"By learning how the Shire worked, we can start to understand how our own past worked, in all its complexity and contradictions." Sorry but this is totally pre

"By learning how the Shire worked, we can start to understand how our own past worked, in all its complexity and contradictions." Sorry but this is totally preposterous. Why should we look at our past through a fictional creation of one author? Why don't we go directly to the sources that that same author had? Makes much more sense.