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J. R. R. Tolkien

Biography

J. R. R. Tolkien

J. R. R. Tolkien (1892–1973) is the creator of Middle-earth and author of such classic and extraordinary works of fiction as THE HOBBIT, THE LORD OF THE RINGS and THE SILMARILLION. His books have been translated into more than 50 languages and have sold many millions of copies worldwide.

J. R. R. Tolkien

Books by J. R. R. Tolkien

written by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Peter Grybauskas - Adventure, Fantasy, Fiction

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 one of the defining conflicts of 10th-century England, due to it being immortalized in the poem The Battle of Maldon.” Written shortly after the battle, the poem would inspire J.R.R. Tolkien to compose his own dramatic verse-dialogue, The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm’s Son, which imagines the aftermath of the great battle. Leading Tolkien scholar Peter Grybauskas presents for the very first time Tolkien’s own prose translation of The Battle of Maldon, together with the definitive treatment of The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth and its accompanying essays.

written by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Carl F. Hostetter - Adventure, Fantasy, Fiction

It is well known that J.R.R. Tolkien published THE HOBBIT and THE LORD OF THE RINGS. What may be less known is that he continued to write about Middle-earth in the decades that followed, right up until the years before his death in 1973. For him, Middle-earth was part of an entire world to be explored, and the writings in THE NATURE OF MIDDLE-EARTH reveal the journeys that he took as he sought to better understand his unique creation. From sweeping themes as profound as Elvish immortality and reincarnation, and the Powers of the Valar, to the more earth-bound subjects of the lands and beasts of Númenor, the geography of the Rivers and Beacon-hills of Gondor, and even who had beards!

written by J. R. R. Tolkien and edited by Brian Sibley, with illustrations by Alan Lee - Adventure, Fantasy, Fiction

J. R. R. Tolkien famously described the Second Age of Middle-earth as a "dark age, and not very much of its history is (or need be) told." And for many years readers would need to be content with the tantalizing glimpses of it found within the pages of THE LORD OF THE RINGS and its appendices. It was not until Christopher Tolkien published THE SILMARILLION after his father’s death that a fuller story could be told. Now, adhering to the timeline of "The Tale of Years" in the appendices to THE LORD OF THE RINGS, editor Brian Sibley has assembled into one comprehensive volume a new chronicle of the Second Age of Middle-earth, told substantially in the words of Tolkien from the various published texts, with new illustrations in watercolor and pencil by Alan Lee.

written by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien and illustrated by Alan Lee - Fantasy, Fiction

In the Tale of THE FALL OF GONDOLIN are two of the greatest powers in the world. There is Morgoth of the uttermost evil, unseen in this story but ruling over a vast military power from his fortress of Angband. Deeply opposed to Morgoth is Ulmo, second in might only to Manwë, chief of the Valar: he is called the Lord of Waters, of all seas, lakes and rivers under the sky. But he works in secret in Middle-earth to support the Noldor, the kindred of the Elves among whom were numbered Húrin and Túrin Turambar. Central to this enmity of the gods is the city of Gondolin, beautiful but undiscoverable.

written by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien, with illustrations by Alan Lee - Fantasy, Fiction

The epic tale of Beren and Lúthien became an essential element in the evolution of The Silmarillion, the myths and legends of J.R.R. Tolkien’s First Age of the World. Always key to the story is the fate that shadowed their love: Beren was a mortal man, Lúthien an immortal Elf. Her father, a great Elvish lord, imposed on Beren an impossible task before he might wed Lúthien: to rob the greatest of all evil beings, Melkor, of a Silmaril. Painstakingly restored from Tolkien’s manuscripts and presented for the first time as a continuous and stand-alone story, BEREN AND LÚTHIEN reunites fans of THE HOBBIT and THE LORD OF THE RINGS with Elves and Men, along with the rich landscape and creatures unique to Tolkien’s Middle-earth.

written by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Verlyn Flieger - Fantasy, Fiction

Brought up in the homestead of the dark magician Untamo, who killed his father, kidnapped his mother and tried three times to kill him when he was still a boy, Kullervo is alone save for the love of his twin sister, Wanona, and the magical powers of the black dog Musti, who guards him. When Kullervo is sold into slavery, he swears revenge on the magician. But he will learn that even at the point of vengeance, there is no escape from the cruelest of fates. Published here for the first time with J.R.R. Tolkien’s drafts, notes and lecture essays on its source work, the Kalevala, THE STORY OF KULLERVO is a foundation stone in the structure of Tolkien’s invented world.

written by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien - Fantasy, Fiction, Literary Criticism

The translation of BEOWULF by J. R. R. Tolkien was an early work, very distinctive in its mode, completed in 1926: he returned to it later to make hasty corrections, but seemed never to have considered its publication. This edition is twofold, for there exists an illuminating commentary on the text of the poem by the translator himself, in the written form of a series of lectures given at Oxford in the 1930s; and from these lectures a substantial selection has been made, to also form a commentary on the translation in this book.

by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien - Fiction, Historical Fiction, Poetry

THE FALL OF ARTHUR, the only venture by J.R.R. Tolkien into the legends of Arthur King of Britain, may well be regarded as his finest and most skillful achievement in the use of the Old English alliterative metre. Unhappily, it was one of several long narrative poems that he abandoned. Associated with the text of the poem, however, are many manuscript pages in which the strange evolution of the poem’s structure is revealed, together with narrative synopses and very significant notes.

by J. R. R. Tolkien

J.R.R. Tolkien's three-book epic encompassing THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING, THE TWO TOWERS, and THE RETURN OF THE KING) is a battle of good versus evil in the fictional world of Middle Earth.