Themes of The Lord of the Rings This is, according to Shippey, a very modern, 20th-century theme, since in earlier, medieval times, power was considered to "reveal character", not alter it. Shippey mentions Lord Acton's famous statement in 1887, that ""Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men..."" He then goes on to point out authors that were dealing in the same themes of power and corruption at around the same time as Tolkien wrote his work. These authors include George Orwell with "Animal Farm" (1945), William Golding with "Lord of the Flies" (1954), and T. H. White with
Lord of the Flies and Jack Caine as "Simon". Many writers have borrowed plot elements from "Lord of the Flies". By the early 1960s, it was required reading in many schools and colleges. Stephen King's fictional town of Castle Rock, inspired by the fictional mountain fort of the same name in "Lord of the Flies", in turn inspired the name of Rob Reiner's production company, Castle Rock Entertainment, which produced the film "Lord of the Flies" (1990). Stephen King got the name Castle Rock from the fictional mountain fort of the same name in "Lord of the Flies" and used the name to refer