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The Sillymarillion: An Unauthorized Parody of J.R.R. Tolkien's Classic The Silmarillion
Blasphemy! Heresy! Not since Bored of the Rings has there been such a blatant desecration of the sacred works of J.R.R. Tolkien! True fans of Middle-earth, rise up against this upstart and his distorted retelling of The Silmarillion, Tolkien's history of the world before The Lord of the Rings. No self-respecting Dark Lord would ever enter a rapping competition, nor would beautiful elf-maidens ever behave like this! The greatest tragic love story in fantasy history was not made possible through the efforts of a ferret, nor were the great battles of Beleriand covered by TV news crews! Don Lloyd's The Sillymarillion dares to be the first and only, and therefore we can claim without contradiction, the funniest, the most outrageous, parody of the wildly famous old professor's fiction in the last generation. The action begins in the land of Valium, an idyllic paradise, but now the tranquility has been shattered by the theft of the magical Siliputi by the Dark Lord Mostgoth. The King of the Neuter has vowed revenge and his people have rebelled against the gods themselves. Fleeing to the continent of Myrtle-earth in pursuit of their enemy, the Neuter become embroiled in a war that will last for hundreds of years, bringing great triumphs and tragedies as the free peoples of the world flight for their very existence. The reader will encounter polka-dotted elves, cross-dressing gods, and rodents possessed by malevolent spirits, but these will all somehow seem strangely familiar...Parodies - Bored of the Rings and in The Soddit - have sold extremely well
192 pages, Paperback
First published September 28, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 9, 2008
A little-known fact about me: I hated The Lord of the Rings the first time I read it. I thought it was dull and overblown, with 2D characters and lots and lots of pointless page-filler. I thought that Gollum was the only fully fleshed-out character in the whole story, and was glad to put it behind me. That was when I was about ten, I think.
Ten years later I read it again. By this time, I had a lot more modern fantasy under my belt and could finally appreciate the importance of the book to the genre. A lot of references suddenly became a lot clearer, and the book was suddenly much more enjoyable. Plus, I had figured out which parts to skim ("Tom Bombadil? Hell, that's thirty pages right there..." *flipflipflip*). Bolstered by my newfound respect, I read it again a few years later ("Oh good, another song." *flipflipflip*), and I think once more before the movies came out ("Yeah, yeah, yeah, Saruman's running the Shire, let's skip ahead." *flipflipflip*).
By the way, this is the one exception to my "The book is always, always. always, without exception, better than the movie." Just thought I'd throw that out there.
Anyway, at some point in this journey, I stumbled across Bored of the Rings by Harvard Lampoon. I don't want to spoil anything, but it nearly made me wet myself when I read it. To say it caused paroxysms of laughter would fall short of the mark. It's brilliant. But more on that later.
Having triumphed over Lord of the Rings, I got cheeky. Arrogant, you might say. I took on The Silmarillion. This isn't a novel, really. It's a history book, detailing the entire history of the world, from its Creation up until the Penultimate Battle Against Sauron, with Isildur and Elindil and all that.
In its way, it's a great book. It's very well thought-out, logically presented, and gives a stunning foundation to the more famous trilogy. At the same time, it is a history book, detailing hundreds of events and places, many of which go by more than one name (if you're lucky). There are countless characters, complex family relationships, and a lot of the names sound despairingly alike. Once you get past the groovy creation myth, with Morgoth screwing up the divine harmony and the Valar trying to make the world look nice for the Elves, it gets very slow and tedious, with only the occasional tale of derring-do to break up the monotony.
Such is the case with The Sillymarillion.
Having been a big fan of both Tolkien's works and the parody by National Lampoon, Mr. Lloyd took it upon himself to give The Silmarillion equal treatment. He gets an "A" for effort, but the finished product is probably not nearly what he'd hoped it would be. There are a few good laughs here and there, more modern jokes than Bored of the Rings, but let's face it - The Silmarillion just isn't a very good book for this kind of thing. It's not a story, it's simply a recounting of events, and no amount of silly names can make up for that. In fact, there's entire sections of this parody where you could just replace the wacky names with the original names from the story, and it would read just fine.
So, I give Mr. Lloyd credit for trying his best and getting his work out there on the bookshelves. It isn't his fault that he was working from useless source material.
Now, on to the real funny to cleanse my palate....
Ten years later I read it again. By this time, I had a lot more modern fantasy under my belt and could finally appreciate the importance of the book to the genre. A lot of references suddenly became a lot clearer, and the book was suddenly much more enjoyable. Plus, I had figured out which parts to skim ("Tom Bombadil? Hell, that's thirty pages right there..." *flipflipflip*). Bolstered by my newfound respect, I read it again a few years later ("Oh good, another song." *flipflipflip*), and I think once more before the movies came out ("Yeah, yeah, yeah, Saruman's running the Shire, let's skip ahead." *flipflipflip*).
By the way, this is the one exception to my "The book is always, always. always, without exception, better than the movie." Just thought I'd throw that out there.
Anyway, at some point in this journey, I stumbled across Bored of the Rings by Harvard Lampoon. I don't want to spoil anything, but it nearly made me wet myself when I read it. To say it caused paroxysms of laughter would fall short of the mark. It's brilliant. But more on that later.
Having triumphed over Lord of the Rings, I got cheeky. Arrogant, you might say. I took on The Silmarillion. This isn't a novel, really. It's a history book, detailing the entire history of the world, from its Creation up until the Penultimate Battle Against Sauron, with Isildur and Elindil and all that.
In its way, it's a great book. It's very well thought-out, logically presented, and gives a stunning foundation to the more famous trilogy. At the same time, it is a history book, detailing hundreds of events and places, many of which go by more than one name (if you're lucky). There are countless characters, complex family relationships, and a lot of the names sound despairingly alike. Once you get past the groovy creation myth, with Morgoth screwing up the divine harmony and the Valar trying to make the world look nice for the Elves, it gets very slow and tedious, with only the occasional tale of derring-do to break up the monotony.
Such is the case with The Sillymarillion.
Having been a big fan of both Tolkien's works and the parody by National Lampoon, Mr. Lloyd took it upon himself to give The Silmarillion equal treatment. He gets an "A" for effort, but the finished product is probably not nearly what he'd hoped it would be. There are a few good laughs here and there, more modern jokes than Bored of the Rings, but let's face it - The Silmarillion just isn't a very good book for this kind of thing. It's not a story, it's simply a recounting of events, and no amount of silly names can make up for that. In fact, there's entire sections of this parody where you could just replace the wacky names with the original names from the story, and it would read just fine.
So, I give Mr. Lloyd credit for trying his best and getting his work out there on the bookshelves. It isn't his fault that he was working from useless source material.
Now, on to the real funny to cleanse my palate....
February 2, 2008
There are 3 complete, epic Middle-earth novels by Tolkien: The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and the Silmarillion. Also there are the respective stand-alone parodies, The Soddit, Bored of the Rings, and The Sillymarillion, each from a different author/publisher. Of all these 3, Sillymarillion made me laugh by far the most. It's often vapid and rediculous parody, but if you like that kind of stuff, you'll love it. For an example, the list of (not real) "other books by this author":
-Elves and the Men Who Love Them
-Hobbits are from Venus, Dwarves are from Mars
-Coney Soup for the Soul
-Wizardy for the Total Moron
-When Frodo Met Harry: A Relationship Guide for Imaginary Beings
-Who Moved My Lembas?
-Taming your Inner Balrog
-The Seven Habits of Highly Efficient Dark Lords
(now available in Orkish)
-Elves and the Men Who Love Them
-Hobbits are from Venus, Dwarves are from Mars
-Coney Soup for the Soul
-Wizardy for the Total Moron
-When Frodo Met Harry: A Relationship Guide for Imaginary Beings
-Who Moved My Lembas?
-Taming your Inner Balrog
-The Seven Habits of Highly Efficient Dark Lords
(now available in Orkish)
December 24, 2011
If you have actually read "The Silmarillion", you'll probably find this books to be very funny. If you haven't read "The Silmarillion", then "The Sillymarillion" is going to seem like the biggest waste of paper you've ever encountered.
Keeping in mind that the title tells us this book is going to be silly ... this is a funny book. Puns, goofy narrative and names that made me chuckle out loud, this is a book that never once asks to be taken seriously. But if you have read the source material, you'll appreciate that the author actually did a wonderful job of staying true. In fact, this novel actually helped me put the overall storyline of Tolkien's work together better. (I love "The Silmarillion", but I have to admit that I get lost in it and forget who is doing what)
One more thing, and I've already touched on it: the names. Lloyd's names are hilarious! Some of them, I had to say them out loud to actually get the joke, and those were my favorites.
Keeping in mind that the title tells us this book is going to be silly ... this is a funny book. Puns, goofy narrative and names that made me chuckle out loud, this is a book that never once asks to be taken seriously. But if you have read the source material, you'll appreciate that the author actually did a wonderful job of staying true. In fact, this novel actually helped me put the overall storyline of Tolkien's work together better. (I love "The Silmarillion", but I have to admit that I get lost in it and forget who is doing what)
One more thing, and I've already touched on it: the names. Lloyd's names are hilarious! Some of them, I had to say them out loud to actually get the joke, and those were my favorites.
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November 23, 2010I read this in parallel with Tolkien's The Silmarillion, and I found that reading them together greatly helped my understanding of both books. The chapters in this book are much shorter, hitting (and twisting) the highlights of the stories. Also, the names in this book are much more memorable, which helped me keep track of who was related to who and who did what when and where.
However, I did not find this to be as funny as I expected. Some of the humor was good, but some of it just felt thrown together, and most of it was just plain irreverent. It is a good summary, but just doesn't quite fall into my range of humor.
However, I did not find this to be as funny as I expected. Some of the humor was good, but some of it just felt thrown together, and most of it was just plain irreverent. It is a good summary, but just doesn't quite fall into my range of humor.
April 10, 2009
I was surprised how close this stayed to the giant Silmarillion. The names, while clever and so cute, were also quite recognizable. This story even had the epic qualitiy of good guys bad guys, sorrow, and sturggle, all while they try to claim the sillly putty, engage in ritual handholding, and do other foolish things. Not to be missed.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews