trilogy, but I found myself actively cheering for Sam's demise. And if he mentions his "Gaffer" one more time....ARRRGHHH!!! Aside from Sam, there are no blatantly offensive characters, and some like Gollum & Frodo are incredible creations while Gandalf has become the template for kindly old wizards everywhere. (Obi-Wan Kenobi anyone?)

But back to the story. There are passages as Frodo & Sam journey to Mordor that will have you hesitant to turn the page because you just know there's no possible way they can survive. Yet survive they do, only to fall into a mess far worse, then worse again. And the way they survive the horrors of Mordor are always believable. No deux ex machina here (well, not much anyway ;) )Everything fits together, everything is logical, everything makes sense (this is the part modern authors don't copy). An Olympian task for over one thousand pages of text, yet Tolkien pulls it off. And the climax to Return of the King is a scene that you will never ever forget for all of its perfection. It fits superbly with what has gone before. And really, its the way things should turn out according to the flow of the plot and what we know of all the characters. One could argue that the anti-climax is largely redundant, but after the chaos of Mordor, it's a nice change of pace, and it does tie up some loose ends rather nicely. My only quibble with the plot structure is that I wish the Fellowship could have stayed together a bit longer. It seems a lot of time is spent establishing a very interesting group dynamic, only to have thrown out the window when Frodo & Sam cross the river after the Orc attack. But that is a small, insignificant complaint. The plot requires the Fellowship to break at that point, so break it must. It sets the stage for the majesty of what is to come.

A few words concerning the other Middle-Earth books JRR Tolkien worked on, The Hobbit and The Silmarillion. His son Christopher is responsible for the History of Middle-Earth series. The Hobbit was intended as a children's book and its noticeably less dark than Lord of the Rings. It is the prequel to Lord of the Rings and it does a nice job of introducing the world of Middle-Earth and all of its inhabitants. Though Orcs are called Goblins, and the Trolls seem to speak with British Cockney accents. However a very significant event happens in The Hobbit, which has a direct impact upon Lord of the Rings. This event really has little to do with Smaug the Dragon, but if you read the Hobbit before Lord of the Rings, there'll be a moment early on in Fellowship of the Ring, where'll you know information before even Gandalf figures it out. I always thought that was cool trick for Tolkien to pull off. Comparing The Hobbit to Lord of the Rings is not really fair. They're two different works with two different purposes for two different audiences. Taken by itself, The Hobbit is an enjoyable book. A bit slow in places, kind of tedious in others, but entertaining nonetheless.

As for The Silmarillion...yikes. Unless you are a HARD CORE fan of Middle-Earth, avoid The Silmarillion. It's basically The Bible of Middle-Earth. The creation myth of the Elves is there, along with the origins of all the races of Middle-Earth and Sauron. It's akin to reading a text book of an ancient civilization. It covers thousands of years of history, and the names!!!! Hundreds and hundreds of elf names on every page. It's a very hard book to read. The amount of detail Tolkien created for Middle-Earth is mind boggling. I might hazard a guess that he was obsessive-compulsive, because The Silmarillion is that dense with intricate information. It also gives Tolkien the opportunity to show-off the three Elf languages he made up. Yep, you read that right, he made up 3 complete working languages (and alphabets). Who would even think of doing such a thing these days? The man was either a genius or just bonkers (or just a guy with too much time on his hands). One of the neat things of the Silmarillion is that it does give a complete history of the elves. So when Elrond or Galadriel mentions an elf name in Lord of the Rings, even if its just a passing reference, there's a LOT of history behind that remark. You get the notion of how ancient the Elves really are, and thus how doubly tragic it is for them to leave Middle-Earth and sail to the West. It's the end of a long, long, long saga.

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Yes, there is fantasy out there that's not Tolkien. We'll get to that later...and also, the stuff that's leagues and leagues away from Tolkien.

Back to Books more of the Good stuff...