What It's Like Reading Tolkien - The Silmarillion vs. LOTR/The Hobbit

What it's like reading Tolkien. Reading The Silmarillion versus reading The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings

[hian]

You forgot the final stage - when you've read the Silmarillion more than three times and now everything makes sense to you, but you can no longer communicate normally with other human beings and every time you visit the local supermarket you address the clerk by first providing eight generations worth of your lineage.

[jamesburke]

Fist line of the Hobbit: "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit"

First line of LORT: " When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton."

First line of the Silmarillion: "There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Iluvatar; and he made the first Ainur, the Holy Ones, that were the offspring of his thought, and they were with him before aught else was made."

[rothbardfreedom]

If reading the Silmarilion is confusing, imagine the work Christopher did to edit it out from J.'s notes and drafts.

[themole]

Love how different the elves are in each book. In the Hobbit they're all singing "Tralalala Lally come down to the valley" when Bilbo and the dwarves first approached Rivendell. They love dancing, games, drinking wine and teasing the dwarves about their beards. In the Lord of the Rings they're sombre, mysterious, speak in riddles about the stars, the pull to the West and about things that were, are and have yet to come to pass. In the Silmarillion they're bloodthirsty maniacs, fighting wars over shiny bois and massacring therr own cousins who stand in the way of their quest for vengeance.

[genericallyentertaining]

What sort of madman starts rereading a book without even having stood up after finishing it the first time? Absolute legend.

[TheDreamsCo]

"I have no idea what I just read. It was pretty good, though" is probably the most accurate way to describe my experience reading the Silmarillion.

[Ryan_Thompson_Guitarist]

It gets even better when you find out that The Silmarillion was pitched as the sequel to The Hobbit, but the publishers rejected it because they wanted something that 'had hobbits in it'

[jmtheelitefan]

I loved how The Hobbit was a simplistic, classical “character finds his courage” story, then LOTR became a “good vs evil” plot, then The Silmarillion was basically the Bible with Elves, Orcs, Dwarves, and Dragons lol. Tolkien was a master at his craft.
Edit: a year later thanks to a comment, I just realized I’m a dummy who forgot the third “i” in Silmarillion lol.

[jarltrippin]

The Silmarillion is the most demanding book I've ever read and I'm proud of finishing it. I don't know what happened but it was great. I wish modern fantasy authors would seize the opportunity to revel in more archaic prose like Tolkien did. His world and characters are amazing but its his mastery of the English language that really sends you to another world.

And shout-out to Christopher Tolkien, the man did such fantastic editorial work that he basically deserves a writing credit.

[vladimpaler]

I have, since the late 1970's, read The Silmarillion more than 25 times. It is one of the ebooks on my mobile. If I am stuck somewhere I read it again. It is awesome. When you ask people the question, "If you could go back in time what would you do?" a lot of people say, "I would kill Hitler." I answer, "I would go back and give JRR Tolkien a word processing machine so he could write faster, and a bag of gold so he would have time to do it." You can argue I do not have my priorities straight, but people die and literature lives on.

[margarita_k]

The Silmarillion is the first book I read from Tolkien and is by far my favorite one. I like to re-read it from time to time and it always surprises me how every time I notice something new. It's a little masterpiece.

[OverlyAverageBen]

Luckily for us Tolkien fans, there's going to be this brilliant new show made by the illustrious Amazon Studios that tells the story of the 2nd age so we have to read the Sillymillion again. Thank goodness a studio like Amazon are making it! One we can trust and who have never desecrated a fantasy authors work!

[davidguthary]

Currently reading The Silmarillion for the first time. It's great stuff, but it is INCREDIBLY dense and would be almost impossible to follow without the family trees and index of names.

[Latinarama]

Silmarillion is like a synopsis of the entire backstory of Lord of the Rings. It definitely reads like one too, with tons of information squeezed onto every page. Imagine those writings were never published though, nobody would have known just how deeply Tolkien thought all this stuff through.

[alanscott]

Here's my tips:
[1] Listen to the audiobook while reading along,
[2] After reading each chapter, listen to a podcast about that chapter. I listened to The Prancing Pony, The Tolkien Professor, and Talking Tolkien,
[3] Refer frequently to the appendix of names at the back,
[4] Rope other people into reading it with you so you can discuss it (Silmarillion book club),
[5] Take notes in those early chapters with all the Valar, Maiar, and Elven names,
[6] Get the Atlas of Middle Earth (or refer to maps online), and
[7] Down the line, read it again. And again. ∞

After a handful of chapters, your mind starts to click into the style of the writing and it goes much smoother. It is actually quite beautiful, poetical writing, and not like history book writing (which is the cliche that is floating out there).

It is often very big picture, panoramic stuff (the creation of the universe, the movement of whole civilizations, etc.), but then at other times it zooms in on individual, intimate stories.

My personal, anecdotal evidence seems to be that most people who read the Silmarillion have read it numerous times. To read the Silmarillion is to reread the Silmarillion. The first time you survive and are better for it, each additional time for the pleasure and to add depth.

I found the text to be the deepest, densed, most intense work of fantasy I've ever read. Sometimes every few sentences are filled with mindblowing and evocative elements. Whole novels or cycles of novels could be written about just a few sentences. It's beautiful, heady stuff.

[gavinsmith]

*Reads the Fingolfin Morgoth fight*
Me: This is the greatest thing I've ever read.

[Vexarax]

I tried a few times as a Tolkien obsessed kid and had trouble grasping a lot of the stories. Now, as an adult, I'm in awe of this masterpiece. The audiobook version is brilliant too if maybe it would be easier to listen? The stories in it are insane and not to be political, but it's epic that Tolkien was writing genuinely strong women (without it being forced) long before people were burning their bras in the streets. It makes me so mad when people say he was a misogynist for not having enough female characters. Not only does he include women, they often play integral or even hero freaking roles and don't exist solely for marriage and love. And he was writing all of this in the 30s, 40s, and 50s! Silmarillion is a bible for Middle Earth (and is written like a Bible), but it's true within the context of their world :)

[chadia]

🤣🤣 The Silmarillion is my favourite book ever. It reads like real history to me. After I finish it, I always have to remind myself it's not true. 😅 But as you said, it definitely needs to be read a few times. I´ve read it at least 10 times. 😅

[celticwarrior]

It’s also interesting to see how the lore significantly changes from The Silmarillion to the 3 stand-alone tales of Turin, Beren and Luthien, and the fall of Gondolin.

[yisroelackerman]

"The Children of Hurin" is my personal favorite. It brings a lot of the Silmarillion to life, it stops being confusing, and you just want to know more.