THE LORD OF THE RINGS

J.R.R. Tolkien invests with considerable charm this 1952 recording of a few bits and pieces from THE LORD OF THE RINGS (and one poem that he apparently intended to include in the then unpublished work but did not). Tolkien is gruff, humorous, sad in the elegy for Boromir, sometimes clearly amused by his own poetry, all in all a satisfactory reader. Yet the cassette has, as one might expect given its time, a few problems--inconsistent volume and occasional difficulty in understanding Tolkien being the major ones. Still, the author's millions of fans will ignore these just to hear their favorite read his own stuff, and they will be pleased. T. H. © AudioFile 2000, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC/JAN 01]