July 22, 2002

Fans
Brett C.

About 6 months ago I was in a bookshop and of course I was browsing through the fantasy section. Nearby were two girls who looked to be around 15, and to my complete surprise they were looking at one of the movie books for Fellowship of the Ring. I must admit I was curious enough to tune into their conversation, then quickly realised they were discussing the relative hotness of Aragorn [Viggo Mortennson] and Legolas [Orlando Bloom]. I rapidly lost interest in their discussion, though I did overhear enough to know that in their opinion Legolas was the clear winner.

Needless to say I was amused by the whole encounter but also a little disturbed. I like to think of myself as something of an academic and as such Tokien's works had always been something that rested snuggly in my domain. It was a bastion of culture which I shared with my fellow academics and roleplayers [I believe the technical name for us in the wider world is 'nerds']and suddenly these 'Clueless' replicants were discussing it as if they had some ownership of the subject. I felt like I was George Lucas listening to Ed Wood explain how he should have made Star Wars.

But then I started thiking about Ben. Ben is one of my best friends. Ben is also a roleplayer, like myself, but he is about as far from an academic as you can get. When he was in high school he used to draw plans of German P.O.W. camps for technical drawing assignments, and his English book reports were done about War Adventure Comicbooks. When he graduated he proudly announced that he had a tertiary score you could use for a bus route number [in Australia, that's really low]. Fortunatly he joined the army reserve as an M.P. and now has a very good job as a government security guard. Anyway, we both love sci-fi and roleplaying, and for about 15 years he has been plying in the game I run using the Middle Earth Roleplaying Game system.

Now it should be obvious that with a background like Ben's, he has never, ever read The Lord of the Rings. Of course he knows about it, but aside from a viewing of the Bakshi movie many years ago, that's all he knows - the name. Every other person in our little game group has at least read it, except for good old Ben.

When the movie was coming out, we were all very excited. The guys I play with [along with my wife, for the third time in two days, God bless her] went to see it. During the movie Ben would often lean over and ask me questions about what ws happening on screen. Having seen the film twice before I was happy to explain stuff. A week or so later we saw it again and again Ben quizzed me on stuff we watched - Are these Black Riders the Ringwraiths - why can we see them? What was Amon Sul? Is that city Gandalf just rode to Minas Tirth? Are Uruk's really made that way? etc. etc.

The thing is I was not least disturbed by Ben's lack of knowledge of the literary works. I long ago realised Ben just isn't the type to read Tolkien, but suddenly I was able to communicate with him on a whole new level because finally he had at least some spark of knowledge about the subject. He still makes fun of me about how much I know, even calls me Nerd Lord, a title I actually find quite flattering, but now if we are talking Tolkien he has some background knowledge he would never otherwise possess without PJ's cinematic efforts.

I guess what I'm saying here is that on the whole I don't feel threatened by the fans of the LOTR movies who will never read the books. If they enjoy the movies, fine. As long as PJ does a decent job adapting the story the Proffessor's saga of courage, hope and loyalty should reamin intact. Should we look down on those people who only understand it as an action adventure. I don't think so. Everyone has to start somewhere, and a lot of those people may come to understand, as they themselves mature, that there is much more to the tale. Some probably won't and for them it will just be entertainment of the moment, rather than the consuming passion of so may readers of this forum. But Tolkien had at heart I think a desire to entertain, and often expressed complete bafflement at the 'cult following' his works gained, so who is to say how his opinions of each group would run.

For we Tolkien fanatics, we will still have our discussions, our games, our debates on Balrog Wings, and our retreat into the relaxing realm of fantasy academia. For the greater majority, they will have a 10 hour escape into a place more wonderful, terrible, and moving than they ever dreamed existed in a real world that is often very hard and very cold. If I look down on people like Ben, or the girls in the bookstore, or the little kids talking about how cool the fight with the Orcs was, in a way I feel like I'm saying 'I am big and you are small.' That's a little more like Saruman than Gandalf than I care for.