One thing that has stood in my way regarding reading the whole
HOME series, is a uneasiness in knowing
too much about how the sausage is made, so to speak.
I wonder if enough inside info on the shifting conceptions and ideas Tolkien had for the lengendarium might in time rub off some of the magic of the stories themselves. I know that for a lot of people, that's simply a non-issue. But I think back on a
certain movie, where the late, great Robin Williams dismisses an English textbook's author's attempts to rate the quality of poetry but analyzing its rhyme and meter rather than emotional impact. Perhaps that's an imperfect comparison, but it almost feels like the same thing.