Just the useless stuff I tend to distract myself with, but that I enjoy quite a lot. I've been rereading Lord of The Rings and it is such an incredible damn story, especially after reading the Silmarillion which I recently got. You really feel like you're witnessing the last days of this dying world and all the remnants of its once glorious and happy past are slowly being eroded away by the sands of time and hatred. There is no story quite like it out there.
Middle-Earth is the most fully realized fictional world you can ever get lost in and its people and stories and beauty are truly incredible. The Hobbit and the Valfenda of the Silmarillion are such joyous works with so much wonder and tragedy but when you head to Lord of The Rings you truly start to realize how far the world has fallen from grace since those times. LOTR is a very dark and somber work and it couldnt be set in a most perfect time in Middle-Earth, the darkness and hopelessness have set in for this world and everyone can only wait as this world slowly consumes itself until there is nothing left. All the happiness and glee and nice things of the last ages are all being snuffed out and everyone is tired and sad and fleeing.
This is my favorite written work of all time. It has so much detail and such a melancholy to it, Tolkien will meticulously describe the environment of every single place, you really feel like you're in there and the themes of war, hopelessness, addiction and most surprisingly, true friendship really resonated with me, Sam and Frodo are legit best fictional friendship to me, they will go to the ends of the earth for eachother and it's so fuckin beautiful idc if it's corny to say this but I cry every time at the Mt Doom chapter. It's so wholesome and pure for a story as dark as this, even in a truly hopeless world and insurmountable odds their friendship still stands to the end.
I could spend hours on end talking about every single aspect I like about this book, the beautiful songs and rhyming schemes, the sceneries, creativity, Aragorn's plot that I failed to mention until now, the way the Fellowship are given such distinct personalities and feel so human, the languages, culture, backstories, events, it's all perfect. Tolkien's experience with the War is also really apparent in Book 4 at Mordor.
“They lie in all the pools, pale faces, deep deep under the dark water. I saw them: grim faces and evil, and noble faces and sad. Many faces proud and fair, and weeds in their silver hair. But all foul, all rotting, all dead.”