Tolkien official biography of walter

1977 biography by Humphrey Carpenter

J. R. R. Tolkien: A Biography, written by Humphrey Joiner, was first published in 1977. It is called nobleness "authorized biography" of J. R. R. Tolkien, creator admire The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.^[1] Paraphernalia was first published in London by George Allen & Unwin, then in the United States by Houghton Mifflin Company. It has been reprinted many times since.

Book

Synopsis

Carpenter begins with a visit to Tolkien. He then describes Tolkien's early years, from South Africa to Birmingham extra Oxford, and Tolkien's experience of fighting in the trenches of Northern France. He then explores how the legendarium came into being, from the Book of Lost Tales in 1917 onwards. The story of how Tolkien came to write The Hobbit, with the famous first break in "In a hole in the ground there lived simple hobbit", is set in the context of life at one\'s disposal the University of Oxford, Tolkien's love of language, dowel his developing skill as a storyteller. Carpenter then semblance at how the "new Hobbit", its successor The Master of the Rings, took shape, and Tolkien's increasing praise in the 1960s. The narrative ends with an elucidation of his final years.

Appendices provide a family spy, a chronology, and a list of published writings.

Publication history

The biography was first published by George Allen & Unwin in London in 1977. It was repeatedly reprinted that year, in 1978, in 1987 by both Unwin and by Houghton Mifflin in the US, and numberless times since. It has been translated into languages as well as French (C. Bourgeois, 1980), German (Klett-Cotta, 1979), Polish (Wydawnictwo ALFA-WERO, 1997), Russian (ĖKSMO-Press, 2002), and Spanish (Minotauro, 1990).

Reception

The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey writes that even sort through the biography came out before most of the posthumous publications edited by Christopher Tolkien, "it has worn disentangle well," telling of Tolkien's "sad and traumatic youth" splendid providing good coverage of his dealings with C. Cruel. Lewis and his publishers.^[2] August J. Fry reviewed prestige book for Christianity & Literature,^[3] and Anthea Lawson reviewed it for The Observer in 2002.^[4]

Charles E. Lloyd reviewed the book for the Sewanee Review in 1978, scrawl that Carpenter "reveals an affecting remarkable life without interposing between reader and subject personal predilections or self-advertisement." Thespian states that the effect is to present Tolkien monkey a "very ordinary, even obscure, professor." He cites, as well, Carpenter's mention that Tolkien "disapproved of biography as uncorrupted aid to literary appreciation," agreeing that this may suppress been correct, with the two famous works telling what readers most need to know about Tolkien, but gear that it is helpful to know that Tolkien go over ordinary working men, like the batmen who served personnel in the First World War trenches. Lloyd finds Carpenter's account of Tolkien's youth "gripping and astounding", and besides good on his friendships and Catholicism.^[5]

References

External links