>Raised the bar in the genre so high no other author could ever hope to live up to him

[...]
Yup. LotR is widely considered a classic piece of literature despite its fantasy setting, and this fact alone makes post-modernist trannies seethe and froth at the mouth in an impotent rage.

It's been almost 70 years since the first volume Fellowship of the Ring was first published, and if anything the novel in its entirety is more beloved than ever. I'd say it has passed the required filter of time.

I once had a graduate school professor who said that The Lord Of The Rings was the only major work that was going to survive the 20th Century. He didn't think the other things we laud as great from the 20th Century would make it: not Joyce, not Faulkner, not Hemingway, not Kafka, not Pound, only Tolkien would survive. He said that Lord of the Rings was the only work that was "big enough" to survive for centuries to come.
I thought that was an incredibly stupid thing to say, but years later looking back on it, I have a feeling that he might have been right. The novel might not be the greatest thing of the 20th century, but it resonates with people the most.

Robert e Howard is another giant quite frankly. Conan the Barbarian, as corny as some people might think it, is pretty well written.

As much as his academic background adds to the work, I don't think that is the core that sets it so far apart. If I were making a fantasy world I'd honestly probably just make another Not England using whatever names I thought just sound cool; that's more than sufficient and I don't think spending a thousand hours to make a super detailed world is necessary since I'm not a fricking nerd, go read history if you want "lore." If you write a book that simply edifies, inspires, instills nostalgia and wanderlust, and stimulates the imagination then you've succeeded. Post-Tolkien fantasy became enamored with the superficial aesthetics without understanding that they were merely tools leading to something higher.

Tolkien also cleverly begins the story in a safe and familiar place, and moves it to progressively wilder and more exotic regions, allowing him to sketch in the historical and geographical details as he goes. In this way he ensures the reader isn't overwhelmed with details of world-building and largely avoids dry slabs of exposition.

>Even if they do, they either incorporate it too much or too little in to the novel (usually the former). And then you have a million hacks
Speaking of hacks and the first major Tolkien imitator, David Eddings' two fantasy series are a good example of both. The first series (Belgariad+Tamuli) has a fairly interesting and robust lore for the world. It's clear that Eddings had some passion for it, even if he's more or less openly a Tolkien-inspired hack. But the lore does become a bit oppressive, in the sense that almost everything about the world seems defined and constrained by the mythology. Redditors are quick to complain about how races are all blatant stereotypes. Much of what you see is driven by prophecies and mythological or metaphysical explanations. But there's still a long and reasonably coherent history of the world. You have countries with boundaries explained by a thousand years of political maneuvering and geography, there are many varied histories and relationships to discover in the story. But most of it does get stuffed into the stories.

Elenium and Tamuli are very different in this sense. Sparhawk's world feels much less "just so," driven less by prophecies and mythological conflicts between the gods. One of the most powerful gods in the world (intended to be analogous to the Catholic God) never plays any direct role at all. Unlike the Belgariad world, There's a sense that there's a lot more history and possibility that isn't directly part of the story. Unfortunately, there's also the strong sense that the reason for that is Eddings just didn't bother with it. Nobody thinks Eddings actually fleshed out plausible implications of the Styric "thousand god pantheon," much less defined more than a tiny handful of them. Styrics are just wizard israelites with persecution complex.

I'm a moron unfamiliar with Wolfe but in the comparison with Herbert I assume anon was referring to the similarity of their criticisms of modern society but the vast difference in how they say to deal with it:
>Just be good and have faith and do the right thing and things will work out because god and stuff also 19th century preindustrial(ps not actually preindustrial, the industry just hadn't spread to his neighborhood yet, he still liked things like clockwork and lived an upper middle class lifestyle which didn't exist before industry) life was universally better because it was better for me when I was a small child
vs
>cultivate physical and mental discipline and never give yourself over to heroes and causes because they're working for themselves not you and you never know when the uncaring universe will decide to take a shit on you
Herbert's view is cynical but far more helpful in the modern world, whatever you think of Dune as a book.

There is no reason to call Tolkien fantasy but not Homer and Virgil—let alone Dante or Milton.