J.R.R. Tolkien discussion

Hello,

I'm reading LotR right now for the second time (first time in English though), and I recently purchased an edition of The Atlas of Middle-earth, which is very helpful.

I've read other books from JRR and his son (The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, The lays of Beleriand ...) but I'm wondering if there are other books as useful as the Atlas, or essays worth reading about Tolkien's work and especially The Lord of the Rings.

I'm sure there are, but I don't know where to start ! What do you recommend ?

P.S. : Sorry if my english is awful, it's not my main language

Thank you, I guess I have to add shelves !

I think I'll go with Tom Shippey's work first, I don't mind "heavy-hitting scholarly" and some comments on amazon are promising.

http://www.walking-tree.org/cormare.php
If you're brave enough for the total English heavy hitting (as Oloris said)

If you're curious you can check out my Tolkien Studies (which I realize needs updating! :( )

Your map book is excellent! There is only one other book out there, and it follows Frodo only. There are wall size maps as well which you could find at Amazon.com. Otherwise you should be just fine using the Atlas.

With French your native language (?) you may find some excellent sources at your amazon in France; also if you read German, some of the writers are also German that do the Cormare series of books.

Either way, enjoy and welcome to the fandom! :)

"Tolkien - the illustrated encyclopedia" by David Day is great. It deals with everything from the natural history to the sociology of Middle-earth.

Thanks for your advices !

Indeed my native language is French, but I don't mind reading books in english (I read english far better than I write it fortunately).

Thanks :)

This website should be very useful to you:

http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Catego...

-Its a big list of the various books written about Tolkien, simply click on a title and you'll be directed to a article about it. I haven't read most of these, but at the very least you could use it as a reference point to search for reviews or ino before you purchase anything.


I would however reccomend:

The Road to Middle Earth (revised 3rd edition), Roots and Branches, and Author
of the Century by Tom Shippey-fascianting, in depth books exploring the themes of Tolkien's work (though there is some overlap between the books, and a few of his essays are a little out of date)

The Letters of JRR Tolkien, JRR Tolkien A Biography, The Inklings (All be Humphrey Carpenter) are very good biographical books on Tolkien, and give an insight into how he works and thinks. Tolkien and the Great War by John Garth is a must read biography of Tolkien's World War One expereinces.

The Annonatated Hobbit:Revised and Expanded Edition (2002/2003), is an illustrated Hardback edition of the hobbit featuring lots of interesting commentary,and production infomation about The Hobbit book, over 300 illustrations are included, as well as a number of hard to find poems by Tolkien:

http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/The_An...

The History of the Hobbit is a must read book by John D Rateliffe-containing the original drafts and outlines of The Hobbit it gives a blow by blow account of how the book changed as Tolkien wrote it (for exmaple at one point Bilbo killed Smaug, and Thorin was called Gandalf), as well as the other changes made to the book over the years-the 1960 version of the hobbit (abandoned after two chapters) is a fasciating attempt to rewrite the book in the style of Lord of The Rings. There is a very interesting in depth commentary by Rateliffe-Radgast (a character mentioned in one line in the book) has a 13 page essay!:

http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/The_Hi...

The Complete Tolkien Companion by J.E.A Tyler, and The Complete Guide to Middle Earth by Robert Foster are essentially encyclopedias on Middle Earth and great reference guides when you are looking for info, page numbers or quotes by the characters in Tolkien's books.

Wayne G Hammnond and Christina Scull are widely respected Tolkien scholars and authors of several books on Tolkien I hear nothing but good things about:

http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/The_J....

(2300 pages long!)

http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/J.R.R....

http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/The_Ar...

Hello Paul and thank you for your great and helpful post ! I hope many of these books are available in Europe, I've been looking for works from Wayne G. Hammnond and Christina Scull but It seems I have to order from US websites. Shipping will be long, but I'm sure it's worth the wait !

Hi Camille Glad to be of help, I live in the UK and almost all of the books I have mentioned can be ordered of amazon.co.uk-it may be cheaper and quicker to order from them rather than the USA (many of the books are published by Harper Collins a UK Company)-BUT some of the books can be quite expensive as they haven't been reprinted in over a decade, and are often only availble second hand.

Its probably best to check if your local libary has any copies you can borrow, or you could always join The one ring, and ask around on their forum for advice:

http://newboards.theonering.net/forum...

Camille wrote: "Hello Paul and thank you for your great and helpful post ! I hope many of these books are available in Europe, I've been looking for works from Wayne G. Hammnond and Christina Scull but It seems I ..."

Camile, I just found these books at amazon.co.uk. Closer than the US. Maybe check the French site too? Never know.

I recommend Understanding Middle-Earth: Essays on Tolkien's Middle-Earth by Michael Martinez which is in essay style. There are other books from him as well.

His "Parma Endorion" is quite well known, as well:
http://www.michael-martinez.com/mmboo...

Here's something really special -- The Science of Middle Earth: Explaining the science behind the greatest fantasy epic ever told

Tolkien himself was an avid amateur scientist and reader of journals. His fantasy was partially rooted in the physics and biology of the day, with an ample dash of magic, of course. Interesting reading for those who like to speculate...

The Real Middle-Earth by Brian Bates is an interesting read and one that i would recomend to any Tolkien enthusiast. It is about how our history connects to that of Tolkien's work, ie. places created in Lord of the Rings, traditions and culture is drawn from our own world.

Camille wrote: "Hello,

I'm reading LotR right now for the second time (first time in English though), and I recently purchased an edition of The Atlas of Middle-earth, which is very helpful.

I've read other book..." Your English is great!

Tolkien: Man and Myth: A Literary Life by Joseph Pearce, published by Harper Collins in 1998 is a very good book, well worth the read. J.R.R. Tolkien: A biography by Humphrey Carpenter, published by Allen and Unwin in 1977 is also worth reading, as is Tolkien: a biography by Michael White, published by Little Brown in 2001. The best window on Tolkien's writings is his own essay On Fairy Stories in his book, Tree and Leaf.

I would also recomend the lord of the films by WJ Brawn, which is the essential companion guide to Peter Jackson's films {based on JRR Tolkien's LOTR}.

Great reads are and .

For people who are interested in a book about Aragorn's character, I recommend Hobbit to Hero:The Making of Tolkien's King by Elizabeth M. Stephen.

I recommend the following:

Unfinished Tales of Numenor and Middle-Earth by Tolkien

The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien

Tolkien's Ring by David Day - some inaccuracies but has other interesting information.

The Annotated Hobbit

J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography by Humphrey Carpenter

~~~~

The Journeys Of Frodo by Barbara Strachey is the other map book mentioned in this thread.

There is another book I found, but haven't read it yet:
Aragorn: J.R.R. Tolkien's Undervalued Hero by Angela P Nicholas

Journeys of Frodo, by Barbara Strachey, and the Atlas of Middle-earth, by Karen Wynne Fonstad. But then, like Bilbo, I love maps.

I've also got the set of four maps by John Howe. Due to lack of wall-space I can only get one on the wall at a time. Perhaps I need a bigger house?

I second everything that's already been mentioned--so many beautiful books! Robert Foster's Complete Guide to Middle-earth was mentioned, and I highly recommend the edition with illustrations by Ted Nasmith. He has done some of my favorite Tolkien illustrations, and that book is the best one-volume collection of them.

I also recently enjoyed The Ring of Words: Tolkien and the Oxford English Dictionary, which begins with a short biographical sketch of Tolkien in the years he worked on the OED; but for me what was even more fascinating was a section that explains the origins of the words that Tolkien created for his works. I was amazed at some of the words that he created which have since become standard fantasy-story vocabulary, and I also loved learning the meanings in many of his words.

As for maps...Sorry, Hyarrowen, but if you see the two sets of maps by Daniel Reeve, you'll need even more wall space! I have both sets, and I even have three of the maps framed, and yet I haven't found the right wall space for them. :)

Tom Shippey's The Road to Middle-earth has been kicking around for a long time. But, in my opinion, this remains the best analysis of Tolkien's writings.

I guess it helps that Shippey is a philologist and shares the same love of words that Tolkien did. It gives him an insight that few others can match.

One of my favorites all time is the Journeys of Frodo - a book of maps that tracks everyone's adventures throughout the story.

Sorry, Hyarrowen, but if you see the two sets of maps by Daniel Reeve, you'll need even more wall space! I have both sets, and I even have three of the maps framed, and yet I haven't found the right wall space for them. :)

I took a look and gosh, they're beautiful - fortunately so pricey that the problem of where to put them won't arise! They're obviously drawn with love and attention, though.

A Hobbit Journey, and the Philosophy of the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. They offered new perspectives about Tolkein's middle earth.

I don't know if you are a Christian or not, but if you are you might consider reading The Grip of Grace: God's Hand in the Lord of the Rings by Brent King. I am currently reading it and just love it so far :)

For a further Christian perspective, 'Secret Fire' by the late Randolph Caldecott.

More generally, John Garth's Tolkien and the Great war; anything by Jane Chance; Colin Duriez; Bob Blackham; Dimitra Fimi; Jason Fisher's 'Tolkien and the study of his sources; Lynn Forest-Hill; Diane Glyer's The company they keep' (I'm running along my shelves here!); loads of stuff on the Walking Tree Publishers website; Isaacs and Zimbardo's Tolkien and the critics. That's halfway down the shelf so I'll pause here with a reminder that many Tolkien Websites list other works, and on the LOTR Fanatics Plaza there is a Scholars Forum which includes essays specially written by some of these authors.
A few more names before this gets too long; Anne C. Petty; J.S. Ryan; Michael Stanton. Google or some other search should uncover these and many more.
Forgive me if my first post here is too long!

And more: Tom Shippey and Verlyn Flieger are always good.

Well so they are, but they've been mentioned many times already. Hard work to try and read verything that comes out. I forgot Matthew Dickerson too.

Hammond and Scull recently reviewed two books focusing on Aragorn, they sound quite interesting:

http://wayneandchristina.wordpress.co...

http://wayneandchristina.wordpress.co...

These are rather academic but match the initial premise:

http://www.amazon.com/Middle-earth-se...
http://www.amazon.com/Middle-earth-se...
http://www.amazon.com/Dynasties-Middl...
http://www.amazon.com/Words-Westernes...

Edit:
Oh, there's another one which has just recently been published: http://codexregius.blogspot.de/2015/0...

I think no one mentioned the volumes 6-9 and 12 of the "History of Middle-earth" yet that discuss the drafts of LotR in all detail and give much information that did not make it into the published books. If you are interested in the birth-dates of all the kings of Arnor and Gondor, then vol. 12 is your choice, for example ...