The Guardian reviews the new, uh, Tolkien

[dianeduane]

"My name is Turambar," cried Turin, "and Evil have been all my ways."

"And my name is Niniel," wept Nienor as they fell into each other's arms and she became heavy with child.

And lo, when Glaurung told her she had shagged her brother and Turin had been slain on his quest to rescue Húrin, she threw herself into a ravine. Yet Turin was mere wounded, and once he discovered Nienor's fate, he slew Glaurung before turning his sword on himself. So it was that no one lived happily ever after.

(snort)

Comments

[wolfette]

the kind of ending that goes down well in classic Chinese or Indian drama.

[(Anonymous)]

Bill Shakespeare and Sophocles both did "boffo box office" with very similar endings. (Sufficiently so that it reads like a Romeo and Juliet/Œdipus mash-up.

[cmdr-zoom.livejournal.com]

Daggers fall! Everyone dies!

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

*snerk*

[seiberwing.livejournal.com]

I know. I was just thinking that I'd seen this play before.

[seldearslj.livejournal.com]

*sporfle*

[heliona.livejournal.com]

I'm fairly certain that Tolkien didn't write 'shagged'!!

Weird how they've intermixed the Tolkien-esque style of writing with coloquial. It really seems out of place. I'd have just stuck to it being colloquial!

One has to laugh, though! *g*

[taldragon.livejournal.com]

that's the Guardian - their digested reads are usually a mix of the book and the reviewer's opinions.

with the aim of being as snarky as possible, obviously ;)

[heliona.livejournal.com]

It was funnier once I'd read the whole thing! (Being the nit-picking Tolkienite that I am, I did notice a few errors in the text (and I don't mean errors on purpose)! *sigh* Sometimes I wish I wasn't like that. It's like I can't watch anything with sailing in it without noticing everything that's wrong!

(Although it was funny to begin with.)

To be honest, as far as the snark went, I think it could have a little more sophisticated, which I would have expected from the Guardian. It kind of falls a little flat - it would have made more of an impact if it'd been cleverer, I think.

[anamin.livejournal.com]

*snerk*

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

*snork*

Thank you for the link.

It made my morning.

[the-gneech.livejournal.com]

...at which point, they all spontaneously broke into song.

-The Gneech

[triad-serpent.livejournal.com]

Teehee. Very amusing. ^^

[estara.livejournal.com]

Only the British can write it like that.

~ says the German in awe and silly pleasure, albeit sorry for the fact that the book seems worse than the Silmarillion.

[nwhyte]

I thought the book was much better than the Guardian did!

[trialia]

Ahaha! Oy vey...

I won't be getting to this one for a while yet, I don't think. Still fighting my way through Unfinished Tales, off and on.

[eavanmoore.livejournal.com]

Nice icon.

[trialia]

Thanks! Gotta love Wicked. ^_^ I cosplay Elphaba at pretty much all the cons where I end up. :)

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

[trdsf.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, that's pretty much how I remember Tolkien... I set LotR aside in the mid-70s and to this day have had no desire to pick it back up again.

[lizardqueen.livejournal.com]

Snort indeed! The Hurin/Turin stuff has always been my least favorite thread of all Tolks's work. In fact, I actually HATE it. It's just so grim and grotty and nasty...obviously it emerged from a very dark part of its author's psyche.

I mean, not that the Sil is any daisy-strewn romp in the park, and LOTR itself has its bleak moments, certainly...but really. That nice old jolly paternal-looking philology don could sure write a bummer when he felt like it.

So no sympathy for Hurin and his kids from me. They annoy me and bore me beyond belief. Now, Tuor and Idril, THERE's some fun folks!