I am reading The Fellowship of the Ring to Smallsteps at night and just finished the chapter "The Bridge of Khazad-dûm" in which at the end Gandalf is pulled by the Balrog into the chasm to his (at this point) demise. I have read these books several times over the years but the last time must have been over twenty five years ago, before the release of the first movie hit the cinemas, as I wanted to get reacquainted with it. However, something came to mind when reading the book last night, because it was wrong.
You shall not pass!
That was the line I remembered. But the book had it as "You cannot pass". And then I remembered that when the first movie came out (I saw it at the cinemas at the premiere because my sister worked there at the time), I noted the same change. There were of course many changes in the movie compared to the book in order to keep the flow going and reduce complication with too many characters, but that line stood out, as it is such an important part of the story. But since then, I have seen the movie a few times and well, the memory replacement process kicked in and forced my memory to remember the changed line instead of the correct line.
Close enough is good enough?
My friend who was here the other day is reading a book on Einstein he is enjoying, but that came up because while we were talking we were discussing creativity and the ability to imagine. Imagination is vital for humanity, but it is being reduced through our cultural changes, namely, the way we consume. A famous paraphrased Einstein quote is,
"If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.
It isn't the story that makes them intelligent, it is the process of forced imagination they are pushed into, where they have to create worlds, animals and characters that do not exist, and cannot exist. It forces a child to imagine the impossible, which develops multiple parts of their brain function to practice and enhance their imaginative capabilities. Imagining the impossible is high-level problem solving and when done through the lens of a fairy tale, it doesn't feel like work at all.
When Gandalf was pulled down by the Balrog, Smallsteps' eyes welled.
When our brain imagines something, it can't help but treat it as real, even when logic tries to overrule it. And through books we are not only able to imagine the visuals, but also the emotions we might experience when something like loss happens. Smallsteps felt the loss of Gandalf at that point, not because of what she had heard, but because it impacted on the world she had created, that was unique to her, and where she had attached herself to the characters.
But most kids these days, don't read, they watch. Watching is completely different to reading, even if the story is identical, because it provides all the sights and sounds and direction, without having to create anything. When watching, the majority of value in the fairy tale is lost, but we do not even realise it because, we are not personally invested. When we watch a movie we are a fly on the wall, a voyeur. When we read a book and imagine the story, we are the creator.
Einstein said, fair tales.
Because they aren't real. Yes, there are plenty of lessons that can be learned from them, but the "unrealness" is what forces us to practice our imagination and push it to the limits. Do this enough and it becomes easy to innovate, to problem solve, and be creative across many disciplines. Einstein's ability at math wasn't driven only by the numbers, it was because he was able to "put himself" into his theories, imagine himself travelling on a particle (or wave) of light. He could visualise the theory, and then close the gaps to better understanding.
But, when we watch not only do our creative processes get crushed, but our memories get changed. I can no longer see the characters I created for LotR when I was a kid, all I see are the actors from the movies. My own world has been hijacked without me putting up a fight. And this was made salient again last night, as to how while we think we remember, we think we can do, we don't actually no what has been replaced, what we have lost, until we are reminded of it.
By then, it might be too late.
And we cannot pass.
Taraz
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I read a lot to my kids and there was a fair bit of fantasy in there. I eventually did LotR with the elder one and it took about a year to get through. It is hard work in places with the songs and stuff, but still an epic tale. I've read it a couple times for myself. The movies are a slightly different thing as there are a lot of changes, but it's the old tale of good and evil. I don't think you need religion to understand the difference.
One of the kids still reads a lot, so there was partial success in that. They happen to be a PhD scientist :)
The LotR movies are great too and I understand leaving a lot of things out. I was not a fan of the songs as a kid, but reading them again I have more appreciation for the history and poetry in them. My daughter finds it amazing that one person created all of this.
I wonder how much influence it had/has
I know some people have issues with the differences, but I never expect a book and film to be exactly the same. Tolkien was an expert on languages and cultures so that had to influence his writing. It's still a great work and admired by lots of people.
BTW We went to where they filmed Hobbiton in New Zealand. That was fun.
I think it's called the Mandela Effect or something like that where everyone remembers something a certain way, but it's not actually accurate. I'm currently watching a show on Apple TV+ that is "based" on a book. I thought it was going to be a more accurate representation due to the author being one of the producers on the show, but it is totally different. Some of the characters are the same, but so so different. We aren't finished with it yet, but as of right now, the book is much better! Oh, it's called "Lucky".
Normally the books are better, because we can make them ours. A thousand people can read the same book, and have 1000 different worlds.
Is Lucky good? It is on my list as I like the actress.
We are about halfway through and it isn't bad. If I hadn't read the book I would probably like it a lot more than I currently do. I really like Timothy Oliphant, so I was interested to see how he was in this.
Did you watch the Aliens show with him?
Oh no, Alien Earth? I haven't seen that yet at all.
Yeah. It was alright.
Do you think that Lord of the rings would be better if Gandalf stayed dead?
Hmm, I don't think so. He has his own arc and a lot of it goes missing in the book. Would be nice to see what "actually" went on.
My mother read me hundreds of fairy tales. Later, during my school years, I read thousands of science fiction short stories and novellas. I was constantly generating new ideas and making discoveries, while most people around me followed a set pattern.
When everyone is consuming the same, they can pretty much only create in between the lines.
Hmm, you’re right, I still remember book we read when we were in primary and even secondary school, some Shakespeare work especially those that deal with fairy tales too. I think the kind of generation will have now prefer TV and audio to reading and I see that a lot here.
Have you watched any of the shakespeare movies and been surprised by the characters?
Yes, I have watched several Shakespeare movies because we show them to our students preparing for examination. Tempest, I like Ferdinand, merchant of Venice, hamlet and many others.
Hence the name of a particular device, the "tell-a-vision". Decline started not long after
Yeah - the idiot box is what my grandad called it.
intesting. i guess it sounds better too.. imo. :)
in the head? Smallsteps hears it in my voice :D
This made me remember something that got stuck in my mind from the high school years when I was in a trip with my girlfriend and wanted to stay on a bench and somebody told us: Don't touch it, it's mine! We all looked twice at that and after the person left we ended up laughing about it and that phrase stayed with us. Some things simply leave an impression on us... sorry for the off-topic comment, just reading your post activated that memory from my brain. 😆
I like it when something triggers weird memories! :D
When we read, I think we have to create the characters and the world in our own minds, so the experience becomes more personal. However, movies inevitably replace some of that imagination with someone else's version of the story.
I guess when we watch enough, all of our own thoughts are overwritten with the images from someone else.
Respectfully, my imagination actually grew from my deep love for films. From that love, I started building my own worlds and stories in my mind, and I even have ideas for films now. So for me, watching was not passive; it was a spark that made me a creator too. Reading and watching both build imagination, just two different doors to the same house.
All I hear coming out of people's mouths who watch a lot, is repetition of what they have heard. Sure, ideas can come, but it doesn't build that imagination automatically. Reading forces the imagination to work. Most people watch, and think very little.
A pertinent reflection prompted by your return to The Lord of the Rings, both the book and the film. I am certainly convinced that reading books is indispensable, and when two media and styles are so different, cinema cannot replace the experience of reading. Especially if the film is somewhat simplistic and already fully resolved in every respect, as is sometimes the case.
A few days ago, this question came to mind again after watching Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey. I quite like Nolan’s philosophical and moral approach, but I wondered: what might happen to someone who hasn’t read The Odyssey?
Best regards, @tarazkp.
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As a storyteller you can "carefully craft" (I think it's now a buzzphrase which makes me automatically hate it, I think I'm going to end up hating most of the English language the way I'm going XD) every sentence of every paragraph, every line of dialogue, every shot, every character's expression just so, and people may still miss your subtle (and sometimes BLATANTLY OBVIOUS as far as I'm concerned in the case of my roleplayers XD) cues/clues/foreshadowing even if they are actively paying attention.
I don't really have target audiences/demographics but people who want something easy and passive that spells out everything for them aren't it, I'm hilariously terrible at straightforward simple stories with unabiguous neat resolutions
I keep saying I should try LoTR, I am pretty sure we have all of the books here (J's midlife crisis has been embarking on trying to collect/preserve as much literature/"classics" as he can/is interested in), unfortunately I'm "mentally scarred" as the first time I encountered J.R.R Tolkien was seeing The Scimarillon on a friend's bookshelf, remembering that author was supposed to be a good one and grabbing that book.
and I'm prioritising re/reading the Discworld series first >_> and after that is Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell which is a whale bludgeoner
The Silmarillion is more a history text for the world of LOTR than an adventure. It has some great stories in it, but you don't want to read it as a story for sure.
Yeh my completely blind approach to it was entirely the wrong one 😅
Imagination is what AI cannot replicate so far, so I think that this is going to be a very good skill to develop going forward...
What about the self improving models? Don't those lessen the need to be imaginative? One may imagine an idea and feed it to AI, then it goes through several self-checks and improvements and one may pick something from the results, which won't close the doors of further imagining?
I have not seen those in action yet...
The point about books forcing us to create the world instead of just consuming one… yeah. There’s something so special about a story living differently inside every reader’s head. The fact that Smallsteps actually felt the loss of Gandalf because she had built that world herself
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STOPI have always enjoy to read the book first and then the movie becomes more colorfull more understandable.
do you think audiobooks are better than movies for keeping our imagination alive
As a librarian, I had to often remind people that audiobooks were still books, and should not be looked down upon as less-than. I don't know if I would say they are better, just different. Reading and listening, at least to me, mean activating different intellectual processes. More importantly, I can listen while I drive, do chores, etc. but I can't read while I drive, for example. People with dyslexia and vision impairment find print an obstacle, but audio a way around that.
I listen to audio books when I can't read
This is one of the benefits of audiobooks, although now a days audio dramas are overwhelming audiobooks. I feel no need of the extensive sound effects, acting, just narration is more than enough I think.
It must be amazing to get that feeling of hearing these books for the first time again by using Smallsteps as a proxy. Nothing quite matches that first time through a story.
Reading creates boundless possibilities, no matter how good the adaptation is, it can never give the feeling of reading. For example, I can say about the Bourne Trilogy. Many people say that is one of the best spy thriller movies. I totally can agree with them, but compared to books, those are average to me. As while reading, I felt that I was shadowing Jason I felt what he felt, but the movies I only watched.