Professor Tolkien's "Hobbit" and 'Trilogy' are masterpieces. How often have you read them? Are you an addict?

Repeat after me... "The Lord of the Rings is not a trilogy. It's a single story, usually published in three volumes."

I haven't counted, but I've read The Hobbit maybe three or four times, and LOTR maybe five times - mainly when I was 10-15, once just before the first movie came out.

I adored The Silmarillion when I first read it, but I understand why a lot of people don't like it. As soon as you find a character you like, he's killed in battle, or the narrative skips ahead 50 years and he's moved out of the narrator's knowledge, or died of old age.

Tolkien lived about another 18 years after finishing LOTR, so it's not as if he didn't have time to write another book, but he was a perfectionist. He still wasn't happy with The Silmarillion by the time he died, and his son Christopher had to edit it into a coherent whole.

A few other bits and pieces of Middle Earth lore were published after he died. I remember "Unfinished Tales" as being enjoyable, if rather disjointed. His son also published early drafts of other stories, with commentary that explains how it developed - fascinating if you want to understand the creative process.

I am so happy! Another who couldn't get through Silmarillion!

I love books and feel very guilty if I don't finish a book once I've started (others include "Catcher in the Rye" and "Captain Corelli's Mandolin", but that's about it).

I remember I first read LOTR when I started my first job after graduating. Every spare moment I had, my head was in that book. My boss was very understanding and urged me to "finish the damn book and do some work"!

Yes. Addicted. btw, @Bozo, I DID get your previous reference to Prof Tolkien's work in a previous question! ;-)

Loved Hobbit as well. Loads!

I haven't read them for so long. The magic of that first time read won't be there. I really lived it! But, I'm sure I will read them quite differently now and take something different from them.

I did see Tolkien's manuscripts at the Bodleian library in Oxford, some while back. A real thrill.

You've enthused me to dust off some of those books and re-read!

I've read The Hobbit only once or twice, but I've read LOTR several times and feel an urge (not always acted on) to read it again every autumn. I definitely share your feelings! It's like everything beautiful I've ever read, yet like nothing else. When I finished it the first time (probably before you were born), trying to read anything else was like hearing someone else speak after Saruman.

How did you like the movies? When I first read the trilogy an ddiscussed it with friends we tended to agree that it would be almost impossible to film, but Peter Jackson DID IT! Even though he left out Tom Bombadill and that marvelously understated courtship of Faramir and Eowyn and downplayed the arrival of the Riders of Rohan at the siege of Gondor, I loved all three parts. Seeing them was like stepping into the story!

Incidentally, I always enjoyed informing my literature classes that Tolkien was the father of modern Beowulf scholarship or having them read his translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. I also got a kick out of citing his "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics" in my dissertation.

Well Lord of The Ring i have read it like 20 times in my Life. The Hobbit i only read it twice, but since i decided that for Summer i will read books that i've read before in more than 5 years. I'll put that one on list now. As for the Silmarillion to be honest i have never read it.

I love the Movies and Books. I'm only 14 and have read the hobbit 3 times, trilogy 2 times, and similarion 1 time.

Movies, I've lost count of how many times I've watched it (extended version) plus cast commentary and appendixes.

First time I ever started I was in 5th grade... amazingly understood most of it, obviously with the help of the movie as a guidline.

I miss Tom Bombadidil in the movies, but the hobbit actors are glad they didn't have to run in circles naked...

And the computer games (1 is movie version, 2 is book) I like a lot. They're fun... I think they might've used massive to make them...

:)

I first read them when I was 15, then I read them again each year until I was 25, since then it's been about every 5 years I reread them. I couldn't quite ever get through the Silmarillion, although I did once read all the way through the appendixes of LOTR. These are some of my all time favorite books. We even have an old recording on vinyl of J.R.R himself reading some of LOTR poetry, he does a great Treebeard!. BTW for those who are unsure how to pronounce Tolkien he said "tollken"

Over the thirty years since I first read it, maybe 20 times in all. More at the beginning ( I think at least twice a year for the first few years) and once a year for period. Not so much anymore, once in the last five years, but then again I read a lot less fantasy than I used to.

I've read the hobbit and the lord of the Rings during this past year. It was My first time. I plan on reading them once every couple of years. I didnt try silmarillion. I have read farmer giles of ham and smith of major wooten. They were very easy reads

Hobbit = Epic

Trilogy = Borrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrring

I am reading the Hobbit right now. =)

Well, not right this minute, but I was reading it earlier.