Customer Reviews

The Real Middle Earth: Exploring the Magic and Mystery of the Middle Ages, J.R.R. Tolkien, and "The Lord of the Rings"

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Reviewer: A reader from England This is a superb book. Vividly written, it explores the magical and spiritual beliefs of people who lived in the 'real' Middle-earth. This was the Anglo-Saxon and Norse cultures of a thousand years ago and more, which so inspired Tolkien. The author Brian Bates is well-known for previous books on this subject (especially his best-selling novel The Way of Wyrd). It is different from other books purporting to compare Tolkien with ancient mythology, because the world it reveals is one in which people saw their EVERYDAY LIVES as being charged with a mysterious power they called Wyrd. It was manifested by a magical landscape, in which trees, plants and animals all had powerful symbolic presences. Elves, dragons, giants and dwarves were encountered in reality as well as in dreams and stories. Shapeshifting, spellcasting and healing are explored as they happened in real life.

Bates also explains really well how such a magical outlook on life relates to our own perspectives. In a time where The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter confirms the potency of magic for our lives, we see how we once had a wisdom lost over the centuries as first Christianity and then science became dominant world views. But Bates does not paint a utopia - he makes clear that life was hard in Anglo-Saxon times. Yet he shows what the usual history or mythology books are missing - the magic at the heart of life in those times.

The book is refreshingly written, free from academic pomposity and dry argument. He offers vivid anecdotes, examples, and beautiful descriptions which make the reader feel present in those times. And for those readers who want to follow up topics in more detail, there is an excellent list of sources, with guidance for the specialist academic books that cover the material best.

I agree with previous reviewers that the book is not a lot about Tolkien directly. But I and other Tolkien fans who have read it, found it very illuminating about the source of his ideas, and much more original than the many books that just endlessly discuss The Lord of the Rings.

As a practitioner of the Old Ways, this book is far more informative than many titles out there today. It helps to reconstruct the spiritual ways of our pre-Christian European ancestors as well as give a better understanding of what Germanic Heathens and Celts believed.

They were very deeply spiritual people who were quite connected to the Otherworld. The Divine, including magic, was an integral part of everyday life.

I have LOVED Tolkien since I was a child, not only because he was such a magnificent writer, but because of the genuine Pagan/Heathen beliefs he incorporated into his works. For instance, it is amazing how much Gandalf is like the god Woden/Odin. ("Gandalf" means "magic wand/staff elf" in Old Norse, by the way.)
This book reveals much about what these people believed and has much excellent information contained within. A gem!!!!

First of all this book talks relativly little about Tolkien or any of his books. What it does is try to capture the "magic" of the places and time periods that Tolkien drew inspiration from for his work, namely post Roman to pre Norman Great Britain, and to a slightly lesser extent Scandinavian and Icelandic society and culture from the same time periods using historical sources, so called "myth", namely the pagan beliefs of the Celts, Norse and Anglo-Saxons and other assorted folk beliefs and tales.

From what I can gather from reading this book the author seems like he has a similar belief that I have always had that Tolkien on one level was conciously trying to help to write a missing part of our (assuming you are of anglo-celtic-norse ancestry) heritage due to our own ancestors poor job of writng down and recording their own history, and in part to the fact that much of what is known of our pre christian history was written by outsiders to the culture, or people with a biased political agenda, and above all Christian church hierarchy who were more or less under orders to discredit our whole culture as of being of the Jewish satan and to force this demonic alien Jew Yahweh/Jesus god upon our people. Even though Tolkien himself was a devout Catholic, I believe he was conciously trying to "fill in the blanks" in a sense, even though the inspiration and the imagination of the Hobbit/LOTR came from his subconcious ancestral memory as well as the written sources of the time that we have.

So enough of my pschoanalyzing, on to the book itself. Bates goes into most everything that was "magic" about those times and is very entertaining in doing so talking about the warrior culture, the concept of wyrd and destiny, shapeshifting, the pre christian gods and how the people related to them, how people related to nature, animals, the forest, the land, the use of spells and magic, dwarves and elves, whether you take these things as real or imaginary superstitions they were 100% real to the people of those times.

This is a great book for anybody who wants to look into the "magic" of those times or for anybody who wants to get a better understanding of where Tolkien got his ideas, both on the concious and subconcious levels.

okay, first of all, the title is not misleading. the book is about the cosmology, society and spiritual beliefs of dark age northwestern europe. it is not an encyclopedia of tolkien's middle earth, like some reviewers hoped it would be. it is about the "real" middle-earth, the one that tolkien loved and created a mythology for. i highly recommend this book. brian bates is well-read and really knows his history. if you want to learn more about teutonic and celtic beliefs other than the names of their gods, read brian bates! he explains the concept of wyrd, which is as important to true heathenism as god is to christianity. it is like a huge cosmic web that everything is attached to. when you tremble it, beware. think of it as a combination of karma/free will/ and a vague sense of destiny. also you will learn why binding, weaving and fettering terms are used when describing magic spells. you will learn how important "totem" animal spirits were(beorn), bird messengers, and the magic power of water, springs, trees, stones, and ruins. the valknot is explained, as is the real meaning behind the interlaced designs of celtic and germanic artwork. along with the vast amounts of information about ancient europe, brian bates points out where those ideas appear in tolkien's work, thus giving you a greater understanding of tolkien's middle earth, and at the same time, the real middle-earth. this book is comprehensive, and if you want to get into heathenism, it's a good place to start. i also recommend "the way of wyrd" by the same author. it's about a monk who follows an anglo-saxon sorcerer around to learn about heathens. you will never fully understand either middle-earth until you read this book.

This excellent book turns the anthropological magnifying glass back on the West. This is about "our (if you are of anglo celtic ancestry) Dreamtime". If we understood our cultural heritage as well as this book articulates it then may be we wouldn't have treated others (such as indiginous peoples) so poorly. A very important book that should be studied in High Schools...

This book never claims to be about Tolkein - it is about the Real Middle Earth that Tolkein uses as a background for his fantasy work.

This book is engaging and filled with lots of wonderful information that leads us to the truth about the time in which our ancestors lived. It communicates to us how they viewed the world.

If one looks at Brian Bates other book "THe Way of The Wyrd" you begin to realize this is fundamental to his life work not a rip off of Tolkein.

I highly recommend this to anyone who wants to understand our indigenous backgrounds - or just likes a good book to read for that matter.

This book is an excellent read. It is very inspiring and informative at the same time. If you like informational reading material, you might like this book. If you like a good book to sit and read, you'll love it!!

This book examines the dark years of Anglo-Saxon settlement in the area abandoned by the retreating Roman Empire. The comparisons are made to source material which later inspired Tolkien in writing his volumes. Well written, easily readable and quite interesting for persons who are fans of the writings of J.R. Tolkien.

My sense on reading this book was that the author already had a manuscript in preparation on the Dark Ages, and included references to Tolkien in order to help sell it. After reading several pages, one comes across the occasional, out-of-place paragraph with a loose connection to Tolkien's work, as though it was dropped in after the manuscript was already completed. Many of his references to Tolkien are actually somewhat forced and occasionally off the mark.

Bates is a psychologist, and I found his overview of history rather general, to say nothing of his familiarity with Tolkien. Moreover, he suppresses certain terminology (such as the Norse term "Midgard" which he replaces with "Middle-Earth") in order to drive the point home. This might be forgiveable if his point was academic, but the reader begins to suspect a marketing strategy instead.

While some of his insights are informative, I felt this book suffers from trying to accomplish something that may not have been the author's original intention.

As a person of celtic ancestry, I have always been very interested in the mythology and history of the middle ages. I have also been reading Tolkien since I was 13, some 24 years now. In this time, I have made many connections between actual history and Tolkien's literature. When I saw this book, I had hoped to delve further into these connections, but unfortunately, this book is more for the beginner who has just found an interest in such histories.

While Mr. Bates writes with reasonable knowledge about the people of the middle ages, their history as well as mythology (except for a very little misinformation regarding the celts), he does not really incorporate Tolkien's world into this history. Except for a few passing nods in each chapter, Tolkien's middle earth is barely mentioned. It also seemed to me that Mr. Bates did not read any of Tolkien's works more than once or twice. Some of his remarks seemed quite off the mark, so to speak. Overall, he does not seem familiar enough with Tolkien's world and so cannot make the necessary connections between it and the middle ages.

That said, I still think this is a very informative book for those who are just starting out with an interest in the history and mythology of the middle ages. There are a few weak areas, such as in celtic mythology, but overall it is quite good. However, if you are looking to learn more about symbolism, myths and history of the middle ages and how they pertain to Tolkien's middle earth in greater detail, this may not be the book for you. For instance, I was very curious as to the specific jewels used in "The Lord of the Rings." For instance, Aragorn's jewel, the emerald; why was this so specific and important? And the ruby in Narya, why a ruby? It took a good deal of research for me to learn the answers to these questions and I had hoped to learn still more. But again, this is more of a beginner's book. A good beginner's book.