The Master Storyteller
By: Alisha Heavilon

JRR Tolkien was a master storyteller. I don't say this because he was an English writer and professor at Oxford University, the most prestigious college in England, but because he truly was a storyteller, heart and soul.

For example, how many of you have seen "Forest Gump"? Do you remember the two scenes with the white feather fluttering in the air? The scenes are shown briefly, at the beginning and the end of the movie. It isn't a crucial part of the film. Most people don't even remember that part. But that detail was important to the director, who is as much a storyteller as any writer. That's why two weeks worth of filming was spent creating a two-minute shot.

JRR Tolkien was the same way. He spent most of his life perfecting his world. He drew maps and he drew scenes from his stories. He created entire languages and alphabets to go with them.

Tolkien's childhood played a large role in the creation of his stories. He was born in South Africa in 1892, at time when the country had numerous political problems. When he was four years old his father died. Then Tolkien, his mother, and his younger brother Hilary returned to England. Shortly after that his mother died as well. He was then raised by a less than affectionate Catholic priest. Many people with similarly difficult lives retreat into their own worlds - by reading, watching movies, in some cases doing drugs, and a wide variety of other things. Tolkien became a writer.

After his marriage, he often told stories to his children for amusement. One day a publisher saw a rough draft of a story based in Tolkien's world, which was named Middle-Earth. The story, which had originally been written for his son John, was soon the published book, "The Hobbit". Not realizing the popularity of his book, Tolkien then continued to work on his history of Middle-Earth, which he called "The Silmarillion". Soon, however, his publisher began talking about a sequel to "The Hobbit". Eventually Tolkien began work on a new story in Middle-Earth. It was published a number of years later, as the trilogy called "The Lord of the Rings".

"The Lord of the Rings" was the first of its kind. Today, you could go to any bookstore in the world and find an extensive fantasy/science fiction section. But when Tolkien wrote his epic, there was nothing else like it. No one had ever written a book even remotely similar before. "The Lord of the Rings" was an amazing fantasy that took place in a world we've never seen, and yet we can relate to. The choice between good and evil is present throughout the entire set of books, if you look closely enough. But Tolkien doesn't stress those choices, he doesn't preach to his readers. Tolkien doesn't come out and say, so-and-so did this and he's a bad person. He lets the readers decide what they think for themselves.

Now, "The Lord of the Rings" is the most acclaimed fantasy book there is. It was the first, and Tolkien did a good job writing it. On any fantasy shelf of a bookstore you can find a dozen or more books that are compared to Tolkien or Tolkien's world. "The Lord of the Rings" is the ultimate fantasy standard. A lot of this is because the way Tolkien wrote. He didn't tell you it was cold outside, or than his characters were hungry. He made you feel it was cold. He described everything in great detail. You're right along with his characters through every step of their journeys. You feel like you really are in Middle-Earth.

I think JRR Tolkien is important for many of the same reasons. He opened everyone to a world that only a few had dreamed of before. Everyone has points in their lives when they feel like life is too much to handle and they just want to get away from it all. Unfortunately, most of us can't leave town for a few days just because we want to. "The Lord of the Rings" is a way to escape for a little while. It has adventure and risks, but in the back of your mind you always know things will turn out okay. For that very same reason, Tolkien wrote it. It was his personal outlet; his way of dealing with life.

JRR Tolkien lived and breathed his epic. It ultimately achieved its purpose - not because so many other people love it and his family made a great deal of money from it, but because it was his. It would have meant just as much to him if no one had ever read it.

Peter S. Beagle, the author of "The Last Unicorn" once wrote, "For in the end it is Middle-Earth and its dwellers that we love, not Tolkien's considerable gifts in showing it to us. I said once that the world he charts was there long before him, and I still believe it. He is a great enough magician to tap our most common nightmares, daydreams and twilight fancies, but he never invented them either: he found them a place to live, a green alternative to each day's madness here in a poisoned world. We are raised to honor all the wrong explorers and discoverers - thieves planting flags, murderers carrying crosses. Let us at last praise the colonizers of dreams."

Tolkien was the master storyteller because, in a way, he made Middle-Earth real for everyone who ever dreamed. He's not loved because he created a world, he's loved because he provided a doorway to the place everyone dreams of.