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
Martha Peake: a Novel of the Revolution Martha Peake: a Novel of the Revolution Martha Peake: a Novel of the Revolution is a 2000 novel by the British author Patrick McGrath. It tells the story of the grotesquely crippled Harry Peake and his daughter Martha, their involvement with the mysterious anatomist Lord Drogo, the tragic events that separate them, and the subsequent flight of Martha to America at the dawning of the Revolution. The work is narrated by Ambrose Tree as he asks his elderly Uncle William about the story of the "Cripplegate Giant" Harry Peake, his daughter Martha, and Lord Francis Drogo, a famous anatomist that