Random thoughts about one of my favorite topics:

If you define myth as a sacred story, then yes. We are inspired by these characters, from the Sil all the way through the appendices of ROTK. They show us how to be, and how not to be. Tolkien is a master at teaching without preaching, at letting the story be the thing, and yet showing us so much about love, duty, patience, sacrifice, ends never justifying means, etc. etc.

I also believe in Jungian archetypes, and LOTR has 'em. It's one reason the story is so powerful.

I think it's incredible that he succeeded so well in creating, single handedly, a mythology for England. But he was steeped in the genre and in the history of the place, its old, pre-Norman literature. He was one of the few who could actually do it. I belive Blake was another.

The Sil is more overtly a mythology in the way that we expect it today. But any story that tells us who we are and how to behave is a myth. Like Markale says, we now have, in the U.S. anyway, a myth of the automobile! What it does for us, who we are with it. How to act.

So, my answer is, yes.

The Road to Mt. Doom

The Hobbits plod on.
One does not need a road map
when marching t’ward death.

A Haiku
by Altaira

Viggo Mortensen, on doing art:
"It's like a conversation. You don't know what's going to emerge."