| Philologist Tom Shippey notes the characteristics that indicate that the Lord of the Rings is a twentieth-century work even though it is not set in the twentieth century. Shippey, author of J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century, identifies one of the characteristics as the momentum that accompanies evil and that sweeps characters into action before they understand what is happening. Twentieth century warfare, he adds, is industrial and impersonal, just as is the warfare in Lord of the Rings. Shippey also discusses the traditional pattern of the quest and how the trilogy does not fit it. While most of those who are on a quest are looking for something to recover, Frodo and his friends are traveling far in order to throw away something, states Shippey. |
J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (Houghton Mifflin, 2001) |
