The classification of The Lord of the Rings as a modern myth can be seen in several different ways. There are many characters in The Lord of the Rings, which have parallels with characters in classical mythology such as Tom Bombadil, Gandalf, Gollum and Frodo. Other examples of mythological concepts held in the novel are seen simply in the storyline, the quest in particular and the battle between good and evil.

The status of myth for The Lord of the Rings can also be seen in the deep history that Tolkien gave to Middle Earth and it’s people. There are extensive histories given through thousands of years of Middle Earth and is thoroughly recorded in Tolkien’s works such as

Some of Tolkien’s characters have been believed to have Christ-like qualities in their actions and the way that they are placed within the story. Some examples of Christ-like qualities can be seen in Frodo’s decision to being the Ringbearer in the Fellowship and how it is such a difficult burden to carry but he decides to take it anyway. Another example of Christ-like qualities would be Gandalf’s resurrection from the dead after his battle with Durin’s Bane. Although Tolkien claims that he despises all forms of allegory (Tolkien, Foreword to Lord of the Rings) it is still thought that he had chose to give his protagonists Christ-like qualities.

Along with the setting of Tolkien’s Middle Earth came the characters he had in The Lord of the Rings, many of which had counterparts in classical mythology. Stories can be broken down as basically as possible by essentially having protagonists and antagonists but in many myths the characters go beyond that, as do Tolkien’s characters in The Lord of the Rings.

The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, The History of Middle Earth and The Book of Lost Tales. This element of storytelling is seen throughout almost all stories regarded as mythology, the story is given a deep background involving deities and the beginning of the Earth into the creation of man and in some of them has a deity interacting with the characters in the myth. This is true in Tolkien’s later work in The Silmarillion which is mostly a story somewhat similar to The Lord of the Rings except that The Silmarillion takes place much earlier in Middle Earth’s history and several allusions to it are made in The Lord of the Rings that could not be understood without doing proper historical research into Tolkien’s world which is vast to say the least. This makes the novel’s status as a myth different from other classical myths in that they took place in the known world at that time which included the Mediterranean theater of Greece and the Italian peninsula, Northern Scandinavian countries and Anglo-Saxon dominated areas. In Tolkien’s case he went ahead and made an entirely different world with entirely different geography and entirely different races of people and histories. This of course is used to be conducive to the “fairy story written for adults” (The Letters of JRR Tolkien pg. 232) quality that Tolkien wanted in The Lord of the Rings and his other works.

Some critics have seen Tolkien parallel what some would call “Christian mythology” in his writing with the creation of Arda and Middle Earth. Arda is the entire world of Tolkien, which includes Valinor, the Undying Lands, Numenor, which is Tolkien’s Atlantis and Middle Earth, which is the continent on which The Lord of the Rings takes place. Tolkien’s creation of Arda is not chronicled in The Lord of the Rings although it is mentioned several times thro

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