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Originally Posted by Karellen
Oh, geez, don't get me started on The Silmarillion. WTF was that about. It was one of the rare books that I just closed, marked as 1 star and placed the dreaded "Never Read Again" tag on the book. The first couple of chapters and I had already been introduced to 500 odd characters. It was written "bible-like" and sounded like one long recital of a family tree. Boron, son of Gloin, father of John, cousin of Terry, Uncle of George, blah, blah, blah. And people go crazy for this book???
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I have very mixed feelings about posthumous books. Not those that are ready for publication or nearly so, but the ones that are cobbled together from the leavings. Absolutely there’s a legitimate academic interest in an important author’s ephemera and I also get that a fan might want to read
everything. But as it’s frequently packaged, the reality is that it’s just a cash grab on the part of the heirs and if an author didn’t publish it in his lifetime, it’s because he didn’t think it publication-worthy, so in a sense his legacy is tarnished against his will. Hemingway is another example.