I still need to finish Two Towers, Return, and Silmarillion. Ungoliant is maybe my favourite extended lore character. I kind of understand all the critiques about it being racist but I think it's a pretty tired discourse. It is what it is and it's still worth reading. It was a story written by a guy obsessed with legends, mythology, and languages who wanted to write his own.
I think it mainly repeats certain racist tropes, but doesn't take them wholesale, and isn't, well, "married" to 'em in the sense that it's integral (like Lovecraft's own Cthulhu mythos of short stories).
Exactly. It bugs me that some people put it in the same category as truly racist adventure/fantasy fiction like Lovecraft and the Tarzan books, where racism is the entire point.
Exactly.
Besides, we know that Tolkien was a "typical" anti-fascist of his day, where, even if falling for certain racist tropes, they were more-or-less anti-racist by default.
It's not like nowadays where 4chan memes and behavior are common.
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