Curated playlist
Themes of The Lord of the Rings
- Tolkien's Middle-earth family treesTolkien's family trees helped him check his own drafting for mistakes. They also let him play with names.
- Company of the RingThe Company of the Ring, also known as the Fellowship of the Ring and the Nine Walkers, is a band of nine travellers sent out to face nine enemies. J. R. R. Tolkien says he fixed the number on purpose. It was meant to match and oppose the…
- Addiction to power in The Lord of the RingsIn The Lord of the Rings, Sméagol murdered his friend Déagol to take the Ring. It gave him five centuries of ruin.
- Poetry in The Lord of the RingsThe Lord of the Rings has 61 poems, and most readers skip them. A Tolkien scholar says the verse is essential.
- Quests in Middle-earthIn The Lord of the Rings, the hero carries the greatest prize and hopes to destroy it.
- Sound and language in Middle-earthTolkien printed an Elvish poem in The Fellowship of the Ring with no translation at all.
- Christianity in Middle-earthTolkien warned that spelling out Christian faith in his fantasy would be "fatal." So he wove it into the story instead.
- Tolkien and raceIn 1938, a German publisher asked Tolkien to prove he was of pure Aryan descent. He found it deeply offensive.
- Tolkien's mapsThe heavy line on Tolkien's Hobbit maps was a school paper margin. It said "Do not write in this margin".
- Women in The Lord of the RingsEleven women appear in The Lord of the Rings, and scholars still debate what they mean.
- Themes of The Lord of the RingsIn The Lord of the Rings, Frodo carries a treasure to destroy it, not to win it. Critics call this quest backward.