SAURONman

They used to be colleagues.

They're not. They have completeley different etymologies and are less similar than the names Joshua and Jesus, which I doubt you'd confuse. It's just unfamiliarity with the languages in question that makes them seem superficially similar.

or if you feel shitty

Tolkien fanboys btfo

>yfw Saruman was supposed to represent industry and technological progress
>is depicted as evil by Tolkien

Fucking luddites I swear.

Tolkien fought in WWI and that is a very large part of the reason as to why he had that view.

Stupid Morgul snaga, that there is Sharkey.

I'm of two minds on this issue. I do love pastoral, description and natural folklore, but at the same time, I don't particularly like the 'fires of industry' view, though it does make a good villain.

On a related note, has anyone else here read The Edge Chronicles? Kids books, of course, but I devoured them as a child, and from what I remember the worldbuilding was very vivid and fantastic, helped by Riddell's illustrations. They have a similar industrial villain in one of the cycles, the Foundry Glades (pic related).

MODS, DO YOUR JOB.

>still regurgitating the "Tolkien was a Luddite" meme
read
the
FUCKING
FOREWORD
>Or to take a less grievous matter: it has been supposed by some that The Scouring of the Shire reflects the situation in England at the time when I was finishing my tale. It does not. It is an essential part of the plot, foreseen from the outset, though in the event modified by the character of Saruman as developed in the story without, need I say, any allegorical significance or contemporary political reference whatsoever. It has indeed some basis in experience, though slender (for the economic situation was entirely different), and much further back. The country in which I lived in childhood was being shabbily destroyed before I was ten, in days when motor-cars were rare objects (I had never seen one) and men were still building suburban railways. Recently I saw in a paper a picture of the last decrepitude of the once thriving corn-mill beside its pool that long ago seemed to me so important. I never liked the looks of the Young miller, but his father, the Old miller, had a black beard, and he was not named Sandyman.

Corrupted by evil. Bit of nuance you missed in your sweeping generalizations.

fuck those
>muh tax policy
threads. they have triggered fucking
>muh sauronman
threads as a response.

Sometimes I think people are too quick to look for political allegories in works of fiction. Or perhaps these days people are very quick to include political allegories in their works of fiction.

>sweeping generalization
>of one character
Tolkien's work does a lot with industrialization, technological progress, invention (or "sub-creation," as he calls it) and all of the aboves' ties to pride, as in capital-P pride or hubris. This is arguably the result of influence from a couple possible sources: one, ancient, maybe-specifically Germanic superstition about metalcraft and ancient weaponry; two, Paradise Lost, in which Satan does a lot of mining, and invents the cannon; or three, a natural interest in the similarities between artistic (sub-)creation and divine Creation. Consider that Tolkien was a hardcore Catholic and an author, and you can see why this fascination might arise.

Honestly, I may have been a little hasty in posting , because while I wouldn't agree that Tolkien is a Luddite or that he's preoccupied with the destruction of pastoral landscapes because of his own past, there's a lot in his work that makes associations between artifice and the dangers of pride. Aulë's creation of the Dwarves; Aulë's apprentice Sauron, who goes bad pretty fast; Morgoth himself being compared EXPLICITLY to Aulë many times as being closest to him in temperament; the promise of the Silmarils, and the Rings of Power, before being contrasted with the tragedies that arise from desire for these things.

The reason as to why Tolkien wasn't a Luddite, by the way, is that his work associates artistic creation with craftsmanship under "sub-creation" and treats them similarly: if he dismissed ALL such innovation as evil, he would be inevitably condemning himself, as an author. The story of the creation of the Dwarves is key: Aulë, realizing his hubris, repents immediately: he only ever wanted to emulate God. The artifacts of Morgoth, by contrast, are all attempts to SURPASS Him or beat him to making something which does not have its end in Him (which is, of course, impossible).

Right. Nobody would confuse Joshua and Jesus. That'd never happen!

Tolkien was agients advencement at all costs, like most sane people are, but his works were a work of fantasy was something one ran away to, from the world. Stop trying to find political ideas in places that are not there.

So basically WoW-levels of character depth. Got it

We /tv/ now?

I'd actually be okay with this.

...

Melf's from Greyhawk, dingus.