Thoughts after almost half a century...
That's a highly perceptive review, John. Like you, I haven't re-read LoTR in very many years, and it is still on the lower slopes of my own Mount TBR. But I did re-read The Hobbit a few years ago: my review here https://deepwatersreading.wordpress.com/2019/06/08/the-hobbit-or-there-and-back-again-by-j-r-r-tolkien/.
Unlike yourself, I'd previously returned to LoTR via the BBC radio dramatisation; and about eight years ago I acquired that recording on CD. It included as a bonus a recording of a dramatisation of the Hobbit from the 1960s. It made for interesting listening: https://deepwatersreading.wordpress.com/2015/01/16/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-hobbit-by-j-r-r-tolkien-bbc-radio-dramatisations/.
That's a highly perceptive review, John. Like you, I haven't re-read LoTR in very many years, and it is still on the lower slopes of my own Mount TBR. But I did re-read The Hobbit a few years ago: my review here https://deepwatersreading.wordpress.com/2019/06/08/the-hobbit-or-there-and-back-again-by-j-r-r-tolkien/.
Unlike yourself, I'd previously returned to LoTR via the BBC radio dramatisation; and about eight years ago I acquired that recording on CD. It included as a bonus a recording of a dramatisation of the Hobbit from the 1960s. It made for interesting listening: https://deepwatersreading.wordpress.com/2015/01/16/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-hobbit-by-j-r-r-tolkien-bbc-radio-dramatisations/.