[jallanite]

Originally Posted by littlemanpoet

But the greatest reason is that Tolkien was writing about things that partake of our heritage. I knew deep down in my bones that, somehow, this was real.

What is our heritage? Are you suggesting that only people descended mostly from English stock can appreciate Tolkien while Spaniards and Turks and Indonesians and Scots and Irish and others cannot? Or do you mean something else?

And in reality you cannot know anything in your bones. This story, as you should know by now, was invented by Tolkien, though parts of it are derived from motifs in older stories.

I agree with you that many, including myself, very much wanted the story to be real. Others point to other books that have similarly inspired them, notably Ayn Rand’s book Atlas Shrugged.

Thus, it took on greater significance for me than anything else I had ever read, maybe even the bible. This, at least, is the relationship of this reader to the text.

Thanks for sharing this. Many of us have encountered a book which seemed to contain all wisdom. For me it was James Branch Cabell’s Jurgen.