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Originally Posted by Alcarillo
Tolkien was bit by a tarantula as a child in South Africa. A nurse sucked out the poison. Perhaps his giant spiders of later stories are in memory of the giant tarantulas of South Africa.
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Like any writer worth his salt, though, Tolkien denied any direct biographical importance. According to his biographer, Carpenter, "he [Tolkien] said the incident left him with no special dislike of spiders." (p. 27 in my edition of the biography, chapter "Bloemfontein").
Of course, some of us don't ascribe to the 'author knows everything' version of events.
