When I first read LotR I was writing my own "fantasy" novel. It was very dark and depressing, and I had just set up all my characters to be killed and defeated. Hey, I had a nightmare and it inspired me...what can I say...
But after reading LotR, I realized the importance of hope in a story. I didn't go back and change anything major in my story, but I introduced ways that my characters could triumph over their foe, even if some of them were still killed.
So the way it affected me was to help me understand that even in the darkest hour, you can always,
always find something to lift your spirits and renew your courage.
Tolkien, through Sam, put it best (of course):
Quote:
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Far above the Ephel Dłath in the West the night-sky was still dim and pale. There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the foresaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach. His song in the Tower had been defiance rather than hope; for then he was thinking of himself. Now, for a moment, his own fate, and even his master's, ceased to trouble him.
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