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A coldhearted reader, in fact, may find The Silmarillion at least half fustian and more than a yard long. There are moments when Tolkien sounds as if he were writing a parody of Edgar Rice Burroughs in the style of the Book of Revelations.
And only Tolkien's adoring legions, are likely to care whether the book stirs the Tolkien industry to further rounds of posters, maps, calendars, recordings and items like The Guide to Middle-earth.
But at its best Tolkien's posthumous revelation of his private mythology is majestic, a work held so long and so power fully in the writer's imagination that it overwhelms the reader. Like Tolkien's other books, The Silmarillion presents a doomed but heroic view of creation that may be one of the reasons why a generation growing up on the thin gruel of tele vision drama, and the beardless cynicism of Mad magazine, first found J.R.R. Tol kien so rich and wonderful. Says proud Fëanor, explaining why he will not give up to the Valar the jewels he worked so hard to craft: "For the less even as for the greater there is some deed that he may accomplish but once only; and in that deed his heart shall rest." So it was with Tolkien and his Silmarillion. — Timothy Foote