Tolkien wrote Lord of the Rings after surviving the frontlines of WW1. The movie Tolkien is one of my favs, he was quite the character himself.
Square sidewalks everywhere leads to a boring mind. Normally out in nature, you'd be staring at the abstract.
Orderly mind programming for the masses (squares), abstract programming for the Elites (horde all the good art / relics).
An artist person I know made me realize the square sidewalk / abstract nature path thing. He has a very abstract mind but an absolute asshole otherwise though.