Hobbit or LoTR?

[Scarycount]

For clarity's sake, I am referring to the books.

I was talking to some friends a little while ago. Me and another friend preferried "The Hobbit", the other 2 invilved preferred "Lord of the Rings". I wonder, what about you?

[Ail]

I voted for the Hobbit, perhaps strangely since I think LOTR has been more influential to me. But I must be honest, The Hobbit is much more truer to that sense of adventure that I had in the first computer games. That is the feeling I always try to capture in games, and LOTR is too complex and sophisticated for that. The Hobbit is the simple quest, a simple adventure and does not have the burden of 'saving the world'. The heroes are heroes for heroicity's sake, for their interest, not because they must. It is freer and it makes me fantasise more wildly about going on adventure.

Alex

[Catman Jim]

I voted Hobbit, if only for the example of conducting conversations with dragons.

[Jester of the FoS]

LotR.

From a literary standpoint it's better as it's a more solid, cohesive work. The Hobbit is great as a smaller self-contained with regular highs and lows (each chapter feels like a sub-story or smaller incident) but suffers at the end from too much Deus Ex Machina (the eagles show up and save the day not once but twice) and the huge final battle between no less than five armies. It started good but then Tolkein started getting ahead of himself and slipped in something from the trilogy.

[Ail]

LotR.

From a literary standpoint it's better as it's a more solid, cohesive work. The Hobbit is great as a smaller self-contained with regular highs and lows (each chapter feels like a sub-story or smaller incident) but suffers at the end from too much Deus Ex Machina (the eagles show up and save the day not once but twice) and the huge final battle between no less than five armies. It started good but then Tolkein started getting ahead of himself and slipped in something from the trilogy.

You are right in your points, Jester, but those are from a critical point of view. I chose to judge the books emotionally, by the influence and appeal they had to me. I read the Hobbit first, and so I may be biased. But at least it made me prefer Dwarves to Elves forever more... and that's one think I'll never pardon Peter Jackson: he made a complete fool out of Gimli, which he absolutely is not in the books.
Frankly, I disliked the ending of the Hobbit. When I read it, I had the impression that the Dwarves were swindled from their treasure by a bunch of opportunistic Elves and Men, even though the latter, at least, had some claim. But I've never really liked Elves after Thranduil's attitude in there.
Even though, I like LotR. I've read it 7 times so far, and I wouldn't read it that many times if I didn't like it.

Alex

[VAN]

LotR for me, I think they are more complete as books.

[Kel-nage]

I hated the ending of the Hobbit. It ruined the whole book for me, so LoTR it is.

[Charlatan]

The Hobbit. Just could never get into LotR books. Thought the movies were alright though, not a big enough fan of the books to gripe at all the changes.

[Guardian of Twilight]

Lord of the Rings here, since I always thought that The Hobbit was more of a kids book, and The Lord of the Rings more of an adult adventure. Some of that could pertain to the fact that I was a kid when I saw the cartoon rendition of The Hobbit. I bet a lot of you have seen that cartoon, am I right?

[LordGodefroi]

I voted for The Hobbit because it was entertaining and well-paced. As for LotR, I read Fellowship of The Ring and then stopped because the writing style was so dry and dull. It was like Tolkien wasn't sure if he was writing a novel or an academic textbook.

[JinnTolser]

I picked LotR. Although I don't like the ending (Peter Jackson made the right decision ending his movies with Sauron's defeat!), the Hobbit just seems a little kiddie to me.

[Charney]

I picked LotR. Although I don't like the ending (Peter Jackson made the right decision ending his movies with Sauron's defeat!), the Hobbit just seems a little kiddie to me.

He should have removed the eagles too...

[Guardian of Twilight]

I picked LotR. Although I don't like the ending (Peter Jackson made the right decision ending his movies with Sauron's defeat!), the Hobbit just seems a little kiddie to me.

Out of curiosity, did you watch the cartoon version of The Hobbit as a kid (like I did), and then read The Lord of the Rings as an adult? I think that might be the reason I look at The Hobbit as I do.

[Rotipher of the FoS]

Heh heh. When I saw this thread, I had this overwhelming temptation to write in "Harry Potter" as preferable to either, just to see how many things the Tolkein fanatics would throw at me....


(Sorry, off-topic ... but I used to game with a LotR-obsessive whom I got a big kick out of baiting. "But if the eagles could fly in and scoop up Frodo and Sam at the last minute, why couldn't they have flown the hobbits to the Cracks of Doom in the freakin' first place...?")

[LouisVendredi]

(Sorry, off-topic ... but I used to game with a LotR-obsessive whom I got a big kick out of baiting. "But if the eagles could fly in and scoop up Frodo and Sam at the last minute, why couldn't they have flown the hobbits to the Cracks of Doom in the freakin' first place...?")

Presumably, because Sauron would have noticed them if they did that.