70
votes
Should I read The Silmarillion before or after reading The Lord of the Rings?
You should read The Silmarillion after reading The Lord of the Rings trilogy.
To start off with an analogy:
The Silmarillion starts on such a gigantic scale that if you begin with it everything ...
- 749
35
votes
Accepted
Why is the order of The Chronicles of Narnia changed from original publication?
The question of reading order for The Chronicles of Narnia is a complicated one, with much debate even among avid fans of the series. But you've asked only why publishers changed the order, which is ...
- 76.7k
27
votes
In which order should the Sherlock Holmes stories be read?
TL;DR:
Begin your Holmesian adventure with short stories from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. Continue with the early novels before moving on to the later short ...
- 6,092
26
votes
Should I read The Silmarillion before or after reading The Lord of the Rings?
Voronwë's answer is excellent, but I'm going to post the answer I was planning to anyway.
LotR is a gripping tale; the Silmarillion is more like a textbook or encyclopedia.
This is a slight ...
- 76.7k
24
votes
Accepted
In what order should Rick Riordan's mythological series be read to make the most sense, and what is the chronological order?
Warning: This is long.
A reminder: Percy Jackson and the Olympians deals with the Greek gods. The Heroes of Olympus deals with the Greek and Roman gods. The Kane Chronicles deals with the Egyptian ...
- 27.2k
20
votes
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Do I need to read the Redwall books in any specific order?
I've already posted about this on another SE site. Let me try to go into even more detail here.
There are two obvious possibilities for the ordering: publication order and in-universe chronological ...
- 76.7k
17
votes
Accepted
Which order is recommended for the "Commonwealth" novels?
The Commonwealth universe consists of three series of books that should be read in publication order:
Commonwealth Saga:
Misspent Youth (2002), "prequel"
Pandora's Star (2004)
Judas Unchained (2005)
...
- 653
17
votes
Accepted
Do I need to read the Hardy Boys books in order?
You don't need to read them in any order.
Overall advice
The interesting thing about The Hardy Boys is that the writing style has changed over time. I don't know just how many ghostwriters have been ...
- 6,092
17
votes
Should I read The Silmarillion before or after reading The Lord of the Rings?
Another point that hasn't been mentioned. The Silmarillion has a summary of the Lord of the Rings as its final chapter, "Of the Rings of Power and The Third Age". It is a full summary of LoTR and ...
- 279
16
votes
Accepted
Should Go Set A Watchman be read before To Kill A Mockingbird?
Definitely read To Kill a Mockingbird first. Although Go Set a Watchman reads more as a first draft of To Kill a Mockingbird, without reading Mockingbird, much of the bigotry Atticus displays in ...
- 4,625
16
votes
Should I read The Silmarillion before or after reading The Lord of the Rings?
I would agree with the posters saying: first LotR (to enjoy it fully, and it is an easier read, and the huge scale of the Silmarillion events will not "dwarf it down").
But not in your specific case.
...
- 318
13
votes
Accepted
For and Against different Reading Orders for Narnia
I first read the books in the chronological ordering when I was about five. And that, I think, makes a big difference, because to a five-year-old, The Magician's Nephew is a slog. I didn't understand ...
- 2,113
12
votes
Should I read The Silmarillion before or after reading The Lord of the Rings?
You are asking two different questions here, one in the title ("should I read the Silmarillion before or after LotR?") and one in the text ("what would be the upside to reading the Silmarillion before ...
- 229
10
votes
Accepted
Reading order for Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere
This solves your problems. It shows a nice chart outlining a few different ways to read the cosmere. Here it is:
On the other hand, as long as you read each series in order, you can really do ...
- 4,552
10
votes
In which order should the Sherlock Holmes stories be read?
HDE's great answer is much more detailed than mine and has more reasoning for each of his reading order choices, but with that in mind, I thought I'd chime in.
I've read all of the Sherlock Holmes ...
- 4,625
8
votes
Accepted
Would a reader of Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea miss anything essential without knowing about Jane Eyre?
Yes, a reader of Wide Sargasso Sea who is unaware of its connection to Jane Eyre is pretty much guaranteed to have missed the entire point of the novel.
Jane Eyre is so iconic that Rhys could simply ...
- 31.5k
7
votes
Would a reader of Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea miss anything essential without knowing about Jane Eyre?
There is no consensus among critics about whether Wide Sargasso Sea stands on its own or not. For example, Francis Wyndham wrote in his introduction to the first edition (1966):
For many years, ...
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7
votes
What order should I read the "Ender's game" series in?
Orson Scott Card said something about this (shamelessfully stolen from this answer on SFF)
You can read them in the order written - Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, Children of the Mind, ...
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7
votes
Accepted
Can I read the second book of "In Search of Lost Time" out of order if I can't find a good translation?
Yes, the books are related and are intended to be read in order. In Search of Lost Time is one work in seven volumes. Each volume is not an independent work. Rather, the novel is a developing story; ...
- 31.5k
7
votes
Should I read the English translation of "Khasākkinte Ithihāsam" first, or the original?
Read the Malayalam original first. Whatever your aim in reading the English translation, you will achieve it more readily by having the knowledge of the original in mind.
As the quote you have ...
- 31.5k
7
votes
Accepted
Is there any merit to reading the Poirot novels in order?
There's no need to read the Poirot books in any particular order.
Agatha Christie has rewritten a few of the early Poirot short stories (see list) from the book Poirot's Early Cases (1923) and The ...
- 1,970
7
votes
Should I read The Silmarillion before or after reading The Lord of the Rings?
I would agree that the Silmarillion should be read after the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit, but for quite a different reason than everyone seems to be espousing.
For me, when I finished the Hobbit,...
- 4,880
7
votes
Accepted
Can the Odyssey be consumed independently of the Iliad?
tl;dr
Yes, they can be read independently.
On the nature of myth (hand-wavy background stuff)
In a comment to your question, you note:
these were originally oral traditions rather than written books.....
- 31.5k
7
votes
Can the Odyssey be consumed independently of the Iliad?
In addition to verbose's theoretical comments on the nature of myth, there is evidence that the two epics were, in fact, consumed separately in ancient Greece.
Aelian (Various History 13.14) attests ...
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6
votes
Accepted
Is there "required" background reading for "The Hero With a Thousand Faces"?
I think the best way to understand Hero is to read or watch The Power of Myth; the book is a transcript of the series of interviews by the same name. Bill Moyers sat with Campbell to discuss Hero, and ...
6
votes
Accepted
What order should I read Thomas Pynchon's novels in?
If you're tackling the first three books, I'd say Lot 49, followed by V., followed by Gravity's Rainbow. "A Journey into the Mind of Watts" makes a nice addition somewhere in there. There is a ...
- 2,180
6
votes
Do I need to read all the supplementary material for The Expanse, and in what order?
Corey has suggested they are best read in publication order, (main novels in bold):
Leviathan Wakes (2011)
The Butcher of Anderson Station (2011)
Caliban's War (2012)
Gods of Risk (2012)
...
- 6,398
6
votes
Are you required to read any of Langdon books by Dan Brown to properly understand and enjoy the next ones?
I read the books out of order (first The Da Vinci Code, then The Lost Symbol, then Angels and Demons, and then Inferno), and I don't think there is much reason to read them in any particular order. ...
- 6,050
6
votes
Should I read The Silmarillion before or after reading The Lord of the Rings?
I read the books in the chronological order of the story, that is, the Silmarillion, the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings, and I would recommend this order - although maybe not for all readers.
The ...
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