Due to circumstances beyond my control (c’est la vie), I have been forced to take a few weeks of vacation. This does not mean I have 14 days I can devote to sitting in the grass under a large tree in the Shire and waiting for Bilbo’s birthday to arrive (which as all good LOTR fans know is September 22). I have not even had time to delve into writing mode because of the important business (not at all party business) needing attention in my life right now. However, I do need to do something for diversion and bit of relaxation for the sake of maintaining my sanity. Or more accurately, for maintaining my usual nerdy, yet still socially acceptable, insanity.

Therefore: I signed up for the MOOC offered by Vanderbilt University through Coursera called “Online Games: Literature, New Media, and Narrative.” It’s “a university-level English literature class—a multi-genre, multimedia tour of how literature, film, and games engage in the basic human activity of storytelling” that covers the literature of Tolkien, Spenser, Keats, Browning, and others, Peter Jackson’s movie The Fellowship of the Ring and the Lord of the Rings Online game.

When I first heard about the course through Kathryn E. Darden’s Middle Earth Times, I told myself that I really did not have time for it and I despaired over the missed opportunity to delve into the literature and films I love along with fellow nerds (at least 40,000 at last count for the enrollment).

The course started on September 9th.

I avoided reading articles about it that first week. Why torture myself?

By the weekend, I had gone to the site and read the course description at least twice. Inner voices nagged at me. The main culprits: J.J.R. Tolkien and Peter Jackson. Not to mention hobbits – four hobbits – and a cast of other characters never far from my imagination.

So, here we are with the course well into its second week. I enrolled today. My poor olde laptop won’t support LOTRO, so I won’t be able to do the “Distinction Track” of the course, but there’s plenty to do in the general track, especially now since I’m such a late starter. Still, it feels good to finally give in and get started, much as Bilbo must have felt as he ran down the path after Gandalf and Thorin’s company.