Talk:J. R. R. Tolkien

Popular Resurgence
The lead section of the article claims that: "the great success of The Lord of the Rings led directly to a popular resurgence of the genre", and links to Works inspired by J. R. R. Tolkien in support of this claim. The "popular resurgence" claim is problematic. Yes, there were earlier fantasy writers like Morris, Dunsany, Cabell, Eddison, etc., but at the time LOTR was published, there was not yet a cohesive fantasy tradition from which to "resurge".

I find nothing in the Works inspired by J. R. R. Tolkien article or indeed, in the History of fantasy article to support this "popular resurgence" claim.

I would suggest instead something along the lines of: the tremendous success of The Lord of the Rings ignited a profound interest in the fantasy genre and ultimately precipitated an avalanche of new fantasy books and authors. BehemothCat (talk) 09:11, 29 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I agree with that.--Jack Upland (talk) 03:58, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * OK, I've edited the article to make the above proposed change. Thanks for the feedback!  BehemothCat (talk) 06:26, 30 April 2024 (UTC)

Incorrect info
Bournemouth is not in Hampshire it is in Dorset. LukeJH1996 (talk) 13:11, 5 May 2024 (UTC)


 * @LukeJH1996 It was in Hampshire when Tolkien died, as noted in the source code of the infobox. -- Verbarson talkedits 13:27, 5 May 2024 (UTC)

Birthplace
I am surprised to see how nothing has been written concerning the fact that Tolkien was born in the Republic of South Africa. It does show Bloemfontein but more could've been mentioned to that effect. Why do people mostly want to associate Africa with disease, starvation, and just poverty? The writer obviously benefitted SOMETHING from Africa. The article must be edited to show a clearer picture. 45.215.254.1 (talk) 19:06, 11 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Thank you for the thoughts. He left SA when still very young. Some scholars have suggested that Shelob the giant spider owes something to a childhood memory (covered over there); otherwise there is little that could possibly be mentioned here. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:11, 11 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Specifically, the first two paragraphs of the "Childhood" section cover his residence in Africa. Deor (talk) 20:06, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Missing word(s)
The article currently says The scholar Tom Shippey refers to Tolkien as one of the authors of the 20th century and one of the most influential authors of all time. That Tolkien was "one of the authors of the 20th century" is of course correct (if trivial), but it seems pretty obvious that Shippey made a more specific statement than that. Ping who might know what was intended. TompaDompa (talk) 15:27, 11 July 2024 (UTC)


 * Shippey's phrase was "author of the century", implying somewhat boldly that he was the Muhammad Ali of fiction writers. I guess someone had a go at toning this down and came up with the current incomprehensible waffle. I'll put it back but please feel free to rephrase it, intelligibly, as you like. Chiswick Chap (talk) 16:46, 11 July 2024 (UTC)