Those who have not read the book know it by hearsay as an object of affection for its readers, as ‘an absolute must-read’ - sometimes even as ‘the book of the twentieth century’. And you don’t want them to.The Lord of the Rings, Le Seigneur des Anneaux, El Señor de los Anillos, Kryezoti i Unazave, Sayyid al-Khawatim, Eraztunen Jauna, Sarbadhipoti Angti, Mo Jie, La Mastro de l’Ringoj… in over fifty languages, images engraved in the reader’s mind come to life with these words: Frodo and Sam climbing Mount Orodruin in order to destroy Sauron’s ring, which they had brought from the Shire to Mordor at the risk of their lives Gollum on the steps of Cirith Ungol the fight with Shelob, or the battle on Weathertop the farewell to Lórien, or Éowyn’s grief at losing Aragorn Tom Bombadil’s peacefulness and the solace to be found in Bag End.

You may know, or guess, what kind of a tale it is, happy-ending or sad-ending, but the people in it don’t know. “I wonder,” said Frodo, “But I don’t know. But those aren’t always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we’ve fallen into?” You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same like old Mr Bilbo. We hear about those as just went on, and not all to a good end, mind you at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. And if they had, we shouldn’t know, because they’d have been forgotten. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually their paths were laid that way, as you put it.

But that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of a sport, as you might say. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and Frodo, adventures, as I used to call them. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. “Yes, that’s so,” said Sam, “And we shouldn’t be here at all, if we’d known more about it before we started. “I don’t like anything here at all.” said Frodo, “step or stone, breath or bone. And trees and hills they long have known.

Tolkien lord of the rings