I want to be the [Lord of the Rings] [SOLVED]

kuhlmeye

So, I got the extended edition blurays for Christmas, and it's convinced me that I should finish reading the books.. I only made it through the two Towers on my first read through 10 years ago.

That said, I want to buy the books, and was hoping to get some advice on which edition to buy. With that, tell me how to read the Lord of the Rings.

TychoCelchuuu

Uh just buy any edition. They're all the same book.

kuhlmeye

Is the "full" edition just all three books bunched up together? There's nothing different about it, correct?

AaronKI

TychoCelchuuu wrote: »

Uh just buy any edition. They're all the same book.

Pretty much.

As nice as they look on your bookshelf, I'd recommend against getting any of the editions that combine all three into one book. They usually weigh several pounds and can be cumbersome to read.

Edit: If you decide to grab the Hobbit while you're at it, this is one of the nicest looking editions around. The dust cover is a recolored version of the first edition art.

Hewn

Read The Hobbit first. That's my real advice here. Skip the other supplementary texts, like the Silmarillion, unless you really, really, really love the lore.

The other guys are right about buying the books individually. I have a huge combined edition and it looks great on the shelf, but it's not something I carry around and read. For that I have smaller paperbacks that travel well. AaronKI's Hobbit suggestion is great.

kuhlmeye

Hmm... I had not considered rereading The Hobbit. Plus, that edition looks really nice. I'll probably end up going for the individual books. Does anybody have suggestions of editions with good cover art? Anything in the similar vein of the Hobbit edition linked above? It would be awesome to have them all look similar on the bookshelf.

Knight Of Awesome

I concur with that AaronKI said, I recently bought that exact copy of the hobbit and found it was a joy to read (larger page sizes) and the pages of artwork are nice to admire. In 2005 HarperCollins released a similar set of books for the whole LotR trilogy. I don't have these copies; HarperCollins website gives me the impression that these were made with the same care as the Hardcover copy of the hobbit they've released, a release I'll never stop praising.

If your just interested in reading and not all the extra bells and whistles I'd recommend that you head off to your local book store and pick up a four pack of the trilogy + the hobbit. Can't get any more simple and complete then that.

RiemannLives

TychoCelchuuu wrote: »

Uh just buy any edition. They're all the same book.

there are differences between editions. But they are small things that don't affect the content much (mispellings and other mistakes).

I recently bought the trilogy to read on my android phone from the Google Play bookstore. It had an excellent intro talking about differences between editions and the textual history.

MichaelLC

The sets with artwork by Alan Lee are the best.

Cantido

I read The Hobbit, and am reading LotR, via Kindle.

Enc

Definitely start with the Hobbit. Lord of the Rings builds a lot based on the Hobbit, not having it going in is like skipping book 1.

Ignore the books of lost tales, Simarillion, and the Christopher Tolkien stuff until after you finish the series and only then read them if you are something of a history/lunguist buff. They are all interesting and worthwhile, but are really really dense compared to the original books.

Athenor

If you find yourself having troubles with the flow and pacing of the books, I can't recommend The Atlas of Middle Earth enough. It was made by a trained, professional Cartographer who went through all of Tolkien's notes and used them to rebuild the maps and travels and things like that. A good chunk of it focuses on Silmarillion/History of Middle Earth stuff, but it still does a very good job with the main books.

I would not have gotten through reading The Silmarillion without this book.

I've got an Illustrated version of The Hobbit, which is really nice, but it isn't terribly needed. The movies were all based on the most popular Tolkien artwork, so they do a good job of helping the imagination.

A few years back, a 50th anniversary edition of LotR was put out that published the book as Tolkien originally intended. It's purely a collector's item, as the book is INCREDIBLY unwieldy. Just stick to an up to date publication that fits your preferred method of reading - I can't stand paperbacks, for instance.

Fairchild

He means that Tolkien originally wrote LOTR as one volume, but his publisher thought it would be too long and so broke it into the three-part series we know so well.

Athenor

Sorry, I'm a little incoherent today. Yes, the 50th anniversary follows Tolkien's original publication notes to the letter... And if the publisher would have put it out in that way, no one in their right mind would have read it.

Fairchild

I dunno, Shirer's RISE AND FALL OF THE THIRD REICH was published around that same time and it weighs in at just under 1,600 pages, and it was a bestseller for decades.

AaronKI

MichaelLC wrote: »

The sets with artwork by Alan Lee are the best.

I own the set that's the first result in your link and I'm really happy with the presentation. The outer art is minimalist compared to other editions and there's a foil embossed version of the original dust jacket art on each book.

Edit: A bit of googling suggests that the foil covers are based on the 1965 second edition of the books. The main difference is that they were black instead of brown.

MichaelLC

AaronKI wrote: »

MichaelLC wrote: »

The sets with artwork by Alan Lee are the best.

I own the set that's the first result in your link and I'm really happy with the presentation. The outer art is minimalist compared to other editions and there's a foil embossed version of the original dust jacket art on each book.

I'm a sucker for versions of books that look like similar to their first printing.

Very nice. That Eye is excellent.

Yeah, I have some older edition too. Blue box, white dust jackets - don't know if that $250 set listed or not, but remember it being nicely made.

I guess I should clarify that any set is fine, but if you're looking for something to keep, those would be good choices. Related, I'd like to get 'Dune' in hardcover, have some early edition paperbacks only.

kuhlmeye

Well, I went ahead and picked up that version of the Hobbit and the box set of the Lord of the Rings that AaronKI pictured. Also, Assassins Creed Revelations was on sale for $20, so... Thanks to Discover reward points it was a whole 25 bucks for the lot.

Thanks everyone, this can be closed.

AaronKI

MichaelLC wrote: »

I guess I should clarify that any set is fine, but if you're looking for something to keep, those would be good choices.

That reminds me of something else I didn't care for about my LoTR: Jumbo XL Edition. To keep the weight and the cost down, the pages were like those you would see in free Bibles. Nearly tissue paper. I was always afraid of accidentally tearing one and I'm not sure how it would stand up to years and years of reading. Yet somehow it still weighed as much as a baby hippopotamus.

Edit: Oops, nevermind. :P