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Originally Posted by LMP
Thou dost protest too much, methinks. CoH's bestselling most likely has more to do with it having been authored by Tolkien, and it being a brimming good yarn. These facts do not make Túrin a more noble character.
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Originally Posted by Child
But does it really go beyond that to an attraction to the work because of its distinctive tone is somehow better suited to the 21st century?
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Possibly. Yet many, I think, who didn't care for Tolkien's other work will try the book because of the many reviewers in the 'serious' press who have said that while they didn't get on with Tolkien's other work they found the darker, bleaker vision of CoH a revelation. Also, something else I've noted in quite a few of the reviews (& I think this is due in no small part to John Garth's work)- references to Tolkien's wartime experiences & the way they have influenced his work. CoH will be for many readers a return to Tolkien after many years away.
Another point re the Lewis review is that while it applies perfectly to LotR:
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"The book is like lightning from a clear sky... To say that in it heroic romance, gorgeous, eloquent, and unashamed, has suddenly returned at a period almost pathological in its anti-romanticism, is inadequate."
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It could not be applied to CoH. As I said, CoH is 'pathologically anti-romantic'. And I wonder if that is due to the presence of 'God' in LotR & his absence in CoH? It seems as if (in Tolkien's case at least) the 'gorgeous, eloquent, unashamed & principally 'romantic' dimension required the presence of 'God'. When he comes to write a story without 'God' he swings to the opposite ('pathological') extreme - whatever can go wrong will go wrong & go as badly wrong as it possibly can. The one is the inverse of the other, & I can't help feeling that they reflect the two aspects of Tolkien's personality.