The First LOTR Fans

[Laurinquë]

That is amazing tale, how you must have suffered without any other LotR fans to pontificate with! I don't think I could have managed that, I might have "imploded" from pent up exuberance!
I would like to hear other Tolkien Coming of Age club members stories, i hope they pay a visit! I myself have been a fan for mere months, in fact I finished the less then a month ago (I read LotR first)! Really quite sad...
Oh, and no your not rambling Estelyn Telcontar, I love hearing this stuff!

[Estelyn Telcontar]

I'm glad you enjoyed my historical meanderings!

Originally Posted by Laurinquë

I would like to hear other Tolkien Coming of Age club members stories, i hope they pay a visit!

You are very welcome to read the stories for yourself on the two threads to which I linked in my above post - anyone can look in! We've only restricted posting (not reading) to those Downers who have been Tolkien readers/fans for at least 18 years.

[Lalwendë]

Do I count as 'old time' then? I first read Tolkien in the early 80s (when it was deeply uncool, and the province of D&D fans, who were also deeply uncool then). In fact it is my silver anniversary this year...

There was certainly no internet then. I remember my first 'go' on the net was sometime around 1996-ish when my mate sneaked me into the University computer rooms because "this internet is brilliant and you've got to have a go on it, I reckon you can find anything on it, honest" I looked up Stereolab, F1 and... Tolkien. Even then there were silly numbers of sites. I didn't get home internet until about....oooh....2000? And that was considered luxuriously 'high tech'! How times change...

[Mithadan]

I have previously discussed at length my early and later experiences with being a fan of LoTR http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthr...019#post531019

[TheGreatElvenWarrior]

Originally Posted by Laurinquë

That is amazing tale, how you must have suffered without any other LotR fans to pontificate with! I don't think I could have managed that, I might have "imploded" from pent up exuberance!

If it wasn't for me then you wouldn't be a Tolkien fan... You would've barely even gotten halfway through the Fellowship, if I hadn't made you finish it... And for me it's all you know who's fault(I won't say her name online) for making me want to read Tolkien.
On another note, I wasn't even born before some (okay, most) BDers discovered LotR... I'm young and haven't even come up on my 1 year anniversary on reading LotR...

[Thinlómien]

I certainly don't qualify as one of the first LotR fans and not as an early Tolkien fan either, but as I became a LotR enthusiast before the films came out and before I discovered internet, or at least before I discovered discussion forums, so I feel like I have a "right" to ramble here...

I was introduced to Tolkien's work in 1996 when I was only six years old. I saw the Bakshi animation and TH and LotR were read aloud to me, later followed by Sil and UT. I did not know any other people who liked Tolkien except myself, my father (who introduced me to it), my sister (who also became a fan) and a friend of my mother's. It really didn't bother me, I was so small that I didn't care about discussing about LotR deeply (only things like "who's your favourite character" and those could be well discussed with my sister) and I could always immerse myself in ME by playing ME with my sister. I also introduced several friends of mine to LotR - means I told them about the races and the places - and then we played ME together. My friends didn't totally grasp everything it was about, but they thought it funny and some even read LotR.

Mostly my classmates thought I was a bit odd. It maybe is no wonder as when they read those "I just learned to read"-books with big font and less than 50 pages, I read LotR. Later, too, they considered my fascination with LotR (and history and other stuff they thought strange) as something odd and abnormal and I didn't meet any fellow enthusiasts.

When the movies came out, everything changed. Everybody knew what LotR was about and suddenly it was much easier to convince people to read LotR. Not only did I either meet my current best friends or more or less managed to make them Tolkien fans back then, but I met other people of my age who liked LotR. I soon became disappointed, though, as they were mostly just interested in Orlando Bloom and had never read the book.

Then, some years later, I had become more interested in and accustomed to the internet and my English skills had developed into a satisfactory level. So, when I came across a certain forum, I registered - first just to ask a question that had troubled me - became hooked and have met lots of awesome Tolkien fans since then.

And I don't know if it's because the people who I socialise with are older, or because I hang around in certain sort of places or because the movies have raised LotR awareness significantly, but it seems I really meet/discover fellow Tolkien fans far more often than before in RL too.

[Sauron the White]

When I graduated from college in '71 I was sick and tired of reading only non-fiction as my major was political science and my minors sociology and history. I had just gotten married and my wife bought me a bunch of books to read over the summer and HOBBIT and LOTR were among them. I had a good friend who had read them and I would call him to discuss the latest chapters I had read. He kept saying that as good as I thought it was, it only kept getting better as the book developed. And he was right.

About the same time I worked as a recreation director for Dearborn Michigan and became friends with a guy named Tom Tataranowicz. We were both Polish Catholic kids with similar backgrounds and he was interested in both LOTR and antimation. He ended up working for Bakshi on a few films including LOTR and sent me a couple of hobbit cels.

I never went in for the societies or academic groups, but kept rereading the books every five to seven years. Bought SIL the first day it came out and read a bit of it in the car on the way to a Frank Frazetta convention in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania --- at least thats how I remember it.... it could have been a World Fantasy Con... who knows anymore?

Have read all the HOME and love the Jackson movies and am looking forward to the next ME films. I am lucky to have first US editions of HOBBIT and LOTR and lots of stuff from the films. My prized possession is a signed JRRT record album - POEMS AND SONGS OF MIDDLE EARTH which I bought from the collection of a rather well known New York city collector.

[A Little Green]

Originally Posted by Lommy

I certainly don't qualify as one of the first LotR fans and not as an early Tolkien fan either, but as I became a LotR enthusiast before the films came out and before I discovered internet, or at least before I discovered discussion forums, so I feel like I have a "right" to ramble here...

Ooooh do I have a right to ramble as well? I was but 4 years old when I fell in love with LotR. Surely that counts?

Originally Posted by Lommy

When the movies came out, everything changed.

Indeed. I didn't take it like you did, though... I thought it annoying that LotR, that had been MY personal oddity until then, was suddenly known to all. I found it disgusting that all the boys in my school were suddenly playing Aragorn or Legolas in Helm's Deep, and pretended to know so much about LotR. I hated it. (Have mercy, I was, what, ten years old...)

I never really minded not knowing too many other fans. It was sufficient for me to have my sis (and her friends, and my dad and that friend of my mum's, for that matter) to talk about LotR with. Some of my friends have read it, most have not, and with those who have we rarely discuss it.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by A Little Green

I thought it annoying that LotR, that had been MY personal oddity until then, was suddenly known to all.

Oh yeees! I had exactly the same feeling (and I was older than you ). These silly newcomers just were not worth of Tolkien's world! (as if I had any more right on it than them) It even moved me to leave Tolkien's world behind for some time... and I returned to it only very recently, before coming to Barrow-Downs.

Concerning other fans, I am not also of the bunch who have the right to talk here, but I can say even in the 90's it was not easy to meet other fans around here. I did not meet many, but it did not bother me. And maybe it was for the best: I felt that I AM the authority among my friends who had some knowledge about Tolkien and that was a thing I liked

[Thinlómien]

Originally Posted by Greenie

I was but 4 years old when I fell in love with LotR. Surely that counts?

Yes, you were 4 years old, all too small. You always said it was scary and wanted Dad to stop reading when it became interesting... (On a slightly more serious note, I think a very amusing occasion was when our dad was reading the chapter The Stairs in Cirith Ungol and she was scared and asked Dad to stop reading just a little while before Frodo says: 'You and I, Sam, are stuck in the worst places of the story, and it is all too likely that some will say at this point: "Shut the book now, dad; we don't want to read anymore."' It was amazing.)

Originally Posted by Legate

And maybe it was for the best: I felt that I AM the authority among my friends who had some knowledge about Tolkien and that was a thing I liked

Now that is a familiar feeling... I loved both telling my friends about LotR and seeing them starting to like it but never rivalling my enthusiasm and I also loved to brainwash my sister to like stupid races or characters - it was so annoying if someone had the same favourite as me, because they were my favourites.

Besides, now I even recall about half of the girls in my class playing "Gollum-tag" in our school yard. The chaser was Gollum and other people were fish and one person was The Ring and Gollum tried to catch them all, but especially The Ring. The rules really didn't make any sense, but hey, I was probably eight or something when I made it up and I'm quite proud of getting so many people playing it with me. And my poor best friend, she was always laughing so much at my Gollum-imitations that I caught her pretty often...

This thread seems to be turning into an unofficial nostalgia thread...