(no subject)

[camwyn]

So apparently the latest posthumous novel from J. R. R. Tolkien is out: The Children of Hurin was advertised in a Barnes and Noble email today. I don't know if it's actually out or if that was a 'come pre-order with us!' message or what, but even as something of a Tolkienista I'm really not interested. Yes, he worked on that part of his legend-lore all his life; yes, he considered it his most significant work, or somewhere close to it. I don't much care. The whole Narn i Hin Hurin in the Silmarillion and the History of Middle-earth volumes was just too depressingly un-original for me to be interested. I could just as easily get the exact same story, minus the orcs and elves and dragon, in the Kalevala. Then it'd at least have interesting cultural elements from a civilization I was interested in. This? This is nothing I haven't read a hundred times before.

No offense to Christopher Tolkien, who I am willing to allow probably put a lot of effort into finishing up his father's final big manuscript, but I'm not buying this one and I'm probably not even getting it from the library. I'm just not interested.

Comments

[morelindo.livejournal.com]

This is nothing I haven't read a hundred times before.

Exactly. And actually I am quite sceptical about everything that carries the name of Christopher Tolkien. It all looks like "hey, look what I found in my father's writing desk after he was dead! Can we make money with this?"

[camwyn]

I'll give Chris Tolkien this:

1. He's mostly just editing what his dad already had on paper, rather than making stuff up and saying 'oh, Dad and I were planning on working on this when he died' (Brian Herbert, don't think I don't know what atrocities you perpetuated upon your father's work! NOT CANON, NOT CANON AT ALL!), and

2. Tolkien really did think that his Children of Hurin stuff was the hottest hotness to ever hot up the literary scene. I'm not sure why he was so proud of that segment of his work, but he was- and he probably would've put as much enthusiasm into getting the damn book out as Chris did, were he still alive.

[silly-dan.livejournal.com]

I'll probably read it eventually, even though I'd much rather it had been about Beren and Luthien.

[camwyn]

"She was the PRETTIEST ELF CHICK EVER and she had GORGEOUS HAIR and she could SING and she looked just like my wife."

Versus,

"SISTERFUCKER! And a dragon! AHAHAHAHAHA CLASSIC LITERARY THEME AHAHAHAHAHA hoo boy I'mma genius."

[silly-dan.livejournal.com]

Don't forget the magical talking dog. 8)

In all seriousness, the Beren and Luthien story always seemed to me to be a more important story when I read The Silmarillion (probably due to the closer LOTR connections), whereas the story of Turin never stuck with me as much more than "more unpleasant things happened in the First Age."

[lyorn.livejournal.com]

For me the main difference was that I wished someone would slap some sense into Turin, while Beren and Luthien seemed generally competent and reasonable.

[mephron]

There's a review of it up at Salon:

http://www.salon.com/books/feature/2007/04/17/hurin/

"If you're looking for the accessibility, lyrical sweep and above all the optimism of "Lord of the Rings," well, you'd better go back and read it again. There are no hobbits here, no Tom Bombadil, no cozy roadside inns and precious little fireside cheer of any variety found here. This is a tale whose hero is guilty of repeated treachery and murder, a story of rape and pillage and incest and greed and famous battles that ought never to have been fought. If "Lord of the Rings" is a story where good conquers evil, this one moves inexorably in the other direction."

[the_croupier]

I'm sorry, but I completely disagree with the comment above regarding Chris Tolkien's books. These aren't some cynical attempt to make money off of his father. Chris Tolkien has undertaken a truly incredible feat of editing that offers an unprecedented look at the creative process in action.

The History of Middle Earth is as close as we're ever going to get to a behind-the-scenes look at an entire literary lifetime, short of visiting an archive and pouring through an author's collected papers, which is something the vast majority of people are not in a position to do.

The series doesn't get anything like the credit it deserves, particularly from people who want to be writers.