Read or Listen?

[Nerwen]

Interesting. I have never heard a dramatisation of "Lord of the Rings", so I can't go from personal experience on that one. Generally, I've found adaptations of books create slight jarring, because the voices of the characters aren't the way I imagine them.

On the other hand, my first introduction to LOTR was being read to by my mother– she read it to my brothers and me every night for about a year... and that is where my mental image of the characters, including their voices, was set in the first place. (My mother has a fairly low voice and can imitate a male voice without much trouble.)