Recommended by
- Elon Musk In Tad Friend’s 2009 New Yorker profile Musk traces the sense that someone ought to be trying to save the world to the fantasy and science fiction he read as a bullied schoolboy in Pretoria. Rendered as a relationship rather than a quote because the profile is paywalled and the wording could not be checked against the original. source ↗
- Peter Thiel — Documented in Business Insider's 2012 report on the Tolkien-derived names he chose for his companies (Lembas, Rivendell One, Valar, Mithril, Palantir) source ↗
Summary
J.R.R. Tolkien's 1954-1955 high-fantasy trilogy (often published as a single volume) following the quest of the hobbit Frodo Baggins to destroy the One Ring in the fires of Mount Doom, and the fellowship of elves, dwarves, men, and wizards who aid him against the dark lord Sauron. The work created the modern fantasy genre through its depth of world-building — complete languages, mythologies, and histories — and its exploration of power, corruption, friendship, and the courage of ordinary beings in extraordinary circumstances. It is one of the best-selling and most influential novels of the 20th century.