Scan barcode
A review by pickett22
The Book of Lost Tales, Part One by J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien
4.0
I'm not gonna lie, this was a slog in places. Tolkien can be difficult to read when he's organized and edited, but trying to get through so much plot that is contradictory to itself and without any consistency as far as names and such go is sometimes like wading through treacle. Very beautiful, very interesting treacle.
I started reading it and then quickly realized I needed some help keeping everything straight in my head, so I ended up reading it chapter for chapter in conjunction with the Silmarillion. I've read the Silmarillion before, which was very helpful, but I definitely needed to read the two together to avoid confusion. However, while this was very helpful (and all the more interesting, seeing the differences in detail) it made for a drawn out read.
The biggest thing I noticed was the contrast in quality between the two. This book was beautiful and well worth reading, but there were times when I read a chapter from the Silmarillion and then a chapter from the Tales and found it very obvious which was the draft and which was the re-worked version. Even Tolkien's drafts are amazing, but the Silmarillion is so much more refined, the language is more efficient, and the stories wander less.
Overall, though, it was lovely and worth the work to get through.
I started reading it and then quickly realized I needed some help keeping everything straight in my head, so I ended up reading it chapter for chapter in conjunction with the Silmarillion. I've read the Silmarillion before, which was very helpful, but I definitely needed to read the two together to avoid confusion. However, while this was very helpful (and all the more interesting, seeing the differences in detail) it made for a drawn out read.
The biggest thing I noticed was the contrast in quality between the two. This book was beautiful and well worth reading, but there were times when I read a chapter from the Silmarillion and then a chapter from the Tales and found it very obvious which was the draft and which was the re-worked version. Even Tolkien's drafts are amazing, but the Silmarillion is so much more refined, the language is more efficient, and the stories wander less.
Overall, though, it was lovely and worth the work to get through.