Parts We Skip and Why

[Firefoot]

At the urging of Bêthberry I'm starting this thread on a topic was broached in the CbC Discussion of The Taming of Sméagol a couple weeks ago (finally got around to posting this). Several people had been commenting on how they found the switch over from the storyline with Aragorn, Gandalf, Merry and Pippin, etc. to that of Frodo and Sam to be a let down. I then responded:

Hmm. Interesting how other people feel a let down after leaving the other story line - particularly on my first reading, I experienced a very different reaction. Upon my first reading, I was very much into Frodo (still my favorite character, but I appreciate others more as well now) - after leaving Frodo and Sam at Amon Hen, they were the only two characters I really wanted to know about. Admittedly, I did not get a whole lot out of Book 3 that first reading with the exception of a few notable passages. So eager was I to find out when I was getting on to Frodo that in name-scanning the proceding chapters I accidently found out Gandalf came back... oops. So, anyway, suffice it to say that I was thrilled to reach this chapter.

Let it be said that I have come to enjoy these chapters in Book 3 of LotR much more by now.

There are bound to be particular sections of LotR (and Tolkien's other books) that you particularly dislike or find boring, as Tolkien himself stated in the Foreward to LotR: "It is perhaps not possible in a long tale to please everybody at all points, nor to displease everybody at the same points; for I find from the letters that I have received that the passages or chapters that are to some a blemish are all by others specially approved."

So, what particular passages/chapters/groups of chapters have you been known to skip, or just skim through for content? Particularly on first readings, were there parts that you found incapable of holding your attention, and has this changed on subsequent readings? And, of course, why?

[Encaitare]

Particularly on first readings, were there parts that you found incapable of holding your attention, and has this changed on subsequent readings? And, of course, why?

I first tried to read FotR when I was about twelve -- I found it in the basement and decided it looked like it might be interesting. I liked the first part but for the life of me could not make myself read through the part with Tom Bombadil. I thought, Okay, when is something actually going to happen? That part of the tale really isn't all that important to the plot as a whole, and I just got bored and didn't pick it up again for several years.

This has changed, very much so! I think it's mainly because I've become a better reader in all aspects, and while I've always loved to read, my attention span for it has definitely grown. Plus, some of the discussions I've read here give me something to think about while I'm reading about him -- just who is this bouncy little rhymester anyway?

[Mithalwen]

I do agree that these chapters are thin on action and the CbC is a good way of making me look closer at chapters which despite my abiding love for Faramir, I generally skim through and which proved my nemesis on my first reading ( Like the child of Sam and Frodo's imagining, at 10, I found the fringes of Mordor too dark and didn't want to read anymore, and I had forgotten the intricacies of the other plot by the time it came to rejoin Gandalf and Pippin ).

I discovered this thread having just posted above in CbC, and so having quoted myself I will now elaborate. I received LOTR for Christmas when I was 10, and got to the beginning of ROTK by the end of the Christmas holiday. I really struggled with book 4 (then as now I the "Aragorn" thread held the interest more and finding that I had gone through all that to get Pippin and Gandalf back when I wanted more of Aragorn, Merry and Eowyn was too much. 18 months later I was a Tolkien addict. However not all parts of the book had equal places in my affection. Frodo and Sam were largely ignored (nothing seemed to happen for ages and then it was all too horrible), elves were favourite. However in the early readings I had a tolerance for Bomabadil which I have since lost. I guess it was closer to the Hobbit which I had loved when I had heard it on Jackanory and subsequently read. Now I find the both the Hobbit and the early rings grates a bit .... just too "young"?

When I read now - I am afraid I do head for favourite chapters .. I really must read it systemically but oddly enough, although I so often skim them in the text, I love the Frodo and Sam in Mordor parts of the Radio adaptation which I listen to in its entirety quite frequently.

[Eruanna]

I read 'The Hobbit' when I was about ten but didn't read the trilogy until I was in my late teens. I remember that I was expecting much more of the same and was very surprised at the darker tone of 'The Fellowship' from the meeting with Strider onwards.
I was delighted that the story was so much more 'serious' and 'adult'. As such, in further readings I tended to skip the Bombadil parts, I really didn't see how it fit into the book at all!
However, that changed when by chance I stumbled on The Trickster thread here at the dear old 'downs. I was intrigued enough to re-read the earlier parts of the story to see what I had been missing. Quite a lot as it turns out!
I'm going away tomorrow and taking my battered copy of the book in my suitcase...I won't be skipping any of it

[Feanor of the Peredhil]

I'm afraid I tend to skim over a few parts.

Fea extends wrist for a good slapping.

I've discovered in the past year or so that I have a moderately bad attention problem. I'm incapable of taking notes, although I can retain information through listening or discussing. I can't sit still for too long, and I tend to skip over reading things that are overly verbose. (Which means that my love for Shakespeare confuses me. A lot.)

What that means for The Silmarillion is that it took me an entire summer to slog my way through it, whereas The Fellowship took me some three days. I only just read Of Belariand and its Realms a few months ago, having skipped it so many times. There are simply too many names, places, and really really boring bits for me to force myself to concentrate on. With the Trilogy, I get easily lost in the world. With The Silm, I have to dive in head first and hold onto a really big rock to stay put.

In The Two Towers, I didn't quite "get" Helm's Deep for a good long time, because the descriptions were killing me. I was having trouble processing everything, so I sort of quit for the first time and came back after awhile.

These days, I skip a lot of Frodo/Sam parts. Yes, yes... I know that nothing else in the books would happen but for their sake, but at this point in my life, it's just so boring. I even did it watching Return of the King (EE) last night. I dozed off when Frodo was trapped in the tower and had my brother poke me when it reverted to the Pelennor. Bad me, yes, I know.

Fea

[Sharpis Corbis]

First of all I read slow. I first read the Fellowship when I was twelve, as well as The Two Towers. I thought the second part of it was incredibly boring, Frodo, Sam, and Smeagol wandering around. It took me a few months to finish. I was more intrested in the other parts because of fighting and battles. But now I've come to appreciate that part more.

[KamexKoopa]

Originally Posted by Encaitare

I first tried to read FotR when I was about twelve -- I found it in the basement and decided it looked like it might be interesting. I liked the first part but for the life of me could not make myself read through the part with Tom Bombadil. I thought, Okay, when is something actually going to happen? That part of the tale really isn't all that important to the plot as a whole, and I just got bored and didn't pick it up again for several years.

I kind of get what you mean(t). I like all the Shire parts, it's establishing place and character and whatnot, but I can't help but think; when sending a book to a publishers, you send the first three chapters, what would the publisher think to seeing hobbits moving back and forth across the 'Shire "without anything happening" yet :P

[Juicy-Sweet]

Didnt skip anything as such, but my least favorite part is Frodo's and Sam's walk from Cirith Ungol to Mount Doom. Nothing much happens there, they get thirstier and thirstier, the ring gets heavier and heavier, Mordor sucks, Lembas is running out - he just repeats these two things endlessly

I think instead he should have cut the walking stuff to a few paragraphs, describing how thirsty and all they are, and used the space for a long interesting adventure, giving some more hints at "Life in Mordor" + hinting at some old secret stuff, like they come acrors the stables for another kind of fell beasts or somehting, to steel some food there from Orc WOMEN, as well as nick some gross mysteriously descibed animal to ride on using the ring to control it.

Caradhras is boring also.

Fav parts are: All the mysterious things and places (Bombadil, barrows, Moria, paths of the dead) + council of Elrond.

[littlemanpoet]

Funny, I've never skipped anything in a straight read-through. However, on my first reading at age 13 I came to a months-long halt just outside Minas Tirith. I was intrigued to learn that Tolkien, in his writing, came to the same halt.

I have often gone back and started with a particular section that I especially enjoy, only to read all the rest of the way through, then go back and read from the beginning back to that point, just to keep things even.

[Celuien]

I'm also in the non-skipper club. I don't feel like I can claim to have read a book without going cover to cover, and I'd fear missing something that turns out to be important for understanding what's happening later.

That said, if there was a point when I was tempted to put the book down, it was when Tom Bombadil ring a dong dilloed on to the page. The first time I read LotR, I was in the mood for more serious business, and while the glimpses of ancient history and myth left me wanting to read more, Tom's silly songs did not. Now, I've come to appreciate the enigma and don't mind his singing quite as much... maybe in part because I've grown more comfortable with being openly silly too as I've grown older.

Despite that, Sam's song in the tower of Cirith Ungol still holds more appeal, and I'll sometimes just go to reread that chapter, and go onward through Mordor with Frodo and Sam.

[mark12_30]

I don't reliably skip the same place every time; but I have read The Battle Of the Pelennor Fields many more times than I have read the entire trilogy. (Perhaps thirty or more times thru the Pelennor, maybe, vice a dozen or fifteen times thru the trilogy?)