# Why do you like Middle earth?



## Ingwë (Dec 20, 2005)

Why do you like Middle-earth?

Because the legends come true there or because of the magic? Do You like the Elves or the Dwarves? Do You like the stories about Mighty Kings and Rulers or great battles and duels? 
Why do you like it?


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## e.Blackstar (Dec 20, 2005)

I like it because it's so believeable. Tolkien created not just new people, or a new map, but a whole rich background of myth and history.


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## Barliman Butterbur (Dec 20, 2005)

Ingwë said:


> Why do you like Middle-earth?



Because good triumphs over great evil _and always will._

Barley


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## Hobbit-GalRosie (Dec 22, 2005)

Barliman Butterbur said:


> Because good triumphs over great evil _and always will._
> 
> Barley



I'm afraid I can't concur with that at all, dear Barley, it seems to me that one of the things I like best about ME is the fact that it seems so utterly real, so like our own modern world yet in a certain alien way, that it makes you look at your own world with a fresh eye. And with that I think it includes all the same kinds of evils and dangers, and while for the most part good triumphed in the stories we have, I don't think it's any more certain for that to happen on the everyday scale as it is here...only in the Great Battle at the end of the world, as many people also believe is true now. And that constant feeling of peril throughout the books was one of my favorite things about them.


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## Noldor_returned (Jan 11, 2006)

I like Middle-Earth because of its complexity. Name another fairly modern book that so much could be disucssed about. And think about how he (Tolkien) created his own world, and made so many people compulsive readers of his works.


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## Majimaune (Jan 12, 2006)

well middle-earth is really the only place in fiction that has the history that M.E. does and that could be why i like it


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## scotsboyuk (Jan 12, 2006)

I like Middle Earth because Tokien created such a pwerful and detailed background for it so that it seems more real than just an imaginary land in a book. I also like it because it is not an idealised place, but rather somewhere that has both good and bad, positive and negative, that I can relate to.

I also like Middle Earth because it is somewhat based on where I live.


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## Walter (Jan 13, 2006)

I like it because Tolkien did "create" it and yet - at the sime time - did not really "invent" it from scratch. On the one hand it is very similar to the Middle-earth (_middangeard_) of Germanic/Northern tradition, on the other hand it is very different. In some ways it almost could be considered a tradition paralleling the other Indo-European traditions like the Graeco/Roman, the Celtic and Germanic/Northern (even Finnish) ones.


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## Ermundo (Jan 14, 2006)

When you consider it that way Walter, than I really like Middle Earth to.

But Personally I like Middle Earth a lot since it inspires me . I think that is why Lord of the Rings is so popular. It inspires to be something we aren't. It's a place to escape to on a cloudy day when it's cold outside and gloomy all day.


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## Rover (Feb 16, 2006)

Ingwë said:


> Why do you like it?


 

I like Tolkien's writing for many reasons. It's escapist, entertaining, enchanting, intelligent, imaginative. I can't think of more than handful of fantasy/sci-fi writers whose work would stand up to comparison.


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## Erestor Arcamen (Feb 17, 2006)

I love Tolkein because ME is just so deep, theres soooo much there. So much unknown, so much mystery, so much myth and magic and ELVES! ELVES ELVES! and theres so much adventure and acton and the beauty of the landscape and i love the evil guys too (not orcs, but balrogs, dragons, trolls, Ringwraiths! etc). And the girls muahahaha Arwen, Galadriel (not movie bleh), Eowyn, Luthien! I love everything about Middle Earth, there's so much drama, so much history and so much everything! Who else has a world that the history for like what 6 or 7 thousand years, probly a lot more, is written down, where actual languages are created, where it is so real you feel like you could get on a plane and fly there! Tolkein is now and always be in my own opinion of hte greatest if not THE GREATEST author of fantasy fiction! 

of course you know *gets an evil glint* it's not fiction, it's real, real as you and me and I shall rule Middle Earth for all time! I shall be a dark lord ruler of all muahahahahahahaha!


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## Garwen (Feb 18, 2006)

I like to escape into Middle Earth. Its so rich with details I become lost there.


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## Confusticated (Oct 5, 2010)

Simple and magical... makes you want to believe. Some fantasy locations feel like lies, this feels like a secret truth.


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## Starbrow (Oct 5, 2010)

I like the fact that there is a history to ME and you can feel it in the stories. It makes them seem much more real and makes me hunger for more stories.
I also find it very inspirational and cheering. When times are dark, there is still hope.


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## Confusticated (Oct 5, 2010)

Yeah, the history makes it feel so authentic. I think another reason it feels this way is because of the degree to which Tolkien created the languages, and the care with which he chose the names for the characters whose names were not in his invented languages. How, for instance, the Rohirrim lanuage shared a similar relation to Westron as Old English and English. The place and people names are consistent, and you really feel the different cultures too. It is not a mishmash of random made up silly sounding names. He even presents that Quenya and Sindarin, and all languages, change over time. And in the HoME even goes into depth about the whole tree of Elvish tongues... how they split off and changed from eachother. This gives a credibility.


I remember reading somewhere... this is terrible I can't recall for certain, but that editors wanted to mess with what JRRT had written. The example I remember is the use of 'of' where 'have' is the correct word: _Tolkien should of wrote it this way. _They just didn't get it.... JRRT knew best where the language and spelling issues were concerned and he had his reasons. But everything to do with language contributes to the authentic feel I think.


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## Eledhwen (Oct 6, 2010)

I recognise The Shire and Rohan in the countryside about me. I recognise the Englishness of the hobbits. But even if I were not in an English Shire, I still identify with the eternal struggle against evil, recognised by Galadriel in the words "together through the ages of the world we have fought the long defeat." This 'long defeat', richly documented in The Silmarillon, The Hobbit and LotR. A world so well realised that, after reading The Sil, a re-read of The Hobbit brings out rich jewels of history remembered as if it were one's own, a guest present at the mention of it, acknowledging Elrond's words with a nod that says; "Yes; I know of Gondolin". Tolkien doesn't just tell a story, he takes you to Middle-earth along with him, and it becomes your own country.


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