Tolkien's legendarium is the body of
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 ...
's
mythopoeic writing, unpublished in his lifetime, that forms the background to his ''
The Lord of the Rings
''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's boo ...
'', and which his son
Christopher
Christopher is the English language, English version of a Europe-wide name derived from the Greek language, Greek name Χριστόφορος (''Christophoros'' or ''Christoforos''). The constituent parts are Χριστός (''Christós''), "Jesus ...
summarized in his compilation of ''
The Silmarillion
''The Silmarillion'' () is a collection of myths and stories in varying styles by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien. It was edited and published posthumously by his son Christopher Tolkien in 1977, assisted by the fantasy author Guy Gavriel ...
'' and documented in his 12-volume series ''
The History of Middle-earth
''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 that collect and analyse much of Tolkien's legendarium, compiled and edited by his son, Christopher Tolkien. The series shows the development over ti ...
''. The legendarium's origins reach back to 1914, when Tolkien began
writing poems and story sketches,
drawing maps, and
inventing languages and names as a private project to create a unique English mythology. The earliest story drafts (of ''
The Book of Lost Tales
''The Book of Lost Tales'' is a collection of early stories by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien, published as the first two volumes of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume series ''The History of Middle-earth'', in which he presents and analyses ...
'') are from 1916; he revised and rewrote these for most of his adult life.
''
The Hobbit
''The Hobbit, or There and Back Again'' is a children's fantasy novel by English author J. R. R. Tolkien. It was published in 1937 to wide critical acclaim, being nominated for the Carnegie Medal and awarded a prize from the '' ...
'' (1937), Tolkien's first published novel, was not originally part of the larger mythology but became linked to it. Both ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings'' (1954 and 1955) took place in the
Third Age
In J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, the history of Arda, also called the history of Middle-earth, began when the Ainu (Middle-earth), Ainur entered Arda (Middle-earth), Arda, following the creation events in the Ainulindalë and long ages of l ...
of
Middle-earth
Middle-earth is the fictional setting of much of the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy. The term is equivalent to the ''Miðgarðr'' of Norse mythology and ''Middangeard'' in Old English works, including ''Beowulf''. Middle-earth is t ...
, while virtually all of his earlier writing had been set in the first two ages of the world. ''The Lord of the Rings'' occasionally alludes to figures and events from the legendarium, but such ancient tales are depicted as being remembered by few until the story makes them relevant.
After ''The Lord of the Rings'', Tolkien returned to his older stories to bring them to publishable form, but never completed the task. Tolkien's son Christopher chose portions of his late father's vast collection of unpublished material and shaped them into ''
The Silmarillion
''The Silmarillion'' () is a collection of myths and stories in varying styles by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien. It was edited and published posthumously by his son Christopher Tolkien in 1977, assisted by the fantasy author Guy Gavriel ...
'' (1977), a semi-chronological and semi-complete narrative of the mythical world and its origins. The sales were sufficient to enable him to work on and publish
many volumes of his father's legendarium stories and drafts; some were presented as completed tales, while others illustrated his father's complex creative process.
Tolkien research
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 ...
, a continuing examination of Tolkien's works and supporting mythology, became a scholarly area of study soon after his death.
Etymology
A ''legendarium'' is a literary collection of
legend
A legend is a Folklore genre, genre of folklore that consists of a narrative featuring human actions, believed or perceived, both by teller and listeners, to have taken place in human history. Narratives in this genre may demonstrate human valu ...
s. This
medieval Latin
Medieval Latin was the form of Literary Latin used in Roman Catholic Western Europe during the Middle Ages. In this region it served as the primary written language, though local languages were also written to varying degrees. Latin functioned ...
noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...
originally referred mainly to texts detailing legends of the lives of
saint
In religious belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of Q-D-Š, holiness, likeness, or closeness to God. However, the use of the term ''saint'' depends on the context and Christian denomination, denominat ...
s. A surviving example is the
Anjou Legendarium
The Anjou Legendarium is a Gothic illuminated manuscript of a collection of stories from the life of saints important to the House of Anjou of Hungary. It was made on the occasion of the journey of Charles I of Hungary and his son Prince Andrew to ...
, dating from the 14th century. Quotations in the ''
Oxford English Dictionary
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a com ...
'' for the synonymous noun ''legendary'' date from 1513. The
Middle English
Middle English (abbreviated to ME) is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English p ...
''South English Legendary'' is an example of this form of the noun.
[Since ''legendary'' in contemporary English is mostly used as an adjective, the Latin form reduces ambiguity, but ''legendary'' as a noun remains in use in specialist (medievalist) vocabulary. ]
Documents included
Tolkien's usage
Tolkien described his works as a "legendarium" in four letters from 1951 to 1955, a period in which he was attempting to have his unfinished ''
The Silmarillion
''The Silmarillion'' () is a collection of myths and stories in varying styles by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien. It was edited and published posthumously by his son Christopher Tolkien in 1977, assisted by the fantasy author Guy Gavriel ...
'' published alongside the more complete ''
The Lord of the Rings
''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's boo ...
''. On ''The Silmarillion'', he wrote in 1951, "This legendarium ends with a vision of the end of the world, its breaking and remaking, and the recovery of the
Silmarilli and the 'light before the Sun'";
and in 1954, "Actually in the imagination of this story we are now living on a physically round Earth. But the whole 'legendarium' contains a transition from a flat world ... to a globe".
On both texts, he explained in 1954 that "... my ''legendarium'', especially the 'Downfall of
Númenor
Númenor, also called Elenna-nórë or Westernesse, is a fictional place in J. R. R. Tolkien's writings. It was the kingdom occupying a large island to the west of Middle-earth, the main setting of Tolkien's writings, and was the greatest civil ...
' which lies immediately behind ''The Lord of the Rings'', is based on my view: that Men are essentially mortal and must not try to become 'immortal' in the flesh",
and in 1955, "But the beginning of the legendarium, of which the
Trilogy
A trilogy is a set of three works of art that are connected and can be seen either as a single work or as three individual works. They are commonly found in literature, film, and video games, and are less common in other art forms. Three-part wor ...
is part (the conclusion), was an attempt to reorganise some of the
Kalevala
The ''Kalevala'' ( fi, Kalevala, ) is a 19th-century work of epic poetry compiled by Elias Lönnrot from Karelian and Finnish oral folklore and mythology, telling an epic story about the Creation of the Earth, describing the controversies and r ...
".
Rateliff's definition
"Tolkien's legendarium" is defined narrowly in
John D. Rateliff John D. Rateliff is an author of roleplaying games and an independent scholar. He specializes in the study of the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, particularly his Middle-earth fantasy writings.
Early life and education
John D. Rateliff was raised in Ma ...
's ''
The History of The Hobbit'' as the body of Tolkien's work consisting of:
* ''
The Book of Lost Tales
''The Book of Lost Tales'' is a collection of early stories by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien, published as the first two volumes of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume series ''The History of Middle-earth'', in which he presents and analyses ...
''
* ''The Sketch of the Mythology'' and contemporary alliterative verses
* The 1930 ''
Quenta Noldorinwa
''The Shaping of Middle-earth – The Quenta, The Ambarkanta and The Annals'' (1986) is the fourth volume of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume series ''The History of Middle-earth'' in which he analysed the unpublished manuscripts of his father J. ...
'' and first Annals
* The 1937 ''Quenta Silmarillion'' and later Annals
* The later ''Quenta''
* The final Annals
These, with ''
The Lays of Beleriand
''The Lays of Beleriand'', published in 1985, is the third volume of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume book series, ''The History of Middle-earth'', in which he analyzes the unpublished manuscripts of his father J. R. R. Tolkien.
Book
Inscrip ...
'', written from 1918 onwards, comprise the different "phases" of Tolkien's
Elven legendary writings, posthumously edited and published in ''The Silmarillion'' and in their original forms in the series ''
The History of Middle-earth
''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 that collect and analyse much of Tolkien's legendarium, compiled and edited by his son, Christopher Tolkien. The series shows the development over ti ...
'' by
Christopher Tolkien
Christopher John Reuel Tolkien (21 November 1924 – 16 January 2020) was an English academic editor, becoming a French citizen in later life. The son of author and academic J. R. R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien edited much of his father' ...
.
Scholarly usage
Other Tolkien scholars have used the term legendarium in a variety of contexts.
Christopher Tolkien's introduction to ''
The History of Middle-earth
''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 that collect and analyse much of Tolkien's legendarium, compiled and edited by his son, Christopher Tolkien. The series shows the development over ti ...
'' series talks about the "primary 'legendarium'", for the core episodes and themes of ''The Silmarillion'' which were not abandoned in his father's constant redrafting of the work.
The scholars
Verlyn Flieger Verlyn Flieger (born 1933) is an author, editing, editor, and Professor Emerita in the Department of English at the University of Maryland, College Park, University of Maryland at College Park, where she taught courses in comparative mythology, medi ...
and
Carl F. Hostetter edited a collection of critical essays on ''The History of Middle-earth'' named "''
Tolkien's Legendarium: Essays on The History of Middle-earth''". Flieger writes that "...the greatest is the creation of the Silmarils, the Gems of light that give their names to the whole legendarium", equating the legendarium with the ''Silmarillion'' (which sometimes denotes the 1977 book published under that name, and sometimes the larger body of un-edited drafts used to create that work).
In the ''
J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia
The ''J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia: Scholarship and Critical Assessment'', edited by Michael D. C. Drout, was published by Routledge in 2006. A team of 127 Tolkien scholars on 720 pages cover topics of Tolkien's fiction, his academic works, hi ...
'',
David Bratman David Bratman is a librarian and Tolkien scholar.
Biography
David Bratman was born in Chicago to Robert Bratman, a physician, and his wife Nancy, an editor. He was one of four sons in the family. He was brought up in Cleveland, Ohio and then in ...
writes that "''The History of Middle-earth'' is a longitudinal study of the development and elaboration of Tolkien's legendarium through his transcribed manuscripts, with textual commentary by the editor, Christopher Tolkien."
Dickerson and Evans use the phrase "legendarium" to encompass the entirety of Tolkien's Middle-earth writings "for convenience".
[ Dickerson, Matthew T. and Evans, Jonathan Duane: '']Ents
Ents are a species of beings in J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy world Middle-earth who closely resemble trees; their leader is Treebeard of Fangorn forest. Their name is derived from an Old English word for giant.
The Ents appear in ''The Lord of ...
, Elves, and Eriador
The geography of Middle-earth encompasses the physical, political, and moral geography of J. R. R. Tolkien's fictional world of Middle-earth, strictly a continent on the planet of Arda but widely taken to mean the physical world, and '' Eä'', all ...
: The Environmental Vision of J. R. R. Tolkien'' p. 277 This would encompass texts such as the incomplete drafts of stories published before ''The History of Middle-earth'' in the 1980 ''
Unfinished Tales
''Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth'' is a collection of stories and essays by J. R. R. Tolkien that were never completed during his lifetime, but were edited by his son Christopher Tolkien and published in 1980. Many of the tales ...
''.
Shaun Gunner of
The Tolkien Society
The Tolkien Society is an educational charity and literary society devoted to the study and promotion of the life and works of the author and academic J. R. R. Tolkien.
It began informally in 1969, and held its inaugural meeting in 1970. It ho ...
has called the 2021 collection of Tolkien's previously unpublished legendarium writings ''
The Nature of Middle-earth'', edited by Carl F. Hostetter, "an unofficial 13th volume of ''
The History of Middle-earth
''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 that collect and analyse much of Tolkien's legendarium, compiled and edited by his son, Christopher Tolkien. The series shows the development over ti ...
'' series".
Development
A private mythology
Unlike "
fictional universe
A fictional universe, or fictional world, is a self-consistent setting with events, and often other elements, that differ from the real world. It may also be called an imagined, constructed, or fictional realm (or world). Fictional universes may ...
s" constructed for the purpose of writing and publishing popular fiction, Tolkien's legendarium for a long period was a private project, concerned with questions of
philology
Philology () is the study of language in oral and writing, written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defin ...
,
cosmology
Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount (lexicographer), Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', and in 1731 taken up in ...
, theology and mythology. His biographer
Humphrey Carpenter
Humphrey William Bouverie Carpenter (29 April 1946 – 4 January 2005) was an English biographer, writer, and radio broadcaster. He is known especially for his biographies of J. R. R. Tolkien and other members of the literary society the Inkli ...
writes that although by 1923 Tolkien had almost completed ''The Book of Lost Tales'', "it was almost as if he did not want to finish it", beginning instead to rewrite it; he suggests that Tolkien may have doubted if a publisher would take it, and notes that Tolkien was a perfectionist, and further that he was perhaps afraid of finishing as he wished to go on with his
sub-creation
Worldbuilding is the process of constructing a world, originally an imaginary one, sometimes associated with a fictional universe. Developing an imaginary setting with coherent qualities such as a history, geography, and ecology is a key task fo ...
, his invention of myth in Middle-earth.
Tolkien first began working on the stories that would become ''The Silmarillion'' in 1914,
intending them to become an English mythology that would explain the origins of English history and culture,
and to provide the necessary "historical" background for his invented
Elvish languages
Elvish languages are constructed languages used by Elves in a fantasy setting. The philologist and fantasy author J. R. R. Tolkien created the first of these languages, including Quenya and Sindarin.
Tolkien's Elvish languages
The philologist an ...
. Much of this early work was written while Tolkien, then a British officer returned from France during World War I, was in hospital and on sick leave.
He completed the first story, "
The Fall of Gondolin
J. R. R. Tolkien's ''The Fall of Gondolin'' is one of the stories which formed the basis for a section in his posthumously-published work, ''The Silmarillion'', with a version later appearing in ''The Book of Lost Tales''. In the narrative, Gon ...
", in late 1916.
He called his collection of nascent stories ''The Book of Lost Tales''.
This became the name for the first two volumes of ''
The History of Middle-earth
''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 that collect and analyse much of Tolkien's legendarium, compiled and edited by his son, Christopher Tolkien. The series shows the development over ti ...
'', which include these early texts.
Tolkien never completed ''The Book of Lost Tales''; he left it to compose the poems "
The Lay of Leithian
''The Lays of Beleriand'', published in 1985, is the third volume of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume book series, ''The History of Middle-earth'', in which he analyzes the unpublished manuscripts of his father J. R. R. Tolkien.
Book
Inscrip ...
" (in 1925) and "
The Lay of the Children of Húrin
The Lay of the Children of Húrin is a long epic poem by J. R. R. Tolkien which takes place in his fictional fantasy-world, Middle-earth. It tells of the life and ill fate of Túrin Turambar, the son of Húrin. It is written in alliterative verse ...
" (possibly as early as 1918).
The first complete version of ''The Silmarillion'' was the "Sketch of the Mythology" written in 1926
(later published in Volume IV of ''The History of Middle-earth''). The "Sketch" was a 28-page synopsis written to explain the background of the story of
Túrin to R. W. Reynolds, a friend to whom Tolkien had sent several of the stories.
From the "Sketch" Tolkien developed a fuller narrative version of ''The Silmarillion'' called ''Quenta Noldorinwa''
(also included in Volume IV). The ''Quenta Noldorinwa'' was the last version of ''The Silmarillion'' that Tolkien completed.
Ælfwine framing device
The stories in ''
The Book of Lost Tales
''The Book of Lost Tales'' is a collection of early stories by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien, published as the first two volumes of Christopher Tolkien's 12-volume series ''The History of Middle-earth'', in which he presents and analyses ...
'' employ the narrative framing device of an
Anglo-Saxon
The Anglo-Saxons were a Cultural identity, cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo- ...
mariner named
Ælfwine
Ælfwine (also ''Aelfwine'', ''Elfwine'') is an Old English personal name. It is composed of the elements ''ælf'' "elf" and ''wine'' "friend", continuing a hypothetical Common Germanic given name ''*albi- winiz'' which is also continued in Old Hig ...
or Eriol or Ottor Wǽfre who finds the island of
Tol Eressëa
Valinor (Quenya'': Land of the Valar'') or the Blessed Realms is a fictional location in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, the home of the immortal Valar on the continent of Aman, far to the west of Middle-earth; he used the name Aman mainly to me ...
, where the Elves live, and the Elves tell him their history. He collects, translates from
Old English
Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, Anglo ...
, and writes the mythology that appears in ''
The History of Middle-earth
''The History of Middle-earth'' is a 12-volume series of books published between 1983 and 1996 that collect and analyse much of Tolkien's legendarium, compiled and edited by his son, Christopher Tolkien. The series shows the development over ti ...
''.
Ælfwine means "Elf-friend" in Old English; men whose names have the same meaning, such as Alboin, Alwin, and
Elendil
Elendil is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium. He is mentioned in ''The Lord of the Rings'', ''The Silmarillion'' and ''Unfinished Tales''. He was the father of Isildur and Anárion, last lord of Andúnië on the island of ...
, were to appear in the two unfinished
time travel
Time travel is the concept of movement between certain points in time, analogous to movement between different points in space by an object or a person, typically with the use of a hypothetical device known as a time machine. Time travel is a w ...
novels, ''
The Lost Road
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...
'' in 1936 and ''
The Notion Club Papers
''The Notion Club Papers'' is an abandoned novel by J. R. R. Tolkien, written during 1945 and published posthumously in ''Sauron Defeated'', the 9th volume of ''The History of Middle-earth''. It is a time travel story, written while ''The Lord of t ...
'' in 1945, as the protagonists reappeared in each of several different times.
There is no such framework in the published version of ''The Silmarillion'', but the ''
Narn i Hîn Húrin'' is introduced with the note "Here begins that tale which Ǽlfwine made from the ''Húrinien''."
Tolkien never fully dropped the idea of multiple 'voices' who collected the stories over the millennia.
A context for ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''
When Tolkien published ''
The Hobbit
''The Hobbit, or There and Back Again'' is a children's fantasy novel by English author J. R. R. Tolkien. It was published in 1937 to wide critical acclaim, being nominated for the Carnegie Medal and awarded a prize from the '' ...
'' in 1937 (which was itself not originally intended for publication, but as a story told privately to his children),
the narrative of the published text was loosely influenced by the legendarium as a context, but was not designed to be part of it. Carpenter comments that not until Tolkien began to write its sequel, ''The Lord of the Rings'', did he realise the significance of hobbits in his mythology.
In 1937, encouraged by the success of ''The Hobbit'', Tolkien submitted to his publisher
George Allen & Unwin
George Allen & Unwin was a British publishing company formed in 1911 when Sir Stanley Unwin purchased a controlling interest in George Allen & Co. It went on to become one of the leading publishers of the twentieth century and to establish an ...
an incomplete but more fully developed version of ''The Silmarillion'' called ''Quenta Silmarillion''.
The reader rejected the work as being obscure and "too
Celtic
Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to:
Language and ethnicity
*pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia
**Celts (modern)
*Celtic languages
**Proto-Celtic language
* Celtic music
*Celtic nations
Sports Fo ...
".
The publisher instead asked Tolkien to write a sequel to ''The Hobbit''.
Tolkien began to revise ''The Silmarillion'', but soon turned to the sequel, which became ''The Lord of the Rings''.
Writing ''The Lord of the Rings'' during the 1940s, Tolkien was attempting to address the dilemma of creating a narrative consistent with a "sequel" of the published ''The Hobbit'' and a desire to present a more comprehensive view of its large unpublished background. He renewed work on ''The Silmarillion'' after completing ''The Lord of the Rings'',
and he greatly desired to publish the two works together.
When it became clear that would not be possible, Tolkien turned his full attention to preparing ''The Lord of the Rings'' for publication.
John D. Rateliff John D. Rateliff is an author of roleplaying games and an independent scholar. He specializes in the study of the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, particularly his Middle-earth fantasy writings.
Early life and education
John D. Rateliff was raised in Ma ...
has analysed the complex relationship between ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Silmarillion'', providing evidence that they were related from the start of ''The Hobbit''s composition.
Towards publishable form
With the success of ''The Lord of the Rings'', Tolkien in the late 1950s returned to ''The Silmarillion'', planning to revise the material of his legendarium into a form "fit for publication", a task which kept him occupied until his death in 1973. Much of his later writing from this period was concerned more with the theological and philosophical underpinnings of the work than with the narratives themselves. By this time, he had doubts about fundamental aspects of the work that went back to the earliest versions of the stories, and it seems that he felt the need to resolve these problems before he could produce the "final" version of ''The Silmarillion''. During this time he wrote extensively on such topics as the nature of
evil
Evil, in a general sense, is defined as the opposite or absence of good. It can be an extremely broad concept, although in everyday usage it is often more narrowly used to talk about profound wickedness and against common good. It is general ...
in
Arda
Arda or ARDA may refer to:
Places
*Arda (Maritsa), a river in Bulgaria and Greece
* Arda (Italy), a river in Italy
*Arda (Douro), a river in Portugal
* Arda, Bulgaria, a village in southern Bulgaria
* Arda, County Fermanagh, a townland in County ...
, the origin of
Orcs
An Orc (or Ork) is a fictional humanoid monster like a goblin. Orcs were brought into modern usage by the fantasy writings of J. R. R. Tolkien, especially ''The Lord of the Rings''. In Tolkien's works, Orcs are a brutish, aggressive, ugly, a ...
, the customs of the
Elves
An elf () is a type of humanoid supernatural being in Germanic mythology and folklore. Elves appear especially in North Germanic mythology. They are subsequently mentioned in Snorri Sturluson's Icelandic Prose Edda. He distinguishes "ligh ...
, the nature and means of Elvish rebirth, the "flat" world, and the story of the Sun and Moon. In any event, with one or two exceptions, he made little change to the narratives during the remaining years of his life.
A presented collection
The scholar
Verlyn Flieger Verlyn Flieger (born 1933) is an author, editing, editor, and Professor Emerita in the Department of English at the University of Maryland, College Park, University of Maryland at College Park, where she taught courses in comparative mythology, medi ...
writes that Tolkien thought of his legendarium as a presented collection, with a
frame story that changed over the years, first with an Ælfwine-type character who translates the "Golden Book" of the sages Rumil or Pengoloð; later, having the Hobbit
Bilbo Baggins
Bilbo Baggins is the title character and protagonist of J. R. R. Tolkien's 1937 novel ''The Hobbit'', a supporting character in ''The Lord of the Rings'', and the fictional narrator (along with Frodo Baggins) of many of Tolkien's Middle-eart ...
collect the stories into the ''
Red Book of Westmarch
The ''Red Book of Westmarch'' (sometimes the ''Thain's Book'' after its principal version) is a fictional manuscript written by hobbits, related to the author J. R. R. Tolkien's frame stories. It is an instance of the found manuscript conceit ...
'', translating mythological Elvish documents in
Rivendell
Rivendell ('' sjn, Imladris'') is a valley in J. R. R. Tolkien's fictional world of Middle-earth, representing both a homely place of sanctuary and a magical Elvish otherworld. It is an important location in ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of th ...
.
The scholar
Gergely Nagy observes that Tolkien "thought of his works ''as texts within the fictional world''" (his emphasis), and that the overlapping of different and sometimes contradictory accounts was central to his desired effect. Nagy notes that Tolkien went so far as to create facsimile pages from the Dwarves' ''
Book of Mazarbul
Tolkien's artwork was a key element of his creativity from the time when he began to write fiction. The philologist and author J. R. R. Tolkien prepared illustrations for his Middle-earth fantasy books, facsimile artefacts, more or less "pictur ...
'' that is found by the
Fellowship
A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context.
In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements.
Within the context of higher education ...
in
Moria. Further, Tolkien was a
philologist
Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...
; Nagy comments that Tolkien may have been intentionally imitating the philological style of
Elias Lönnrot
Elias Lönnrot (; 9 April 1802 – 19 March 1884) was a Finnish physician, philologist and collector of traditional Finnish oral poetry. He is best known for creating the Finnish national epic, ''Kalevala'',
(1835, enlarged 1849), from short b ...
, compiler of the Finnish epic, the ''
Kalevala
The ''Kalevala'' ( fi, Kalevala, ) is a 19th-century work of epic poetry compiled by Elias Lönnrot from Karelian and Finnish oral folklore and mythology, telling an epic story about the Creation of the Earth, describing the controversies and r ...
''; or of
St Jerome
Jerome (; la, Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was a Christian priest, confessor, theologian, and historian; he is comm ...
,
Snorri Sturlusson
Snorri Sturluson ( ; ; 1179 – 22 September 1241) was an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician. He was elected twice as lawspeaker of the Icelandic parliament, the Althing. He is commonly thought to have authored or compiled portions of the ...
,
Jacob Grimm
Jacob Ludwig Karl Grimm (4 January 1785 – 20 September 1863), also known as Ludwig Karl, was a German author, linguist, philologist, jurist, and folklorist. He is known as the discoverer of Grimm's law of linguistics, the co-author of th ...
, or Nikolai Gruntvig, all of whom Tolkien saw as exemplars of a professional and creative philology. This was, Nagy believes, what Tolkien thought essential if he was to present
a mythology for England
England and Englishness are represented in multiple forms within J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth writings; it appears, more or less thinly disguised, in the form of the Shire and the lands close to it; in kindly characters such as Treebeard, F ...
, since such a thing had to have been written by many hands. Further, writes Nagy, Christopher Tolkien "inserted himself in the functional place of Bilbo" as editor and collator, in his view "reinforcing the mythopoeic effect" that his father had wanted to achieve, making the published book do what Bilbo's book was meant to do, and so unintentionally realising his father's intention.
See also
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Middle-earth canon The term Middle-earth canon, also called Tolkien's canon, is used for the published writings of J. R. R. Tolkien regarding Middle-earth as a whole. The term is also used in Tolkien fandom to promote, discuss and debate the idea of a consistent fict ...
– the set of Tolkien's writings on Middle-earth
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J. R. R. Tolkien bibliography
This is a list of all published works of the English writer and philologist J. R. R. Tolkien. Tolkien's works were published before and after his death.
Fiction Middle-earth
#1937 '' The Hobbit, or There and Back Again'', ( HM)
#1954–1955 ''T ...
– list of all Tolkien's writings
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J. R. R. Tolkien's influences
J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy books on Middle-earth, especially ''The Lord of the Rings'' and ''The Silmarillion'', drew on a wide array of influences including language, Christianity, mythology, archaeology, ancient and modern literature, and pe ...
– influences on Tolkien's Middle-earth writing
* ''
Tolkien's Legendarium: Essays on The History of Middle-earth'' – a 2000 collection of scholarly essays on the legendarium
References
Primary
::''This list identifies each item's location in Tolkien's writings.''
Secondary
Sources
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{{J. R. R. Tolkien
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Tolkien studies
Fantasy worlds
High fantasy novels