Tolkien Vs. Howard

There's quite a few ways to skin this particular cat, but before I start, I just want to address anyone who's thinking: "Oh, don't compare Tolkien and Howard--they're doing something completely different from each other." Or, "They both do an excellent job at doing what they set out to do." Sorry, but that kind of flimsy waffling is too easy. If we want to have values, we need value judgments, and so here's my judgment in the case of J.R.R. Tolkien vs. Robert E. Howard. Let's start with the basics: On a sentence-by-sentence basis, Tolkien is, admittedly, a better writer. He is a dedicated and careful craftsman who has a deep knowledge of traditional storytelling. Howard, on the other hand, can be atrociously bad: sentence-by-sentence he can be all over the place. His metaphors are, without fail, over-the-top and usually only partially appropriate. Reading Howard, you often feel that he's grabbed the closest cliche he could find and spiced it up a little. None of this should be very surprising: Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books were a

Tolkien emphasises Frodo's inner strength, his courage, loyalty, and moral sense, as being more important than anything else. Frodo longs, more than anything else, for the comfort of his home in the Shire. Conan, on the other hand, is one of the last of the no-nonsense heroes of old. He is strong, cunning, and out for himself. He has no qualms about enjoying life's more sensual pleasures. Though he's not amoral, he is a die-hard realist. Advantage: Howard. Tolkien is also guilty of emasculating the fantasy genre. Who better to play that "dreamy" Strider than heart-throb Viggo Mortensen? And isn't Frodo just the cutest thing? Bah. Fantasy heroes should carry around huge swords and spend their time plundering and wenching. They should make things happen rather than just get sucked into events that are bigger than