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Yeah, it's true.
Hello, my name is Bjorn, and I'm... not excited about the Lord of the Rings movie.
This occurred to me as I was driving to work this morning and saw the "FRODO LIVES" sign that someone had hung from a pedestrian bridge over SR-520.
It's not that I don't think that Lord of the Rings is a classic work.
It's not that I am incapable of appreciating Tolkien's work, or that I'm not aware that he more or less created the high fantasy genre all by himself. That's a seriously impressive achievement, and I'm in awe of him for that.
But the problem is -- his world just never inspired me. And here is why:
Firstly, I've never cared for High Fantasy all that much, unless it's the mannerpunk stuff that started coming out in the late 1990s (Steven Brust, Ellen Kushner, and the like) where everything revolves around byzantine court politics. (I love that stuff.) The straight questing High Fantasy of the Belgariad and the like just never really excited me all that much. It's just not a story that resonates for me.
Secondly, the first High Fantasy I ever read was recent High Fantasy, after authors have had a century to refine the tropes and character types and story ideas that Tolkien originally came up with... not to mention develop more enjoyable authorial "voices". This made it really hard to go back and read older fantasy and enjoy it -- it always seemed derivative and dull, despite the fact that it was the recent High Fantasy that was derivative.
Here's what I learned: when exploring a genre that is new to you, always read books in the genre in chronological order, until you have a pretty good idea of the structure and development of said genre. That way, you will be able to appreciate all eras of the genre -- you'll have the appropriate nostalgia for the early stuff, and be properly excited by the new stuff.
...Now, my Tokien-loving friends, I realize that the man was one of the very first builders of fantastical worlds, and that modern SF and fantasy could not exist without him. I really respect that.
But I didn't spend my childhood dreaming of Middle Earth, and the Ring never bound me.
I love the stars, and the steam, and the software, and that's where my heart remains.
So enjoy your movie, my friends. I'll get around to watching it at some point.
Hello, my name is Bjorn, and I'm... not excited about the Lord of the Rings movie.
This occurred to me as I was driving to work this morning and saw the "FRODO LIVES" sign that someone had hung from a pedestrian bridge over SR-520.
It's not that I don't think that Lord of the Rings is a classic work.
It's not that I am incapable of appreciating Tolkien's work, or that I'm not aware that he more or less created the high fantasy genre all by himself. That's a seriously impressive achievement, and I'm in awe of him for that.
But the problem is -- his world just never inspired me. And here is why:
Firstly, I've never cared for High Fantasy all that much, unless it's the mannerpunk stuff that started coming out in the late 1990s (Steven Brust, Ellen Kushner, and the like) where everything revolves around byzantine court politics. (I love that stuff.) The straight questing High Fantasy of the Belgariad and the like just never really excited me all that much. It's just not a story that resonates for me.
Secondly, the first High Fantasy I ever read was recent High Fantasy, after authors have had a century to refine the tropes and character types and story ideas that Tolkien originally came up with... not to mention develop more enjoyable authorial "voices". This made it really hard to go back and read older fantasy and enjoy it -- it always seemed derivative and dull, despite the fact that it was the recent High Fantasy that was derivative.
Here's what I learned: when exploring a genre that is new to you, always read books in the genre in chronological order, until you have a pretty good idea of the structure and development of said genre. That way, you will be able to appreciate all eras of the genre -- you'll have the appropriate nostalgia for the early stuff, and be properly excited by the new stuff.
...Now, my Tokien-loving friends, I realize that the man was one of the very first builders of fantastical worlds, and that modern SF and fantasy could not exist without him. I really respect that.
But I didn't spend my childhood dreaming of Middle Earth, and the Ring never bound me.
I love the stars, and the steam, and the software, and that's where my heart remains.
So enjoy your movie, my friends. I'll get around to watching it at some point.