Happy Birthday Professor Tolkien!

I can’t believe I almost forgot J.R.R. Tolkien’s birthday.  He would have been 119.  I won’t go into detail, except to say I’ve never been much of a fantasy or sci-fiction fan, but his masterpiece The Lord of the Rings still ranks as one of my favorites.  I try to read at least one of the three books every year (always starting in September of course).  His works are loved by many, and like anything, disliked by others.  But few try to dismiss the influence he had on fantasy in particular and fiction in general.  A work of such magnitude, by a man so brilliant in his field and yet possessing that rarest of qualities in so many academic settings – common sense and wisdom – molded a tale that is wonderful on more levels than I can grasp.  The films, cartoons, animated specials all have their own visions of what he wrote, and each has good and bad.  But there is nothing to compare with his magnum opus, a story that makes other popular fantasy literature seem like pale reflections at best.   So for the influence, the enjoyment, and the sheer depth of the literary undertaking that stands almost as its own genre, thanks for everything!  And Happy Eleventy-Ninth Birthday!