My problem with the songs is that, how on earth can they be songs without any indication of how they’re meant to sound? My internal monologue tries to apply rhythm and it just makes for awkward reading.

That said, the only poetry I really get anything out of is John Cooper Clarke, and I’ve heard him perform and so have a very clear mental sound of how the poem should be delivered. So maybe it’s just me.

> At the very least from what I recall there are sections of songs and poems which made my eyes glaze over and just skip.

I felt the same way the first time I read the books. But the more I re-read and understand about Tolkien's worldbuilding the more I particularly appreciate them. The culture of Middle Earth is passed down by song and poetry, and when songs show up in the books they aren't just random interjections of the author but strands of culture connecting the characters.

If Tolkien had sprinkled more of the content of the Simirilion throughout LotR a lot of the meanings and symbolism would have been made more clear, but I don't think it would have been as immersive. The enjoyable thing about Tolkien is that he balances giving you enough explicit detail to follow and enjoy the main narrative, while also giving you a breadcrumbs that reveal the complex cosmology that contextualizes everything and is in the back of every characters mind.

Jackson's "enhancements" to The Hobbit were failures because he wasn't a good storyteller. He turned it into a Disneyland ride. You can see that in other Jackson movies, like "King Kong".

Jackson needs a Paul McCartney to tell him "no, take this scene out, and that one, and that one."