> One reason I find myself so fascinated with
> Tolkien's work is the amount of effort he put
> into creating it.
> He began in his late teens (or possibly early
> twenties) and continued until his death. He
> created an intricate history for his world. He
> invented several languages and used them
> throughout. He immersed himself so
> thoroughly in the world of Middle-Earth that
> he wrote the appendices to LOTR as if he was
> merely a historian/linguist who translated the
> story into English from its original Elvish.

This is similar to the point of why I became so fed up with fantasy and Science fiction in general as I headed out of adolescence - LOTR in particular. Yes, it is very involved and Tolkien has put a lot of time into developing this imaginary world, but it kills off any semblance of pace in the novels, and unless you are prepared to immerse yourself in the lore of his world, it's just not that satisfying to read.

I've found, in general, when I read fantasy novels these days, that the set-up of the world (which often includes explanations of local politics, languages, funny names and fantasy races but tends to accept magic as something that just happens naturally) usually isn't worth sitting through for the story that follows. And there's always the persistent question - why am I reading about battles for a world that does not exist outside of another person's head? Why haven't I gone down to the history section and picked out a book about our own history, full of bloodshed, adventure, terror, horror, heroism and beautifulest ladies, all of it having really happened (although it's your job to work out how skewed the historians version of events is).

Bourne