How have you read it?

[Guinevere]

I have not, to this day, read all the 'lays' and poems, Ugh!! they're too long!

I usually skip the poems and the songs...I find them long and boring.

What a pity! Do you generally dislike poetry, then? I love most of the poems in LotR and I even know my favourite ones by heart! (No need to look them up ) Tolkien's language is so beautiful!
Already when reading "The Hobbit" for the first time, the dwarves' song delighted me, (even if I had to look up a lot of ancient words in the dictionary)
And I never would have thought that I would develop a taste for alliterative verse, but now I relish "Out of dark, out of doubt, to the days rising... etc" !

It does credit to Tolkien that his works appeal to so many different people with quite different tastes. Some are more Hobbit lovers, some prefer the heroic battles - there is something for nearly everybody.

[Kath]

I love the songs and poems but I often find that they break up the story too much for me. If I just pick up one of the books and read from any old place and there happens to be a poem I will then read it but if I'm really into the story and I've begun from the start of a book then a poem just seems to be in the way.

I did learn the Oliphaunt song by heart though!

[littlemanpoet]

In my first couple of readings I skipped some of the Elvish songs, but not the Hobbity ones. But Tolkien's poetry has grown on me and now I consider them to be integral to the story. In a certain sense, to me anyway, they are the story.

[Eonwe]

sam's poem about the troll is awesomely hillarious. i always relish the time leadnig upt to it . it says so much about sam (the fact taht no one knew he was such a verse writter)...

the poetry is amazing in general. i love coming to a song i know of and rereading it. such as galadrial's song of regret/whatever when the fellowship leaves lorien. or gimli's song about kazad-dum. or sams song of teh oliphant.

i like how becuase i know the plot, i can focus on different things. like sometime i'll puzzle out teh mystery of aragon's kingship. or another time ill focus on sam adn frodo's journey. one thing i've always wanted to do (but it would be increaibley hard. maybe ill do it in the summer when i have time) is draw up a really detailed map of middle-earth and plot things on it. just read through and plot where this person in when sam and frodo are here, etc. i think that would be so awesome. then i could pin it on my wall and worship it every night.

[Holbytlass]

I just really like silly poems, lymericks stuff like that, I prefer things that rhyme.
I should have been more specific, I love and have memorized (singing them to my children) the hobbit poems, but the elvish is "work" to me.

If something is a forced read, like in a class, I certainly do appreciate a person's work, understand the haiku having certain syllables in the three lines, descriptive language and even play on words, etc. But if it's for my own entertainment, I'll be honest, I like "There was a man from Nantucket...." than "Is there anything as lovely as a tree" (or whatever that tree poem is).

I will mirror the sentiments that Tolkien could do so many varieties that there's something for all.