Title: The Fellowship of the Ring
Author: J. R. R. Tolkien
Pages: 423
Finished: July 4, 2019
First Sentence: 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.
Summary: First part of a trilogy. Bilbo Baggins decides to retire from Hobbit life and go on more adventures, leaving his ring behind for Frodo. Little does Frodo know, this small, golden ring is actually The One Ring made by Sauron to control all the world. With the help of his friends, it's up to him to get the Ring to Rivendell where hopefully someone else will take up the burden of destroying it.
Thoughts: My experience with this trilogy: My dad read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings to us when I was around 8. I tried reading the trilogy again in high school when the movies were coming out, but found them to be dull and difficult to get through. I listened to the books on Audio post college while shelving books.
This is my first time reading them in a decade. For the most part, I really enjoyed the first book this read through. As I have more experience, I kept comparing the book to the movie. The main difference is the time. It takes multiple chapters before there's even talk of Frodo leaving the Shire with the Ring. And then it takes multiple chapters to get out of the Shire.
In general, one of the things I really like about this story is the friendships and loyalty. I've mentioned it with the four hobbits, but then, when you add Aragorn into the mix, there's something quite lovely about those five.
Really, I don't have a whole lot to say on the book other than I enjoyed reading it in between some of the other things I was reading. It was nice to have a straightforward adventure. I'm curious to see how the other two books fare, as I think Two Towers was where I got bored last time.
Back to comparing with the movies. One thing I have said time and again is that I will give a movie a pass for being "unfaithful" provided it keeps the spirit of the book. Movies and books are separate entities, and often when a movie keeps too close to the source material, the movie becomes boring. I've long maintained that the LoTR movies are spiritually very close to the books. At least with the Fellowship of the Ring, I feel the movie did a great job adapting the book. Sure each episode is shortened and lesser characters are left out. Some things are changed for time. I feel like the Fellowship was on par. We see Boromir falling prey to the Ring's power, even as he's a good man for the most part. We see the grief after Gandalf falls to the Balrog. We see Legolas and Gimli bicker, though as of yet, they have little to no part of the story. Now that the party has splintered, I imagine we'll see more of them.
I'm glad I took on this challenge. Finishing Fellowship means I can strike another book off my Classics Club list, and I'm just a bit closer to finishing this challenge. I have to get through about 9 chapters of The Two Towers by the end of this month to get back on track.
This is my first time reading them in a decade. For the most part, I really enjoyed the first book this read through. As I have more experience, I kept comparing the book to the movie. The main difference is the time. It takes multiple chapters before there's even talk of Frodo leaving the Shire with the Ring. And then it takes multiple chapters to get out of the Shire.
In general, one of the things I really like about this story is the friendships and loyalty. I've mentioned it with the four hobbits, but then, when you add Aragorn into the mix, there's something quite lovely about those five.
Really, I don't have a whole lot to say on the book other than I enjoyed reading it in between some of the other things I was reading. It was nice to have a straightforward adventure. I'm curious to see how the other two books fare, as I think Two Towers was where I got bored last time.
Back to comparing with the movies. One thing I have said time and again is that I will give a movie a pass for being "unfaithful" provided it keeps the spirit of the book. Movies and books are separate entities, and often when a movie keeps too close to the source material, the movie becomes boring. I've long maintained that the LoTR movies are spiritually very close to the books. At least with the Fellowship of the Ring, I feel the movie did a great job adapting the book. Sure each episode is shortened and lesser characters are left out. Some things are changed for time. I feel like the Fellowship was on par. We see Boromir falling prey to the Ring's power, even as he's a good man for the most part. We see the grief after Gandalf falls to the Balrog. We see Legolas and Gimli bicker, though as of yet, they have little to no part of the story. Now that the party has splintered, I imagine we'll see more of them.
I'm glad I took on this challenge. Finishing Fellowship means I can strike another book off my Classics Club list, and I'm just a bit closer to finishing this challenge. I have to get through about 9 chapters of The Two Towers by the end of this month to get back on track.
It's been well over two decades for me since I read the trilogy, but I agree with a lot of your points. The relationships between the members of the fellowship were the most endearing aspects of the book. It does move incredibly slow as Tolkien made these stories incredibly dense with a rich history. It's definitely important to view the film trilogy as its own art form, but those movies definitely captured the spirit of the books.
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