comparing the two is comparing orange to orange juice. The similarties are superficial in that they're fantasy novels taking place in alternate worlds. Tolkien was much more influenced by mythology and adventure stories, Martin's son of fire and ice actually has more historical roots in the Medieval feudal system.

With that said fuck hobbit singing

LOTR is much better if you skip all of the singing parts. Especially the whole Tom Bombadil part.

Fuck that guy.

Seriously, the part of the book between Gandalf leaving to talk to Saruman and the hobbits getting to Bree almost made me stop reading the damn book.

It's pretty telling that in the Directors Cut of the movie trilogy - something that is seen as fairly comprehensive and loyal to the source material - even Peter Jackson decided Tom Bombadil wasn't worth including.

That's why Peter Jackson is a good director.

I quite liked the book LOTR (and The Hobbit), but The Silmarillion was completely impenetrable. Just one giant hedge-maze of names and epithets, more like a phone book than a creation myth.

Haven't yet read or seen any Game of Thrones, but everyone seems to love it so I'm sure I will at some point!

I love LOTR as well, except for Tom Bombadil. And the Hobbit is awesome.

I am going to go back and read Game of Thrones again. I liked it.

I love Hobbits!

I read The Hobbit and LOTR and The Simarillion.

I grew up with those books and have strange nostalgic tendencies to defend their honor. (Read: Weird!)

I even disliked/ only half likes the Harry Potter series cause I felt like it ripped off so many Tolkien themes.

FANATICAL!

You should definitely read "Bored of the Rings," a Harvard Lampoon parody of you-know-what.

Many of the cultural references are dated but it's still milk-out-the-nose funny.

I read Bored of the Rings.

if you're going to hate a fantasy series for ripping off tolkien you might as well just give up on the genre as a whole

I read the first book in a series that was almost a direct rip off of LOTR. As in, it had pretty much the same plot. A guy who is a race of small people is the only person who can save the world from a great evil in the land. It was awful.

Also, Willow.

Oh man, I'm on book 5 of the song of ice and fire series- have any of you guys read the series? I have so much I wanna talk about, but no one to really talk to. I need to find a discussion board. Martin is a literary madman

The Tolkien books are an attempt to create a mythology for England: Martin is just out to kick ass, as far as I can tell.

So they're doing two totally different things. That said: I skimmed a hell of a lot of LotR because that shit was boring.

@Jay Def: I think I know the series you're thinking of. It even had an extended sequence of going through the dwarven caves under the mountains and awakening an ancient evil...

lil p: soon as I get a chance to read book 5 i'll be happy to talk with ya bout it

on topic: They're out to do different things, you wouldn't have martin without tolkien, etc. but whatever. They're both freakin' awesome.