What Writers Can Learn From JRR Tolkien

Annie Cosby
December 30, 2024 | 3 min read

The final installment of JRR Tolkien’s Middle Earth saga was published 69 years ago. Hobbits — and readers — finally reached Mount Doom, and the fantasy genre was altered forever.

Before Tolkien, fantasy was often relegated to fairy tales and children's stories, lacking the intricate plots and detailed settings that define the genre today. He set a new standard for world-building, introducing a truly immersive world in Middle Earth, complete with its own languages, history, and mythology. And his characters established many fantasy archetypes and tropes familiar to us today. 

Of course, the themes Tolkien's work focused on were more mature, too. The exploration of heroism, friendship, mortality, and the corrupting influence of power, all elevated fantasy into a sophisticated literary form.

The fantasy genre, once viewed as escapist or juvenile, became a respected domain for exploring profound human experiences.

So what exactly can we, as writers, learn from the great Tollers* and his high fantasy masterpieces?

*That's what his friends called him. And we like to think we'd have been friends.

On Writing

Why do we love Tolkien so much? Well, The Lord of the Rings speaks for itself.

But we're also huge fans of Tolkien's writing process.

Tolkien often embraced freewriting. He would start with small, spontaneous ideas that would later evolve into complex narratives. For example, the iconic first sentence of The Hobbit came to him while grading student papers.

Tolkien built his characters and storylines organically, frequently discovering the plot as he wrote, similar to how a painter gradually adds layers to a canvas. He didn’t worry about the details at first, but let them emerge through the writing process.

Get more details in "How to Write Like J.R.R. Tolkien."

 

On Living The Writer's Life

It took Tolkien 14 years and a very intensive writing process to complete the writings of Middle Earth we know and love today.

Depending on how fast you write, that might sound like an incredibly long time ... or a very short period. Either way, the reality is this: You can't take 14 years out of your life to stop living and immerse yourself in your fantasy world. Both have to co-exist.

Tolkien is a wonderful example of this.

We're lucky to have a great peek into Tolkien's life via his written correspondence with loved ones. These letters provide a fantastic look at how Tolkien balanced writing with chores and family life, as well as his "day job" as a professor.

Another interesting thing about Tolkien is that his success was within his lifetime, something that didn't happen for many authors we consider classics today.

Tolkien's letters give incredible insight into how he dealt with the commercial success of Lord of the Rings — and how he struggled to write through it.

Read more in "4 Writing Lessons from J.R.R. Tolkien You Really Don’t Want to Hear."

Additional Reading on JRR Tolkien

  • HOW TO WRITE LIKE JRR TOLKIEN: It’s easy to picture J.R.R. Tolkien sitting down and cranking out one fantasy masterpiece after another. After all, that’s how we read and experience his stories today. But the reality was much different.

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I’ve spent years writing while secretly fearing that a single misplaced word would expose me — not just as a bad writer, but as a fraud.

My background is originally in photography, and I see it there, too. A photographer I know recently posted a before-and-after comparison of their editing from 2018 versus now, asking if we also saw changes in our own work over the years.

Naturally, we should. If our work is the same, years apart, have we really grown as artists?

So why is that the growing, the process of it, the daily grind of it, is so painful?

So why is that the growing, the process of it, the daily grind of it, is so painful?

The Haunting

Hitting “publish” on an essay or a blog always stirs up insecurity — the overthinking, the over-editing. The fear that someone will call me out for not being a real writer.

I initially hesitated to make writing part of my freelance work. My background is in photography and design. Writing was something I gravitated toward, but I had no degree to validate it. No official stamp of approval.

Like many writers, I started with zero confidence in my voice — agonizing over edits, drowning in research, second-guessing every word.

I even created a shield for myself: ghostwriting.

I even created a shield for myself: ghostwriting.

If my words weren’t my own, they couldn’t be wrong. Ghostwriting meant safety — no risk, no vulnerability, just words without ownership.

I still remember the feeling of scrolling to the bottom of an article I had written and seeing someone else’s name, their face beside words that had once been mine.

The truth is, I always wanted to write. As a kid, I imagined it. Yet, I found myself handing over my work, letting someone else own it.

I told myself it didn’t matter. It was work. Getting paid to write should be enough.

But here’s the thing: I wasn’t just playing it safe — I was slowly erasing myself. Word by word. Edit by edit. And finally, in the by-line.

I wasn’t just playing it safe — I was slowly erasing myself. Word by word. Edit by edit. And finally, in the by-line.

The Disappearing Act

This was true when I was writing under my own name, too. The more I worried about getting it right, the less I sounded like me.

I worried. I worried about how long an essay was (“people will be bored”), finding endless examples as proof of my research (“no way my own opinion is valid on its own”), the title I gave a piece (“it has to be a hook”), or editing out personal touches (“better to be safe than be seen”).

I built a guardrail around my writing, adjusting, tweaking, over-correcting. Advice meant to help only locked me in. It created a sentence rewritten to sound smarter, an opinion softened to sound safer, a paragraph reshaped to sound acceptable.

I built a guardrail around my writing, adjusting, tweaking, over-correcting.

But playing it safe makes the work dull. Writing loses its edge.

It took deliberate effort to break this habit. I’m not perfect, but here’s what I know after a year of intentionally letting my writing sound like me:

My work is clearer. It moves with my own rhythm. It’s less shaped by external influence, by fear, by the constant need to smooth it into something more polished, more likable.

But playing it safe makes the work dull. Writing loses its edge.

The Resurrection

The drive for acceptance is a slippery slope — one we don’t always realize we’re sliding down. It’s present in the small choices that pull us away from artistic integrity: checking how others did it first, tweaking our work to fit a mold, hesitating before saying what we actually mean.

And let’s be honest — this isn’t just about writing. It bleeds into everything.

It’s there when we stay silent in the face of wrongdoing, when we hold back our true way of being, when we choose work that feels “respectable,” whatever that means. It’s in every “yes” we say when we really want to say “no.”

If your self-expression is rooted in a need for acceptance, are you creating for yourself — or for others? Does your work help you explore your thoughts, your life? Does it add depth, energy, and meaning?

My work is clearer. It moves with my own rhythm. It’s less shaped by external influence, by fear, by the constant need to smooth it into something more polished, more likable.

I get it. We’re social creatures. Isolation isn’t the answer. Ignoring societal norms won’t make us better writers. Often, the most meaningful work is born from responding to or resisting those norms.

But knowing yourself well enough to recognize when acceptance is shaping your work brings clarity.

Am I doing this to be part of a community, to build connections, to learn and grow?

Or am I doing this to meet someone else’s expectations, dulling my voice just to fit in?

The Revival

Here’s what I know as I look back at my writing: I’m grateful for the years spent learning, for the times I sought acceptance with curiosity. But I’m in a different phase now.

I know who I am, and those who connect with my work reflect that back at me — in the messages they send, in the conversations we share.

I know who I am, and those who connect with my work reflect that back at me — in the messages they send, in the conversations we share.

It’s our differences that drive growth. I want to nurture these connections, to be challenged by difference, to keep writing in a way that feels like me. The me who isn’t afraid to show what I think and care about.

So, I ask you, as I ask myself now:

If no one was watching, if no one could judge, what would you write?

If no one was watching, if no one could judge, what would you write?

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