From the heart of the Shire, through the depths of Moria, to the ends of Middle-Earth, it’s The Babylon Bee Reads The Lord Of The Rings! In this episode of The Babylon Bee Reads, Kyle and Dan tell some of their personal stories relating to Tolkien’s writings and discuss Tolkien’s Foreword in which he aggressively denies that The Lord Of The Rings is an allegory. Subscribers also get to hear their discussion of the Prologue concerning hobbits, the Shire, and pipeweed.

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Foreword

Our personal stories with Lord of the Rings

Themes we’ve gotten out of the books in the past

How fleeting evil is. History is cyclical, but the faithful need not worry. (Tom Bombadil) (“There was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach”)

Small people doing ordinary deeds can change the world - Diana Glyer

Good vs. evil, obviously. But more specifically, the asymmetric war of good and evil. Good is eternal. Evil is fleeting. Evil is just twisted good. They are not on equal footing.

Tolkien’s almost overly defensive foreword -- extreme insistence that it’s not an allegory

Says if it were an allegory for WW2, the Free Peoples would have used the Ring.

Prologue

Setting the stage: Middle-Earth as myth and an alternate history of earth

Hobbits are seemingly unimportant, yet they change the world

Maps!