Tolkien’s Life and Work

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien

Basic facts to know

• Place and date of birth

• Family basics and major events

• Religion

• Love life

• Education

• War experience

• Profession

Tolkien’s Life and Work

• Philology: love of words

– The languages come first!

– Especially interested in pleasure of sounds

– Learned and invented languages

– Historical reconstruction of language

• Creates history for his languages: Quenya and Sindarin

Tolkien’s Life and Work

• A parallel process: Historical reconstruction of folklore and national collections

– Grimm’s Fairy Tales

– Elder (Poetic) Edda and Prose Edda

– Kalevala

• Invented “history”: “The Man in the Moon” song

Creating a history to go with the languages (“a mythology for England”):

Eala earendel engla beorhtast

ofer middangeard monnum sended

• The Voyage of Earendel (first version 1914)

• The Fall of Gondolin

• Turin Turambar

• Beren and Luthien (all by 1917)

Tolkien’s “co-curricular activities”

• T.C.B.S (Tea Club and Barrovian Society)—unofficial group of friends in school

• School plays (sometimes in drag!)

• Rugby team (school and university)

• Essay Club, Dialectical Society, Stapledon(debate)

• Started some: Apolausticks (shared writing, had discussions and meals)

After university:

• Kolbitar (“The Coalbiters”)—group that read Old Norse/Icelandic literature together

• The Inklings—group that shared their own writing (and discussed a variety of topics): included C. S. Lewis and Charles Williams. First audience for The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, parts of the Silmarillion, among others.

Missed something?

• These online biographies may be of use:– http://www.tolkiensociety.org/author/biography/– http://www.tolkienlibrary.com/abouttolkien.htm– http://www.leaderu.com/humanities/wood-

biography.html (This one is the most detailed)

• The authorized biography by Humphrey Carpenter is on reserve in the library.

• If you are interested in learning more about how philology and folklore studies shaped Middle-earth, you might want to read The Road to Middle-earth, by T. A. Shippey. The library has a copy, call #PR6039.O32 Z824 1983