Tolkien, the Shire and South Lake
If you’re a fan of The Lord of the Rings, or perhaps The Hobbit by J R R Tolkien you would have come across a land called The Shire. In Tolkien's fiction, the Shire is described as a small but beautiful, idyllic and fruitful land, beloved by its hobbit inhabitants. They had agriculture but were not industrialized. The landscape included downland and woods like the English countryside. Families lived in a close community of friends and neighbors, often celebrating and having meals together. He envisioned The Shire as a place of refuge in an otherwise chaotic and often dangerous world. Sometimes I view The Shire a bit like living on South Lake within Sun City Center proper. Tolkien himself experienced chaos and extreme danger as a soldier in the first World War. Barely surviving the Battle of the Somme, spending months in recovery from Trench Fever. The battle was one of the world's bloodiest battles, with one million casualties. Withi...