XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien   
   From: g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies   
      
   In message    
     Steve Hayes  wrote:   
   > On Thu, 2 Aug 2012 09:38:52 +0000 (UTC), Lewis   
   >  wrote:   
      
   >>To mean it reads like an old English Professor getting mad because   
   >>people are laughing at a Shakespeare Comedy instead of treating it as the   
   >>serious scholarly work he imagines it to be.   
      
   > Tolkien and Lewis WERE old English professors.   
      
   Yes, but I was talking about *Christopher* Tolkien, not JRR. I have no   
   idea if JRR himself ever said anything about movies or not. He did sell   
   the rights to have movies made, so he couldn't have been that opposed to   
   the idea. Certainly Christopher Tolkien would *never* have sold the   
   rights for films of any kind.   
      
   > Though I haven't seen the films (I don't want them to mess with the pictures   
   > in my head), I think the thing that really makes people see them   
   superficially   
   > is computer games of the 1980s and 1990s, when people ask about the relative   
   > "powers" of the likes of Gandalf and Sauron as if it is "power" that counts.   
   > To do that is to miss the point of the story, which is that Sauron is   
   > defeated, not by power, but by weakness.   
      
   I've always maintained that the essential point<1> of the book is that   
   Frodo *fails* in his quest. In the end, the ring is too strong and Frodo   
   is corrupted by it. This is something that many people don't seem to   
   understand, despite it being made painfully obvious, or they gloss over   
   it. It is also important that despite Frodo's ultimate failure, he is   
   still rightfully hailed as a hero.   
      
   Does anyone other than Sam know the whole story? Does Frodo carry his   
   failure as a shameful secret or not? Should he be ashamed? Gandalf   
   certainly would not think less of him, but would the others?   
      
   <1> Well, one of several dozen "essential" points.   
      
   --   
   SOURCERERS MAKE THEIR OWN DESTINY. THEY TOUCH THE EARTH LIGHTLY.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)