100 Great Books: [Book 25: The Lord of the Rings]
World Building in Action
Walk through the headquarters of almost any major technology company, and traces of The Lord of the Rings are hard to miss. Palantir, now a fixture in government data contracts, takes its name from the all-seeing stones in Tolkien’s novels. Anduril, a defense startup valued at several billion dollars, borrows the name of Aragorn’s sword. Engineers talk about building fellowships when assembling teams. A daunting policy fight becomes Mordor in company Slack channels. Video game franchises build entire worlds around elves, dwarves, and dark lords, drawing on conventions Tolkien helped standardize. A novel written in postwar Britain now shapes the language of boardrooms, streaming platforms, and online communities.
