01-21-2019, 03:43 AM
I was 13 when I read the Lord of the Rings and that poem immediately gripped me, speaking to something in my bones. It inspired me so much I wrote my first story, about a powerful magical leader of a rebellion against the "shadow" whose soul was placed in a human on Earth to protect her after a crippling defeat/setback in their cause. I identified her specifically as a wanderer and the ongoing story was about the rediscovery of these soul connections between the two protagonists who were both seeded, but from opposing sides. At that point in time I was not a great writer. Maybe now I could revisit it and make it good; I can make it SOUND like it COULD be good (plot twist: it wasn't–the protagonists were self inserts of me and my best friend, and our siblings were the antagonists. Double twist: maybe every single one of us is actually a wanderer in real life I WOULD NOT BE SURPRISED)
It chills me a little to think just how much of my life I have identified with being a wanderer specifically here for the purpose of helping, long before having an association with the word.
I can still vividly remember the first time I encountered that poem. I marked it in the book, wrote it out, tried to memorize it; for some reason it seemed to explain everything about me that didn't fit.
I do appreciate the grandiose and thought in Tolkien's worldbuilding, it's overall been something very inspiring for me and I don't think my life would at all be what it is today without it. I mean, down to what I do for a living. Literally. It's strange to think how much of an impact one book series could have, but it launched me into something special indeed.
It chills me a little to think just how much of my life I have identified with being a wanderer specifically here for the purpose of helping, long before having an association with the word.
I can still vividly remember the first time I encountered that poem. I marked it in the book, wrote it out, tried to memorize it; for some reason it seemed to explain everything about me that didn't fit.
I do appreciate the grandiose and thought in Tolkien's worldbuilding, it's overall been something very inspiring for me and I don't think my life would at all be what it is today without it. I mean, down to what I do for a living. Literally. It's strange to think how much of an impact one book series could have, but it launched me into something special indeed.