The Fellowship of the Ring on audiobook

I have been listening to The Fellowship of the Ring, by J. R. R. Tolkien, narrated by Rob Inglis, ©1990 by Recorded Books, LLC (15 cassettes, 20.5 hours).

I remember reading The Hobbit in 8th grade. Nothing about the story, mind you, just the act of reading it. I recall my grumpiness and boredom, gleefully cracking the spine of my paperback and highlighting the vocabulary words my teacher asked us to find (things I never did to books I loved, at least not until I went to college and learned that writing in books can be a good thing). I also remember getting to the last battle scene (I think there was a dragon involved), and getting so enthralled in the story that I did not want to put the book down. But I was so intent on despising the book that I would never admit that I actually came to enjoy it. So it was that I never read any of Tolkien’s other books, nor did I rush out to see the movies. I watched half of the first film with a group of friends and went to see “Return of the King” with my father-in-law. It wasn’t enough to get me interested in reading the books, though, which I had heard numerous times were even more tedious than The Hobbit.

I picked this audiobook because of the following reasons: 1) I had already picked up four other books for romance, sci-fi, mystery, and horror, and found a large-print suspense, which meant I had to pick an audiobook for fantasy; 2) 15 cassettes take up a lot of space on the shelf which helped make this book “jump out” at me; 3) If I am ever going to read this book, I thought listening to the audiobook might inspire me to actually do it.

For those of you who have not read The Fellowship of the Ring and have not seen the movie (I know you’re out there because I used to be one of you!), here is a very brief synopsis:
When last we met the hobbit Bilbo Baggins, he had collected lots of treasures on his journeys out of the Shire, one of which is a mysterious and magical ring that makes him disappear when he wears it. This ring was forged by a very evil power, and now the very evil power is trying to rise again and is in search of the ring. Bilbo, not realizing the full significance of the ring, passes it down to his nephew Frodo Baggins. Gandalf the wizard tells Frodo about the ring and advises him to leave the Shire before the black horsemen have a chance to catch him and seize the ring. Frodo sets out on a journey, accompanied by a few hobbit friends, and meets elves, dwarves, and men along the way as they are all chased by the dark forces who are looking for the ring.

Now, I hope that those of you are more familiar with the story will forgive me for my vague account of the plot. In part I blame the audiobook format and its incompatibility with my lifestyle. I have listened to audiobooks before, mostly in the car, and found them to be a true delight. That was when I made 30 minute commutes to and from school when I lived in Dallas, TX. Since moving to Atlanta, I live 2 miles away from where I used to work and most of the places I go are within a 5-mile radius of my house. I rarely drive more than 10-15 minutes to go anywhere. If I had restricted listening to this audiobook to my car, I would still be on the first five tapes. Instead, I tried to incorporate listening to it into my daily routine. At first I thought it was pretty cool, listening to the book while I cooked dinner, checked my e-mail, played with my son, etc. By the 10th tape, however, it became a bit more tiresome. I found I would miss things quite often as I stopped to pay attention to something else. For example, I wasn’t quite sure that Gandalf had disappeared and had to look it up in my hard copy of the book to revisit the passage and see what had happened. I was also expecting the book to have at least a small story arc and sense of finality to it, but even when I was on the 15th tape and knew the end was near, I was surprised to hear the words “THE END.” These are details that I might have found if I had been reading book instead of listening to it.

To the audiobook’s credit, it did serve to get me interested in reading LotR. The narrator was good, although he doesn’t sound as good as the guy that does the Harry Potter books, based on some of your observations and comments. Rob Inglis did make up different voices for the characters and sang the tunes (I’m curious if someone wrote out melodies for them or if he made up the tunes), but the voices were not distinct enough for me to always discern who was talking at any given time. That was a bit frustrating when I had to stop and start the tapes at odd points during the story. I also found it intriguing that they included Tolkien’s foreword, which discusses some of the underlying themes and motivations for writing LotR. That in itself really made me want to read the book for myself because I knew I wouldn’t be able to catch all the symbolism and allegory by listening to it.

I do think audiobooks are a good thing, but for myself I will save the pleasure for long car trips and a time when I may have to commute more than 15 minutes. They are much better enjoyed when you’re just looking at the long road ahead of you, making a journey of your own as you listen to the journey of a good story.