Charles Jared Lobdell (29 November 1937 – 22 March 2019) was an American author and one of the first
Tolkien scholar
The works of J. R. R. Tolkien have generated a body of research covering many aspects of his fantasy writings. These encompass ''The Lord of the Rings'' and ''The Silmarillion'', along with his legendarium that remained unpublished until after ...
s. He is best known for some thirty academic books on American history and
the Inklings
The Inklings were an informal literary discussion group associated with J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis at the University of Oxford for nearly two decades between the early 1930s and late 1949. The Inklings were literary enthusiasts who pra ...
including
J. R. R. Tolkien
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philology, philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''.
From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was ...
,
C. S. Lewis
Clive Staples Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963) was a British writer and Anglican lay theologian. He held academic positions in English literature at both Oxford University (Magdalen College, 1925–1954) and Cambridge Univers ...
, and
Charles Williams.
Biography
Jared Lobdell was born to Charles and Jane Elizabeth (Hopkins) Lobdell in New York. He was educated at
Yale University
Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
. He wrote many books on aspects of American history, and on each of the three major
Inklings
The Inklings were an informal literary discussion group associated with J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis at the University of Oxford for nearly two decades between the early 1930s and late 1949. The Inklings were literary enthusiasts who pra ...
, the Oxford literary society centred on
C. S. Lewis
Clive Staples Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963) was a British writer and Anglican lay theologian. He held academic positions in English literature at both Oxford University (Magdalen College, 1925–1954) and Cambridge Univers ...
that also included
J. R. R. Tolkien
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philology, philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''.
From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was ...
and
Charles Williams. He died at Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania.
Works
Books
Lobdell wrote some 30 non-fiction books, including:
* ''A Tolkien Compass'' (editor) (Open Court, 1975)
* ''England and Always: Tolkien's World of the Rings'' (Eerdmans, 1981)
* ''The Detective Fiction Reviews of Charles Williams, 1930-1935'' (McFarland, 2003)
* ''The World of the Rings: Language, Religion, and Adventure in Tolkien'' (Open Court, 2004) — an expansion of ''England and Always''
* ''The Scientifiction Novels of C. S. Lewis: Space and Time in the Ransom Stories'' (McFarland, 2004)
* ''The Rise of Tolkienian Fantasy'' (Open Court, 2005)
* ''Eight Children in Narnia: The Making of a Children's Story'' (Open Court, 2016)
Encyclopedia entries
Lobdell wrote 23 of the essays in the 2006 ''
J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia: Scholarship and Critical Assessment''.
Articles
Among Lobdell's many scholarly articles are:
* "Words That Sound like Castles" (Rally, August, 1966)
* "A Medieval Proverb in The Lord of the Rings" (American Notes and Queries Supplement I, 1978)
* "Mr. Bliss: Notes on the Manuscript and Story" (Selections from the Marquette J.R.R. Tolkien Collection, 1987)
* "C.S. Lewis's Ransom Stories and Their Eighteenth-Century Ancestry" (Word and Story in C.S. Lewis, 1991)
* "Ymagynatyf and J.R.R. Tolkien's Roman Catholicism, Catholic Theology, Religion in The Lord of the Rings" (Light Beyond All Shadow: Religious Experience in Tolkien's Work, 2011)
* "Humour, Comedy, the Comic, Comicality, Puns, Wordplay, 'Fantastication', and 'English Humour' in and around Tolkien and His Work, and among the Inklings" (Laughter in Middle-earth, 2016)
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lobdell, Jared
1937 births
2019 deaths
Tolkien studies
20th-century American historians
American male non-fiction writers
20th-century American male writers