Shippey covered a lot of topics in his chapter explaining how Tolkien mapped out the plot of The Lord of the Rings. It was interesting to see the different material Tolkien used as reference. It is amazing how much work and research Tolkien did before he began writing the Lord of the Rings. The Hobbit was Tolkien’s work that created the background and scenery of The Lord of the Rings. The Silmarillion provided Tolkien with numerous poems and songs that he included in his six well organized books. I am unsure if Tolkien realized when he was working on all these other literary works that they would help him develop The Lord of the Rings, a literary masterpiece that helped to define his amazing career.
The idea that pipeweed was the hobbits only contribution to civilization was rather amusing. I also found it interesting how Tolkien created the hobbit civilization to parallel the resemblance of traditional English civilizations. Their common interest in tea times, and daily postal visits were among a few of the similarities between the two. It was interesting to learn about ancient English history while reading this chapter. One of the few positions that have survived until today is the position of mayor. The mayor of Hobbiton was the only political person mentioned in the Shire.
The section that discussed the second chapter of the book, The Council of Elrond, was very interesting. The information that Shippey provided in this section was enlightening. He basically summarized the chapter and pointed out every rule of writing that Tolkien broke. To start of the chapter was over 15,000 words and seven of the twelve main speakers in the chapter were new to the reader. I know little about writing a book, especially a book that is over a thousand pages long. As I recall reading this chapter I did think it was very long but I thought it gave the reader a lot of information that they needed to know. One of my favorite parts of this chapter was when Gimli introduced himself and claimed that he was the son of Gloin, one of the dwarves from The Hobbit. I thoroughly enjoyed The Hobbit and after reading it I was excited to start The Lord of the Rings. I was surprised by the number of characters included in this chapter and I have to agree with Shippey that this confusion can make it hard for a reader to follow along if they have no history of The Lord of the Rings and have not seen any of the movies.
When you think about it, 15 thousand pages is a lot when the only topics discussed in the chapter is whether or not the ring Frodo carried was the One Ring, what they should do with the ring, and who should accompany the ring on the perilous journey. In my opinion, the first two chapters were like an introduction to The Lord of the Rings. This chapter provided history and detail to the reader to help them better understand the story. After the council met and the fellowship formed, then the real adventure began.
