'Wheel of Time' and 'Lord of Rings' parallels (potential spoilers)

[Mr Ares]

You do have to make allowances... :)

No I don't. Anyone who confuses quality and genre is an idiot.

Sorry I forgot to turn on my sarcasm there. I completely agree that a good story is a good story. I think we (human beings) have an innate need to classify things, which sometimes causes us to miss out on great things that fall outside our comfort zones.

True. Of course, sometimes people start redifining genre boundaries to exclude stuff they like from being fantasy or sci-fi. People who say "It's not sci-fi, it could really happen" about their sci-fi novel should be shot in the face.

 

But do you see what I'm saying about the scope of the setting?

Yes, I see.

[mb]

Some similarities to Gollum::

-Gholam: spelling & sound similar and both non-human

-Grey Men: both former people.

 

[Braus]

Bah... most, not all, but most of the parallels here is really silly.. and some of these parallels you could proberly find in any other non fantasy book, even if the author of that book never read tolkien.

 

anyway

 

Even if RJ would have said "i based all my books and work on tolkien", i know at least which one of them i would want to ressurect given a chance.

[Mr Ares]

Even if RJ would have said "i based all my books and work on tolkien", i know at least which one of them i would want to ressurect given a chance.

Indeed. One can never have too much Tolkien.

[Silmarien]

I'm a lover of Tolkien's world and for me he's the best of the best and i think everyone after him have based at least a detail on his world.

Many have simply copied what Tolkien have done (with not the same result of course)and Jordan too have took some "inspirations" from Tolkien, but i like of RJ is that him, differently from many others modern authors, was able to create his own world, maybe with some things similar to Tolkien's world, but completely new and different in its way, don't know if u understand.

That's why i really love RJ works because him, as Tolkien (even if he's on another level) has created a world u can believe in and it's not easy!

 

[Stubob]

In Paolini's defense, 13 and 9 are good numbers for evil organizations.  They sound official.  Really, if he'd had the 8, or the 16 forsworn everybody would have been like, wtf?  Get this loser out of here!

 

Dennis Leary talked about this with the 10 commandments.  Some numbers just work :P

 

Though I have to agree, a name just a little bit further away from 'forsaken' might have been nice.

"I have these 15 *crash* 10, 10 Commandments!"

[Stubob]

Everyone in the fantasy genre copies from each other, which is problery why people like it so much. Most of the worlds look alike, they have monsters which look alike (i mean orcs, elves, dwarves and so on). Some people just are more original and creative than others and succed to turn the book they write into something like noone have seen before (WoT is a good example of this). But then there are people like Paolini, who doesn't even bother by differing from the standard plot (good guy are chosen to beat the big bad meanie), so that everyone can see he didn't invent anything by himself.

On the sidenote: Ever played World of Warcraft? "The scarlet crusade" is kinda like "The Whitecloaks", don't get me wrong i absolutely love it when people get so blinded by what they think is right, that they see everyone who don't follow them as their enemy (in books mind).

 

Everyone in every genre and every fictional medium copy each other to some extent.

[Stubob]

Like I say, how far do you have to stretch these definitions in order to fit the demands of the story, and what are you left with at the end?

 

In my experience, there's surprisingly little stretching.

 

You wouldn't have magic or monsters in a western, and you're unlikely to have cowboys in a fantasy (nothing stopping it, though).

 

That's what I said: "Of course you're not going to have magic and monsters in a western or mystery novel (or even a fantasy novel), but you are going to have the unexplained and the foreign."

 

...but really this is just furniture. The basic story is the same, whether it has cars or horses or dragons. And a good story is a good story, regardless of genre.

 

Exactly what I've been trying to say. You've put it a bit more eloquently though.

 

I know some might disagree with that. These people are idiots.

 

You do have to make allowances... :)

 

I still disagree with you about Steerpike--my understanding is that the setting of the novel was, for lack of a better term, the court. Yes, the kitchen (where Steerpike worked) existed, but it wasn't really part of the setting. This is only because of how narrowly the setting is defined by the author. My question is whether I've got the right impression of how the book starts out? If the setting is larger than the wikipedia article makes it seem, then I'll concede the point.

 

I wish I had more time for my "to read" list.

 

This thread is to talk about similarities/parallels between 'Wheel of Time' and 'Lord of the Rings' (and/or between other Middle-Earth books).

 

Boring.

 

You can have Fantasy & Westerns mix. The Dark Tower series by Stephen King. Also adds mystery & even elements of espionage. Also starts with neither a Hero leaving town nor a stranger arriving.