Hee-ya!
Wow, what a response to an opinion on a series of books! Jeez, people...

Tolkien, as I recall, wrote the stories for his son who was serving in WWII at the time. He'd write a chunk and send it to him- at least, he did so for The Hobbit. I don't know about the rest of them.

At that time WWII was very much a permeating factor in everyone's lives. Ever notice how people who were young in those years have certain traits in common, such as being extremely thrifty and conservative? That conflict made a huge impression on everyone who was around at the time, regardless of whether they served or not. And I'm sure that was especially true of Tolkein. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, the war had to have had an influence on him.

Sure there was racism in his books, at least by today's standards. It was prevalent back then. Look at The Lone Ranger or any of the Westerns of the day- Indians and Mexicans were not portrayed nicely. In my memory Chinese were portrayed in cartoons on TV in very broad stereotypes, and Germans were shown as being Nazis whether they wore a uniform or not. It really wasn't until the 70s and 80s, after the popularity of Polish jokes faded, that PC began to take hold. Judging older works by today's standards is really not fair, as standards change over time... but if they bother someone, that's that person's right to be bothered. Enzyme's perfectly right to hold his opinions, whether you agree with them or not.

And for those calling Enzyme a racist- pull your head out of your ass, you silly little shit.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Fri 7 Mar 2008, 13:11, Reply)