Distributed for Bodleian Library, University of Oxford
Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth
The range of J. R. R. Tolkien’s talents is remarkable. Not only was he an accomplished linguist and philologist, as well as a scholar of Anglo-Saxon and medieval literature and Norse folklore, but also a skillful illustrator and storyteller. Drawing on these talents, he created a universe which is for many readers as real as the physical world they inhabit daily.
Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth explores the huge creative endeavor behind Tolkien’s enduring popularity. Lavishly illustrated with three hundred images of his manuscripts, drawings, maps, and letters, the book traces the creative process behind his most famous literary works—The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion—and reproduces personal photographs and private papers, many of which have never been seen before in print.
Six essays introduce the reader to the person of J. R. R. Tolkien and to main themes in his life and work, including the influence of northern languages and legends on the creation of his own legendarium; his concept of “Faërie” as an enchanted literary realm; the central importance of his invented languages in his fantasy writing; his visual imagination and its emergence in his artwork; and the encouragement he derived from his close friend C. S. Lewis and their literary group the Inklings.
The book brings together the largest collection of original Tolkien material ever assembled in a single volume. Drawing on the extensive archives of the Tolkien collections at the Bodleian Libraries, Oxford, which stretch to more than five hundred boxes, and Marquette University, Milwaukee, as well as private collections, this hugely ambitious and exquisitely produced book draws together the worlds of J. R. R. Tolkien – scholarly, literary, creative, and domestic—offering a rich and detailed understanding and appreciation of this extraordinary author.
This landmark publication, produced on the occasion of a major exhibition at the Bodleian Libraries in Oxford in 2018 and at the Morgan Library in New York in 2019, is set to become a standard work in the literature on J. R. R. Tolkien.
Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth explores the huge creative endeavor behind Tolkien’s enduring popularity. Lavishly illustrated with three hundred images of his manuscripts, drawings, maps, and letters, the book traces the creative process behind his most famous literary works—The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion—and reproduces personal photographs and private papers, many of which have never been seen before in print.
Six essays introduce the reader to the person of J. R. R. Tolkien and to main themes in his life and work, including the influence of northern languages and legends on the creation of his own legendarium; his concept of “Faërie” as an enchanted literary realm; the central importance of his invented languages in his fantasy writing; his visual imagination and its emergence in his artwork; and the encouragement he derived from his close friend C. S. Lewis and their literary group the Inklings.
The book brings together the largest collection of original Tolkien material ever assembled in a single volume. Drawing on the extensive archives of the Tolkien collections at the Bodleian Libraries, Oxford, which stretch to more than five hundred boxes, and Marquette University, Milwaukee, as well as private collections, this hugely ambitious and exquisitely produced book draws together the worlds of J. R. R. Tolkien – scholarly, literary, creative, and domestic—offering a rich and detailed understanding and appreciation of this extraordinary author.
This landmark publication, produced on the occasion of a major exhibition at the Bodleian Libraries in Oxford in 2018 and at the Morgan Library in New York in 2019, is set to become a standard work in the literature on J. R. R. Tolkien.
416 pages | 300 color plates | 9 1/4 x 10
Literature and Literary Criticism: British and Irish Literature
Reviews
Table of Contents
Foreword
J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biographical Sketch – Catherine McIlwaine
Tolkien and the Inklings – John Garth
Faërie: Tolkien’s Perilous Land – Verlyn Flieger
Inventing Elvish – Carl F. Hostetter
Tolkien and ‘that noble northern spirit’ – Tom Shippey
Tolkien’s Visual Art – Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull
Catalogue
One
Reading Tolkien: ‘to England; to my country’
Two
Childhood: ‘born with a talent for language’
Three
Student Days: ‘the beginning of the legendarium’
Four
Sheer Invention: ‘new patterns of old colours’
Five
The Silmarillion: ‘the Silmarils are in my heart’
Six
The Professor’s Study: ‘from time already mortgaged’
Seven
The Hobbit: ‘In a hold in the ground there lived a hobbit’
Eight
The Lord of the Rings: ‘it is written in my life-blood’
Nine
Mapping The Lord of the Rings: ‘I wisely started with a map and made the story fit’
Contributors
Acknowledgements
Select Bibliography
Picture Credits
Exhibition Items
Index
J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biographical Sketch – Catherine McIlwaine
Tolkien and the Inklings – John Garth
Faërie: Tolkien’s Perilous Land – Verlyn Flieger
Inventing Elvish – Carl F. Hostetter
Tolkien and ‘that noble northern spirit’ – Tom Shippey
Tolkien’s Visual Art – Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull
Catalogue
One
Reading Tolkien: ‘to England; to my country’
Two
Childhood: ‘born with a talent for language’
Three
Student Days: ‘the beginning of the legendarium’
Four
Sheer Invention: ‘new patterns of old colours’
Five
The Silmarillion: ‘the Silmarils are in my heart’
Six
The Professor’s Study: ‘from time already mortgaged’
Seven
The Hobbit: ‘In a hold in the ground there lived a hobbit’
Eight
The Lord of the Rings: ‘it is written in my life-blood’
Nine
Mapping The Lord of the Rings: ‘I wisely started with a map and made the story fit’
Contributors
Acknowledgements
Select Bibliography
Picture Credits
Exhibition Items
Index