J. R. R. Tolkien

In one volume for the first time, this revised and updated examination of how J.R.R. Tolkien came to write his original masterpiece The Hobbit includes his complete unpublished draft version of the story, together with notes and illustrations by Tolkien himself. The Hobbit was first published on September 21,1937. Like its sequel, The Lord of the Rings, it is a story that "grew in the telling," and many characters and plot threads in the published...

The first-ever standalone edition of one of J.R.R. Tolkien's most important poetic dramas, that explores timely themes such as the nature of heroism and chivalry during war, featuring previously unpublished and never-before-seen texts and drafts. In 991 AD, Vikings attacked an Anglo-Saxon defense-force led by their duke, Beorhtnoth, resulting in brutal fighting along the banks of the river Blackwater, near Maldon in Essex. The attack is widely considered...

This book was originally published in 1953. In December of that year, J.R.R. Tolkien took possession of a reel-to-reel tape recorder and, sometime during the first few months of 1954, decided to record 'the whole thing on tape' as a way of 'testing' the performative quality of the dramatic dialogue between Tídwald and Torhthelm. For the older Tídwald, Tolkien adopted a slower, deeper voice, perhaps akin to 'the voice of Gandalf' that W.H. Auden...

Concentrating on the realm of Middle-earth and comprises such elements as Gandalf's lively account of how it was that he came to send the Dwarves to the celebrated party at Bag-End, the emergence of the sea-god Ulmo before the eyes of Tuor on the coast of Beleriand, and an exact description of the military organization of the Riders of Rohan. also contains the only story about the long ages of Numenor before its downfall and all that is known about...

This documentary examines the social and cultural foundations of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, in an attempt to understand the work's phenomenal success and influence.